Note 1. A “job” precisely similar to this was undertaken, and successfully accomplished by Corporal Falconer of the Royal Engineers, and assistant-instructor in diving, from whom we received the details. The gallant corporal was publicly thanked and promoted for his courage and daring in this and other diving operations.
Chapter Twelve.
Diving Practice Extraordinary in the East.
In a certain street of Hong-Kong there stands one of those temples in which men devote themselves to the consumption of opium, that terrible drug which is said to destroy the natives of the celestial empire more fatally than “strong drink” does the peoples of the west. In various little compartments of this temple, many celestials lay in various conditions of debauch. Among them was a stout youth of twenty or so. He was in the act of lighting the little pipe from which the noxious vapour is inhaled. His fat and healthy visage proved that he had only commenced his downward career.
He had scarce drawn a single whiff, however, when a burly sailor-like man in an English garb entered the temple, went straight to the compartment where our beginner reclined, plucked the pipe from his hand, and dashed it on the ground.
“I know’d ye was here,” said the man, sternly, “an’ I said you was here, an’ sure haven’t I found you here—you spalpeen! You pig-faced bag o’ fat! What d’ee mane by it, Chok-foo? Didn’t I say I’d give you as much baccy as ye could chaw or smoke an ye’d only kape out o’ this place? Come along wid ye!”
It is perhaps scarcely necessary to say that the man who spoke, and who immediately collared and dragged Chok-foo away, was none other than our friend Rooney Machowl. That worthy had been sent to China in advance of the party of divers with his wife and baby—for in the event of success he said he’d be able to “affoord it,” and in the event of failure he meant to try his luck in “furrin’ parts,” and would on no account leave either wife or chick behind him.
On his arrival a double misfortune awaited him. First he found that his employer, Edgar Berrington, was laid up with fever, in the house of an English friend, and could not be spoken to, or even seen; and second, the lodging in which he had put up caught fire the second night after his arrival, and was burnt to the ground, with all its contents, including nearly the whole of his diving apparatus. Fortunately, the unlucky Irishman saved his wife and child and money, the last having been placed in a leathern belt made for the purpose, and worn night and day round his waist. Being a resolute and hopeful man, Rooney determined to hunt up a diving apparatus of some sort, if such was to be found in China, and he succeeded. He found, in an old iron-and-rag-store sort of place, a very ancient head-piece and dress, which were in good repair though of primitive construction. Fortunately, his own pumps and air-pipes, having been deposited in an out-house, had escaped the general conflagration.