“’Tis a long time to suffer.”
“You ain’t a-going to suffer—I’ll take care o’ that; but keep quiet, and don’t show that you are not contented enough—not a word to anybody about what’s been said this night,—not a word, my lad!”
I promised faithfully to observe the directions given, and, as Brace was now called to his watch upon deck, I went down along with him, feeling lighter at heart than I had done since I first set foot on board the Pandora.
Chapter Eleven.
I need not detail the incidents that occurred during the remainder of our run to the African coast. There is not much variety in a journey upon the sea. A shoal of porpoises,—a whale or two,—some flying-fish,—a few species of sea-birds,—sharks and dolphins,—are nearly all the living creatures that are ever seen, even upon the longest voyages. Most of our course lay due southward, and directly across the northern tropic, and, of course, the weather was hot nearly all the time,—so hot that the pitch oozed out from the seams of the planking, and the soles of our shoes parted with a creaking noise every step we took over the deck.
We were in sight of several sail,—most of them were Indiamen,—some outward bound from England, and some on their way home from the East. A few smaller craft we saw, brigs and a barque or two, and, as they carried English colours, we concluded they were traders to the Cape, or Algoa Bay. None of them,—neither these nor the East Indiamen—seemed desirous of cultivating the Pandora’s acquaintance; and all, in meeting or passing, allowed her a “wide berth.” Of course, the slaver was equally desirous of avoiding them; and, therefore, none of these vessels were “spoken.”
There was one ship, however, that did not appear to shun us. On the contrary, the moment the Pandora came in sight of her the strange vessel changed from the course in which she had been steering, and with all sail set came running towards us. As we were now in the Gulf of Guinea, and about a hundred miles or so from the Gold-coast, the probability was that the vessel that had so boldly headed towards us was a cruiser, and consequently, the very sort of craft that the Pandora’s people did not desire to fall in with. Indeed, this point was soon settled beyond dispute; for the behaviour of the strange vessel, and her peculiar rig—which was that of a cutter—combined with the fact of so small a craft sailing boldly towards a barque so large as the Pandora, all went to prove that she was either a war-cruiser in search of slave-ships, or a pirate,—in either case, a vessel much better manned and armed than the Pandora.
It was hardly probable that the cutter was a pirate; though, had it been upon a different part of the ocean it would have been probable enough, for at that time pirates were by no means as scarce as they are at present. But it was not a favourite locality with pirates. The merchant-craft that traded along this part of the coast were usually small vessels with insignificant cargoes, and, when outward bound, carried only such bulky articles as salt, iron, and rum, with toys and trinkets; which, though sufficiently attractive to the black savages of Dahomey and Ashantee, were not the sort of merchandise that pirates cared to pick up. They were sometimes more richly freighted in their homeward trip, with gold-dust and elephants’ teeth, and pirates could find a market for these. There were still some of these freebooters upon the African coast, for there they could find many a secure rendezvous, but they were never so numerous there as in the West Indies and elsewhere. Had the cutter been met with at an earlier period—that is, while we were further out on the Atlantic, and upon the track of the Cape traders and Indiamen—then the people of the Pandora might have taken her for a pirate, and very probably would have taken less trouble to get out of her way—for these gentry were far less afraid of a pirate than of an honest warship. They knew that the pirates looked upon traders of their kind as kindred spirits—almost birds of the same feather; and that, therefore, they would have but little to fear from their brother outlaws. They knew, moreover, that they had nothing to lose but a few casks of brandy and rum; the iron, salt, and toys which formed the remainder of the Pandora’s cargo, being goods that a pirate would not be bothered with. The brandy and rum would be all he would be likely to rob them of, and of these there were only some half-dozen puncheons—for I had ascertained that most of the great casks in the hold were water-butts filled with water, and of course intended to supply the living cargo on their voyage across the Atlantic.