Nearly eighty years ago, when the news of Napoleon's downfall at Waterloo had not yet reached England's colonies in the Far East, a country ship named the Nourmahal sailed from Madras for the Island of Singapore. The object of her voyage was not known except, perhaps, to the leading officials of the Company's establishment at Madras; but it was generally believed that she carried certain presents from the Indian Government to the then Sultans of Malacca, Johore, and Pahang. Sir Stamford Raffles, it was known, had urged the occupation and fortification of Singapore as a matter of importance to England's supremacy in the Eastern seas. And, indeed, three years later he began the work himself.
But the presents destined for the Rajahs never reached them; for from the day that she sailed from Madras roadstead the Nourmahal was never heard of nor seen again; and a year later no one but the relatives of the few Europeans on board thought any more about her. She had, it was conjectured, foundered in a typhoon, or been captured by pirates on her way through the Straits of Malacca.
The master of the missing ship was an Englishman named John Channing. For twenty-five or more years he had served the East India Company well, and his brave and determined conduct in many a sea-fight had won him not only a high place in the esteem of the directors, but considerable wealth as well. In those days it was not unusual for the captains of the larger ships belonging to or chartered by the Honourable Company to accumulate fortunes as the result of half a dozen successful voyages between England and Calcutta, and Captain John Channing had fared as well—or even better—than any of his fellow-captains in the service. For many years, however, he had not visited England, as, on account of his intimate and friendly relations with both the Portuguese and Dutch in the East Indies, the Government kept him and his ship constantly employed in those parts. Jealous and suspicious as were both the Dutch and Portuguese of English influence, they yet accorded Channing privileges granted to no other Englishman that sailed their seas. The reasons for these concessions from the Dutch were simple enough. A Dutch war-vessel conveying treasure to Batavia had been attacked by pirates, and in spite of a long and gallant defence was almost at the mercy of her savage assailants when Channing's ship came to her rescue and escorted her to port in safety. With the Portuguese merchants he was on most friendly terms, for twenty years before the opening of this story he had married the daughter of one of the wealthiest of their number, who was settled at Macassar, in Celebes. They had but one child, Adela, who when the Nourmahal sailed from Madras was about eighteen years of age, and she, with her mother, had accompanied her father on his last and fateful voyage. In England the missing seaman had but one relative, a nephew named Francis Channing, who was a lieutenant in the Marines. Nearly a year after the departure of his uncle's ship from India, all hope of his return was abandoned, and as he had left no will an official intimation was sent to the young man by John Channing's Calcutta bankers, informing him of his uncle's supposed death, and suggesting that he should either obtain a lengthened leave or resign from the service and come out to India to personally confer with them and the proper authorities as to the disposal of the dead man's property, which, as the owner had died intestate, would, of course, be inherited by his sole remaining relative. But the ship by which this letter was sent never reached England. A week after she sailed she was captured by a French privateer, one of several which, openly disregarding the proclamation of peace between England and France, still preyed upon homeward-bound merchantmen; and all the letters and despatches found on board the captured vessel were retained by the privateer captain, and were doubtless lost or destroyed.
Meanwhile Lieutenant Channing, quite unconscious of his good fortune, had sailed in His Majesty's ship Triton for the Cape and East Indies. With no influence behind him, and nothing but his scanty pay to live on, he had nothing to hope for but that another year's or two years' service would gain him his captaincy. Of his uncle in India he had scarcely ever heard, for his father and John Channing had quarrelled in their early lives, and since then had not corresponded.
Although at times quiet and reflective in his manner, his genial, open-hearted disposition soon made the young officer of Marines a general favourite with every one on board the Triton. The captain of the frigate, one of those gallant old seamen who had distinguished themselves under Nelson and Hyde Parker, knew Channing's worth and bravery well, for they had served together in some of the bloodiest engagements that had ever upheld the honour of England's flag. Unlike many other naval captains who in those days were apt to regard somewhat slightingly the services rendered by the Marines, Captain Reay was, if not an ardent admirer of the corps, at least a warm-hearted advocate for and friend to it. Perhaps much of the feeling of friendship shown to Channing was due to the fact that before he joined the Triton her captain had told his officers a story of his experiences in the West Indies, in which the officer of Marines was the central figure. Captain Reay had been sent by the senior officer of the squadron to demand the surrender of a fort on the Island of Martinique, when by an act of treachery he and his boat's crew were made prisoners and confined in the fortress, where he was treated with almost savage brutality by the commandant. The frigate at once opened fire, but after four hours' bombardment had failed to silence a single gun in the fort. At midnight it was carried in an attack led by young Channing, then a mere lad, and who, although two-thirds of his small force fell ere the walls were reached, refused to draw back and abandon Reay and his men. From that day Reay became his warm and sincere friend.
The best part of a year had passed since the Triton had sailed from Portsmouth, and now, with only the faintest air filling her canvas, she was sailing slowly along the shores of a cluster of islands, high, densely wooded, and picturesque. They formed one of the many minor groups of the beautiful and fertile Moluccas. Ten days before, the frigate had left Banda, and, impelled upon her course by but the gentlest breezes, had crept slowly northward towards Ternate, where Captain Reay was touching for letters before reporting himself to the Admiral at Singapore. On the quarter-deck a party of officers were standing together looking over the side at the wonders of the coral world, over which the ship was passing. For many hours the Triton had sailed thus, through water as clear as crystal, revealing full sixty feet below the dazzling lights and ever-changing shadows of the uneven bottom. Now and again she would pass over a broad arena of sand, gleaming white amid encircling walls of living coral many-hued, and gently swaying weed and sponge of red and yellow, which, though so far below, seemed to rise and touch the frigate's keel and then with quivering motion sink again astern. And as the ship's great hull cast her darkening shadow deep down through the transparency, swarms of brightly coloured fishes, red and blue and purple and shining gold, and banded and striped in every conceivable manner, darted away on either side to hide awhile in the moving caverns of weed that formed their refuge from predatory enemies. So slowly was the frigate moving, and so clear was the water, that sometimes as she sailed over a valley of glistening sand the smallest coloured pebble or fragment of broken coral could be as clearly discerned upon the snowy floor as if it lay embedded in a sheet of flawless crystal; and then again the quivering walls of weed and sponge would seem to rise ahead as if to bar her way, then slowly sink astern in the frigate's soundless wake.
But if the strange world beneath was wondrous and fascinating to look upon, that around was even more so. Three miles away on the starboard hand a group of green and fertile islands shone like emeralds in the morning sun. Leaning over the rail, Francis Channing gazed at their verdant heights and palm-fringed beaches of yellow sand with a feeling but little short of rapture to a man with a mind so beauty-loving and poetic as was his. Familiar to the wild bloom and brilliance of the West Indian islands, the soft tropical beauty of the scene now before him surpassed all he had ever seen, and, oblivious of the presence and voices of his brother officers as they conversed near him, he became lost in reflective and pleased contemplation of the radiant panorama of land, sea, and almost cloudless sky around him. Thirty miles away, yet so distinctly defined in the clear atmosphere that it seemed but a league distant from the ship, a perfect volcanic cone stood abruptly up from out the deep blue sea, and from its sharp-pointed summit a pillar of darkly-coloured smoke had risen skywards since early morn; but now as the wind died away it slowly spread out into a wide canopy of white, and then sank lower and lower till the pinnacle of the mountain was enveloped in its fleecy mantle.
As the young officer watched the changes of the smoky pall that proclaimed the awful and mysterious forces slumbering deep down in the bosom of the earth, he was suddenly aroused from his reflective mood by the shrill whistles and hoarse cries of the boatswain's mates, and in another minute the watch began to shorten sail: a faint greenish tinge in the western sky, quickly noted by the master, who was an old sailor in Eastern seas, told of danger from that quarter.
Although the typhoon season had not yet set in, and both Captain Reay and the master knew that in that latitude (about 4 deg. south) there was not very much probability of meeting with one, every preparation was made, as violent squalls and heavy rain, at least, were certain to follow the greenish warning in the sky. In a very short time their surmise proved correct, for by four in the afternoon the Triton under short canvas, was battling with a mountainous sea and furious gusts of wind from the W.N. W. The presence of so much land around them, surrounded by networks of outlying reefs, the strong and erratic currents, and the approaching night, gave Captain Reay much concern, and it was with a feeling of intense relief that he acceded to the master's suggestion to bring the ship to an anchor in a harbour situated among the cluster of islands that the ship had passed early in the day.