The Life of a Celebrated Buccaneer Part 12

"It will be a costly affair, for I needs must make gigantic preparations. I shall have to go into training."

"Name but your sum, Dogvane, and it is yours," cried the fighting old Buccaneer in an ecstasy of delight.

"It cannot be done comfortably, sir, under 11,000,000," replied the captain.

"It is yours, Dogvane! It is yours, I am rich, and I am generous."

"Has the taking off of my coat in any way frightened him, my master?

Your eyesight is better than mine."

"Not a bit, Dogvane. The beggar is dancing about just as if the whole place belonged to him. Go in, old man, and win. Nail your colours to the mast," the old sea king could not forget his early days, with its quaint language. "And may G.o.d defend the right!" he piously exclaimed as he took off his hat and raised his eyes devoutly to heaven. Of course there could be little doubt in the Buccaneer's own mind as to who was in the right. As has already been stated he fully believed that G.o.d was always on his side, and if he did come off second best, it was the Devil who for some good reason was allowed, for the time being, to prevail against him. This is a pardonable vanity and is shared by many other pious and devout people. With Dogvane it was different. He was blessed, or cursed according to the way it is looked at, with a most tender conscience, and though he never allowed it for any length of time to stand in his way, it caused him so to act, that people condemned him as a splitter of straws and a weigher of scruples. While he was thus occupied he generally allowed the golden opportunity to pa.s.s by and thus he frequently brought his wares to the market a day or so after the fair.

And many a time the words "too late" were hung out over the gate he wished to enter at.

Scarcely had the Buccaneer finished the above pious e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n than Dogvane's stout right arm fell listlessly to his side. He drooped his head as he repeated, in a low tone of voice, the words of his master: "And may G.o.d defend the right! That sends a cold thrill through every vein in my body. Suppose," he said, addressing his master. "Suppose; I say suppose, my master, we are in the wrong, what a weight of blood-guiltiness will rest upon our heads? Suppose we are in the wrong, and being in the wrong we spill the blood of a fellow-creature? Good master, I have a qualm of conscience."

"Oh! d.a.m.n your conscience!" cried the Buccaneer, whose blood was up. Of course such language is reprehensible in the extreme; no matter who uses it; but it is doubly so when it falls from the lips of a pious Christian gentleman. But, good people all, what is bred in the bone, will come out in the flesh. Dogvane recoiled from such language.

"d.a.m.n not my conscience, sir, nor that of any other man," he said, for his religion was unlike many a modern lady's beauty, it was even more than skin deep.

"Conscience," continued Dogvane, "is the guiding star by which we steer these frail barks of ours through life. Too many of us do not, consequently we find ourselves lost amidst shoals and quicksands. In a just cause, in a righteous cause I will fight."

"What!" cried the Buccaneer in amazement, "are you going to put your coat on again?"

"This, sir, is a matter that must receive our gravest consideration.

Before we fight we must thoroughly sift the matter in the inmost recesses of the mind, until we are fully convinced of the sacredness of our cause. The man--"

"Stay, Master Dogvane! Not another word in that direction as you value the wholeness of your skin. Give me anything you like; but damme, don't try my temper with another sentiment."

"What I was going to say, most n.o.ble master, is this. If we have in any way offended the Bandit of the East, we must make what reparation we can by craving his pardon."

"What!" cried the Buccaneer, "are you going to humble me before all the world?"

"Nay, sir; call it not by such a name. It is a n.o.ble thing, and the act of a great and generous mind to own freely that it is in the wrong. I do not humble you. I exalt you and place you upon a high pinnacle of perfection. It requires more courage to own oneself in the wrong than it does to take up the sword. It stands to reason, sir, that we both cannot be in the right; this being conceded why should not the wrong be on our side, nay, what more likely than that it is? Let us then sheathe the b.l.o.o.d.y brutalizing sword until the merits of the case are fully shown."

"And are all your mighty words to go for nothing, Master Dogvane? How about my honour? How about my honour?" said the Buccaneer sorrowfully.

"Honour, sir!" replied Dogvane. "Honour! what is honour that you should shed human blood over it? It is but a breath that comes from the mouths of other people, and the same mouth is as ready to d.a.m.n as bless. This honour, what is it? It is here to-day, it is gone to-morrow, and is hunted often to death by envy, hatred, and malice, until in the end it is handed over to the tender mercies of its adversary shame. This self same honour that is so much lauded, is a picker of quarrels, a shedder of blood, a vain boaster, and a veritable swashbuckler. This honour is the veriest bubble that man ever fought for, or prated about, and it has done more mischief in the world than any other of man's vain causes of strife; because no principle has been so plentifully abused, except, perhaps, the principle of religion. For this self same honour, or its shadow, you have sacrificed countless thousands of your own sons, and slaughtered countless thousands of other people's. For the sake of this honour you have burdened yourself with a debt that you will carry with you to your grave and it will bend your back, more and more each day you live. G.o.d grant that in the end it does not crush you beneath its weight. We will place this matter in the hands of others who will arbitrate between you and the Eastern Bandit, who, I cannot but think, is grossly maligned. This, good master, will be a more humane, a more civilised, and a more Christian method of settling your dispute."

During this harangue of Dogvane's the spirits of the Buccaneer kept on falling and falling until despair sat heavily at his heart. There was something quite pathetic in his bearing as he said: "Master Dogvane, I do not wish to be better than my neighbours. They are all Christians, and yet they all fight. Madame France is armed to the teeth. My German cousin sleeps in armour always, with one eye open. Then, why should I hang up my sword, pistols and buckler and resent neither rebuke, insult, nor injury? In such a matter as this, is it wise to trust to a third party?"

"Master, what does your religion teach you? Be you the pioneer of a better state of things. G.o.d knows we have had fighting enough."

"I wish my old c.o.xswain were here," said the Buccaneer. "This is an occasion when his advice would come in well." Perhaps, had he been present he might have told his master that he had better turn monk at once and start a monastery if he intended to follow the advice of the captain of the watch. Why, you ask, did not this fighting, hard swearing, and hard drinking old sea king whip out his hanger and go in at the Bandit himself?

Good people all, it must be remembered, that he now conducted his business on purely const.i.tutional principles, and he would have violated some one or many of these had he so acted. So wedded was he to his const.i.tution that it is probable he would have preferred to be utterly ruined by sticking to it, than saved by going in any way against it. He was a great stickler for routine, red tape, and custom. They, for the time, left the Eastern Bandit in the full enjoyment of his actions.

Dogvane broke the silence. "Sir," he said, "I have in my mind's eye a worthy potentate who may, for a small consideration, be induced to serve you in this dispute you have with the Eastern Bandit. King Hokeepokeewonkeefum--"

"What!" exclaimed the Buccaneer, in surprise.

"Does the length of the name astonish you, sir? We have near neighbours whose names, were they all joined together, far exceed the one just mentioned. All great and ill.u.s.trious people have long names; but they are all capable of contraction. King Hokee, sir, as we will for brevity call him."

"What!" exclaimed the Buccaneer again, almost breathless with amazement.

"Entrust my affairs to a black?" There was an adjective used, but for various reasons it has not been recorded.

"Surely, sir," replied Dogvane, "you are above the prejudice of colour.

Though black, King Hokee has no doubt a mind particularly free from prejudice. Is he not a man and a brother? Besides, sir, to borrow somewhat from perhaps a greater William than myself: Hath not King Hokee eyes? Hath he not hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, pa.s.sions? If he has not I have no official information on the subject.

Is he not fed by the same food, hurt by the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as we are? If you p.r.i.c.k King Hokee, think you he will not bleed? If you tickle him, will he not laugh? If you poison him, will he not die?"

"Cease, Master Dogvane; no more of this. You have stabbed me, and verily I bleed. To think that the old sea king should be brought so low as to ask a favour from a d.a.m.ned black!"

For certain weighty reasons the adjective here is not omitted.

"Have I then no friend, Master Dogvane; no great neighbour to whom I can entrust this affair?"

"It is one of the penalties attached to greatness, sir, to be without friends. The great stand upon an eminence and look down upon a gaping crowd of admirers, flatterers, and detractors; but they have no friends, at least not worth the mentioning. Besides, King Hokee would do the thing cheaper. A tin star with an appropriate appellation would satisfy him, and you could make him pay handsomely for the star."

"Am I then placed so high up on this bleak and sterile peak? I have done a great deal for Egypt; surely she will show me some little kindness? To show that my prejudice for colour is not great I will place the matter in her hands."

"People served, sir, have but short memories," was Dogvane's reply.

"We will at any rate break our journey back there, Master Dogvane, and we can mention the subject to the gipsy queen."

The captain did not seem to relish this, for he said in a disparaging manner: "Yes, you have done a good deal for the gipsy; but the man who does not wish to be disappointed will expect grat.i.tude from no one, least of all from a woman. In Egypt, sir, our game has been, I own, a subtle one; but, like the villain in the play, we have been obliged, and still must dissemble, so as not to excite the jealousy of our neighbours."

Dogvane loved dissembling. "Sir," he added, as he shut one eye and put the forefinger of his right hand to the side of his nose in a most knowing manner, "we have not thought it wise to let the gipsy woman into our little secret. We have set up in Egypt a dummy whom we call a ruler.

Behind his back we pull the strings of administration. When all goes well we come in front and make our bow to the audience, and receive our well merited applause. When anything goes wrong, we beat our dummy; he does not mind, and it would be all the same if he did; our neighbours are satisfied, and their suspicions are allayed."

"Is this honourable, Dogvane?"

"Sir, it is most diplomatic, consequently, it cannot be less than honourable."

The Buccaneer thought for awhile and then said: "It would have been better for me, Master Dogvane, to have seized the country at once. There would have been a cackling in some of my neighbours' poultry yards, but it would have saved an infinity of trouble in the end."

Dogvane was horrified at such a suggestion. This was a falling off and a going back with a vengeance. "Such a wholesale act of robbery," he said, "would perhaps have been pardonable in your old Buccaneering days, when you laid your hands on what you could, and did all you could to keep it; but in this, your age of extreme respectability, it would never do. Why!

you would have had all your neighbours buzzing about your ears like a swarm of angry wasps. The act would have been most undiplomatic."

Here apparently some unpleasant thoughts entered the Buccaneer's mind, for a cloud pa.s.sed over his face. "Diplomacy," he said; "that has never been a very strong point with me. I like to be open and above board, at least, at one time I did, and I loved to call a spade a spade. This diplomacy, Master Dogvane, is a genteel kind of a highwayman, who is not above insinuating his hands into the pockets of the unwary, while he distracts the attention of his victim by expressing towards him the highest esteem and regard. I would quite as soon he showed himself in his true colours and cried out boldly: 'Stand and deliver.'"

CHAPTER XXVI.

The journey homewards was a sad one, for the spirits of the old sea king were entirely broken. The captain of the watch tried all he could to cheer him up. He drew in fancy a pleasing picture of the island home they had left; of the contentment, prosperity, and happiness that reigned there, and old Dogvane did not forget to lay on the colours. As an artist in this line he was extremely good. As they left the domes and minarets of the grand Turk behind them, Dogvane turned to his master and said: "I cannot see why so good and great a man as my august master is, should not be content to rest upon the laurels he has already earned."

Flattery is at all times acceptable, and to all people; the only difference being that to suit the vulgar appet.i.te you must lay it on thick, while to the refined the touches must be delicate and smooth.

Dogvane, seeing the good effect that this kind of physic had upon his master, administered a little more. "Now take this Egyptian woman's case. See what you have done for her. You have tried to put down slavery. You have set your face against the brutal lash. You have tried at least to banish the evil-minded, blood-sucking Pasha, and in doing all this you have spent millions of money, and have sacrificed many of your bravest sons. One, even, we immolated at the shrine of the great G.o.d Necessity. We placed him in a pit even as Joseph was placed in a pit; but alas! Joseph was more fortunate; our offering was slain. Think you, sir, that in return for all this you will receive grat.i.tude?"