Hurricane Hurry

by William Henry Giles Kingston

My party required no second order, but away we all scampered as fast as we could go, scattering from each other to distract our friends in their very unfriendly employment.

“Oh, Mr Hurry, I bees hit, I bees hit?” sung out Tom Rockets.

I expected to see him fall, but the shot only made him scamper on the faster. Our flight, of course, made Mr Heron fire at us more zealously, and we had to throw away all the things we had collected to escape with greater speed from his heroic fury. We took a course inland, and then turned back towards the place where we had landed. Happily we soon got among trees and rocks and broken walls, which much sheltered us, and Tom was the only man wounded. As soon as we got clear of the shot from the boat, I called a halt to examine his hurt. It was merely a slight flesh wound from a bullet in the leg, and a handkerchief bound round it enabled him to walk on. It was now time to return on board, so we made the best of our way to the boat, not without some considerable risk of being shot by our own sentries. On my stepping on deck I found several officers round the captain. Mr Heron was among them.

“The rascally rebels can’t stand us for a moment, sir,” he was saying. “A whole gang of them hove in sight as I was pulling along-shore—a hundred at least—and stood hallooing to me and daring me to come after them. I let fly among them, sent them scampering away like a flock of sheep, knocking over a good dozen or more, I should think. It was rare fun, sir.”

“Very good fun for you, Mr Heron,” said I, turning round; “but I beg to assure you, sir, that there were not a dozen of us altogether.”

“You! what do you mean?” he asked, with a look of surprise.

“Why, that I was one of the body of supposed rebels, and though we shouted to you and begged you not to fire, you banged at us so furiously that we had to throw away a whole heap of things we had collected, and to run for our lives.”

Captain Hudson and the other officers laughed not a little at this exploit of Mr Heron’s, for he was notorious for his boasting. He bore me a grudge about it ever after.

“Well, Mr Hurry,” said the captain good-naturedly, “you shall go on shore in the afternoon with Mr Heron, and try to recover some of your treasures.”

Away we went in the afternoon accordingly in high glee, Mr Heron expecting to pick up all sorts of things, and I hoping to recover those I had lost. We soon reached the field on which Mr Heron boasted to have gained his hard-won victory; but the swords and all the things of value were gone, picked up by the plundering-parties who invariably issue forth over the scene where the strife has been hottest, as birds of prey gather on the carcase just fallen in the desert. I looked about for the poor fellow I had assisted in the morning. He was gone. He had, I concluded, either been taken prisoner, or had managed to crawl off and rejoin his friends. We went on much farther than we had been in the morning, picking up some drums and a few similar bulky articles, which others had not thought worth collecting. We picked up in all nine drums, one of the largest of which I sent to my friend, Jack Bluet, who lived in a small house at Falmouth. It might have served him for a drawing-room table. I hope he has got it still. A little way beyond where I found the wounded man I came on the body of an officer. He lay on his back, shot through the heart, his hand grasping a very handsome fusee, and with a look of defiance still on his countenance. I suspect he had been bush-fighting in Indian fashion, in hopes of checking the advance of his enemies, in spite of the flight of his companions in arms. He was a fine young man, and from his style of dress and general appearance was evidently of respectable family. I stooped down, and, undoing the grasp with which the dead man’s fingers held the fusee, took possession of it and ran after my companions. Still, as I hurried on, the look worn by the features of the dead officer haunted me. I felt as if I had been depriving him of his property. I thought of his mother and sisters, or perhaps a young wife, who were doomed never to see him again, or of friends who might be expecting to meet him that very day, and for a moment all the dreadful results of warfare presented themselves before me more vividly than they had ever before done. The laughter and jokes of my companions, however, very quickly drove all such thoughts from my mind. We had been joined by an acquaintance of mine, Simeon, a midshipman of the Phoenix, who had with him the gunner and seven men. By some means or other I had been separated from Mr Heron and my boat’s crew—indeed, my lieutenant had no particular fancy for my society, so I joined company with Simeon, and together we rambled into the woods. We had not gone far when we caught sight of a fellow skulking among the trees. When he saw that he was observed he took to his heels, and this of course made us give chase. The woods rang with our shouts and cries, and we were not long before we came up with the man, who proved to be a rebel militiaman. He sang out most lustily for mercy, thinking that we were going to kill him, but we soon quieted his fears on that score by assuring him that he was not worth powder and shot. He seemed to be very grateful, and informed us that there had been a smart skirmish in the wood between his party and a body of Hessians, the latter of whom he believed were still in the neighbourhood of the wood. Of the truth of part of his story the dead bodies scattered here and there about were too true witnesses. Simeon and I, on this, called a halt and consulted together with the gunner whether we should go back or seek further adventures ahead.