Read Ebook: Under the White Ensign: A Naval Story of the Great War by Westerman Percy F Percy Francis Hodgson E S Edward Smith Illustrator

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THE BROTHERS AT HOME.

Twenty years ago, not twenty miles from the Land's End, there lived a Cornish gentleman named Trevannion. Just twenty years ago he died, leaving to lament him a brace of noble boys, whose mother all three had mourned, with like profound sorrow, but a short while before.

Any one knowing the conditions under which the young Trevannions received their two thousand pounds must have believed it to be a gift, since it was handed over to them by the family solicitor with the private understanding that they were to use it in pushing their fortunes elsewhere,--anywhere except in Cornwall!

The land-pirate who had plucked them--for in reality had they been plucked--did not wish them to stay at home, divested, as they were, of their valuable plumage. He had appropriated their fine feathers, and cared not for the naked bodies of the birds.

There were those in Cornwall who suspected foul play in the lawyer's dealings with the young Trevannions, among others, the victims themselves. But what could they, do? They were utterly ignorant of their late father's affairs,--indeed, with any affairs that did not partake of the nature of "sports." A solicitor "most respectable,"--a phrase that has become almost synonymous with rascality,--a regular church-goer,--accounts kept with scrupulous exactness,--a man of honest face, distinguished for probity of speech and integrity of heart,--what could the Trevannions do? What more than the Smiths and the Browns and the Joneses, who, notwithstanding their presumed greater skill in the ways of a wicked lawyer world, are duped every day in a similar manner. It is an old and oft-repeated story,--a tale too often told, and too often true,--that of the family lawyer and his confiding client, standing in the relationship of robber and robbed.

The two children of Squire Trevannion could do nothing to save or recover their paternal estate. Caught in the net of legal chicanery, they were forced to yield, as other squires' children have had to do, and make the best, of a bad matter,--forced to depart from a home that had been held by Trevannions perhaps since the Phoenicians strayed thitherward in search of their shining tin.

They were at this period something more than mere children. Ralph had reached within twelve months of being twenty. Richard was his junior by a couple of years. Their book-education had been good; the practice of manly sports had imparted to both of them a physical strength that fitted them for toil, either of the mind or body. They were equal to a tough struggle, either in the intellectual or material world; and to this they determined to resign themselves.

For a time they debated between themselves where they should go, and what do. The army and navy came under their consideration. With such patronage as their father's former friends could command, and might still exert in favour of their fallen fortunes, a commission in either army or navy was not above their ambition. But neither felt much inclined towards a naval or military life; the truth being, that a thought had taken shape in their minds leading them to a different determination.

Their deliberations ended by each of them proclaiming a resolve,--almost sealing it with a vow,--that they would enter into some more profitable, though perhaps less pretentious, employment than that of either soldiering or sailoring; that they would toil--with their hands, if need be--until they should accumulate a sufficient sum to return and recover the ancestral estate from the grasp of the avaricious usurper. They did not know how it was to be done; but, young, strong, and hopeful, they believed it might be done,--with time, patience, and industry to aid them in the execution.

"Where shall we go?" inquired Richard, the younger of the two. "To America, where every poor man appears to prosper? With a thousand each to begin the world with, we might do well there. What say you, Ralph?"

"I do."

"I don't much like the United States as a home,--not because it is a republic, for I believe that is the only just form of government, whatever our aristocratic friends may say. I object to it simply because I wish to go south,--to some part of the tropical world, where one may equally be in the way of acquiring a fortune."

"Is there such a place?"

"There is."

"Where, brother?"

"Peru. Anywhere along the Sierra of the Andes from Chili to the Isthmus of Panama. As Cornish men we should adopt the specialty of our province, and become miners. The Andes mountains will give us that opportunity, where, instead of grey tin, we may delve for yellow gold. What say you to South America?"

"I like the thought of South America,--nothing would please me better than going there. But I must confess, brother, I have no inclination for the occupation you speak of. I had rather be a merchant than a miner."

"If you will it--I'm agreed."

"Thither then let us go."

THE BROTHERS ABROAD.

Ralph and Richard Trevannion. If it were so, a gap of some fifteen years--after the date of their arrival at Cerro Pasco--would have to be filled up. I decline to speak of this interval of their lives, simply because the details might not have any remarkable interest for those before whom they would be laid.

Suffice it to say, that Richard, the younger, soon became wearied of a miner's life; and, parting with his brother, he crossed the Cordilleras, and descended into the great Amazonian forest,--the "montana," as it is called by the Spanish inhabitants of the Andes. Thence, in company with a party of Portuguese traders, he kept on down the river Amazon, trading along its banks, and upon some of its tributary streams; and finally established himself as a merchant at its mouth, in the thriving "city" of Gran Para.

Richard was not unsocial in his habits; and soon became the husband of a fair-haired wife,--the daughter of a countryman who, like himself, had established commercial relations at Para. In a few years after, several sweet children called him "father,"--only two of whom survived to prattle in his ears this endearing appellation, alas! no longer to be pronounced in the presence of their mother.

Fifteen years after leaving the Land's End, Richard Trevannion, still under thirty-five years of age, was a widower, with two children,-- respected wherever known, prosperous in pecuniary affairs,--rich enough to return home, and spend the remainder of his days in that state so much desired by the Sybarite Roman poet,--"otium cum dignitate."

Did he remember the vow mutually made between him and his brother, that, having enough money, they would one day go back to Cornwall, and recover the ancestral estate? He did remember it. He longed to accomplish this design, he only awaited his brother's answer to a communication he had made to him on this very subject.

He had no doubt that Ralph's desire would be in unison with his own,-- that his brother would soon join him, and then both would return to their native land,--perhaps to dwell again under the same roof that had sheltered them as children.

Like his brother, he got married at an early period,--in fact, within the first year after establishing himself in Cerro Pasco. Unlike the latter, however, he chose for his wife one of the women of the country,--a beautiful Peruvian lady. She too, but a short while before, had gone to a better world, leaving motherless two pretty children, of twelve and fourteen years of age,--the elder of the two being a daughter.

Such was the family of Ralph Trevannion, and such the condition of life in which his brother's epistle reached him,--that epistle containing the proposal that they should wind lip their respective businesses, dispose of both, and carry their gains to the land that had given them birth.

The proposition was at once accepted, as Richard knew it would be. It was far from the first time that the thing had been discussed, epistolary fashion, between them; for letters were exchanged as often as opportunity permitted,--sometimes twice or thrice in the year.

In these letters, during the last few years of their sojourn in South America, the promise made on leaving home was mutually mentioned, and as often renewed on either side. Richard knew that his brother was as eager as himself to keep that well-remembered vow.

So long as the mother of Ralph's children was alive, he had not urged his brother to its fulfilment; but now that she had been dead for more than a year, he had written to say that the time had come for their return to their country and their home.

His proposal was, that Ralph, having settled his affairs in Peru,-- which, of course, included the selling out of his share in the mines,-- should join him, Richard, at Para, thence to take ship for England. That instead of going round by Cape Horn, or across the Isthmus, by Panama, Ralph should make the descent of the great Amazon River, which traverse would carry him latitudinally across the continent from west to east.

How this last wish was to be gratified by his brother making the descent of the Amazon, may require explanation; but it will suffice to say that the son of Richard Trevannion was at that time residing with his uncle at the mines of Cerro Pasco.

The merchant's wish was to be gratified. The miner had no desire to refuse compliance with his proposal. On the contrary, it chimed in with his own inclinations. Ralph Trevannion possessed a spirit adventurous as his brother's, which fourteen years of mining industry, carried on in the cold mountains of Cerro Pasco, had neither deadened nor chilled. The thought of once more returning to the scenes of his youth quite rejuvenated him; and on the day of receiving his brother's challenge to go, he not only accepted it, but commenced proceedings towards carrying the design into execution.

THE GALATEA.

On an evening in the early part of December, a craft of singular construction might have been seen descending the Solimoes, and apparently making for the little Portuguese port of Coary, that lies on the southern side of the river.

Perhaps the most singular sight on board this embarkation was the group of animated beings who composed its crew and passengers. The former, as already stated, were dark-skinned men scantily clad,--in fact, almost naked, since a single pair of white cotton drawers constituted the complete costume of each.

For passengers there were three men, and a like number of individuals of younger age. Two of the men were white, apparently Europeans; the other was as black as soot could have made him,--unquestionably an African negro. Of the young people two were boys, not much differing in size, and apparently not much in age, while the third was a half-grown girl, of dark complexion, raven-coloured hair, and beautiful features.

One of the white men appeared to be, and was, the proprietor of the montaria, and the employer of its swarthy crew. He was Ralph Trevannion.

The young girl was his daughter, and bore her Peruvian mother's name, Rosa, more often pronounced by its diminutive of endearment, Rosita. The younger of the two boys--also of dark complexion--was his son Ralph; while the older, of true Saxon physiognomy and hue, was the son of his brother, also bearing his father's Christian name, Richard.

About the negro there was nothing special, more than that he was a pure negro, with enormously thick lips, flattened nose, long protruding heels, teeth white as hippopotamus ivory, and almost always set in a good-humoured grin. The darkey had been a sailor, or rather ship-steward, before landing in Peru. Thither had he strayed, and settled at Cerro Pasco after several years spent aboard ship. He was a native of Mozambique, on the eastern coast of Africa, to which circumstance was he indebted for the only name ever given him,--Mozey.

Both he and the Irishman were the servants of the miner, or rather his retainers, who served him in various ways, and had done so almost ever since his establishing himself among the rocks of Cerro Pasco.

The other creatures of the animated kingdom that found lodgment upon the craft were of various shapes, sizes, and species. There were quadrupeds, quadrumana, and birds,--beasts of the field, monkeys of the forest, and birds of the air,--clustering upon the cabin top, squatted in the hold, perched upon the gangway, the toldo, the yard, and the mast,--forming an epitomised menagerie, such as may be seen on every kind of craft that navigates the mighty Amazon.

It is not our design to give any description of the galatea's crew. There were nine of them,--all Indians,--four on each side acting as rowers, or more properly "paddlers," the ninth being the pilot or steersman, standing abaft the toldo.

Our reason for not describing them is that they were a changing crew, only attached to the craft for a particular stage of the long river voyage, and had succeeded several other similar sets since the embarkation of our voyagers on the waters of the upper Amazon. They had joined the galatea at the port of Ega, and would take leave of her at Coary, where a fresh crew of civilised Indians--"tapuyos"--would be required.

The owner of the galatea endeavoured to tempt the Ega crew to continue another stage. It was contrary to their habit, and they refused to go. Persuasion and threats were tried in vain. Coaxing and scolding proved equally unavailable; all except one remained firm in their refusal, the exception being an old Indian who did not belong to the Ega tribe, and who could not resist the large bribe offered by Trevannion.

The voyagers must either suspend their journey till the Coary turtle-hunters should return, or proceed without paddlers. The hunters were not expected for a month. To stay a month at Coary was out of the question. The galatea must go on manned by her own people, and the old Indian who was to act as pilot. Such was the determination of Ralph Trevannion. But for that resolve,--rash as it was, and ending unfortunately for him who made it,--we should have no story to tell.

DRIFTING WITH THE CURRENT.

The craft that carried the ex-miner, his family and following, once more floated on the broad bosom of the Solimoes. Not so swift as before, since, instead of eight paddlers, it was now impelled by only half the number,--these, too, with less than half the experience of the crew who had preceded them.

The owner himself acted as steersman, while the paddles were plied by "Tipperary Tom," Mozey, the old Indian,--who, being of the Mundurucu tribe, passed by the name of "Munday,"--and Richard Trevannion.

The last, though by far the youngest, was perhaps the best paddler in the party. Brought up in his native place of Gran Para, he had been accustomed to spend half his time either in or upon the water; and an oar or paddle was to him no novelty.

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