For some reason it had been decided that Captain Ker should leave Southampton as marine superintendent, and reside at Cape Town as manager of the Company in South Africa. When he arrived in Cape Town he found the Basuto after a refit, looking very spick-and-span, and I suppose conceived the idea that that was her usual condition, which was bad luck for me. There had never been any great cordiality between us and there was to be less in future, for try as I might there was always something wrong about my ship in his view, and he resented, I think, meeting officers at houses where he visited, especially as ladies do not always pay that deference to superior position to which its owner may think himself entitled. But be that as it may the fact remains that there was no love lost between us.
From time to time we carried as passengers many distinguished men, or those who were in the way of becoming so. Especially do I remember two clerical dignitaries; Bishop Colenso was one. He once confessed to me a feeling of irritation because the new Bishop of Cape Town was to be enthroned by one who was his junior in the Church of England, he himself being precluded from officiating by reason of opinions he had put forward. In due time the new bishop also travelled with us, and when we got the usual dose of bad weather in consequence he declined to turn in, saying with a merry twinkle in his eye that it would be undignified if anything happened, for a bishop to be seen without his gaiters. He is an archbishop now, but at the time I write of his hair was black, and he was not above a bout at singlestick.
Just about this time there was a good deal of national unrest, extending from Zululand to East London. It was shortly after the Langalibalele trouble, and on our way down the coast we were ordered to call at the Kowie and tow to Algoa Bay an American ship called Tecumseh, which had lost her rudder. Captain Ker came up to supervise the operation, and we also took on board as a passenger Mr. J. A. Froude, the historian, who was then on his way to England. He had been touring the country in order to form his own opinion on the political situation for the benefit of his friend Lord Carnarvon, and one may be permitted the remark that it was a great pity he did not take a more careful survey of the situation, for South African politics were not then to be learned in a three months’ sojourn in the country, or for that matter in six either. At all events he failed to recognise the fact that the situation was summed up in lines from Alice through the Looking-Glass.
“The eldest oyster winked his eye, and shook his hoary head,
Meaning to say he did not choose to leave the oyster bed.”
In my own mind I have always held Mr. Froude responsible for the Boer rising which culminated at Majuba.
Of course when it comes to doing an unusual job things cannot be expected to work quite smoothly, and they did not on this occasion. I had been on board the Tecumseh and rigged up a makeshift rudder with stream chain, and returned to my own ship to get the towing-gear ready for a start at daylight. In the morning, of course, I was up betimes, and had as I thought the situation to myself. There was one A.B. who was constantly giving me trouble when there was anything to do, and usually required correcting by some method before the day was out. On this particular occasion I thought I would make the correction before the day began, so as to have no further trouble, when looking round I found Mr. Froude paying me quite as much attention as I thought was necessary. He inquired whether that was my usual method of maintaining discipline, to which I replied in the affirmative, and the incident closed. We towed that ship to Algoa Bay all right, but two captains in one ship are quite unnecessary. Captain Ker, however, would interfere, and at the end of the towage drew down on himself the wrath and language of the Yankee skipper, expressed in a masterly manner, to which I listened with an unholy satisfaction.
On another occasion when he was taking a passage I remember him giving me an order to alter course without consulting Draper, that was an absolutely unwarrantable action, manager for South Africa though he was. His last exploit at sea was, however, splendid. Another manager was appointed, and he took command of one of the Company’s ships that went on the rocks at Ushant one winter’s night. He saved crew, passengers, mails and specie in twenty minutes, and it took a man to do that.
When we got to Cape Town there was an amusing incident. One Sunday Jones and I, with some cheery souls, went out to lunch at Coghills at Wynberg. Mr. Froude was at the table talking in loud tones about his great lady friends at home. There was also present Mr. Savage, one of our directors, whom Jones did not happen to know. In the midst of lunch Jones started to tell his friends how he had acquired some beautiful ostrich feathers from a bird he had travelled with. I could not stop him for my legs were not long enough, but I watched Savage’s face until he said, interrupting dryly, “I hope those feathers were not on freight, Mr. Jones.” Many at the table could see the joke and there was a peal of laughter.
I was not sorry when after about twelve months I managed to get a transfer home. I may mention here, however, the end of the Basuto. She had various peculiarities, one of which was a playful habit of half filling her after hold with water. Of course that never had anything to do with the tunnel or the engine-room, so said the engineers at least; I had my own opinion on the matter. Then, again, she was infested with rats, and we got into a habit of shooting at them with small revolvers in the evenings when we were in harbour. I say little of minor depravities such as the anchor always fouling the stem when we got it. Anyhow, she stayed on the coast about two years after I left her, and then came home and was sold to some Frenchmen. The rest of the tale about her is as it was told to me. The new owners did not understand all her little failings as we had done; one fellow pulled a broomstick out of a hole one morning, and that started an inrush of water which they could not cope with. I heard that when the crew left her they did not even stop the engines—but I do not vouch for the truth of this particular yarn.
I got my passage home in the Nyanza as supernumerary second. Warleigh was skipper, William Somerset Ward was chief and Henry Barnes was second. I forget the others. Now Ward was one of the men who had been brought in over my head when the yarn was that they wanted “more experienced men” (contrast that with the cry of to-day of too old at forty). He was one of Green’s men and a very fine officer. He had brought with him many of the old Blackwall fashions, one of which was that the men of both watches should answer to their names when the watch was relieved. That was a plan that I took with me from that ship for the rest of my sea career, but it was an unpopular proceeding though most useful from a disciplinary point of view. Barnes on the other hand I had known since my first voyage to sea, when he was in the Elphinstone. His appearance was fiery and his character did not belie it, but he was a really good fellow at heart and I liked him. Trouble soon arose. Warleigh wrote in the night order-book that the dinner look-outs were to be kept alternately by the second, supernumerary second, and fourth officers. As a rule they were kept by the third and fourth only, so Barnes got the idea that Warleigh was unduly favouring me, although I was actually Barnes’ senior in the Company. He accordingly walked into the captain’s cabin the next morning and shut the door. No one ever knew exactly what transpired. Barnes was a big noisy man, and Warleigh slight and quiet. There was doubtless plain speaking, for when Barnes reappeared he went to his cabin and remained under arrest until we arrived home, when he left the service. He told me afterwards that he had told Warleigh “he could make his bally chum second mate, and perhaps that would please him”; but it always struck me that he sacrificed his prospects for absolutely no reason.