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James Braithwaite, the Supercargo, a novel by William H. G. Kingston |
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Chapter 16. Mutiny On Board The "Barbara" |
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_ CHAPTER SIXTEEN. MUTINY ON BOARD THE "BARBARA" We have learned from the sad experience of centuries that nominal Christianity, which men call religion, is utterly powerless to stop warfare; it may, in a few instances, have lessened some of its horrors, but only a few. The annals of the wars which have taken place for the last three hundred years since the world has improved in civilisation, show that nations rush into war as eagerly as ever, and that cruelties and abominations of all sorts, such as the fiercest savages cannot surpass, are committed by men who profess to be Christians. Read the accounts of the wars of the Duke of Alva and his successors in the Netherlands, the civil wars of France, the foreign wars of Napoleon, the deeds of horror done at the storming and capture of towns during the war in the Peninsula, not only by Frenchmen and Spaniards, but by the British soldiers, and indeed the accounts of all the wars in the pages of history, and we shall learn what a fearful and dreadful thing war is, and strive to assist the spread of the true principles of the Gospel as the only means of putting a stop to it. Such thoughts as these had been occupying my mind on board the brig, on the morning of that eventful day of which I have just been speaking. Here was I, a peace-loving man, engaged in a peaceable occupation, and yet finding myself continually in the midst of fighting, and now there was every probability of my having to engage in a desperate battle, the termination of which it was impossible to foretell. As I reached the deck I could see a number of dark phantom-looking objects gliding slowly over the water towards us almost noiselessly, the only sound heard being that produced by their oars as they dipped into the water. The pirates, for such we were still certain they must be, expected, perhaps, to find us asleep. The guns were loaded and run out as before. The men stood with their muskets in their hands, and pikes and cutlasses ready for use. The strangers drew closer and closer. They still hoped, we concluded, to catch us unprepared. We, however, did not wish to begin the combat unless they gave us indubitable signs of their intentions. The elder Van Deck, who had, I found, been a naval man, took the command, and everybody on board looked up to him. We were not left long in doubt that the strangers were pirates, and purposed to destroy us. Not, however, till they were close to us with the evident intention of boarding did our chief give the order to fire. The effect was to make them sheer off, but only for a moment. Directly afterwards they arranged themselves on our starboard bow and quarter, and commenced a fire with gingalls, matchlocks, and guns of various sorts, sending missiles of all shapes and sizes on board us. Our men kept firing away bravely, but in a short time, so rapid was the fire kept up on us, that three or four were killed and several wounded. I was standing near the brave Dutchman when a dart shot from a gun struck him, and he fell to the deck. I ran to raise him up, but he had ceased to breathe. His death soon becoming known among the crew, their fire visibly slackened. The pirates probably perceived this, and with fearful cries came dashing alongside. The Javanese are brave fellows, and though they knew that death awaited them, they drew their swords and daggers and met the enemy as they sprang upon our deck. On came the pirates in overwhelming numbers, their sharp kreeses making fearful havoc among our poor fellows. I saw that all was lost. I was still unwounded. Rather than fall alive into the hands of the pirates, as with the survivors of the crew I was driven across the deck, I determined to leap overboard, and endeavour to swim to land. That was not a moment for considering the distance or the dangers to be encountered. Death was certain if I remained in the ship. Unnoticed by the enemy, I threw myself overboard, and struck out in the direction, as I believed, of the shore. I was a good swimmer, but light as were my clothes, I was not aware of the impediment they would prove to me. Already I was beginning to grow tired, and to feel that I could not reach the shore. Yet life was sweet, very sweet, in prospect I prayed for strength, and resolved to struggle on as long as I could move an arm. I threw myself on my back to float. I could see the brig, at no great distance, surrounded by the prahus. All sounds of strife had ceased. Only the confused murmurs of many tongues moving at once reached my ears. Now that I had ceased for a few minutes to exert myself, two fearful ideas occurred to me: one, that I might be swimming from the land, the other, that at any moment a shark might seize me and carry me to the depths below. Had I allowed my mind to dwell on these ideas, I should speedily have lost courage, but instead I had recourse to the only means by which, under similar trials and dangers, a man can hope to be supported. I turned my thoughts upwards, and prayed earnestly for protection and deliverance. I was striking out gently with my feet to keep myself moving through the water when my head struck something floating on the surface. I turned round, and found that it was one of the long bamboo buoys employed by the native fishermen on the coast to mark where their nets, or fish traps, are placed. They are very long and buoyant, and capable of supporting more than one man with ease. I threw my arms over the one I had found, and was grateful that I had thus found an object by means of which my life might possibly be preserved. I looked round me; the prahus and brig were still to be seen, but after watching them for some time, they appeared to be drifting away with the faint land breeze from the spot where I lay. Thus was the danger of being seen by them at daylight lessened. Hitherto I had feared, among other things, should I be unable to swim on shore, that when the pirates discovered me in the morning they would send a boat and give me a quieting knock on the head. Still my position was a very dreadful one. Any moment a passing shark might seize hold of me; that I escaped was owing, I think, humanly speaking, to my having on dark clothes, and my having kept constantly splashing with my legs. I was afraid of resting, also, lest I should lose consciousness, and, letting go my hold of the bamboo, be swept away by the tide. At length, when my legs became weary of moving about, I thought that I would try the effect of my voice in keeping the sharks at a distance. I first ascertained that the pirate prahus had drifted to such a distance that I was not likely to be heard by them, then I began shouting away at the top of my voice. What was my surprise, as soon as I stopped, to hear an answer! For a moment I fancied that it must be some mockery of my imagination; then again I heard the voice say, "What, Braithwaite! is that you?" It must be, I knew, my friend Van Deck who spoke, yet the voice sounded hollow and strange, very unlike his. I can scarcely describe the relief I felt at discovering, in the first place that my friend had escaped, and then on finding that a civilised human being was near me. I could not tell whether he knew that his brother was killed. I did not allude to the subject. We did our best to encourage each other. We would gladly have got nearer together to talk with more ease, but were afraid of letting go our hold of the support, frail though it seemed, to which we clung. Van Deck encouraged me by the assurance that it would soon be daylight, and that at early dawn the fishermen would come off to examine the nets. "They bear the Dutch, I am sorry to say, no good will," he observed. "We are accused too justly of laying the produce of their industry under tribute; but they will respect you as an Englishman, and for your sake save the lives of both of us. Till I found that you had escaped I was very anxious on that score." As I have said, we talked continually, for silence was painful, as I could not tell when my companion's voice was silent whether he had been drawn down suddenly by a shark, or had sunk overcome by fatigue. Even with conversation kept up in this way the time passed very slowly by. How much worse off I should have been alone! At length Van Deck exclaimed that he saw the dawn breaking in the sky. Rapidly after this objects became more and more distinct; the tall bamboo buoys, with their tufts of dry grass at the top, floating on the glassy water; then I could distinguish my companion's head and shoulders just above the surface; and the land about two miles off, on which, however, a surf broke which would have made landing difficult, if not dangerous. The tall trees and the mountains, range above range, seemed to rise directly out of it. Soon the fishermen's voices, as they pulled out, singing in chorus, towards their buoys, greeted our ears. Two boats came close to us. The fishermen exhibited much surprise at finding us, but instead of at once coming up and taking us on board, they lay on their oars, and appeared to be consulting what they should do with the strangers. How the discussion might have terminated seemed doubtful, had not Van Deck told them that I was an Englishman, whose countrymen had just conquered the island; that he was my friend; and that if any harm happened to us my people would come and cut off all the people in the district, whereas if we were well treated they would be munificently rewarded. This address, which, taken in its oriental meaning, was literally true, had the desired effect; one of the boats approached me. Immediately that I was in the boat I fainted, and I believe that my friend was much in the same condition. He, however, quickly recovered, and by the promise of an increased reward induced the fishermen to return at once to the shore. I did not return to consciousness till I found myself being lifted out of the boat and placed on a litter of wicker-work. Van Deck was carried in the same way, as he was too weak to walk. We were thus conveyed to the house of a chief, who resided not far from the shore, built on the summit of a rising ground overlooking the sea. The chief, who was every inch a gentleman, received us with the greatest hospitality, and, seeing what we most required, had us both put into clean, comfortable beds in a large airy room, where, after we had taken a few cups of hot coffee, we fell asleep, and did not awake again till the evening. Our host had then a sumptuous repast ready for us, of which by that time we were pretty well capable of partaking. Poor Van Deck was naturally very much out of spirits at the loss of his brother, but the necessity of interpreting for me kept him from dwelling on his own grief. At the time of which I have hitherto been speaking, when I was in the east, the spot on which Singapore, with its streets of stone palaces, its superb public edifices and rich warehouses, now stands, was a sandy flat, with a few straggling huts inhabited by fishermen or pirates. I am about to give a piece of history posterior to my voyage as a supercargo. After the peace of 1814, when Java and its dependencies were given up to the Dutch, their first act was to impose restrictions on British commerce in the Archipelago. They were enabled to effect this object from the position of their settlements, those in the Straits of Malacca and Sunda commanding all the western entrances to the China and Java seas, and it therefore became evident that, without some effort to destroy their monopolies, the sale of British manufactures in the eastern islands would soon cease. Sir Stamford Raffles, who was at that time Governor of Bencoolen, represented the case so strongly to the Supreme Government at Bengal that the governor-general gave him the permission he asked to make a settlement near the north-east entrance of the Straits of Malacca. He accordingly, in the year 1819, fixed on Singapore, which stands on the south side of an island, about sixty miles in circumference, separated by a narrow strait from the Malay peninsula. Of course the establishment was opposed by the Dutch, who so strenuously remonstrated with the British Government that the latter declined having anything to do with it, and threw the whole responsibility on Sir Stamford Raffles. It was not until it had been established for three years--in the last of which the trade was already estimated at several millions of dollars--that Singapore was recognised by Great Britain. After a rest of a couple of days, poor Van Deck and I were sufficiently recovered to commence our journey back to Batavia. He was anxious to be there that he might take charge of his late brother's affairs--I, that I might report the loss of the brig, and make fresh arrangements for securing a cargo for Sydney. We met with no adventures worthy of note on our journey. On our return to Batavia much sympathy was excited for my friend Van Deck among the merchants at the loss of his brother, and the naval commander-in-chief, returning soon after from Sourabaya, dispatched two frigates and a brig of war in search of the pirates. They were supposed to belong to some place on the coast of Borneo, which has for many years abounded with nests of these desperadoes. The fleet in question was supposed to belong to a famous chief, the very idol of his followers on account of the success of his expeditions. His title was the Rajah Raga, and he was brother to the Sultan Coti, a potentate of Borneo. The Raja Raga had subsequently some wonderful escapes, for he probably got due notice that an English squadron was looking after him, and took good care to keep out of their way. He was afterwards cruising with three large prahus, when he fell in with an English sloop-of-war, which he was compelled to engage. Two of his prahus, by placing themselves between him and the enemy, held her in check a sufficient time to enable him to escape, and were themselves then sent to the bottom; indeed, they must have expected no other fate. On another occasion the rajah remained on shore, but sent his own prahu, which carried upwards of a hundred and fifty men and several large guns, on a cruise, under the command of his favourite panglima, or captain. Falling in after some time with a brig merchantman, as he supposed, and wishing to distinguish himself by her capture, he fired into her, and made preparations to board. Great was his dismay when he saw a line of ports open in the side of his expected prize, and he found himself under the guns of a British man-of-war. The panglima hailed, and with many apologies tried to make it appear that he had acted under a misapprehension, but his subterfuge was of no avail; a broadside from the man-of-war sent his vessel at once to the bottom, and he and all his crew perished, with the exception of two or three who, clinging to a piece of the wreck, were picked up by a native craft, and carried an account of the disaster to their chief. Piracy had been the bane of these seas for years. We were fortunate in obtaining the full amount of the goods we required without having to wait much longer at Batavia. There is an old proverb, "It is an ill wind that blows no one good." The vessel for which they were intended had lost her master and both mates by sickness, and the merchant therefore sold them to me. We had not altogether escaped, and several of our men who were perfectly healthy when we entered the harbour fell victims to the fever engendered by the pestiferous climate. We were compelled to fill up their places with others, who afterwards gave us much trouble. It was with sincere regret I parted from my friend Van Deck. I was glad, however, to find that he was likely to obtain employment suited to his talents under the English Government. The most direct course for New South Wales would have been through Torres Straits, but the east trade wind still blowing, compelled us to take the longer route round the south of New Holland, and through Bass's Straits, not many years before discovered, between that vast island and the smaller one of Van Diemen's Land. A northerly breeze at length coming on, enabled us to sight the south-west point of New Holland, and thence we sailed along the coast, occasionally seeing tall columns of smoke ascending from the wood, showing the presence of natives. On approaching Bass's Straits, the captain was one day expressing his regret to me that we had not time to anchor off one of the islands in it to catch seals, great numbers of which animals frequented the place in those days. He had known, he remarked, considerable sums made in that way in a very short time. Our conversation, it appeared, was overheard by one of the men we had shipped at Batavia. We had had a good deal of insubordination among the crew since we left that place, and we traced it all to that man, Miles Badham, as he called himself. He was about thirty, very plausible and insinuating in his manner, a regular sea-lawyer, a character very dangerous on board ship, and greatly disliked by most captains. He had managed to gain a considerable influence over the crew, especially the younger portion. His appearance was in his favour, and in spite of the qualities I have mentioned, I would not have supposed him capable of the acts of atrocity which were with good reason laid to his charge. Ben Stubbs, the second mate, had charge of the deck one night, and, unable to sleep, I was taking a turn with him, when Mr Gwynne, the surgeon, came up to us. "There is something wrong going on among the people below," he whispered. "I cannot make out what it is exactly, but if we do not look out we may possibly all have our throats cut before morning." "You must have been dreaming, Gwynne," answered Stubbs; "there isn't a man in the ship would dare do such a thing." "I am not certain of that," I observed; "at all events, let us be on the right side. Forewarned, forearmed. We will let the captain know, and I trust that we may thus defeat the plot, whatever it is." _ |
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