The Three Midshipmen

by William Henry Giles Kingston

The request was granted, and Queerface seemed to enjoy the prospect of the trip as much as his companions. Away pulled the squadron of boats. When daylight dawned they were coasting along the shore of an island fringed with cocoa-nut trees, and hills rising in the centre. There were numerous deep indentations, bays, and gulfs, with bluff cliffs here here there, and high rocks scattered about, capital spots in which whole fleets of prahus might lie hid without much chance of being discovered. The weather was very hot, as it is apt to be within a few miles of the equator; and when there was no wind, and the sea shone like a burnished mirror, the sun came down with very considerable force on the top of the heads of the party in the boats. Still their spirits did not flag. Jack and Adair, indeed, had been pretty well seasoned to the heat of the coast of Africa, where, if not greater, it was often far less supportable.

Mr Cherry led: Jack and Terence followed side by side. A constant fire of jokes was kept up between the two boats. Queerface evidently thought that there was something in the wind, and kept jumping about with unusual activity, keeping apparently as bright a lookout as anybody on board. Not an inlet was passed unexplored, still not a sign of the pirates could they discover. On going up one small but deepish river, they came, close to the banks, on a native village. The inhabitants must have taken to flight on their approach, for not a human being was to be seen.

“That looks suspicious,” exclaimed Adair. “We ought to burn this village to teach them better manners.”

Mr Cherry fortunately had no such intention. He had an idea that burning people’s houses was not the best way of making friends of them.

“Indeed, it would be a pity to have to destroy so picturesque a place,” observed Jack Rogers.

The houses were mostly separate, built on piles four or five feet above the ground. They were of one storey, with a deep verandah or gallery running round them, a ladder leading up to it. The roofs, which were high and pointed with deep eaves, were covered with a thick coating of palm-leaves, and so were the walls, while the floors were made of bamboo cut in strips and placed nearly an inch apart, being covered with a thick, beautifully woven mat. They appeared strong, but very springy, so much so, that when Adair began to dance a polka on one of them, he very nearly bounded up to the roof. The village was surrounded and interspersed with cocoa-nut and other palm-trees, and with bananas, whose dark-green foliage gave effect to lighter tints of the forest. The thick jungle pressed hard on every side, leaving space only here and there for some small fields and gardens. Mr Cherry would not allow the slightest injury to be done to the houses; for though it was suspected that they belonged to the pirates, no traces of booty were to be discovered.

After spending some time in examining the locality, they were about to embark, when a dark visage was seen peering out at them from among the trees. Instead of making chase to catch him, Mr Cherry stood still and beckoned to him. This gave the native courage, who, seeing also that no injury had been done to the village, after a little hesitation advanced. One of Jack’s crew was a Malay, who could speak not only his own language, but that of many of the surrounding tribes. He had no difficulty in entering into conversation with the native, who asserted that his people had taken the British for pirates, and had run away in consequence. To prove his sincerity, he offered to pilot the boats to the chief haunts of the pirates. As there was no reason to doubt him, his offer was accepted. He merely requested time to equip himself for the expedition. He entered one of the houses, and soon returned with a couple of creeses stuck in his sash, and a sword by his side, and the whole party, embarking once more, proceeded on their voyage. Their volunteer pilot was a merry, talkative fellow. What his real name was it was difficult to make out exactly, so Jack gave him that of Hoddidoddi, which it sounded very like, and he at once readily answered to it.

All that day they sailed on without seeing anything of the pirates. They began to last to fancy that Hoddidoddi was deceiving them; but he entreated them not to despair, and promised, by noon the next day at farthest, to bring them in sight of the marauders. They brought up at night in a sheltered bay, where the water was as smooth as a mill-pond. Jack and Adair grew very sentimental as they leaned back in the stern-sheets of Mr Cherry’s boat, where all the officers had collected to smoke their cigars, and looked up into the dark sky, sprinkled with stars innumerable. What they said need not be repeated.

“Come, lads, dismount from your Pegasus, and turn in and get a little sleep,” cried their commanding officer; “we’ve a hard day’s work before us to-morrow, I suspect.”

This warning brought their thoughts back to the business in which they were engaged, and, returning to their respective boats, those not on watch were very quickly wrapped in what, as Paddy said, “might have been ‘soft repose,’ if it wasn’t that the planks were so mighty hard.” They were awoke before dawn by a summons from Hoddidoddi, who declared that there was sufficient light for him to pilot them, if they wished to proceed. The anchors were at once got up, and they pulled away along shore.