Told by the Death's Head Part 32

PART IX.

ON THE HIGH SEAS.

CHAPTER I.

THE PIRATES.

The English did not think me of sufficient consequence to suspend me in an iron cage over the crocodile pool. This honor was reserved for the native shahs and rajahs.

I was transported, with scant ceremony, to Bombay, from which city I was s.h.i.+pped to sea, together with fifty other prisoners, who, like myself, had come to India to seek their fortunes, and whose chief crime was their nationality. They were natives of France, Holland, Germany and Spain, and the East India Company believed it had a right to arrest them and s.h.i.+p them in a body to New Caledonia.

Now, honorable gentlemen of the court, I beg you to tell me which was the pirate?--I, in the unseaworthy cutter, bound with chains to a Spaniard, perspiring over my oars, sailing to New Zealand instead of to New Caledonia, where the captain had been ordered to take us; having nothing to eat and drink but dried fish and stale water, the captain having again disobeyed orders, for the East India Company had s.h.i.+pped honest biscuit, smoked meat and brandy for the prisoner's food--which of us, I ask, was the pirate? the captain, who plundered the helpless prisoners in his power and broke the maritime laws--which, I ask, was the pirate; Captain Morder or I?

"I say Captain Morder was the pirate--" and the prince emphasized his reply by thumping the floor with his cane.

Many thanks, your highness; I wanted the question decided, for, against unauthorized force, self-defence is always justifiable. When we poor exiles became aware that our vessel was going farther and farther south, which we were able to judge from the stars; when, in consequence of the wretched food, the scurvy broke out among us; and when at last we also got a taste of the scourge, if we made any complaint, we conspired together to release ourselves from our chains; and to take possession of the cutter.

My hidalgo comrade was an expert in such matters. He showed us how to get rid of our manacles as easily as if they had been gloves or boots.

It is a very pretty trick, but I don't think I could show you how it is done unless I received something in return--

"We don't want to learn the trick," interrupted the chair. "We have no use for it."

Well, after we had removed our fetters, we bound the sleeping crew, and, without shedding one drop of blood, made ourselves masters of the "Alcyona."

Now, honorable gentlemen of the court, I ask you: Can what we did be called mutiny? We were not the slaves of the East India Company; we were not prisoners of war; nor were we criminals. The captain had no right to chain us to the oars; we had done nothing to deserve deportation to a savage country.

On Captain Morder, however, rested most of the blame. He treated us free men like negro slaves; he gave us nothing to eat for a whole week but dried fish, though not all of us were papists; and to be more disagreeably contrary, he gave us smoked meat on Fridays because the majority of our crowd were Catholics.

"That rascally captain deserved to be hanged to the tallest mast on his s.h.i.+p!" exclaimed the justly indignant prince.

Yes, your highness, he did, but we didn't hang him, because we couldn't get hold of him. While we were securing the crew, he fled discreetly to the powder-room, and threatened to blow up the s.h.i.+p when we went to take him. We had to treat with him for terms. We a.s.sured him we did not want to injure him; we only wanted to leave his s.h.i.+p.

To this he replied that we might go to the devil for all he cared.

Then followed a twenty-four hour truce, and our first business was--

"To eat your fill," interposed the chair.

Yes, your honor, to eat and drink all we wanted. Then we lowered the large boat, supplied it with mast and sails; loaded it with all the chests of biscuit, and casks of brandy it would hold, also a small cannon. Then we cut into bits the rigging of the cutter; threw overboard all the weapons we could find, in order that the captain could do us no injury in case he took it into his head to pursue us; took possession of his charts, compa.s.s, and telescope, and sailed away one beautiful moonlight night without saying goodbye to any one. How did Captain Morder reach home with the "Alcyona?" I really forget whether I ever heard.

There were fifty of us in the boat--five different nationalities. As I was the only one who could speak the five different languages, I was elected s.h.i.+p's patron, an office which differs from that of captain in that the latter commands every one on board a vessel, while the former carries out what his companions decide.

"I see plainly to what this subtle distinction will lead," dryly observed the chair. "Some one else will have to bear the blame for whatever misdeeds the 's.h.i.+p's-patron' committed."

I am compelled to admire the honorable gentleman's keen perceptions, returned the prisoner in his most deferential manner. In this case, however, they are at fault; neither the s.h.i.+p's company nor its patron did anything which deserved yard-arm punishment.

Our intention, when we left the s.h.i.+p was to land in Florida, or the Philippines, and there found a new republic. But more than one unlooked-for hindrance prevented us from carrying out the plan. Hardly had the "Alcyona" disappeared from view, when a dead calm settled down on us; it was so still the sails hung in heavy folds from the yards; we could make progress, and that only very slowly, when we employed the oars.

The calm continued for two days, during which not a breath of air wrinkled the surface of the ocean.

"Didn't you say you had taken all the provisions on the s.h.i.+p?"

inquired the chair.

"Yes, your honor, but 'all' was only the one-half of 'many,' and exactly the one-tenth of 'enough.' Even had there been 'many,' we had 'more' hungry mouths, and to take plus from minus is not permissable in Algorithm."

"And it can't be done," authoritatively interposed the prince. "You can't take eight from seven unless you borrow. From whom did you borrow, prisoner?"

"From a crab-fisher we met, your highness. During a calm, the large sea-crabs are more easily taken than at other times."

The honorable gentlemen of the court will have learned from natural history the peculiar characteristics of the sea-crab, which is of all living creatures--the human being not excepted--the most timorous.

When a crab hears thunder or cannonading, he immediately flings off one of his huge claws, in order that he may escape more quickly.

Crab-fishers know this, and have made a compact with all wars.h.i.+ps, by which the latter have agreed to refrain from firing off cannon when in sight of a crabbing vessel. This is the reason all such vessels have a large red crab painted on their sails. The compact also obliges the fishers to deliver half of their catch to any wars.h.i.+p they may meet on the high seas.

Consequently when we came in sight of the crabber we signalled for our share of his catch. We had eaten all our dried fish, and were on half-rations of biscuit.

"Oho!" called the fisher when he came near enough to distinguish the character of our craft. "How can you demand crabs of me? You aren't a wars.h.i.+p."

"But we are hungry, and have a cannon on board. You know the result of a cannon-shot during a calm!"

This threat brought the argument to a conclusion; the crabber, according to seaman's custom, shared his catch with us.

"If," interposed the prince in a thoughtful manner; "If it was according to seaman's custom it cannot be termed 'piracy.'"

"No, certainly not!" ironically appended the chair. "It cannot be termed piracy--only an act of playfulness--a bit of frolic! But, let us hear what other pranks the band of fifty played with their cannon?

I will spread the map here on the table, so that I may follow the course of your boat. I fancy I shall be able to tell from that whether you and your fellows comported yourselves as honest seamen or thievish pirates."

There was an almost imperceptible twitch of the prisoner's left eyelid when the mayor concluded his remark, and spread the map on the table in front of him.

In the neighborhood of the Marquesas Islands, honorable gentlemen, we fell in with a Spanish s.h.i.+p loaded with coffee. The captain, in response to our pet.i.tion, supplied us with coffee, chocolate, and honey. This enabled us to continue our journey; we sailed toward the Aleutians, and met on our way a Russian merchantman, the owner of which took pity on us, and gave us several barrels of good brandy and salted fish.

When we were near the island of Yucatan our provisions again gave out, and we were compelled to borrow from an Italian trader some sago-palm, flour and several boxes of sultanas.

"What need had you of sultanas?" inquired the chair.

Sultanas are not women, your honor, but dried grapes, which are packed in boxes. When a man is starving he will eat anything! In the neighborhood of Barbados a Turkish vessel very kindly gave us a supply of pickled pork; and the captain of a Chinese junk we fell in with near the Canary Islands, was friendly enough to share his wine with us.

When off Madagascar, a Greek captain loaded our boat so generously with _rahut rak.u.m_, it almost foundered under the weight; and when near Terre del Fuego we--

"Hold! stop!" screamed the chair thumping with both fists on the map.

"If I wanted to make an accurate diagram of your course, I should have to tie a thread to the leg of a gra.s.shopper and let him loose on a blank sheet of paper! A courier on horseback could not have made such twists and turns!"

"We did travel in a sort of zig-zag fas.h.i.+on," admitted the prisoner deprecatingly; "but, you see, none of us understood navigation.