it described, it appeared aprincely fortune. There would be no longer any need for me to sail theseas. I could settle down in life, or I could choose some honourablecareer on shore, and, if I was good for anything at all, distinguishmyself therein.
Or, stay, I thought, should I become a soldier? "No, no, no," was theanswer of my soul. The war was past and gone; even the terrible IndianMutiny had been quelled at last. To be a soldier in the field was acareer worthy of a king's son. To be a soldier, and have nothing to dobut loll about in some wretched garrison town, play billiards orcricket, have a day's shooting, English fashion, now and then, beadmired by school-misses and probably snubbed by men with more moneythan brains; no, such a life would not suit me.
I should much prefer, I thought, to stay at home and till my garden.With my jacket off, my shirt-sleeves rolled up, and an axe or spade inhand, I should feel far more free than playing with a useless sword.
Lieutenant Roberts was about to retire from active service in the RoyalNavy, and he had already been promised the command of a ship in theMerchant Service. But before he left England he would, he said, see me,his foster-son, well settled down.
The ship was homeward bound. There was nothing but laughing and talkingand singing all day long, for many of the poor fellows on board had notplaced foot on their native shores for five long years and more. What aglorious place England must be, I mused, to make these men so happy atthe prospect of returning to it. How brightly the sun must shine there!How blue and beautiful must be the seas that lave her coasts!
So we presently crossed the Line and sailed north, and north, and north.Past Madeira--and then the brightness began to leave the sky. The windto me grew chilly, biting, and cruel. The sea became a darker blue, andfinally, as we entered the Bay of Biscay, a leaden grey. My hopes ofhappiness fell, and fell, and fell. Roberts tried all he could to cheerme up, told me of the monster cities I should see, of the ballrooms, ofthe concert-rooms, and of a multitude of wonderful things, notforgetting cricket and football.
We sailed past the Isle of Wight with a grey chopping sea all around us,grey clouds above us, a bitter cold wind blowing, and a drizzling rainborne along on its wings.
Then we entered Portsmouth harbour, and cast anchor among the woodenwalls of England. Finally I landed. Landed, much to my disgust, uponstones instead of soft sand. Landed, still more to my disgust, amongcrowds of people who stared at me as if I had a plurality of heads, oronly one eye right in the middle of my brow. I glanced around me withall the proud dignity of a savage prince. The crowd laughed, andRoberts hurried me on.
I daresay a visit to a fashionable tailor and its subsequent resultsmade me a little more presentable, but I disliked this town ofPortsmouth with a healthy dislike, and was glad when my friend took meaway.
I had to go to London. The railway amused me, and made me wonder, butused as I was to the quiet of the desert and forest, it deafened me, andthe shaking tired me beyond conception.
My solicitor, a prim white-haired man, said he was _so_ glad to see me,though I do believe he was a little afraid of me. Probably not withoutcause, for at the very moment he was entering into business as he calledit, and arranging preliminaries, I was thinking how quickly Otakooma'ssavages would rub all the starch out of this respectable citizen._They_ would not take long to arrange preliminaries with the little man,and as to entering into business, they would do so in a way that wouldconsiderably astonish his nerves.
"Bother business!" I exclaimed at last, in a voice that made the primsolicitor almost spring off his chair.
"Oh! my dear sir," he pleaded, mildly. "We _must_ go into these littlematters."
He ventured to give me two fingers to shake as I left the office withRoberts. I feel sure he was afraid to entrust me with all his hand.
"And as soon as you get home you will telegraph to me; won't you, MrRadnor?"
"Telegraph!" I said in astonishment. "Telegraph! and you tell me it isfive hundred miles from here to Dunryan. Do you think you can see afire at that distance? It must be a precious big one I'll have tolight, and the mountains around Dunryan must be amazingly high."
Both Roberts and the solicitor laughed; they could see that the onlyidea I had of telegraphing was the building of fires on hill-tops.
I arrived at Dunryan at last--my small patrimony. If I was pleased withit at all, it was simply because it was my own; but everything was sonew and so strange and so tame, that as soon as my friend saw me what hecalled "settled," and went away to sea and left me, I began, in the mostmethodical manner possible, to dislike everything round me.
People called on me, but I'm sure they were merely curious to hear myhistory from my own lips, and partly afraid of me at the same time.They invited me out to tea! Ha! ha! ha! I really cannot help laughingabout it now as I write; but fancy a savage sitting down to tea, of alltreats in the world, with a company of gossiping ladies of both sexes.
Now my neighbours made me out to be a bigger savage than I really was,because, to do myself justice, I did know a little of the courtesies ofcivilised life. There was one lady who expressed a wish to have the"dreadful creature" to tea with her. I found out before I went that shehad styled me so, though her note of invitation was most politelyworded.
The "dreadful creature" did go to tea, intent on a kind of quietrevenge. They could not get a word out of me--neither my hostess northe three old ladies she had asked to meet me by way of protection. Idid nothing but drink cup after cup of tea, handing in my cup to bereplenished, and drinking it at once. The bread and butter disappearedin a way that seemed to them little short of miraculous. I saw thatthey were getting frightened, so I thought I would make them a littlesoothing speech.
"Ahem!" I began, standing up. I never got any further.
One old lady fainted; another "missed stays," as a sailor would say,when making for the doorway, and tumbled on the floor; a third fell overthe piano-stool. All screamed--all thought I was about to do somethingvery dreadful.
All I did do was to step gingerly out into the hall, pick up my hat, andgo off.
I lived in Dunryan for a year. The scenery all around was charming inthe extreme. The very name will tell you that Dunryan is in Scotland;the very word Scotland conjures up before the eye visions both of beautyand romance.
But one year even of Scotland, the "land of green heath and shaggywood," was enough for me then.
There was no sport, no wild adventure; all was tame, tame, tame,compared to what I had been used to.
But if following game in Scotland seemed tame to me, what could I say ofsport in English fashion? I tried both; grew sick of both. Hunting thewild gorilla in the jungles of Africa was more in my line.
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One night, soon after the first snow had fallen, a carriage drove up tomy door. It was to bear me away to the distant railway-station. Themoon was shining brightly down upon our little village as we drovethrough; here and there in the windows shone a yellow light; but all wassilent, and neither the horses' hoofs nor the carriage wheels could beheard on the snow-muffled street.
It was a peaceful scene, and I heaved one sigh--well, it might have beenof regret. For many and many a long year to come I never saw Dunryanagain.
CHAPTER NINE.
"The dismal wreck to view Struck horror to the crew."
Old Song.
The earlier history of a human being's life is engraved upon his mind aswith a pen of steel. After one comes to what are termed years ofdiscretion, the soul is not so impressionable, and events must be ofmore than usual interest to be very long remembered. The story, then,of a chequered life cannot be told with even a hopeful attempt atminuteness, unless a log has been kept day after day and year afteryear; and my opinion is, that although diaries are often mostreligiously commenced, especially about New Year's time, they are seldomif ever kept up very long.
My own adventures, and the scenes I passed through in
the first stagesof my existence, were not, as the reader already knows, of a kind to bevery easily forgotten, even had my mind never been very impressionable.It was easy enough, therefore, to record them in some kind ofchronological form.
The few adventures I and my friend Ben Roberts tell in the pages thatfollow, and our sketches of life, are given as they occur to our memory;often brought back to our minds by the incidents of our present everydaylife.
But I do not think that even if Ben and I live as long as Old Parr, weshall either tire of spinning our yarns, or fall short of subjectmatter.
Let me say a word or two about the place I live in now, and where Ben sooften pays me a visit.
We call it Rowan Tree Villa.
It stands mid-way up a well-wooded hill, about two and a half miles froma dreamy, drowsy old village, in one of the dreamiest, drowsiest nooksof bonnie, tree-clad Berkshire.
The top of the hill is covered by tall-stemmed