“Cheer up, Bartie, old fellow!” he exclaimed. “An order has just arrived for our release. I have seen it, and we are to set off at once for Jamaica.”
“Hurrah!” exclaimed the other lieutenant, lifting himself up in his bed. “Then I shall not have to leave my bones in this horrid hole. Hurrah! On, my fine fellows, on!”
He waved his hand above his head as if he had his sword in it, and was leading a party of boarders. I heard a rattling sound. I looked at his countenance. An awful change had come over it. Before I could even support him he fell back in his bed and was dead. Adams and I stood for a moment like persons petrified, so sudden and shocking was the event. We bore him at sunset to our field of the dead in the savannah, and there the hands of his friends and brother-officers laid him beside the grave of his late captain. Adams, however, got away and reached Jamaica in safety. Thus ended, in gloom and almost hopeless despondency, that, to us prisoners, ever memorable year of 1778. For what we could tell to the contrary then, we might have to remain till peace was restored, or till England succumbed to the enemies gathering round her.
Proud of our country as we were, and confident of the bravery of her sons, what had we to hope for? Although at sea the ancient supremacy of our flag had been ably upheld, on shore, either from want of good generals or from our pernicious military system—perhaps from both causes combined—no brilliancy had been shed on the British arms; indeed, we only heard of defeats, ill-conducted expeditions, and disasters of all sorts, which often made our hearts sink to the very depths of despondency.
Chapter Seventeen.
Attacked with fever.—Mammy Gobo, my black nurse.—Recovery.—Death of Delisle.—Sail for Jamaica.—Promoted.—Join the Porcupine.—Chase.—A mishap.—Becalmed.—Provisions run short.—Sufferings.—A fresh breeze brings us relief.—Jamaica again.
I had long held out against the attacks of that arch enemy, the yellow fever, to which so many of my companions in misfortune had succumbed. Several vacancies having occurred in the house, Manby had gone there and left me to the society of Tom Rockets and my cocks and hens. I, however, had got so accustomed to the place that I had no wish to go elsewhere. Impunity had made me fancy that I was proof against the fever. It found me out, however. In an instant I was struck down. I entreated that I might be left where I was. Tom made me up as comfortable a bed as he could, and covered me with a boat-cloak and a blanket. Strange as it may seem, in that climate I felt excessively cold, and thought that nothing would warm me. Hour after hour I lay shivering as if nothing could ever make me warm again, and expecting all the time that I was about to die, and thinking that those I loved most on earth would perhaps never gain tidings of my fate. Then I felt so hot that I had a longing to jump into the nearest stream to cool my fevered blood. Poor Tom sat by my side, often wringing his hands in despair, not knowing how to treat me, and yet anxious to do all in his power to be of assistance. At length one day he jumped up as if a bright thought had just struck him, and out he ran, leaving me alone. I scarcely expected that I should be alive when he came back, so weak and wretched did I feel. An hour or more passed when he reappeared, accompanied by an old black woman with whom I had occasionally exchanged a joke in passing, and I believe bestowed on her some trifle or other,—Mammy Gobo I used to call her,—little thinking the service she would be to me. She felt me all over and looked at my tongue, and then off she trotted. She soon, however, came back with some pots and herbs and some bricks. She first made Tom dig a hole, in which she lighted a fire and at it heated some bricks. These she applied at once to my feet, and, putting on her pots, formed some decoctions with the herbs, which she made me swallow in large quantities. Had she not providentially come, I believe that I should have died that very night. As it was, I was evidently a subject requiring all her care and skill. She seemed anxious to bestow both on me. All night long she sat up by my side, and all day she watched over me. It appeared to me that she never slept. If I opened my eyes they were certain to fall on her jolly ugly visage, with her large eyes turned full upon me, seemingly to inquire what I wanted. When at last she began to go away occasionally for half an hour at a time to collect more herbs, or for some other purpose, Rockets was always ready to take her place, and attended me with all the affection of a true and warm friend. Strong as my constitution was, I am very sure that had I not been watched over by Mammy Gobo and Tom I should not have recovered—that is to say, I felt then, and I feel more strongly now, that they were the instruments, under a merciful Providence, by which I was preserved so long from destruction while hanging between life and death, and ultimately of my recovery, though it was long before that took place. Probably in consequence of his constant attendance on me, before I had begun to recover, Tom himself was attacked with the fever, and there he lay in the stall next to me, moaning and groaning, and occasionally raging with delirium. I ought to have mentioned that some time before this our old horse had been removed to a place of superior accommodation—I suspect to our tumble-down, rickety stable; but, as we wanted his room more than his company, we did not complain of this. Mammy Gobo was no respecter of persons, and I was glad to find that she attended on Tom with as much care as she had done on me. The poor fellow was very grateful.
“Ah, sir,” he said, “though that ’ere nigger woman has got a black skin, to my mind she has as good and red a heart in her body as any white-faced person. It’s just the painting of the outside which ain’t altogether according to our notions; but after all, sir, beauty is, as you know, sir, only skin deep.”