“If your father were dead, that would only have aggravated Rudge’s fault,” he said. “I do not excuse him; I will see what he has to say for himself.”
Rudge was sent for, and appeared with his two black eyes. The doctor looked at him sternly, and reprimanded him for the language he had made use of. “He has been punished, I see,” he observed, “and I will therefore remit the flogging he deserves, and which you, Master Desmond, are liable to for fighting. Now, shake hands, and remember that the next time you take to your fists I shall be compelled to punish you both.”
We shook hands as directed, and were sent back to the playground; and neither did Rudge nor any one else again make any reflection on my family. How he had found out that my father had been engaged in the Irish rebellion I could not discover. He after this, for some time, fought very shy of me, though from that day forth he gave up bullying, and we became very good friends. Indeed, by the wise management of the head-master, our school was really a very happy one, though fights occasionally took place in spite of the punishment which we knew would be inflicted were we discovered infringing its laws.
I had been there rather more than four years, and was now nearly sixteen years of age, when one day the doctor sent for me.
“I am sorry that I am going to lose you, Desmond,” he said. “I have just received a letter from your uncle, desiring me to send you up to town immediately, as he wishes you to accompany him to South America, for which country he purposes forthwith setting out. I feel it my duty to advise you as to your future conduct. The native inhabitants have, I understand, for some years been engaged in a fearful struggle with the Spaniards to become independent of the mother-country; and by the last advices I see that it still continues. You may very probably be tempted to take part with the insurgents; but I would urge you to remain neutral. I do not enter into the point as to whether people have a right to fight for their independence—and from what I know of the Spaniards I fear their rule of their American provinces has been a most tyrannical and unjust one; but I do know that those who draw the sword are liable to perish by the sword, and I should be very sorry to hear that such has been your fate.”
“I am much obliged to you, sir, for your kind wishes,” I answered, and I felt the blood mantling my brow as I spoke; “but I cannot promise to sit at home among the women and children when those I love are hazarding their lives on the field of battle. I have heard enough of the way the Spaniards have treated the inhabitants of Venezuela and New Granada to make my heart burn with indignation and a desire to emancipate the country my father has adopted from the cruel yoke pressing on it; and if I am called on to fight in the cause, I cannot refuse through fear of risking my life.”
The doctor smiled, looking on me still as a boy.
“I suspect, Desmond, that the reason you have been sent for is, that you may assist in protecting your mother and sisters should the older members of your family be engaged elsewhere. Such I gather from the tenor of your uncle’s letter. However, remember what I have said, I beg of you; and may a blessing accompany you wherever you go, as assuredly my prayers will follow you.”
I heartily thanked the kind doctor; and that very day—having said good-bye to my school-fellows, including Rudge, who all heartily expressed their hopes that I should not get shot, or be swallowed by an anaconda, or eaten by a jaguar, and who regarded me with some little jealousy on hearing that I was going to a country where I should meet with all sorts of adventures—I set off for London.
My uncle, I found, had already engaged a passage on board a vessel bound for Jamaica, whence he intended proceeding to the coast of Venezuela. I had but little time to get an outfit, for two days afterwards we were dropping down the Thames on board the good ship Betsy, bound out to Kingston in Jamaica, to bring back a cargo of sugar. Next morning, when I awoke, I could scarcely believe my senses. It seemed but an hour since I had been at school, and I at first expected to hear the morning-bell ring to call the boys up.