Kenneth McAlpine Part 19

But one thing the English have is this, Archie, sound common-sense and a love of derring-do.

"I was standing one day on the pier at Plymouth. I had played my way with my flute all this distance in the hopes of getting a ship. I was no more successful than before.

"On this particular day, Archie, the drum was up [the storm signal], the wind blew cold and high, and the seas tossed their white manes as they rushed each other up the bay. I was feeling very sad and disconsolate, when all at once I heard a voice say to a man beside me,--

"'I'll give a guinea to be taken out to yonder ship.'

"'I don't care to win no guinea,' said the fellow addressed, a hulking boatman in a rough blue jersey. 'I don't care to win no guinea on a day like this. 'Sides, sir, I hain't got no mate.'

"'I'll go,' I cried.

"'You!' said the gentleman; 'why, you're but a child.'

"'I'm a Scotch boy,' I replied, 'and I know boating well.'

"'All right, my lad; jump in.'

"It took us nearly an hour, but we did it.

"I was very wet, and the gentleman kindly took me below, and gave me warm coffee.

"'Now,' he said, 'I'm going to give you half a guinea, and the man half, for if he has to change the gold, he will cheat you.'

"'Are you captain of this ship, sir?' I asked.

"'I am, lad; I'm all that is for the captain.'

"'Well, sir,' I said, 'give the man all the guinea, and take me with you as a boy.'

"I then told him all my story.

"'We don't sail for a week,' he said, 'and if in that time you get your mother's consent, I'll be glad to have so plucky a youngster on board my craft.'

"My dear mother gave her consent, as you know, Archie; and so I became a sailor and a wanderer."

I have but epitomised Kenneth's story. He took much longer time to tell it than I, the author of this little book, am doing, and besides, there was much conversation interspersed with it betwixt him and his old friend Archie.

The moon was high up above the forest trees before he finished, shedding a flood of golden light over mountain and sea, so, promising to resume his narrative next evening, Kenneth arose, and soon after all was silent and dark inside this peaceful cottage.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

KENNETH'S STORY (CONTINUED)--AT THE CAVE.

"On, on the vessel flies; the land is gone, And winds are rude in Biscay's sleepless bay; Four days are sped, but with the fifth anon, New sh.o.r.es descried make every bosom gay."

Byron.

Scene: The Spanish Senor and his two guests, Kenneth and Archie, once more together, not in the mountain cottage to-night, but in a cave, close down by the edge of the sea. It was the sea that was lisping on the sands not far from where they sat on the rocks, but the view beyond was one of moonlight, trees, rocks, and water combined, altogether very beautiful, and in some respects almost English-like.

Yes, now by moonlight it looked thoroughly English, but if by day you had rowed round these rocks, you would soon have been undeceived, for sharks in dozens visited the deep water, and in the cracks beyond were alligators, active and strong, and very hideous-looking crabs often crawled up the wet black cliffs; and among the trees themselves were great snakes, deadly and venomous; but it all looked very quiet and lovely now.

Kenneth was fond of caves, and there were plenty of them about here. He kept his boat in one. That very day, together the two friends had launched it, and spent all the long hours of sunlight in sailing or rowing about among the lovely islands of this sparkling sea, that look on a calm day as if they were actually afloat not in the water, but in the sky itself.

"My life," said Kenneth, resuming his narrative of the day before, "my life, I thought, was going to be all rose-tinted now.

"Alas! Archie, lad, I soon found it quite the reverse, and it does really seem to me that those writers of books who paint a sailor's existence as one long picnic do grievous wrong to the young folks who read them.

"A sailor's life is like the billowy ocean on which he resides, all ups and downs, Archie."

"I can easily believe that," said his friend.

"But Captain Pendrey was very good to me, and there was an old boatswain on board who became my friend from the very first. He taught me to reef, to splice, and to steer, ay, and a deal more; in fact, during the two years I sailed in the old _Miranda_, he made a man of me.

"You see, Archie, I was already so far a seaman that I was not afraid of the ocean; and I was good at an oar.

"I was downright seasick when I first went out of Plymouth Sound. We had a head wind, and being only a sailing craft, had to beat and beat for days. I didn't care much then what became of me. But the rough old bo'sun came and shook me up--I was lying nearly dead on a sea-chest--'Pull yourself together, youngster. Go on deck,' he said, 'and look at the waves. Ain't they mountains, just! It won't do to give in.'

"I did go on deck and look at the waves, just for a moment. A green sea came thundering over the bows, took me off my legs, and washed me away down into the lee-scuppers, where I would have been drowned if the bo'sun hadn't caught me up.

"'I'm not going below again, though,' I said to myself.

"Nor did I.

"The boats were all on board; I got into one of these as night fell, lashed myself to a thwart, and wet though I was, I slept with my head on a coil of ropes all through that stormy night. Stiff in the morning?

Yes, a little, but I was better. I got my clothes off, and a man dashed buckets of sea water over me, and this revived me so much that I went below.

"The men in my mess were at breakfast; they were sitting on deck, jammed into corners anyhow, with their sou'wester hats between their legs to steady their coffee mugs.

"'Salt pork, my lad,' said the bo'sun. 'You're just at that stage that salt pork will turn the scale.'

"I took the hunk of pork he gave me and devoured it.

"Well, the bo'sun was right. It did turn the scale with a vengeance: I went on deck and hove the lead apparently. The steward pa.s.sed me and said,--

"'You're not sick, are you, Sandie?'

"'No,' I said, 'I'm only shamming. Ugh!'

"But by the time we were over the bay I was as sea-fast as any one on board. I got my sea legs, too.

"How blue the sea was now! How white the birds that skimmed over its surface! And the sails of ships that appeared in the distance were like snow when the sun shone over them.

"It wasn't all sunshine even then, for a smart breeze was blowing, and cloud shadows chasing each other over the sea, just as I had often seen them do over fields of ripening grain in Glen Alva.

"I settled down to sea-life very easily now and very naturally. I soon knew every rope and spar and bolt in her, and was as happy as the sea-gulls. I cannot say more.

"We touched at Madeira, and here the captain took me on sh.o.r.e, and all over the place. What an isle of romance and beauty it is!

"We called in both at Saint Helena and Ascension, the former not the lonely sea-girt rock that old books describe, but a charming island of mountain, strath, and glen. Nor did I find Ascension to be a cinder with a few turtles on its beach. It has been cultivated to a wonderful extent, and I never did see a bluer, brighter ocean than that which laves its sh.o.r.es. The Cape of Good Hope hove in sight at last. I watched its bold and rugged coast as we came nearer and still more near to it.