Chapter II: Part 2

Had Karavich been forced away in it? And if so, why, and whither was he being taken? But scarcely had I time to formulate these queries in my mind, before the noise of approaching wheels became audible for the second time. A cloak, similar to that in which the _cafetier_ had been enveloped, was now thrown over my shoulders, and the collar turned up round my face. After a few whispered words of warning from Legros, I was told to follow him down-stairs as noiselessly as possible, which I proceeded to do, the fourth man bringing up the rear. By this time the second vehicle had drawn up opposite the door. The lower part of the house and the shop were in utter darkness. Legros took me by the hand and guided me the way I was to go. Some one—Jean, I take it to have been—stood by the outer door, and opened it silently as we drew near; and so, without a word, we three passed out into the street. The fog had thinned somewhat, but not to any great extent. The light of a lamp on the opposite side of the street showed like a faint blurred point of flame seen from afar. A vehicle, which by that dim light had all the appearance of an ordinary London four-wheeled cab, with a man seated on the box, was drawn up close to the kerb. So much I was enabled to see, but no more. I was hurried at once into the vehicle; Legros and the other man got in after me; the door was shut without noise; the windows were drawn up; Jean, whom we left behind, said something to the driver; and a moment later, we were being driven rapidly away.

I was utterly at a loss to know the time; but judging by the solitude of the streets and the infrequency with which we encountered any other vehicles, it must have been still very early in the morning. Even if the night had been a perfectly clear one, there was nothing in our appearance to attract the notice of the most suspicious of policemen. A cab containing two or three occupants at an early hour in the morning in London streets, is too common an object to call for a second glance from any one who may encounter it.

We were a silent party. None of us spoke after we entered the vehicle. My companions lay back with folded arms and their hats drawn over their brows. Whether they were asleep or awake, it was impossible for me to determine. My thoughts had ample time to busy themselves with any number of perplexing problems before our drive came to an end, which it did, as nearly as I could judge, in about an hour’s time. We had got off the paved streets some time before this, and were now driving over an ordinary macadamised road. Suddenly we drew up, and the same moment my two companions became on the alert.

‘Pardon me,’ said M. Legros as he drew a silk muffler from one of his pockets, ‘but it is necessary that I should blindfold you for a few minutes.’ Then he added: ‘Do implicitly as you are told; have confidence in me, and no harm shall befall you.’

Some one outside had apparently opened a pair of gates by this time; we went through, passed forward a little way farther at a walking pace, and then came to a final stand. Before this, the deft fingers of M. Legros had effectually bandaged my eyes. The carriage-door was now opened, and one of my companions giving me his hand, helped me to alight, and then led me forward. There was an ascent of three or four steps, and then I felt that I had passed out of the cold night-air into the warmer atmosphere of a house. A minute later, my eyes were unbandaged, and, better still, the gag was removed from my mouth.

I found myself in a large and elegantly furnished room, lighted by a lamp on the centre table, and by candles in the girandoles over the chimney-piece. A wood-fire burned cheerfully in the grate. Standing with his back to it, and watching my look of amazement with an amused, cynical smile, was M. Legros. We were alone.

‘I hope you feel none the worse for your little journey?’ he said. ‘We shall have a longer one to take presently, so I think the best thing we can do is to make due preparation for it.’

‘Another journey!’ I stammered. ‘Where to, this time?’

‘That you will learn when the proper time arrives,’ he answered dryly.

‘And Karavich—will he accompany us?’ I asked.

‘Ah, bah! why trouble yourself about Karavich?’ he demanded, with a contraction of his brows. ‘He is nothing to you, nor you to him.’ Then a moment later he added, almost as if speaking to himself: ‘But yes; _ce cher_ Karavich will accompany us certainly. We cannot afford to leave _him_ behind.’

At this juncture, a servant appeared with a tray containing a cold chicken together with other comestibles. This was supplemented by a second tray on which were coffee, wines, and liqueurs. ‘Come,’ said Legros with a smile, as he sat down on a chair which the man had placed for him, ‘let us make ourselves what you English call jolly.’

‘Jolly!’ I ejaculated with a miserable attempt at a laugh. ‘I’m likely to feel jolly under such circumstances as these!’

‘Why not?’ he demanded blandly. ‘Ah, _mon enfant_, when you have lived as long as I have, you will have learnt that the truest philosophy is to enjoy the present while you can, and leave the future to take care of itself. Sit, and let me assist you to a wing of this fowl; or what say you to this mayonnaise? It looks as if it might tempt an anchorite.’

‘I am not hungry; I cannot eat.’

‘Foolish boy! Remember you have a long cold journey before you. Try, at least, a couple of these caviare sandwiches.’

I shook my head. ‘I will take a cup of coffee, nothing more.’

M. Legros pulled the ends of his moustache, but made no further attempt to persuade me; so, while I sat and sipped my coffee, he went on with his supper—if supper it could be called. He was a quick eater, and in a few minutes he rose and pushed back his chair.

After the servant left the room, except for the opening or shutting of a distant door once or twice, no sounds from without were audible. I neither heard nor saw anything either of Karavich or the others. But scarcely had M. Legros risen from the table, when once more we heard the noise of wheels—the noise as of some heavy vehicle, which, after being driven slowly up to the house, came to a halt. In the hush which followed, one could hear the pawing of the horses on the gravel and the champing of their bits. I noticed that my companion was listening as intently as I was. ‘I must ask you to remain here till I rejoin you,’ he said presently. ‘I shall not be more than a few minutes away;’ and with that he smiled, nodded, and left the room.

I had plenty of food for thought during his absence; but those readers who have followed me thus far will scarcely need to be enlightened as to the tenor of my reflections. They were anything but comforting. Scant time was, however, afforded me for perplexed broodings. Presently, a distant door seemed to open, and then came the half-hushed sound of the footsteps of several people advancing along the corridor into which the door of my room opened, then passing the door itself, and then being gradually lost in the distance. The men, whoever they might be, walked slowly and carefully and as though they were carrying some heavy burden. A few moments later, I could distinguish the voices of several people talking in low tones outside the house. My curiosity overmastered my prudence. The room had two windows, both of them having venetian blinds, now closely shut, and, in addition, long heavy curtains that reached the ground. Crossing quickly to one of the windows, I stepped behind the curtain, and then cautiously raising one of the laths of the blind a little way, I peered through the crevice. The sight which met my eyes was one that might well make the blood of a braver man than I profess to be run cold. The fog had cleared away, and by the aid of the starlight, I could just make out what seemed to me the outlines of a hearse, with a pair of horses, standing a few yards away in the courtyard or space of ground which fronted the house. While I was still staring at this grim apparition, a couple of men carrying lighted lanterns appeared on the scene; then I saw clearly that the object I had been gazing at was indeed a hearse, but denuded of its plumes. But scarcely had I time to note this, when a procession of some half-dozen men appeared, walking two and two, and carrying on their shoulders something long, black, and heavy. For one moment I was puzzled, and then the dread certainty flashed upon me that the burden they bent under was a coffin, but not an empty one. When they came within the dim circle of light given out by the lanterns, it became plainly visible. I could bear no more. I let the blind drop, and turned away with a cold sick dread at my heart, such as I had never felt before. Had a murder just been perpetrated under that silent roof, and if so——? A dozen ghastly questions surged through my brain, not one of which I was able to answer. A few minutes later I heard, through my half-dazed senses, the hearse move away a little distance, and a second vehicle drive up and take its place. Then in came M. Legros in his overcoat and hat.

‘All is in readiness for the second stage of our journey,’ he said as he rubbed his chilled hands for a few moments over the fire.

I did not answer him. He looked sharply at me, and as he did so, a cold, dangerous glitter came into his eyes. His gaze travelled to the window, and then back to my face, and then he muttered something under his breath that sounded like a malediction. He was still bending over the grate; but when next his eyes met mine, all trace of annoyance had vanished.

‘You look as white, my friend, as if you had just seen a ghost,’ he remarked with that inscrutable smile of his. ‘You have gone too long without food. However, there’s no time now. Here, drink this,’ he added; and with that he crossed to the table and poured out a small glass of some sort of liqueur. I took it mechanically and drank it. Then Legros handed me the fur-lined cloak and my hat, and then he said: ‘Once more, and I hope for the last time.’ With that he produced the silk muffler and bandaged my eyes; then taking me by the hand, he led me from the room.

HOW TO PROVE A WILL.

IN ENGLAND.

A great change has come over the procedure in proving wills and obtaining administration in England within the last thirty years. Formerly it was a mysterious, difficult, and expensive process, which few people understood; and he who had to undertake such duties was glad to place himself in the hands of a proctor, and, it may be added, was usually glad to get out of them again. The proceeding is now much more simple and intelligible, and when the property is small, is very inexpensive.

Probate, Administration, and the ‘Death Duties,’ as the taxes levied on inheritances have been appropriately named, are no doubt amongst the gloomiest of topics falling to be discussed in the columns of a popular journal. There are very few people of adult years, however, who have not been forced to make acquaintance with these matters in some form or other and at some time or other; and a brief account of the subject, and of the best and cheapest method of proceeding, may not be without value when the pinch of action arrives. To the poor, the knowledge that a legal title to the little properties left by their relatives can be obtained for a few shillings, and with next to no trouble, would seem to be especially desirable. To richer folk, the subject may recommend itself in another fashion. Constituted as men are, it is very certain that the distribution of property amongst survivors forms a not inconsiderable item of the alleviations provided by Mother Nature for the pain of inevitable losses by death, although the generality of us would undoubtedly refuse to indorse the remarkably frank declaration of a hard-hearted modern poet:

Sweet is a legacy, and passing sweet
The unexpected death of some old lady
Or gentleman of seventy years complete,
Who’ve made ‘us youth’ wait too, too long already.

Up to a little more than a quarter of a century ago, the business connected with the proof and custody of wills and the granting of administration in England, was conducted by officers appointed by the archbishops and bishops of the Established Church. In every city which was the seat of a bishop’s see, a court existed, called the Diocesan Court, presided over nominally by the archbishop or bishop, but really by a proctor or barrister, who was the representative or ‘official principal’ of the ecclesiastical dignitary; with a limited number of proctors—that is, ecclesiastical lawyers—who possessed the exclusive privilege of proving wills, and whose posts were very lucrative and much coveted. Besides these Diocesan Courts, a multitude of smaller courts were scattered up and down the country, variously called Archidiaconal, Prebendal, Peculiar, or Manorial Courts, all having the power of making grants of probate or administration in their respective localities, and whose operations frequently resulted in confusion, uncertainty, and needless expense. An investigation into the origin of these small courts discloses in almost all cases curious and interesting features of those times when the authority of the Church penetrated deeply into every portion of society, and into nearly every transaction of life.

All these courts, large and small, were swept away in 1857. After several abortive attempts by successive governments, and in the teeth of great opposition from the interests affected, a measure was carried through parliament, mainly by the energy of Lord Westbury, abolishing the entire system, and creating a court new to English jurisprudence, the Court of Probate. The antique fabric embracing the Prerogative, Diocesan, and Peculiar Courts, with their vicars-general, ordinaries, advocates, surrogates, and apparitors, vanished like a dream before this drastic ordinance. The exclusive privileges of the proctors were put an end to, and all kinds of testamentary business thrown open to the legal profession. It was a rather costly process. Large compensations had to be paid to the superseded functionaries, as is not unusual in such cases; but the extinction of an effete system, and the substitution of a tribunal and a procedure adequate to the requirements of the times, were imperatively called for.

The Court of Probate thus constituted is not only a court for hearing and determining causes connected with contested wills and disputes among next of kin as to the right to property, but possesses also effective administrative machinery for the granting of probate and letters of administration. A principal Registry at Somerset House in London, and thirty-nine District Registries distributed over England and Wales, are attached to the court, and from these registries the grants of probate and administration with which most people are familiar issue.

Did the reader ever prove a will? The phrase has a rather formidable sound, but the proceeding is a sufficiently tame and prosaic affair. A will is ordinarily ‘proved’ in the following manner: The executor named in the will takes it to a solicitor, and furnishes him with particulars of the name, residence, and date of death of the testator; his (the executor’s) own name, residence, business, and relationship to the deceased; with an account of the nature and value of the property. This information is embodied in two affidavits—printed forms with blanks left for the details—which the executor signs, and is sworn to. The will and affidavits are then lodged by the solicitor either in the principal probate registry in London or in one of the district registries, according to the locality in which the testator resided. The documents being in proper order, a form on parchment is filled up in the probate registry, reciting the particulars contained in the affidavits; and to this form is attached a copy of the will, likewise written on parchment. The two together constitute ‘the probate;’ and when this is signed by the registrar and sealed with the seal of the court, the will is said to be ‘proved.’ The original will is forthwith enrolled and indexed in the books of the registry, where it can be perused by any person on payment of a fee of one shilling.

In proving a will, the executor may now either employ a solicitor to prepare the affidavits and take all trouble off his hands, as mentioned above, or he may apply personally at the registry for probate. Facilities for so doing are provided by law, and the grant is obtained at a lower charge than would have to be paid if the services of a professional man were engaged. The _modus operandi_ is as follows: The executor himself lodges the will in the probate registry, and furnishes to the officers there the particulars already enumerated as to the testator, himself, and the property. The necessary affidavits are prepared in the registry, and there signed and sworn to by the executor, who must at the same time pay the registry charges and the probate duty. In case the attestation clause to the will is wanting, or is not in the form required by law—circumstances which frequently occur—a further affidavit is prepared; and one of the witnesses to the signing of the will must attend at the registry and be sworn to such affidavit. In a few days afterwards, the probate of the will is issued to the executor, who can then proceed to deal with the property.

When a deceased person has made no will, but has left money, furniture, shares, or other property not being land or houses, the law steps in, and in effect makes a will for him, by dividing such property amongst his nearest kindred in certain proportions, which are pretty generally known. The instrument authorising a particular person to make the division is called Letters of Administration. If the deceased has left a widow, she is the person entitled to administer; if no widow, then the children; and if no children, then the relative nearest in blood. The widow or relative applying for administration attends at the probate registry in the same way and furnishes the same particulars as an executor who applies for probate of a will, with this addition, that the applicant for administration must enter into bond, and provide two persons of full age, who are willing to become his or her sureties for the faithful distribution of the property. Whether the estate of a deceased person be large or small in amount, the executor or administrator has the option of applying personally at a probate registry for the grant, and in every case by so doing he effects a considerable saving of expense.

The fiscal legislation of the last few years has been very favourable and indulgent to persons administering small estates. At the present time, if a man dies without a will leaving personal property not exceeding a hundred pounds, his widow or children can apply to the probate registry of the district—or if residing more than three miles from such a registry, to the registrar of the County Court of the district—for letters of administration; and the grant will cost only from five to thirteen shillings, according to the value of the property. The children of a widow are entitled to the same privilege.

Again, when a man or woman dies a little better off, either with or without a will, if the whole personal estate does not exceed three hundred pounds, application can be made to the probate registry of the district—or if there be no registry near, to the Inland Revenue office of the nearest town—for a grant of probate or administration. All the necessary papers will be prepared at one or other of these offices; and the grant will be issued on payment of thirty shillings for duty and fifteen shillings for fees. In case the property does not exceed one hundred pounds, on payment of fifteen shillings for fees only. In none of these instances will the property be liable to legacy or other additional duty. The deceased’s debts, however, are not allowed to be deducted in order to bring the property under these amounts, and the privilege is restricted to the cases of persons who have died since the 1st of June 1881. Those who remember how costly was the process of proving a will or obtaining administration in the old ecclesiastical courts, however small the property might be, and those who more recently have had to pay their solicitor’s bill for the same services, will be aware that the substitution of this low tariff is a boon of a substantial character to all interested in the transfer of small estates at death.

While recent legislation has been thus favourable to the poorer classes, and has lessened the expense of obtaining grants in all cases where application is made in person at the probate registry, it has also introduced a much needed reform in the mode of levying the probate duty. The debts owing by any person at death can now be deducted from the amount of the personal property, leaving probate duty to be paid on the remainder only. Formerly, duty was required to be paid on the gross amount of the personal assets without any deduction whatever for debts. It is true that after debts were actually paid, application might be made to the Inland Revenue authorities for a return of the duty or a portion of the duty in respect of them; but difficulty and delay were sometimes experienced in obtaining such returns of duty, and frequent hardships were inflicted. Thus, where the property of a deceased person was nominally under a large amount, and the debts were almost as large, there was obviously no fund out of which probate duty could be paid. The executor was consequently out of pocket, often for a considerable time, and a disinclination to undertake such responsibilities was the natural result.

IN SCOTLAND.

The Scottish law applicable to wills has had an ecclesiastical history as well as that of England. The clergy were permitted to exercise jurisdiction in regard to divorce and succession because they were supposed to be ‘just persons,’ as also because they knew the art of writing better than most other ancient judges. Modern probate law does not differ materially in the two ends of the island, except in nomenclature. The chief distinction is that in Scotland a will does not require any ‘probate’ or proving; it proves itself, if it be signed before witnesses; and if it be holograph—that is, in the handwriting of the testator—its authenticity or validity is assumed, so long as not impugned. The Scottish analogue of English probate is obtaining confirmation of the executor. If the executor be named in the will, he takes it to a lawyer: the lawyer makes up an inventory of the estate of the deceased. This inventory is stamped at a revenue office by a stamp corresponding in cost to the amount of the estate. The stamped inventory, after being sworn to before a justice of the peace, is presented to the sheriff-clerk of the county in which the deceased had his ordinary domicile. The sheriff-clerk, in the interests of the revenue, satisfies himself that the stamp is correct as to pecuniary amount, and then grants confirmation under the seal of the court. That confirmation is equivalent to a judicial warrant to collect every debt and realise every asset specified in the inventory. If there be no will, or no executor named in the will, the sheriff appoints an executor, or executors, according to a recognised order, those equally near in blood, or having an equal interest in the estate, being appointed jointly; a proceeding which corresponds to the granting of letters of administration by the English Probate Court.

Scotland, of course, as well as England, enjoys the benefit of the statutory provisions applicable to estates under three hundred pounds. The persons entitled to succeed, or one of them, can do all that is necessary to transfer the estate from the dead to the living without the intervention of a lawyer or the burden of his bill of costs. He can go to the sheriff-clerk of the county of the domicile, give the requisite information; and the sheriff-clerk will do all that is necessary towards the giving of confirmation, for a fee that is regulated by the amount of the estate, but which is a merely nominal fee compared with what would fall to be charged by a regular professional man.

The courts of Scotland, as a rule, decline to interfere with the administration of the estates of deceased foreigners, among whom Englishmen are included. It is a necessary condition to a Scotch court confirming an executor or appointing one that the domicile of the deceased shall have been in Scotland. Some of the English courts are guided by much more expansive ideas of their duty, and will take charge of the estate of any man, if it be large enough to promise remuneration to Chancery and Probate practitioners. Within the last few years, the English Court of Chancery extended its long arm to administer the estates of Sir W. Stirling-Maxwell, formerly M.P. for Perthshire; and for years the officials of Chancery directed the management of his large Scotch heritable properties of Keir and Pollok, of course with such copious intelligence as Chancery persons have in regard to every property out of which money can be extracted, but perhaps not at a rate of remuneration quite so moderate as would have sufficed, had the greed of English lawyers and the benevolence of English judges permitted the estates of this eminent patriotic Scotchman to be administered according to the law of his own country. A similar stroke of usurpation was more recently attempted in regard to the estate of Orr Ewing. Less than the hundredth part of that estate, which exceeded in value a quarter of a million, had been left to a young man resident in London. This young man was under twenty-one, and therefore an English ‘infant,’ unable to take care of himself. Some officious person, calling himself a ‘next friend’ of this infant, attempted to have all this large estate transferred from Scotland to the Court of Chancery; and the Court of Chancery very kindly did what it could to gratify the zeal of this ‘next friend’ for the interest of the infant—and perhaps of some lawyers—of not very tender years. But this usurpation was resisted by the Scotch beneficiaries and by the Scotch courts. The House of Lords decided distinctly that the English Courts acted according to their precedents when they made this usurpation of jurisdiction over Scotch estates; and they decided also, but a good deal less distinctly, that the Scotch courts did not exceed their jurisdiction in resisting this usurpation. The courts of law in London and Edinburgh are thus in conflict; and the claims of each have so far obtained the sanction of the supreme tribunal of the country, that hereafter, unless the legislature interfere, no large Scotch succession can be considered safe from the purely benevolent but somewhat expensive supervision of the English Court of Chancery.

AN OCEAN MYSTERY.

A TRUE STORY.

Though it is nearly twenty years ago since the events related below occurred, yet the impression left upon my mind has never faded or lost the vividness of its outlines; and though there is nothing really inexplicable about it, yet the dash of mystery connected with it has always marked it in my memory as an incident of an unusual order.

We were driving on our way northwards from the gloomy and savage neighbourhood of Cape Horn, homeward-bound in Her Majesty’s frigate the dear old _Bruisewater_, now, alas, long since consigned to the shipbreaker. The fact of our being homeward-bound should have made all hearts light and all faces bright among our five hundred souls; but for all that, there was a general air of gloom in the ship, which was not to be accounted for save by one theory only—that of superstition. For things had not gone well with us since we had hoisted our homeward-bound pendant. True, we had sailed out of Valparaiso Bay with the said pendant streaming away, and with all our ‘chummy ships’ playing _Should Auld Acquaintance be forgot?_ as we passed by them; and we had received and returned cheer upon cheer as we made our way to the open sea; while from the midshipmen’s berth had rolled up in a rich volume of sound, every night for more than a week before, the old strain, so well known and so lovingly cherished in Her Majesty’s service:

And when we arrive at Plymouth Docks,
The pretty little girls come round in flocks,
And one to the other they do say:
‘Oh, here comes Jack with his three years’ pay;
For I see he’s homeward-bou-ou-ound,
For I see he’s homeward-bound.’

But still, as I say, things had not gone well with us. We had speedily left the warmth of tropical weather, and had gradually found it colder and colder each morning as we made our way down south towards the dreaded Cape of Storms. That was natural, and we were prepared for it; but no sooner had we got to the latitude of the Cape itself, than the wind had shifted, and we had it day after day, night after night, a hard gale right in our teeth. Bitter cold it was too, with tearing storms of snow and hail—heavy thundering seas sweeping us fore and aft, bursting in upon our weather-bow, and covering us with spray, that froze ere it fell upon our decks. Up aloft, everything frozen hard—running rigging as stiff and unmanageable as a steel hawser; blocks jammed with ice and snow; canvas as unyielding as a board; men up aloft for an hour or more trying to take a reef in the fore-topsail, and then so stiffened with cold themselves, as to be unable to come down without assistance: while below, the close, musty, damp, dark ship was the picture of discomfort, her decks, main and lower, always wet, often with an inch or two of ice-cold water washing about on them; soaking clothes hung up all over the place, in the wild hope that they might eventually get dry; ports and scuttles tight shut, to keep out the seas that thundered ceaselessly at them as the ship plunged and wallowed in the angry element; no fires allowed anywhere except at the cook’s galley, which was always fully occupied; and no warmth to be obtained anywhere except in your hammock, and even this, in most cases, what with faulty stowage and leaky decks, was wet through.

Day after day, night after night, this state of things kept on, until there gradually crept in among the men—started, no doubt, by the older hands, always and deeply imbued with the spirit of superstition—a sort of dim suspicion that the ship was under a ban—bewitched, in fact; that, as they said, there was a Jonah aboard; and until he went overboard, we should never weather the dreaded Cape, but were doomed to thrash continually to windward, never gaining an inch on our way. Strange as it may seem, there were many, very many, among our blue-jackets who held this belief firmly, and expressed it openly. We, of course, in the midshipmen’s berth, careless and light-hearted from our extreme youth, laughed at the solemn tones of the old quartermasters, who employed their hours of midnight watch on deck in narrating to us similar instances of vessels which had been thus doomed to struggle with the storm until some unknown criminal had either confessed his crime, or had voluntarily paid the penalty of it. But, as the bad weather continued, and the ship seemed quite unable to advance upon her homeward track, some of us, too, began to allow our minds to be influenced to a certain degree by the mysterious language and ominous hints of these men, so much our elders in years, and our superiors in practical experience.

Matters had got to this pitch, and no change appeared about to take place in the aspect of the weather or the direction of the wind, when one wild and wretched forenoon at seven bells (eleven-thirty) the men were piped to muster on the main-deck for that one drop of comfort which they could look forward to in the day—the serving out of each man’s ‘tot’ of grog. Faces which at other times wore a look of gloom, were brightening under the influence of the spirit; the ever-present growl was stilled for a while; the joke began to pass around as the blood warmed and flowed more rapidly through the veins, when a whisper—a sort of muttered suggestion, made at first with a kind of apologetic reluctance, but with growing confidence and insistence as it gained ground—passed through the throng of men that one of their number was missing. Such a whisper makes its way through a ship’s company, however large, like a current of electricity, and so it was in this case; but at first the men kept it to themselves. It could not long, however, be concealed; and presently it spread to the midshipmen’s berth; next, the wardroom heard it; and soon the captain himself was made aware of the suspicion. Well I remember, how, as we sat in the cold, damp, comfortless, dirty berth, discussing the matter with boyish eagerness, the sudden shrill pipe of the boatswain’s mate burst upon our ears, followed by the hoarse cry of: ‘Hands muster by open list!’ So, then, the captain thought it important enough to make serious and official inquiry into. Then came the calling over of those five hundred names, with most of which we had been familiar for three years or more of our commission in the Pacific. But I am wrong—not quite all of those five hundred. There came a time when the name of one, a petty officer, was called; but no reply came to the call, and a dead silence reigned over the ship—a silence, I mean, as regards human speech or sound: the gale and the thundering seas never for a moment ceased _their_ tumult. Then followed the grave and searching investigation into the mystery. Who had seen him last? Where was he then? In what state? How long ago was it? and so on, and so on; until at last the whole ship’s company knew that one of their number had gone overboard—presumably in the morning watch; probably swept off by a peculiarly heavy sea, well remembered in that watch. But unknown, unheard, unseen—his cry for help, if such a cry he gave, utterly drowned and smothered in the ceaseless roar of the sea, the shriek of the wind. And so the men were dismissed, each to his special duty; and the paymaster was directed to see that the fatal letters D.D. (Discharged dead) were placed against the unhappy man’s name in the ship’s books.

And now occurred a circumstance which took the whole ship by storm, as it were, and which, mere accident and coincidence as it was, made all the old seadogs nod their heads and eye the younger men meaningly, as who would say, ‘What did I tell you?’ while they, on their part, were firmly impressed with the lesson in cause and effect thus so pointedly placed before them. It was close upon noon when the fact of a man being lost was clearly established; and ere the afternoon watch was over, the sky had cleared, the storm had dropped, the wind had shifted right round, and was now blowing dead fair! There was no room for more argument—the oldsters had it all their own way; the scoffers were silenced.

The ship now, in a few hours, rounded the Cape, which before had seemed an impossible obstruction to her, and made her way unhindered to the north; but the feelings engendered by the events immediately preceding this change had taken too strong a hold upon the men to pass lightly away, and in many a long first or middle watch the subject of the disappearance of the lost shipmate and its immediate effect upon the elements was discussed with bated breath, and many an ominous shake of the head was given as the opinion was moodily expressed that ‘We’d not done with him yet.’ And when, a few days afterwards, on a Sunday morning during divine service, the quartermaster of the watch came creeping and tiptoeing down the ladder to report something to the commander, who at once followed him silently up the after-hatchway, but a few minutes afterwards returned and whispered mysteriously to the captain, who in his turn mounted on deck and did not come down again, we all felt that perhaps something more might be in store for us, and was even now perchance at hand. How impatiently we sat as the sermon dragged out its seemingly interminable length, and then, when at last the blessing had been given and the quick sharp voice of the first-lieutenant had issued the order, ‘Boatswain’s mate, pipe down!’ we literally tumbled up on deck, to learn what it was that had disturbed the calm of that Sabbath forenoon. It needed but a glance. ‘Icebergs!’ There they were, a long array of cold, filmy, shadowy giants, looming huge in the mist with which each surrounded himself—ghostly, ghastly, clammy spectres from the very land of Death itself. Not that we thought of them then as such; no, we were glad, we youngsters; we liked them; we said they were ‘jolly,’ though any object less gifted with an aspect of joviality one can hardly imagine. Each, as we neared it, wrapped us in its clammy shroud of death-cold fog, and chilled us to the very marrow, and, towering far above our main-royal-mast head, seemed to threaten us with instant and appalling destruction.

So we sped on, iceberg after iceberg rising above the horizon as we held our course; and, if sources of anxiety and alarm by day, how much more so by night! Often we entered a vast bank of impenetrable fog, conscious that somewhere, in its inmost recesses, lay concealed, as if waiting for its prey, a gigantic berg, but never knowing from moment to moment when or where exactly to expect it. This was a splendid chance for the croakers. Many a great solemn head was shaken, and many a jaw wagged with gloomy forebodings over that unusual and unexpected appearance of ice in the Southern Sea. By-and-by, the wind began to freshen, and signs of another gale appeared, though this time from a quarter fairly favourable to us; and with her canvas snugged down and a bright lookout forward, the old ship began to shake her sides as she hurried away from those inhospitable seas with their spectral occupants towards the inviting warmth of the tropics and the steady blast of the trade-winds.

Anxious for a breath of fresh air before turning in to my half-sodden hammock, I went on deck to take a turn with a chum, and enjoy, as we often did together, a few anticipations of the delights of home once more. It was a wild—a very wild night. There was a small moon; but the clouds were hurrying over her face in ragged streamers, and in such constant succession, that her light was seldom visible; and when she did show it for a fleeting moment, it fell upon a black, tossing, angry sea, whose waves broke into clouds of icy foam as they fell baffled off the bow of the great ship, or tried to leap savagely over her quarter. It was a hard steady gale, the wind shrieking and humming through the rigging, and the old ship herself pounding ponderously but irresistibly at the great mountains of water before her, and creaking, groaning, and complaining as she did so, masts, yards, hull, all in one strident concert together, as if remonstrating at the labour which she was forced to undergo. In spite of the moon, the night was as black as Erebus, and from the quarter-deck on which we paced, the bow of the ship was barely visible. We were just turning our faces aft, my chum and I, in our quarter-deck walk, when a voice rang out sudden, clear, and loud forward—the voice of the starboard lookout man: ‘A bright light on the starboard bow!’ Instantly we, and indeed every soul on deck, turned and peered hard in that direction. Not a vestige of a light was to be seen! Then the voice of the officer of the watch was heard from the bridge, ordering the midshipman of the watch to go forward and find out if the man was dreaming, or if any one else had seen the light which he reported. No one else had seen it; but the man stuck to his text. He had seen for a second of time a bright light on the starboard bow—a _very_ bright light, quite different from anything which was usually seen at sea.

‘No, sir! I beg your pardon, sir! I wasn’t asleep—not I, sir! broad awake as I am now, sir! and able to swear to it.’

By this time all hands were on the alert, and many officers, old and young, had tumbled up from below at the hail.

‘But, my good man, if it was really a light which you saw, some one else must have noticed it too.’

‘Don’t know nothin’ about that, sir; but I can swear to it. What I seen were’——

‘A bright light on the starboard beam!’ sang out the starboard waist lookout at this moment, and ‘I saw it!’ and ‘I saw it!’ echoed several voices; but before the officer of the watch could turn round towards the direction indicated, it was gone, and the starboard beam presented one uniform sheet of impenetrable blackness.

‘Waist there! What was it like?’

‘Somethin’ of a flash-light, I should say, sir,’ replied the lookout. ‘Very bright and very short—gone in a moment-like.’

By this time the captain and commander were both on the bridge, and the whole ship was alive with curiosity.

‘What can it be?’ I asked of the old boatswain against whom I brushed in the darkness as I walked aft.

‘’Tis a boat,’ said he; ‘that’s what it must be. The cap’n he allows it’s a boat, and he’s pretty sure to be right. Some poor souls whose vessel has foundered among the ice—whalers, most likely—took to the boats, they have. I saw that there light myself—seemed very close to the water, it did. They seen our lights, and burnt a flash-light. If they got another, they’ll show that, too, presently.’

And now the voice of the commander rang out: ‘Mr Sights!’

‘Ay, ay, sir,’ replied the gunner.

‘Clear away your two foremost guns on the maindeck, and fire blank charges at short intervals; and get some blue lights, and show them in the fore-rigging at once!’

‘Ay, ay, sir.’ And away went the gunner to see his orders carried out instantly.

But ere his head had disappeared down the hatchway—‘A bright light on the starboard quarter!’ roared out the marine sentry at the lifebuoy right aft; and once more everybody turned sharp round to find nothing to gaze at but the universal darkness.

‘Hands, about ship!’ was now the order; and in quick succession came from the bridge the well-known commands in the sharp, imperative voice of the lieutenant of the watch: ‘Ease down the helm!’—‘Helm’s a lee!’—‘Raise tacks and sheets!’ &c. And as the splendid old ship answered her helm like a boat, and began to fill on the other tack, ‘Maintopsail haul!’—for our courses were furled—‘Head braces!’ ‘Of all, haul!’ and we were on the other tack.

The ship was now brilliantly illuminated by half-a-dozen blue lights burnt in her fore and main rigging; while, as we began to move ahead once more, our bow guns blazed forth from the maindeck one after the other—a roar which we fondly imagined would be more welcome than the most delicious music to the ears of the poor storm-tossed castaways in that frail boat which we now hoped to rescue from the wrath of the raging sea. At intervals there appeared again the bright but transient flash which had first attracted our notice; and through the roar of the waves and the shriek of the wind, we at times imagined that we could hear human voices shouting no doubt for help, and all eyes were strained to the uttermost through the blackness to try and discern the first glimpse of the boat itself. The last flash had told us that we were steering directly for it, and on we sped, our blue lights hissing and flaring in our rigging, our guns ceaselessly roaring out our sympathy and our desire to save.

‘Keep a sharp lookout forward there!’—‘Lifeboat’s crew, fall in aft!’ and we prepared to lower the port quarter-boat, which was told off as a ‘lifeboat’—that is, for any purposes of rescue, although the state of the sea was anything but favourable for boat-duty; but when we thought of that poor boat tossing about on the storm-vexed sea with its freight of shivering and half-drowned men, ay, and maybe a woman or two among them, and then remembered the frowning icebergs and the fearful dangers which they represented, no man hesitated, and had volunteers been called for to man the lifeboat, the whole ship’s company would have come forward. Well can I remember the almost choking feeling of thankfulness in my own heart when I thought of the wild joy of these poor outcasts at the prospect of so speedy a rescue, and anticipated the delight of welcoming them on the quarter-deck of so staunch and safe a ship. But all in a moment my anticipations and my sentiments of gratitude were scattered to the winds.

‘Keep her away, sir! keep her away!’ came a roar from the forecastle. ‘You’ll be right down upon her! A large full-rigged ship right ahead of us!’

Up went our helm, and the ship’s head paid off; and as we strained our eyes in the direction indicated, we could dimly make out, to our intense surprise and unspeakable wonder, the huge, shadowy, ghostly outline of an unusually large vessel. No signs of life appeared about her. The light which had first attracted our notice was now no longer to be seen. Her masts, yards, and sails were only just visible—not as a black hard shadow against the sky, but pale, spectral, as if mere vapour—barely to be discerned, yet leaving no room for doubt. There she sailed, a veritable phantom ship. All hands gazed at her in silence. The blue lights were allowed to burn out, and no fresh ones were lighted. The great guns ceased to thunder on the maindeck. The lifeboat’s crew muttered uneasily among themselves, as if dreading the possibility of being ordered to board so uncanny a craft; while the older hands once more shook their heads, and said ‘they knowed we ’adn’t seen the last of that poor feller as fell overboard.’

But there was nothing more for us to do. Who and what the mysterious stranger hanging on our port quarter was we could not possibly ascertain on such a night, in such a gale; and at length the order was given to ‘Wear ship;’ and we once more turned our back on the vessel which we had been so eagerly pursuing for more than an hour. As we did so, we could see that he too altered his course; his spectral yards, with their shadowy sails, swung round, and he disappeared without a sign in the darkness of the night.

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‘Don’t tell me,’ said the boatswain, ‘as that there were a real ship. Didn’t that poor feller disappear suddently just before we sighted her? Answer me that! Well, then—did we ever know what become of him, eh?—No! Very well, then! That there phantom ship was to tell us as how he was drownded, that’s what that were, and nobody shan’t persuade me no other than that.—How do I explain them bright lights? Answer me this: Were them lights ornery lights, such as ship shows at night?—No; of course they weren’t. Corpse lights!—that’s my answer; and when I says corpse-lights, I means it.’

It _may_ have been an honest merchantman, outward-bound, and too intent upon making a speedy voyage to ‘speak’ us, but, nevertheless, the boatswain’s opinion was pretty generally accepted as the correct solution of what was considered to be an ocean mystery.

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Printed and Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON, and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH.

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