Chapter XXX

That evening, Rosina Fleming went as she was bid to the old African’s tent about half-past eleven, groping her way along the black moonless roads in fear and trembling, with infinite terror of the all-pervading and utterly ghastly West Indian ghosts or duppies. It was a fearful thing to go at that time of night to the hut of an obeah man; heaven knows what grinning, gibbering ghouls and phantoms one might chance to come across in such a place at such an hour. But it would have been more fearful still to stop away; for Delgado, who could so easily bring her Isaac Pourtalès for a lover by his powerful spells, could just as easily burn her to powder with his thunder and lightning, or send the awful duppies to torment her in her bed, as she lay awake trembling through the night-watches. So poor Rosina groped her way fearfully round to Delgado’s hut with wild misgivings, and lifted the latch with quivering fingers, when she heard its owner’s gruff, ‘Come in den, missy,’ echoing grimly from the inner recesses.

When she opened the door, however, she was somewhat relieved to find within a paraffin lamp burning brightly; and in place of ghouls or ghosts or duppies, Isaac Pourtalès himself, jauntily seated smoking a fresh tobacco-leaf cigarette of his own manufacture, in the corner of the hut where Louis Delgado was sitting cross-legged on the mud floor.

‘Ebenin’, missy,’ Delgado said, rising with African politeness to greet her; while the brown Barbadian, without moving from his seat, allowed his lady-love to stoop down of herself to kiss him affectionately. ‘I send for you dis ebenin’ becase we want to know suffin’ about dis pusson dat callin’ himself buckra, an’ stoppin’ now at Orange Grobe wit you. What you know about him, tell us dat, missy. You is Missy Dupuy own serbin’-le-ady: him gwine to tell you all him secret. What you know about dis pusson Noel?’

Thus adjured, Rosina Fleming, sitting down awkwardly on the side of the rude wooden settee, and with her big white eyes fixed abstractedly upon the grinning skull that decorated the bare mud wall just opposite her, pulled her turban straight upon her woolly locks with coquettish precision, and sticking one finger up to her mouth like a country child, began to pour forth all she could remember of the Orange Grove servants’ gossip about Harry Noel. Delgado listened impatiently to the long recital without ever for a moment trying to interrupt her; for long experience had taught him the lesson that little was to be got out of his fellow-countrywomen by deliberate cross-questioning, but a great deal by allowing them quietly to tell their own stories at full length in their own rambling, childish fashion.

At last, when Rosina, with eyes kept always timidly askance, half the time upon the frightful skull, and half the time on Isaac Pourtalès, had fairly come to the end of her tether, the old African ventured, with tentative cunning, to put a leading question: ‘You ebber hear dem say at de table, missy, who him mudder and fader is, and where dem come from?’

‘Him fader is very great gentleman ober in Englan’,’ Rosina answered confidently—‘very grand gentleman, wit house an’ serbant, an’ coach an’ horses, an’ plenty cane-piece, an’ rum an’ sugar, an’ yam garden an’ plantain, becase I ’member Aunt Clemmy say so; an’ de missy him say so himself too, sah. An’ de missy say dat de pusson dat marry him will be real le-ady—same like de gubbernor le-ady; real le-ady, like dem hab in Englan’. De missy tellin’ me all about him dis bery ebenin’.’

Delgado smiled. ‘Den de missy in lub wit him himself, for certain,’ he answered with true African shrewdness and cynicism. ‘Ole-time folk has proverb, “When naygur woman say, ‘Dat fowl fat,’ him gwine to steal him same ebenin’ for him pickany dinner.” An’ when le-ady tell you what happen to gal dat marry gentleman, him want to hab de gentleman himself for him own husband.’

‘O no, sah; dat doan’t so,’ Rosina cried with sudden energy. ‘De missy doan’t lubbin’ de buckra gentleman at all. She tell me him look altogedder too much like naygur.’

Delgado and Pourtalès exchanged meaning looks with one another, but neither of them answered a word to Rosina.

‘An’ him mudder?’ Delgado inquired curiously after a moment’s pause, taking a lazy puff at a cigarette which Isaac handed him.

‘Him mudder!’ Rosina said. ‘Ah, dere now, I forgettin’ clean what Uncle ’Zekiel, him what is butler up to de house dar, an’ hear dem talk wit one anodder at dinner—I forgettin’ clean what it was him tell me about him mudder.’

Delgado did not urge her to rack her feeble little memory on this important question, but waited silently, with consummate prudence, till she should think of it herself and come out with it spontaneously.

‘Ha, dere now,’ Rosina cried at last, after a minute or two of vacant and steady staring at the orbless eyeholes of the skull opposite; ‘I is too chupid—too chupid altogedder. Mistah ’Zekiel, him tellin’ me de odder marnin’ dat Mistah Noel’s mudder is le-ady from Barbadoes.—Dat whar you come from youself, Isaac, me fren’. You must be ’memberin’ de family ober in Barbadoes.’

‘How dem call de family?’ Isaac asked cautiously. ‘You ebber hear, Rosie, how dem call de family? Tell me, dar is good girl, an’ I gwine to lub you better’n ebber.’

Rosina hesitated, and cudgelled her poor brains eagerly a few minutes longer; then another happy flash of recollection came across her suddenly like an inspiration, and she cried out in a joyous tone: ‘Yes, yes; I got him now, I got him now, Isaac! Him mudder family deir name is Budleigh, an’ dem lib at place dem call de Wilderness. Mistah ’Zekiel tell me all about dem. Him say dat dis le-ady, what him name Missy Budleigh, marry de buckra gentleman fader, what him name Sir-waltah Noel.’

It was an enormous and unprecedented fetch of memory for a pure-blooded black woman, and Rosina Fleming was justly proud of it. She stood there grinning and smiling from ear to ear, so that even the skull upon the wall opposite was simply nowhere in the competition.

Delgado turned breathlessly to Isaac Pourtalès. ‘You know dis fam’ly?’ he asked with eager anticipation. ‘You ebber hear ob dem? You larn at all whedder dem is buckra or only brown people?’

Louis Delgado laughed hoarsely. Brown man as he was himself, he chuckled and hugged himself with sardonic delight over the anticipated humiliation of a fellow brown man who thought himself a genuine buckra.

‘Know dem, sah!’ Isaac cried in a perfect ecstasy of malicious humour—‘know de Budleighs ob de Wilderness! I tink for true I know dem! _Hé!_ Mistah Delgado, me fren’, I tellin’ you de trut, sah; me own mudder an’ Mrs Budleigh ob de Wilderness is first-cousin, first-cousin to one anudder.’

It was perfectly true. Strange as such a relationship sounds to English ears, in the West Indies cases of the sort are as common as earthquakes. In many a cultivated light-brown family, where the young ladies of the household, pretty and well educated, expect and hope to marry an English officer of good connections, the visitor knows that, in some small room or other of the back premises, there still lingers on feebly an old black hag, wrinkled and toothless, full of strange oaths and incomprehensible African jargons, who is nevertheless the grandmother of the proud and handsome girls, busy over Mendelssohn’s sonatas and the _Saturday Review_, in the front drawing-room. Into such a family it was that Sir Walter Noel, head of the great Lincolnshire house, had actually married. The Budleighs of the Wilderness had migrated to England before the abolition of slavery, when the future Lady Noel was still a baby; and getting easily into good society in London, had only been known as West Indian proprietors in those old days when to be a West Indian proprietor was still equivalent to wealth and prosperity, not, as now, to poverty and bankruptcy.

Strange to say, too, Lady Noel herself was not by any means so dark as her son Harry. The Lincolnshire Noels belonged themselves to the black-haired type so common in their county; and the union of the two strains had produced in Harry a complexion several degrees more swarthy than that of either of his handsome parents. In England, nobody would ever have noticed this little peculiarity; they merely said that Harry was the very image of the old Noel family portraits; but in Trinidad, where the abiding traces of negro blood are so familiarly known and so carefully looked for, it was almost impossible for him to pass a single day without his partially black descent being immediately suspected. He had ‘thrown back,’ as the colonists coarsely phrase it, to the dusky complexion of his quadroon ancestors.

Louis Delgado hugged himself and grinned at this glorious discovery. ‘Ha, ha!’ he cried, rocking himself rapidly to and fro in a perfect frenzy of gratified vindictiveness; ‘him doan’t buckra, den!—him doan’t buckra! He hold himself so proud, an’ look down on naygur; an’ after all, him doan’t buckra, him only brown man! De Lard be praise, I gwine to humble him! I gwine to let him know him doan’t buckra!’

‘You will tell him?’ Rosina Fleming asked curiously.

Delgado danced about the hut in a wild ecstasy, with his fingers snapping about in every direction, like the half-tamed African savage that he really was. ‘Tell _him_, Missy Rosie!’ he echoed contemptuously—‘tell _him_, you sayin’ to me! Yah, yah! you hab no sense, missy. I doan’t gwine to tell _him_, for certain; I gwine to tell dat cheatin’ scoundrel, Tom Dupuy, missy, so humble him in de end de wuss for all dat.’

Rosina gazed at him in puzzled bewilderment. ‘Tom Dupuy!’ she repeated slowly. ‘You gwine to tell Tom Dupuy, you say, Mistah Delgado! What de debbel de use, I wonder, sah, ob tell Tom Dupuy dat de buckra gentleman an’ Isaac is own cousin?’

Delgado executed another frantic _pas de seul_ across the floor of the hut, to work off his mad excitement, and then answered gleefully: ‘Ha, ha, Missy Rosie, you is woman, you is creole naygur gal—you doan’t understan’ de depth an’ de wisdom ob African naygur. Look you here, me fren’, I explain you all about it. De missy up at house, him fall in lub wit dis brown man, Noel. Tom Dupuy, him want for go an’ marry de missy. Dat make Tom Dupuy hate de brown man. I tell him, Noel doan’t no buckra—him common brown man, own cousin to Isaac Pourtalès. Den Tom Dupuy laugh at Noel! Ha, ha! I turn de hand ob one proud buckra to bring down de pride ob de odder!’

Isaac Pourtalès laughed too. ‘Ha, ha!’ he cried, ‘him is proud buckra, an’ him is me own cousin! I hate him!’

Rosina gazed at her mulatto lover in rueful silence. She liked the English stranger—he had given her a shilling one day to post a letter for him—but still, she daren’t go back upon Isaac and Louis Delgado. ‘Him is fren’ ob Mistah Hawtorn,’ she murmured apologetically at last after a minute’s severe reflection—‘great fren’ ob Mistah Hawtorn. Dem is old-time fren’ in Englan’ togedder; and when Mistah Tom Dupuy speak bad ’bout Mistah Hawtorn, Mistah Noel him flare up like angry naygur, an’ him gib him de lie, an’ him speak out well for him!’

Delgado checked himself, and looked closely at the hesitating negress with more deliberation. ‘Him is fren’ ob Mistah Hawtorn,’ he said in a meditative voice—‘him is fren’ ob Mistah Hawtorn! De fren’ ob de Lard’s fren’ shall come to no harm. I gwine to tell Tom Dupuy. I must humble de buckra. But in de great an’ terrible day, dem shall not hurt a hair of him head, if de Lard wills it.’ And then he added somewhat louder, in his own sonorous and mystic Arabic: ‘The effendi’s brother is dear to Allah even as the good effendi himself is.’

Isaac Pourtalès made a wry face aside to himself. Evidently he had settled in his own mind that whatever might be Delgado’s private opinion about the friends of the Lord’s friend, he himself was not going to be bound, when the moment for action actually arrived, by anybody else’s ideas of promises.

By-and-by, Rosina rose to go. ‘You is comin’ wit me, Isaac?’ she asked coquettishly, with her finger stuck once more in coy reserve at the corner of her mouth, and her head a little on one side, bewitching negress fashion.

Isaac hesitated; it does not do for a brown man to be too condescending and familiar with a nigger girl, even if she does happen to be his sweetheart. Besides, Delgado signed to him with his withered finger that he wanted him to stop a few minutes longer. ‘No, Missy Rosie,’ the mulatto answered, yawning quietly; ‘I doan’t gwine yet. You know de road to house, I tink. Ebenin’, le-ady.’

Rosina gave a sighing, sidelong look of disappointed affection, took her lover’s hand a little coldly in her own black fingers, and sidled out of the hut with much reluctance, half-frightened still at the horrid prospect of once more facing alone the irrepressible and ubiquitous ghouls.

As soon as she was fairly out of earshot, Louis Delgado approached at once close to the mulatto’s ear and murmured in a mysterious hollow undertone: ‘Next Wednesday.’

The mulatto started. ‘So soon as dat!’ he cried. ‘Den you has got de pistols?’

Delgado, with his wrinkled finger placed upon his lip, moved stealthily to a corner of his hut, and slowly opened a chest, occupied on the top by his mouldy obeah mummery of loose alligators’ teeth and well-cleaned little human knuckle-bones. Carefully removing this superstitious rubbish from the top of the box with an undisguised sneer—for Isaac as a brown man was _ex officio_ superior to obeah—he took from beneath it a couple of dozen old navy pistols, of a disused pattern, bought cheap from a marine store-dealer of doubtful honesty down at the harbour. Isaac’s eyes gleamed brightly as soon as he saw the goodly array of real firearms. ‘_Hé, hé!_’ he cried joyously, fingering the triggers with a loving touch, ‘dat de ting to bring down de pride ob de proud buckra. Ha, ha! Next Wednesday, next Wednesday! We waited long, Mistah Delgado, for de Lard’s delibberance; but de time come now, de time come at last, sah, an’ we gwine to hab de island ob Trinidad all to ourselves.’

The old African bowed majestically. ‘Slay ebbery male among dem,’ he answered aloud in his deepest accents, with a not wholly unimpressive mouthing of his hollow vowels—‘slay ebbery male, an’ take de women captive, an’ de maidens, an’ de little ones; an’ divide among you de spoil ob all deir cattle, an’ all deir flocks, an’ all deir goods, an’ deir cities wherein dey dwell, an’ all deir vineyards, an’ deir goodly castles.’

Isaac Pourtalès’ eyes gleamed hideously as he listened in delight to that awful quotation.

THE DUBLIN BANK GUARD.

After reading an article in _Chamber’s Journal_ for August 1885, headed ‘The Bank Picket,’ it struck me (says a correspondent) that a reminiscence of the Bank Guard in Dublin may not prove uninteresting. I say reminiscence, for, though the Bank Guard is mounted there now pretty much, I believe, as in the days of which I write—some eight-and-thirty years ago—the incident which my memory recalls in connection with it is a reminiscence of an event, the actors in which, except myself, have passed away or have left the service; and in either case, I have not seen or heard of any of them for many years; but if one or two still survive, and this should meet their eye, I have no doubt the remembrance recalled by it will raise a hearty laugh at what was to them certainly no joke, and to me personally was a lesson never again to disobey orders.

The guard over the Bank of Ireland in Dublin was then—as I believe it is now—under the command of the senior subaltern for guard in the garrison, with a proper complement of non-commissioned officers and men; and was relieved, like all the other garrison guards, every twenty-four hours. The men’s guardroom was a large apartment, flagged with stone, on the ground-floor of part of what was once the old Irish House of Parliament; and above it was the officer’s guardroom, which was reached by a flight of stairs, at the bottom of which a door communicated on the left with the men’s guardroom, and facing the stair-foot was a small heavy door leading into the street. In this door was a barred aperture about a foot square, closed by a sliding piece of wood, which could be drawn aside to permit the examination from within of any one outside; and inside the door, a sentry was posted during the night. Through the barred aperture, the ‘Grand rounds’—as the field-officer on duty for the day was called—whispered the countersign to the officer of the guard when he visited the bank at night, after which he was admitted, to enable him to inspect the guard. To the left of the door outside was also a large iron-studded gate, leading into a small courtyard, where the guard paraded during the daytime; but this, as well as the small door, was locked and secured by heavy bars at sunset, and the keys of both were kept by the officer of the guard.

Immediately after the mounting of the new guard, every morning a knock at the door of the officer’s room announced the arrival of the head-porter with a large book, in which the officer signed his name, rank, and regiment; and on the departure of the head-porter with the book, a half-sovereign was found on the table where the book had been. There were no meals provided for the officer, as for his more fortunate comrade mounting the Bank Picket in London; nor were the non-commissioned officers or men ‘tipped,’ as at the Bank of England; but they, as well as the officer, were left to shift for themselves in the way of food during the twenty-four hours, without even the assistance of a canteen vendor, so that the dinners and other meals had to be sent from the barracks—in the case of some regiments, a distance of two or three miles—there was no blanket or greatcoat either provided at the Bank of Ireland for the men; but the officer had some articles furnished for his use, for a consideration, which were exhumed towards night from a small closet in the officer’s guardroom. There was no library or anything of that kind for men or officer; and they were left entirely to their own devices how to fill up the tedium of the twenty-four hours’ duty.

The furniture of both guardrooms was scanty, that in the men’s room consisting of a few forms and a guard-bed of wood, raised a couple of feet from the ground; while the officer’s furniture was more luxurious, he having an old leather-covered couch, with four or five chairs to match, and a large table. There was, however, abundance of fuel; and candles of the mutton-fat order were liberally supplied at the rate of one to each room. Both apartments were large and lofty, the ceiling of the officer’s being vaulted; and its walls, in my time, were covered with drawings in pencil and coloured chalks, more or less well done; and many very amusing, being caricatures of well-known staff and other officers, or sketches of various funny incidents which had taken place at guard-mountings and field-days, in which the figure of old Toby White, the well-known town major, was always prominent, as well as an adjutant of one of the regiments, famed for the peculiar peak which adorned his shako, and his feats of horsemanship, which seemed meant to illustrate the many ways one could fall off a horse without getting hurt. Over the vast mantel-piece were drawings of the breastplates of every regiment that had mounted the guard, all artistically and faithfully done. Like the gorgets, these breastplates have ceased for many years to be part of the uniform of the British infantry; but for the benefit of those who don’t remember them, I may say that they served to clasp across the breast the broad white sword-belt worn in full uniform in the days of coatees and epaulets, and were very handsome, having, besides, the number of the regiment, the regimental badge, and the various battles authorised to be borne on the regimental colour, emblazoned on them.

Amongst the other drawings on the walls was, directly opposite the door leading from the stairs into the guardroom, the figure of a young lady clad in the full-dress uniform of a regiment dating many years anterior to the time of which I speak. She was represented as standing at the salute, with a drawn sword extended in her right hand, and the left at the shako peak shading the eyes. There was a legend—whence derived or how handed down, I am unable to say—that the young lady in the obsolete uniform was the wife of an officer of the guard who one night, many years ago, had become intoxicated on duty; and that she saved his commission by dressing herself in his uniform and turning out the guard to the field-officer when going his nightly rounds. This legend was, I have no doubt, as true as very many which are now implicitly believed; but be that as it may, it was an article of faith amongst the subalterns of the Dublin garrison, who always regarded the fair young figure in the quaint uniform with a certain amount of respect.

In those days, the guardrooms in Dublin were pretty generally ornamented with sketches, some of which were very well done. I may specify ‘The Kildare Hunt,’ round the wall of the upper castle guard; and a monument upon a wall facing the door in the lower castle guard, on which was the following inscription:

IN MEMORY OF

A Wigging received by a Subaltern of this Guard from ——.

--------

May whose end be as his life has been—peaceful!

That the above stung the officer in question, who was a well-known martinet, but, unfortunately, had seen no war-service, we soon had reason to know; for an order was issued that in future all commandants of guards were to certify in their guard Reports that the walls of their guardrooms had not been defaced during their tour of duty.

One snowy, bitterly cold day in the winter of 1847-48, I found myself the occupant of the Bank Guard in Dublin, and in the proud position of commandant. The semi-darkness of the afternoon was fast verging on night, and I nodded, half asleep, over the huge fire which blazed on the hearth, when the door opened, and admitted, with a cold swirl of frosty air, the handsome, jolly face of a brother sub. and particular friend of mine, named Harry P——. The old room looked instantly bright and cheerful, and he sat until well after dark, smoking and chatting pleasantly. At length he rose to go, and told me that he was going to dine with his brother at Richmond Barracks; and that after mess, he, his brother, and another officer of his brother’s regiment, were about to visit the theatre, where some popular performer was starring it. ‘And I tell you what it is, old fellow,’ he added, ‘we’ll all come here afterwards; and you have some oysters in, and give us a supper.’

It was in vain that I reminded him of the order that no one was to be admitted to the Bank Guard after tattoo except on duty. He laughed at my scruples; and at last, on his hinting that want of hospitality was at the bottom of my strict observance of standing orders, I was weak enough to give in; and the tempter descending the stairs, stopped to say, by way of encouragement: ‘You know we shan’t be with you before twelve o’clock; and by that time, the Grand rounds will have turned you out, and will be snug in bed in the upper castle.’ So saying, without giving me time to recall my inconsiderate promise, he was off, and I had nothing left me but to call my servant; and between us, we managed to arrange, if not an elegant, at least a comfortable little supper, which was brought in from a neighbouring hotel. Fresh lights were placed upon the now well-furnished table, more coals added to the already roaring fire, beside which simmered a kettle of boiling water, ready to mix with what in the Irish capital is known as ‘the materials;’ and towards the ‘sma’ hours ayont the twal,’ I sat waiting the arrival of my expected guests, as well as the field-officer of the day, who, to my great discomfort and uneasiness, had not up to this hour put in an appearance.

I hadn’t long to wait after midnight had struck for Harry P—— and his companions, who didn’t sympathise with me much concerning the non-arrival of the field-officer, Harry only remarking: ‘Oh, he’ll only just look at the guard, and be off to roost with as little delay as he can. The snow is falling fast, and no one with any brains will stay out in it longer than he can help.’

So, ‘laying this flattering unction to our souls,’ we proceeded, without further ceremony, to pay attention to the good things provided for the comfort of the body, and had already got through a fair lot of the bivalves, when suddenly the loud challenge of the sentry at the door below rang through the vaulted corridor: ‘Who comes there?’ The reply from outside was: ‘Rounds;’ then: ‘What rounds?’ Answer: ‘Grand rounds,’ followed by the sentry’s: ‘Stand, Grand rounds; Guard, turn out.’

This called me to take my part in the ceremony; and my visitors, still looking on the affair as a prime joke, proceeded to ensconce themselves in the closet containing the officer’s bedding, which, on account of the expected advent of company, had not as yet been disinterred. As he closed the door, I heard Harry P—— remark, by way of apology to the others: ‘You know, his Satanic Majesty may prompt him to come up-stairs, and so we had better not show till he goes.’

I now dashed down below, and after the accustomed interchange of question and answer at the barred window in the door, ordered his admission, and proceeded to the guard, which was turned out in the men’s guardroom, to duly ‘present arms’ to the Grand rounds. (I may here remark, that to the sentry’s shout of ‘Guard, turn out’ in the Bank Guard, the response was decidedly Irish, for the guard didn’t turn out at all, in the literal sense of the word, at night, but ‘fell in’ on the stone flags of their guardroom.)

The field-officer on this occasion was a Major F——, of a Highland regiment, a jolly, pleasant-looking little man, who evidently enjoyed to the full the good things of this life; and after acknowledging the salute and receiving the report of ‘All correct, sir,’ he desired me to dismiss the guard, and as we left the room, said: ‘I was looking at the bright light in your guardroom window as I came up, and envied you the roaring fire you must have inside, and I daresay a good glass of something hot also. If you don’t mind, I’ll come up and thaw a bit, for it’s snowing hard, and most bitterly cold outside.’

What could I say, but—heaven forgive me—express the pleasure it would give me to do the hospitable; and so, with troubled heart, I bounded up the stairs ostensibly to fetch a candle to light the major up, but really to clear the room of the prisoners, had they left the closet, or, at all events, to warn them of approaching danger if they had not. In either case, I was, however, foiled, as the Grand rounds, though a portly-looking little man, and not active to all appearance, still had the use of his legs, well tried, no doubt, on many a good Highland moor and mountain; and in spite of my knowledge of the staircase, he was in the guardroom close at my heels. It was, however, to all appearance entirely without any occupants save ourselves, and only the remains of the supper looked suspicious. This at once attracted the major; and to his remark that I appeared to have had a party here, I replied loudly, in order to give notice to the prisoners, that some of our fellows had dropped in during the afternoon and had some lunch; that I had had my dinner after they had left, and that my servant had not yet removed the débris; that I dared say there were some oysters still left, and would the major let me get him a few, &c.? which caused the little man’s eyes to twinkle as he toasted himself by the ample fire; and unbuckling his sword, he seated himself in a chair at the table, and fell to without more ceremony, remarking: ‘You are very kind. What Sybarites you —th fellows are! I’ll just take an oyster or two, and qualify with a glass of hot toddy, to keep out the cold of this bitter night.’

After doing ample justice to the supper, he proceeded to undo a couple of the bottom buttons of his doublet, and, with a sigh of satisfaction, drew his chair closer to the fire, and lighting a cigar, settled himself comfortably for a chat. I, too, lighted a pipe, and with an affectation of enjoyment I was far from feeling, I sat opposite to him, and listened to what I have no doubt were very amusing anecdotes, but which fell unheeded upon ears strained to catch a sneeze or cough or other ill-timed sound from the closet. All, however, was quite still there; and after what seemed to me a century of anxious suspense, the Grand rounds finished his glass, and with profuse thanks for my hospitality, rebuckled himself into his sword-belt and took his departure.

It couldn’t have been much more than an hour since he came up-stairs, and yet to me it seemed ages until the outer door again closed on him and I heard his muffled footsteps retreating over the soft snow. But if the time appeared long to me, what must it not have been to the prisoners caged in the stuffy closet! I found them peeping inquiringly out from their prison; and when the ‘Coast clear’ was announced, such a peal of laughter resounded through the old walls as made them ring again; and there being no fear of further disturbance, we straightway drank health and safe home to the jolly old Grand rounds; and seating ourselves at the table with appetites sharpened by the perils we had passed, we did ample justice to the remainder of the supper, and proved that ‘all’s well that ends well’ in a most satisfactory manner. Far into the night, or rather well into the morning, was it before we parted; and as Harry shook my hand at the stair-foot, he said: ‘Good-night, good-night, or rather morning. We are all much obliged for the night’s amusement; but between you and me, old man, I don’t think that I, for one, will ever again join a supper party in the Bank Guard.’ To which I replied: ‘No; nor will you ever catch me again giving one.’

I have since often thought, did Major F—— suspect that the closet had tenants? If he did, he kept it to himself; and though we often met afterwards, he never made any allusion to that night. He may have meant to teach me a lesson, or he may not; but if he did, he did it most kindly, and it has never been forgotten; nor ever since have I disregarded the resolution, ‘Always stick to orders,’ which I formed that winter’s night upon the Bank Guard.

TREASURE TROVE.

A STORY IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CHAP. II.

Around a roaring fire in a little, lone, beetle-browed inn which stood by the sea about six miles from Saint Quinians, known as the _Lobster_, were assembled one evening, about a week after the events recorded in the last chapter, some half-dozen men, whose apparel and appearance proclaimed them fisher-folk. They were sitting simply smoking and drinking, not speaking, for it may be noted that men whose lives are spent in one continual struggle with danger and death are generally silent. It was a wild, wet evening, although it was April, and the great waves were tumbling on the rocky shore with a booming which never ceased, and which was audible above the roar of the wind and the rattle of the rain against the rickety casements, so that the assembly was not a little astonished to hear the voice of the landlord talking with a stranger, and presently to see a tall man, clad from head to foot in waterproofs, enter. All eyes were instantly fixed on him in a suspicious sort of manner, and more than one man rose, for in these days, coast-folk enjoyed almost as little peace on land as at sea, as preventive men were continually poking about in search of smugglers, and the pressgang was hard at work collecting hands for His Majesty’s ships. But as the newcomer was alone, and saluted them with a ‘good-evening’ as he divested himself of his reeking overalls, their momentary alarm seemed to subside, and they made a space for him in the circle round the fire.

The visitor, who was no other than Jasper Rodley, ordered a stiff tumbler of grog and a new pipe, took his seat, and gazed intently at the leaping flames for some moments without speaking. ‘It’s a wretched evening for a walk,’ he said presently; a remark which elicited a gruff murmur of assent from the circle; ‘and the road from Saint Quinians is as hard to follow as the course between Deadland Shoal and the Painter Buoy,’ he continued. He was evidently a sailor, so that eyes were again fixed on him with something of the original suspicion.

There was another pause, during which pipes were puffed vigorously and more than one mug emptied.

Jasper Rodley broke the silence. ‘Doesn’t a Captain West live somewhere hereabouts?’ he asked.

‘Yes, sir,’ replied a man. ‘Can’t mistake the house—a long white un, standing in a bit o’ garden with a flagstaff in it, about two miles towards the town.’

‘Strange sort of man, isn’t he?’ asked Rodley.

‘Well, sir, he’s strange in some things; but nobody don’t know any harm of him,’ replied the man; ‘’cos it’s precious little folk see of him.’

‘Said to be very rich, isn’t he?’ asked Rodley.

This question brought the eyes of the party to bear again upon the speaker, the problem troubling the rude minds being: ‘If this chap wants to see the captain, and hails from Saint Quinians, why on earth does he go two miles farther than he need?’ Mental conclusion arrived at—stranger up to no good.

‘Well, no, mate,’ replied the man to Rodley’s question; ‘he ain’t what you’d call rich, not by no means, seein’ that he’s only a half-pay captain. But he’s been richer durin’ this last four year than he wur afore.’

‘Lives all alone with his daughter, doesn’t he?’ continued Rodley.

Mental conclusion previously arrived at by the party is confirmed.

‘Yes,’ replied the man who acted as spokesman; ‘lives with Miss Bertha, the cap’en do. She’s a proper quean, she is. Purtiest slip of a lass in these parts by a long way. But the cap’en he keeps her uncommon close; can’t a-bear her to be out of his sight; and when she goes into town a-marketin’ on Wednesdays, we says it’s about all the life she sees.’

Another silence ensued, during which the half-dozen pairs of eyes were taking stock of Rodley sideways, and endeavouring to solve the problem of his intentions from his dress and appearance.

At length Rodley said: ‘Wasn’t there a lugger wrecked off here about four years ago called the _Fancy Lass_?’

‘Nobody heard of it,’ replied the spokesman. ‘There was a lugger of that name left Saint Quinians about four years agone; but she warn’t never heard of no more; and bein’ a smuggler, that ain’t surprisin’.’

‘I thought some bodies were washed ashore by the Locket Rock about that time,’ observed Rodley.

‘There’s a sight o’ poor chaps washed ashore hereabouts every gale,’ replied the man. ‘’Tain’t possible allus to say who they be or where they come from. Saint Quinians’ churchyard is full on ’em.’

Not another word was spoken for at least twenty minutes. At the expiration of that time, Rodley rose, went to the door, looked out, remarked that the rain had stopped, put on his overalls, paid his reckoning, wished the company ‘good-night,’ and went out into the darkness.

‘Didn’t get much information out of these chaps!’ he muttered as he pulled his hat down over his face against the driving wind and retraced his steps towards the captain’s house. What with battling against the wind and stumbling about the uneven road in the dark, it was an hour before the solitary light in the captain’s house met Rodley’s gaze. He crossed the small garden and knocked.

Bertha opened the door, and asked timidly: ‘Who is it?’

‘I—Jasper Rodley,’ was the reply.

She uttered a cry of alarm, and would have shut the door, but that Rodley had placed his foot in the opening. The captain hearing his daughter’s cry, came hobbling along the passage hastily. When he beheld Rodley, a cloud came over his face, and he said: ‘Hillo, mate, what is it at this time o’ night?’

‘I want a bed for to-night, and a few words with you, captain,’ said Rodley, who by this time was fairly inside the house, and coolly taking his hat and coat off.

‘But I’ve no room here. There’s an inn farther down, where they’ll put you up better than we can.’

‘I’m a sailor, captain,’ replied Rodley, ‘and I don’t mind where I shake down: that’s of no consequence, but the talk is.’

The captain, who seemed to treat his evidently unwelcome visitor with a kind of deference, shrugged his shoulders, and led the way into the sitting-room, where the remains of a substantial meal graced the table. Jasper Rodley made himself very comfortable in an armchair; the captain, who was the wreck of a fine man, and who, being lame from a recent accident, used a stick, remained standing, as if uncertain how to proceed next; whilst poor Bertha stood, trembling with fright, by the door.

‘Captain,’ said the visitor, ‘isn’t ten o’clock the usual time for young ladies to go to bed?’

At this hint, the old man made a signal to his daughter, who retired.

‘Now then,’ continued Rodley, ‘let’s to business.’

‘I’m not aware that I have any business with you,’ said the captain.

‘Well, you’ll soon have some with me. Look here. We’re men of the world, and we must understand each other. I’ve only met you twice before: each time you were coming from the same place, and each time you were astonished, in fact, alarmed, at seeing me.’

‘Well, sir, and what of that?’ asked the old sailor. ‘Here am I, an old East India Company’s skipper, living in a lonely place, where I don’t see half-a-dozen people in the course of a month. You came upon me suddenly, just when it was getting dark, and I was naturally startled.’

‘O no; that’s not it,’ continued Rodley. ‘But we’ll leave that for a bit. First of all, I’m head over heels in love with your daughter.’

‘I’m sorry for it.’

‘And I intend to marry her,’ continued his visitor.

‘That depends firstly whether she will have you, which I very much doubt,’ said the captain; ‘and secondly upon whether I let her go, which I also doubt.’

‘So you think,’ sneered Rodley. ‘Now, then, to the other matter. Four years ago, you were a poor man.’

‘So I am now,’ retorted the captain.

‘O no; you’re very well off; your private bank is safe enough.’

The captain fidgeted uneasily in his chair at this.

‘You see, I know more than you think,’ said Rodley; and bending over and speaking in a lower tone of voice, he added: ‘Is it not a little curious that you should have come into your fortune about the same time that the _Fancy Lass_ was wrecked about a hundred yards from your house?’

The poor old captain’s amazement and perplexity culminated here in a start which sent his pipe flying from his hand. ‘Why, how do you know? Who told you?’ gasped the old man. ‘Not a soul escaped from her.’

Jasper Rodley looked searchingly at him for a moment, and said: ‘Perhaps not. That’s got nothing to do with what we are talking about.’

‘And the boat went to pieces,’ added the captain.

‘You’re almost as well up in the subject as I am,’ said Rodley. ‘But she was wrecked on Sherringham Shoal, and went to pieces on the Locket Rock.’

‘Well?’ asked the captain.

‘And her cargo—valuable cargo it was,’ continued Rodley, actually smiling with enjoyment at the misery he was causing—‘her cargo was recovered.’

The old man rose and hobbled about the room in a state of pitiable agony. ‘How do you know?’ he asked desperately.

‘The last time I met you,’ replied Rodley, ‘you were so startled that you dropped something—this.’ He put his hand into his pocket and drew out a sovereign.

‘What do you infer from that?’

‘Why, what’s the use of asking me what I infer? What’s the most natural inference I should draw?’

The captain resumed his seat, and was silent for some minutes. In the meanwhile, Rodley filled another pipe and mixed himself a glass of grog.

At length the old man said: ‘I understand the case to be this. You want to marry my daughter. If I refuse, you’ll’——

‘I will expose you as having taken property which does not belong to you,’ replied Rodley.

‘You must prove it,’ cried the captain. ‘Why shouldn’t I keep my money where I think fit? This is a lonely house, in a dangerous neighbourhood; the folk all about are desperate men—wreckers, smugglers, old privateersmen, escaped pressed-men—men who, if they thought I kept money and valuables on the premises, would not hesitate to rob me; and what could we, a lame old man and a young girl, do to protect ourselves?’

‘I can prove it,’ continued Rodley quietly. ‘But I’m not such a fool as to tell you how I can prove it. Look here; we need not waste words over it. You are in my power; you cannot escape. The price I put upon keeping silence upon a matter which would bring you into the felon’s dock, is the hand of your daughter Bertha. I give you a week to decide, for the matter presses, and I do not intend to remain longer than I can help at Saint Quinians.’

‘Then you would take my Bertha far away from me!’ exclaimed the old man in horror.

‘Not necessarily; my business is on the sea. When I am away, she would remain with you. It would comfort you, and relieve me of the expense of keeping up an establishment, and would thus be an agreeable arrangement for both parties. Is that a bargain?’

The old man bowed his head.

‘Mind,’ said Rodley, smiling, as he rose to go to bed, ‘I shall keep strict watch on the—on the bank!’

THE CORACLE.

Having seen this boat of ancient Britain on those Welsh rivers where it has been wont to float since the commencement of the historic period—having seen a Welsh fisherman ferry his wife over the Towy in a coracle, we will endeavour to describe this antique relic and to relate a few leading facts of its history. Before the subjugation of the British, this boat of theirs was probably found in all parts of England; it is now confined to Wales, the last stronghold of the British after the arrival of the Saxons—or English, as they are now called. It is found, in fact, only in a few parts of Wales; and in the course of this short narrative we shall not ramble far in other regions, though it may be interesting to mention that boats exactly similar in structure to the coracle of Wales are frequently used in many parts of India for the purpose of crossing the rivers of that great country; and this forms one of those obscure links which Mr Borrow loved to dilate upon in his _Wild Wales_, a book of wonderful attraction both to the learned and to travellers and tourists. Joining all the links together into a connected chain, and taking language into account, the evidence is strong that the Welsh, or ancient British, were originally emigrants from India.

The antiquity of this queer little ark—for it is more ark than boat in shape—is undoubted. Herodotus describes the common boats of the Euphrates as having been in all respects similar in pattern and construction to the coracles of Wales. The materials for making these simple, home-built vessels were naturally such as the particular country might afford. In India they were made of wicker, covered with skins; and on the Euphrates they were of willow, covered with hides. In the salmon-fishing season, almost any day except Sunday from April till the end of August, coracles may still be observed on the rivers Towy and Teivy, having remained there unaltered from the time when the attention of Cæsar was attracted by them during his campaign in Britain. A fisherman still slings his boat over his back, and carries it home in that position; and on reaching his dwelling, he sets it erect against the house-wall, and leaves it there till he again goes fishing, when he carries it back to the water. An old Welsh adage runs, ‘A man’s load is his coracle;’ and in former times, when this old-fashioned boat was covered with raw hides, the load must have been a heavy one. The hides, however, have now been discarded for a light covering made of waterproof canvas. The shape of the coracle remains unaltered. It is the broadest of boats in proportion to its length, hence it moves through the water under the alternate stroke of the paddle with a motion like the waddling of a duck.

The time arrived, as it usually does to men of genius, when Cæsar turned the idea of the coracle to good account. Ptolemy had destroyed his bridges, and the only boats that could have saved him were such as he could build quickly of any common materials which might come to hand. He remembered the coracle, which he had seen in Britain built of hazel, or willow, or any kind of rods that were capable of being woven so as to form a framework for the covering of skins. Cæsar immediately proceeded to construct his boats; and by means of a number of coracles of large size, but rapidly constructed, his army successfully crossed the river, which had stopped and endangered its march.

A Welsh coracle for one passenger upsets so easily that a stroke from a salmon’s tail is said to be more than the cranky little boat can bear without being overturned. One person forms a full freight for a coracle of the usual size, besides the one who uses the paddle; and that person being the oarsman’s wife, he places her cautiously in the stern, and declines a second passenger.

When there are two persons to be ferried over, one of them is usually taken across first, and the other is left on the bank, and brought over afterwards. During the voyage, certain precautions must be observed, which are well understood by all persons accustomed to this kind of navigation. But we remember on one occasion, when an English lady, a tourist, was in the act of crossing the river below Cardigan, some of her friends having already crossed, while others watched behind—for her precautions before setting out had been elaborate. She had no sooner reached the middle of the stream than she rose suddenly to her feet, and the next moment was capsized and sprawling in the water. It is a ‘rule of the road’ never to stand up in a coracle.

This ancient boat possesses mythological as well as historical interest, since it was first used symbolically in some of the curious mystical rites of the Druids. Among the traditions of Bardism was that of the bursting of the ‘lake of waters,’ when all mankind were drowned except a single pair, who escaped to Wales in a naked vessel—that is, a ship without sails. According to the Triads, this ark of Wales contained a male and female of all living creatures including the parents of the Cymry, or Welsh people. This human couple were in due time deified, the Noah of the Cymry sharing this honour with his wife. His symbol was an ox; hers, a cow. A Bardish and very singular rite of sacrifice to one of these deities took place, curiously enough, at the very spot where the largest number of coracles is now stationed, a boat of this kind being used in the ceremony. At the mouth of the Teivy, in Cardigan Bay, where the coracles are now used in trawling and setting nets for the salmon-fishing, three miles below Cardigan, at the little fishing village of St Dogmels, the sacrifice was celebrated. At the appointed time, the Druids, clad in their emblematic white robes, and the Bards in robes of sky-blue, assembled at the spot, when the victim was placed in the coracle and the frail boat was turned adrift.

The coracle figured also on the important occasion of the probation of a Bard, when it was used by the neophyte, or probationer, in his passage to and from the island of Sarn Badrig, off the coast of Carnarvonshire. In rough weather this would be an impossible feat. Probably the Gwyddnaw (priest of the ship) selected a suitable day for this occasion. Having brought the novice to the shore, the usual confession was pronounced by him in these words: ‘Though I love the sea-beach, I dread the open sea; a billow may come undulating over a stone!’ The priest then spoke as follows, to reassure the novice: ‘To the brave, to the magnanimous, to the amiable, to the generous, who boldly embarks, the landing-place of the Bards will prove the harbour of life.’

We will only add to this brief account of the coracle, or river-boat of ancient Britain, that the name is derived from _corwg_, a ship.

HOSTESS AND GUEST.