Chapter 70
1932 Words
"There's only one way to cure it," he was wont to say, "and that is, to bring the Portuguese and Arabs to their marrow-bones; put the fleet on the east coast in better workin' order; have consuls everywhere, with orders to keep their weather-eyes open to the slave-dealers; start two or three British settlements--ports o' refuge--on the mainland; hoist the Union Jack, and, last but not least, send 'em the Bible."
We earnestly commend the substance of Disco's opinions to the reader, for there is urgent need for action. There is death where life should be; ashes instead of beauty; desolation in place of fertility, and, even while we write, terrible activity in the horrible traffic in--"Black Ivory."
THE END.
Blown to Bits, by Robert Michael Ballantyne
BLOWN TO BITS
OR
THE LONELY MAN OF RAKATA.
A Tale of the Malay Archipelago.
BY R.M. BALLANTYNE,
AUTHOR OF "BLUE LIGHTS, OR HOT WORK IN THE SOUDAN;" "THE FUGITIVES;" "RED ROONEY;" "THE ROVER OF THE ANDES;" "THE WILD MAN OF THE WEST;" "THE RED ERIC;" "FREAKS ON THE FELLS;" "THE YOUNG TRAWLER;" "DUSTY DIAMONDS;" "THE BATTERY AND THE BOILER;" "POST HASTE;" "BLACK IVORY;" "THE IRON HORSE;" "FIGHTING THE FLAMES;" "THE LIFEBOAT;" ETC. ETC.
PREFACE.
The extremely violent nature of the volcanic eruption in Krakatoa in 1883, the peculiar beauty of those parts of the eastern seas where the event occurred, the wide-spread influences of the accompanying phenomena, and the tremendous devastation which resulted, have all inspired me with a desire to bring the matter, in the garb of a tale, before that portion of the juvenile world which accords me a hearing.
For most of the facts connected with the eruption which have been imported into my story, I have to acknowledge myself indebted to the recently published important and exhaustive "Report" of the Krakatoa Committee, appointed by the Royal Society to make a thorough investigation of the whole matter in all its phases.
I have also to acknowledge having obtained much interesting and useful information from the following among other works:-- The Malay Archipelago , by A.R. Wallace; A Naturalist's Wanderings in the Eastern Archipelago , by H.O. Forbes; and Darwin's Journal of Researches round the world in H.M.S. "Beagle."
R.M. BALLANTYNE.
HARROW-ON-THE HILL, 1889.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
CHAP. I.--THE PLAY COMMENCES, 1
II.--THE HAVEN IN THE CORAL RING, 9
III.--INTERESTING PARTICULARS OF VARIOUS KINDS, 19
IV.--NIGEL UNDERGOES SOME QUITE NEW AND INTERESTING EXPERIENCES, 33
V.--CAPTAIN ROY SURPRISES AND GRATIFIES HIS SON, WHO SURPRISES A n***o, AND SUDDENLY FORMS AN ASTONISHING RESOLVE, 47
VI.--THE HERMIT OF RAKATA INTRODUCED, 58
VII.--WONDERS OF THE HERMIT'S CAVE AND ISLAND, 72
VIII.--PERBOEWATAN BECOMES MODERATELY VIOLENT, 89
IX.--DESCRIBES, AMONG OTHER THINGS, A SINGULAR MEETING UNDER PECULIAR CIRCUMSTANCES, 99
X.--A CURIOUS SEA-GOING CRAFT--THE UNKNOWN VOYAGE BEGUN, 111
XI.--CANOEING ON THE SEA--A MYSTERIOUS NIGHT-SURPRISE AND SUDDEN FLIGHT, 123
XII.--WEATHERING A STORM IN THE OPEN SEA, 140
XIII.--FRIENDS ARE MET WITH, ALSO PIRATES, AND A LIFE-OR-DEATH PADDLE ENSUES, 153
XIV.--A NEW FRIEND FOUND--NEW DANGERS ENCOUNTERED AND NEW HOPES DELAYED, 173
XV.--HUNTING THE GREAT MAN-MONKEY, 189
XVI.--BEGINS WITH A TERRIBLE FIGHT AND ENDS WITH A HASTY FLIGHT, 204
XVII.--TELLS OF THE JOYS, ETC., OF THE PROFESSOR IN THE SUMATRAN FORESTS, ALSO OF A CATASTROPHE AVERTED, 217
XVIII.--A TRYING ORDEAL--DANGER THREATENS AND FLIGHT AGAIN RESOLVED ON, 230
XIX.--A TERRIBLE MURDER AND A STRANGE REVELATION, 243
XX.--NIGEL MAKES A CONFIDANT OF MOSES--UNDERTAKES A LONELY WATCH AND SEES SOMETHING WONDERFUL, 259
XXI.--IN WHICH THE PROFESSOR DISTINGUISHES HIMSELF, 276
XXII.--A PYTHON DISCOVERED AND A GEYSER INTERVIEWED, 297
XXIII.--TELLS OF VOLCANIC FIRES AND A STRANGE RETURN "HOME," 307
XXIV.--AN AWFUL NIGHT AND TERRIBLE MORNING, 324
XXV.--ADVENTURES OF THE "SUNSHINE" AND AN UNEXPECTED REUNION, 343
XXVI.--A CLIMAX, 361
XXVII.--"BLOWN TO BITS," 371
XXVIII.--THE FATE OF THE "SUNSHINE," 377
XXIX.--TELLS CHIEFLY OF THE WONDERFUL EFFECTS OF THIS ERUPTION ON THE WORLD AT LARGE, 385
XXX.--COMING EVENTS, ETC.--WONDERFUL CHANGES AMONG THE ISLANDS, 401
XXXI.--ENDS WITH A STRUGGLE BETWEEN INCLINATION AND DUTY, 414
XXXII.--THE LAST, 425
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
VIGNETTE TITLE.
"HE CAME UNEXPECTEDLY ON A CAVERN."--PAGE 112, Frontispiece .
ART ON THE KEELING ISLANDS, facing page 36
THEY DISCOVER A PIRATES' BIVOUAC, 164
"DO YOU HEAR?" SAID VERKIMIER, STERNLY, 187
BLOWN TO BITS 342
BLOWN TO BITS
A TALE OF THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO.
CHAPTER I.
THE PLAY COMMENCES.
Blown to bits; bits so inconceivably, so ineffably, so "microscopically" small that--but let us not anticipate.
About the darkest hour of a very dark night, in the year 1883, a large brig lay becalmed on the Indian Ocean, not far from that region of the Eastern world which is associated in some minds with spices, volcanoes, coffee, and piratical junks, namely, the Malay Archipelago.
Two men slowly paced the brig's quarter-deck for some time in silence, as if the elemental quietude which prevailed above and below had infected them. Both men were broad, and apparently strong. One of them was tall; the other short. More than this the feeble light of the binnacle-lamp failed to reveal.
"Father," said the tall man to the short one, "I do like to hear the gentle pattering of the reef points on the sails; it is so suggestive of peace and rest. Doesn't it strike you so?"
"Can't say it does, lad," replied the short man, in a voice which, naturally mellow and hearty, had been rendered nautically harsh and gruff by years of persistent roaring in the teeth of wind and weather. "More suggestive to me of lost time and lee-way."
The son laughed lightly, a pleasant, kindly, soft laugh, in keeping with the scene and hour.
"Why, father," he resumed after a brief pause, "you are so sternly practical that you drive all the sentiment out of a fellow. I had almost risen to the regions of poetry just now, under the pleasant influences of nature."
"Glad I got hold of 'ee, lad, before you rose," growled the captain of the brig--for such the short man was. "When a young fellow like you gets up into the clouds o' poetry, he's like a man in a balloon--scarce knows how he got there; doesn't know very well how he's to get down, an' has no more idea where he's goin' to, or what he's drivin' at, than the man in the moon. Take my advice, lad, an' get out o' poetical regions as fast as ye can. It don't suit a young fellow who has got to do duty as first mate of his father's brig and push his way in the world as a seaman. When I sent you to school an' made you a far better scholar than myself, I had no notion they was goin' to teach you poetry."
The captain delivered the last word with an emphasis which was meant to convey the idea of profound but not ill-natured scorn.
"Why, father," returned the young man, in a tone which plainly told of a gleeful laugh within him, which was as yet restrained, "it was not school that put poetry into me--if indeed there be any in me at all."
"What was it, then?"
"It was mother," returned the youth, promptly, "and surely you don't object to poetry in her ."
"Object!" cried the captain, as though speaking in the teeth of a Nor'wester. "Of course not. But then, Nigel, poetry in your mother is poetry, an' she can do it, lad--screeds of it--equal to anything that Dibdin, or, or,--that other fellow, you know, I forget his name--ever put pen to--why, your mother is herself a poem! neatly made up, rounded off at the corners, French-polished and all shipshape. Ha! you needn't go an' shelter yourself under her wings, wi' your inflated, up in the clouds, reef-point-patterin', balloon-like nonsense."
"Well, well, father, don't get so hot about it; I won't offend again. Besides, I'm quite content to take a very low place so long as you give mother her right position. We won't disagree about that, but I suspect that we differ considerably about the other matter you mentioned."
"What other matter?" demanded the sire.
"My doing duty as first mate," answered the son. "It must be quite evident to you by this time, I should think, that I am not cut out for a sailor. After all your trouble, and my own efforts during this long voyage round the Cape, I'm no better than an amateur. I told you that a youth taken fresh from college, without any previous experience of the sea except in boats, could not be licked into shape in so short a time. It is absurd to call me first mate of the Sunshine . That is in reality Mr. Moor's position--"
"No, it isn't, Nigel, my son," interrupted the captain, firmly. "Mr. Moor is second mate. I say so, an' if I, the skipper and owner o' this brig, don't know it, I'd like to know who does! Now, look here, lad. You've always had a bad habit of underratin' yourself an' contradictin' your father. I'm an old salt, you know, an' I tell 'ee that for the time you've bin at sea, an' the opportunities you've had, you're a sort o' walkin' miracle. You're no more an ammytoor than I am, and another voyage or two will make you quite fit to work your way all over the ocean, an' finally to take command o' this here brig, an' let your old father stay at home wi'--wi'--"
"With the Poetess," suggested Nigel.
"Just so-- wi ' the equal o' Dibdin, not to mention the other fellow. Now it seems to me--. How's 'er head?"
The captain suddenly changed the subject here.
Nigel, who chanced to be standing next the binnacle, stooped to examine the compass, and the flood of light from its lamp revealed a smooth but manly and handsome face which seemed quite to harmonise with the cheery voice that belonged to it.
"Nor'-east-and-by-east," he said.
"Are 'ee sure, lad?"
"Your doubting me, father, does not correspond with your lately expressed opinion of my seamanship; does it?"
"Let me see," returned the captain, taking no notice of the remark, and stooping to look at the compass with a critical eye.
The flood of light, in this case, revealed a visage in which good-nature had evidently struggled for years against the virulent opposition of wind and weather, and had come off victorious, though not without evidences of the conflict. At the same time it revealed features similar to those of the son, though somewhat rugged and red, besides being smothered in hair.
"Vulcan must be concoctin' a new brew," he muttered, as he gazed inquiringly over the bow, "or he's stirring up an old one."
"What d' you mean, father?"
"I mean that there's somethin' goin' on there-away--in the neighbourhood o' Sunda Straits," answered the Captain, directing attention to that point of the compass towards which the ship's head was turned. "Darkness like this don't happen without a cause. I've had some experience o' them seas before now, an' depend upon it that Vulcan is stirring up some o' the fires that are always blazin' away, more or less, around the Straits Settlements."
"By which you mean, I suppose, that one of the numerous volcanoes in the Malay Archipelago has become active," said Nigel; "but are we not some five or six hundred miles to the sou'-west of Sunda? Surely the influence of volcanic action could scarcely reach so far."
"So far!" repeated the captain, with a sort of humph which was meant to indicate mild contempt; "that shows how little you know, with all your book-learnin', about volcanoes."
"I don't profess to know much, father," retorted Nigel in a tone of cheery defiance.
"Why, boy," continued the other, resuming his perambulation of the deck, "explosions have sometimes been heard for hundreds, ay hundreds , of miles. I thought I heard one just now, but no doubt the unusual darkness works up my imagination and makes me suspicious, for it's wonderful what fools the imag--. Hallo! D'ee feel that ?"
He went smartly towards the binnacle-light, as he spoke, and, holding an arm close to it, found that his sleeve was sprinkled with a thin coating of fine dust.
- Writer
