A Voyage round the World / A book for boys

by William Henry Giles Kingston

As he spoke, three guns were fired in quick succession from the Triton. The noise and smoke, to which the savages were evidently unaccustomed, made them desist paddling. We redoubled our efforts, and shot ahead. After a little hesitation, the savages once more pressed on after us, but happily at that moment the ship again fired. Mr Brand at the same time seized the muskets and discharged them one after the other over the heads of our pursuers. Again they wavered, some even turned their canoes about, two or three only advanced slowly, the rest ceased paddling altogether. This gave us a great advantage, and without waiting to let Mr Brand reload the muskets, we paddled away with our hopes of escape much increased. Some minutes elapsed, when the courage of the savages returned, and fearing that we might altogether escape them, they all united in the pursuit. The breeze, however, freshened, the ship rapidly clove the waters, and before the canoes had regained the distance they had lost, we were alongside. Loud shouts of welcome broke from every quarter of the Triton as we clambered up her side.

I will not attempt to describe the meeting of Jerry and his father. Captain Frankland, indeed, received us all most kindly and heartily. For a long time he had given us up as lost, but still he had continued the search for us. The Dove had been captured by the American corvette, and soon afterwards he had fallen in with her. From the pirates on board the little schooner he discovered that we were on board the large one. He had pursued her for several months, till at length, passing our island, he had observed our flag-staff and our hut still standing. This was, fortunately, after our second visit, when we had altered the inscriptions on the trees. The gale which had wrecked the pirate had driven the Triton somewhat to the southward of her course for the Bonins, whither she was bound to look for us; and thus, by a wonderful coincidence, she appeared at the very moment her coming was of most importance to rescue us from slavery, if not, more probably, from a horrible death.

The savages, when they saw that we were safe on board the ship, finally ceased from the pursuit. Captain Frankland kept the ship steadily on her course, ordering five or six guns to be fired without shot over their heads, as a sign of the white man’s displeasure. After the first gun, the savages turned round their canoes, and, in terror and dismay, made the best of their way to the shore. The Triton was then steered for the coast of Japan.

It was not till some days afterwards that Jerry gave me an account of what had befallen him among the savages. “I was in a horrible fright when the savage dragged me off,” he said. “I thought that he was keeping me to kill at his leisure, just as a housewife does a pig or a turkey, when he wanted to eat me. I cannot even now describe the dreadful scenes I witnessed when the cannibal monsters cooked and devoured the poor fellows they had so treacherously slaughtered. What was my dismay, also, when a few days afterwards some more bodies of white men were brought in! I thought that they had killed you all; and it was only when I found that there were ten instead of five bodies, that I hoped I might have been mistaken.

“The man who had captured me treated me kindly, and fed me well. At first I thought he might have had his reasons (and very unsatisfactory they would have been to me) for doing the latter; but this idea I banished (as it was not a pleasant fine, and took away my appetite) when I found that he did not partake of the horrible banquets with his countrymen. He was constantly visited also in the evening by a chief, who evidently looked on them with disgust, and always looked at me most kindly, and spoke to me in the kindest tones, though I could not understand what he said. One evening, after he and my master had been talking some time, he got up and made the sign of the cross on my brow, and then on his own, and then on that of my master. Then I guessed that I must have fallen among Christians, and that this was the reason I was treated so kindly. I understood also by the signs he made that you all were well, and that he would do his best to protect you.

“One day he came and told me to follow him into the woods. My master’s hut was some way from the other habitations, so that we could go out without of necessity being observed. It was, however, necessary to be cautious. What was my delight when he took me to a height, and showing me a vessel in the distance, pointed to the fort, and signed to me to run and join you as fast as I could! You know all the rest.”

Jerry at different times afterwards gave me very interesting accounts of various things he had observed among the savages of the Fijis, but I have not now space to repeat them.

How delightful it was to find ourselves once more on board the fine steady old ship, with a well-disciplined crew, and kind, considerate officers! Our sufferings and trials had taught us to appreciate these advantages: and I believe both Jerry and I were grateful for our preservation, and for the blessings we now enjoyed.

We had a very quick and fine run till we were in the latitude of Loo-Choo. A gale then sprung up—rather unusual, I believe, at that season of the year. It lasted two days. When the weather cleared, we saw a huge, lumbering thing tumbling about at the distance of three or four miles from us. It looked, as Fleming the gunner remarked, “like a Martello tower adrift.”

“If you’d said she was one of those outlandish Chinese junk affairs, you’d have been nearer the truth,” observed Mr Pincott the carpenter, who, as of old, never lost an opportunity of taking up his friend. “By the way she rolls, I don’t think she’ll remain above water much longer.”