Rensselaer Republican, Volume 26, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 September 1893 — Page 6

The Perils of Certain English Prisoners.

CHAPTER I. iwM iii T WASIX THE year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and fortyfour, that I, Gill jwjjroim Davis. to com mand, His Mark.

having then the honor to be a private in the Royal Marines, stood aleaning over the bulwarks of the armed sloop Christopher Columbus in the South American waters, off the Mosquito shore. My lady remarks to me before I jgo any further that there Ghristain name as Gill, and that her confident opinion is that the name given to me in baptism wherein I -was made &c., was Gilbert. She is .certain to be right, but I never j fceard of it. I was a fondling child j picked up somewhere or another, : and I always understood my Christian name to be Gill. It is true that I was called Gills when employed at Snorridge Bottom, betwixt Chat-h am and Maidstone, to frighten birds;, but that had nothing to do with the baptism wherein I was made &c., and wherein a number of things were promised for me by somebody, who let me alone ever afterwards as to performing any of them, and who, I consider, must have been the beadle. Such name of Gills was entirely owing to my cheeks, or gills, which at that time of my life were of a raspy description. My lady stops jne.again, before I go any further, by laughing exactly in her old way and waving the feather of her pen at. me. That ac-

tion on her part calls to my mind, as I look at her hand with the rings on it Well, 1 won't! To be sure it will come in in its own place. But it’s always strange to me noticing the quiet hand, and noticing it (as I have done, you know, so many times) a-fondiing children and grandchildren asleep, to think that when blood and honor were up —there! I won’t —not at present!—Scratch it out. She won’t scratch it out, and quite honorable; because we have made an understanding that everything is to be taken down, and that nothin# that is once taken down shall be scratched out. I have the great misfortune not to be able to read and write, and I am speaking my true and faithful account of those adventures, and my lady is writing it, word for word. I say, there I was, a-leaning over the bulwarks of the sloop Christopher Columbus in South American waters off Mosquito shore, a subject of His Gracious Majesty King George of England and a private in the Royal Marines. In those climates you don’t want to do much. I was doing nothing. I was thinking of the shepherd (my father, I wonder?) on the hillsides by Snorridge Bottom, with a long staff, and with a rough white coat in all weathers air the year round, who used to let me lie in a corner of his hut by night, and who used to let me go* about with him and his sheep by day when I could get nothing else to do, and who used to give me so little of his victuals and so much of his staff, that I ran away from him—which was what he wanted all along, I expect —to be knocked about the world in preference to Snorridge Bottom.- I had been knocked about the world for nine and twenty years in all, when I stood looking along those bright blue South American waters. Looking after the shepherd I may say. Watching him in a half-waking dream, with my eyes half shut as he, and his flock of sheep, and his two dogs, seemed to move away from the ship’s side, far away over the blue water and go right down into the sky. “It’s rising out of the water steady,” a voice said close to me. I had beeu thinking on so, that it like woke me with a start, though it was no stranger voice than the voice of Harry Charker, my own comrade. “What’s rising out of the water, steady?" I asked my comrade. “What?” said he. “The Island." “Oh, the Island!” says I, turning <uy eyes toward it. ‘ True. I forgot the island.” “Forgot the port you’re going to? That's odd, ahftit?" “If is odd,” says !. “And odd," he said, slowly considering with himself, “ain’t even. Is it. Gill?” He had always a remark just like that to make, and seldom another. As soon as he had brought a thing round to what it was not, he was satisfied. He was one of the best of men, and in a certain sort of wav, one with the least to say to himself. I-qualify it, because being , able to read and write like a quartermaster, he had always one most excellent idea in his mind. That was, Duty. Upon my soul, I don’t believe, though I admire learning beyond everything, that he could have got a better idea cut of all the books in the world, if he had learnt them every word, and been the cleverest of scholars. My comrade and 1 had been quartered in Jamaica and from there we had been'drafted off to the British settlement of Belize, lying away west and north of the Mosquito Coast. At Belize there had been great alarm of one cruel gang of pirates (there wero always more pi rates than enough in the Caribbean

By CHARLES DICKENS.

seas), and as they got the better of our English cruisers by running into out-of-the-way creeks and shallows and taking the landjvhen they were hotly pressed, the flwernor of Be lize had received orders from home to keep a sharp lookout for them along shore. Now, there was an armed sloop came once a year from Port Royal, Jamaica, to the island, laden with all manner of necessaries to eat. and to wear, and to use in various ways, and it was aboard of that sloop, which had touched at Belize, that I was a-standing, leaning over the bulwarks. The island was occupied by a very small English colony. It had been given, the name of SiLver-Store. The. reason of its being so called was that the English colony owned and worked a silver mine over on the mainland, in Honduras, and used this island as a safe and convenient place to store | their silver in, until it was annually : fetched away by the sloop. It was ! brought down from the mine to the i coast on the backs of mules, attend ed by friendly Indians and guarded by white men; from thence it was conveyed over to Silver-Store, when the weather was fair, in the canoes of that country; from Silver-Store it was carried to Jamaica by the armed sloop once a year, as I have already mentioned; from Jamaica it went, of course, all over the world. How 1 came to be aboard the armed sloop is easily told. Four-and-twenty marines under the command of a lieutenant —that officer’s name was Underwood —had been told off at Belize to proceed to Silver Store, in aid of boats and seamen stationed there for the chase of the pirates. The island was considered a good post of observation against the pirates both bv land and sea; neither the, pirate ship nor yet her

boats had been seen by any of us, but they had been so much heard of that the reinforcement was sent. Of that party I wrs one. It included a corporal and a sergeant Charker was corporal and the sergeant’s name was Drooce. He was the most tyranical non-commissioned officer in His Majesty’s service. The night came on soon after I had the foregoing words with Charker. All the wonderful bright colors went out of the sea and sky in a few minutes and the stars in the heavens seemed to shine out together and look down at themselves in the sea over one another’s shoulders, millions deep. Next morning we cast anchor off the island. There was a snug harbor with a little reef; there was a sandy beach; there were cocoanut trees with high straight stems, quite bare, and foliage at the top like plumes of magnificent green feathers; there were all the objects usually seen in those parts, and I am not going to describe them, having something else to tell about. Great rejoicings, to be sure were made on our arrival. All the flags in the place were hoisted, all the guns in the place were fired, and all the people in the place came down to look at us. One of those Sambo fe'lows—they call those natives Sambos when they are half negro and half Indian —had come off outside the reef to pilot us in and remained on board after we had let go our anchor. He was called Christian George King and was fonder of all hands thau anybody else was. Now, I confess for myself that on the first day, if I had been captain of the Christopher Columbus instead of private in the Royal Marines, I should have kicked Christian George King—who was no more a Christian than he Was a King ora George—over the side, without exactly knowing why, except that it was the right thing to do. But, I must likewise confess, that I was not in a partiularly pleasant humor when I stood under arms that morning on board the Christopher Columbus in the harbor of the Island of Silver-Store. I had a hard life, and the life of the English on the Island seemed too easy and too gav to please me. “Here you are," I thought to myself, “good scholars and good livers; able to read what you like, able to write what you like, able to eat and drink what

(IHT)

WOULD YOU LIKE TO COME IN AND SEE THE PLACE?

you like, and spend what you like, and do what you like; and much you care for a poor, ignorant Private in the Royal Marines! Yet, it’s hard, too, I think, that you should have al) the half-pence, and I all the kicks; you all the smooth and I all the rough; you all the oil and I all the vinegar.” It was as envious a thing as might be, let alone its. being nonsensical: but I thought it I took it so much amiss, that, when a very beautiful young English lady came aboard, I grunted to myself, -, Ah! you have got a lover, I’ll be bound!” As if there was any new offense to ine in that, if she had! She was a sister to the captain of our sloop, who had been in a poor way for some time, and who: was so ill then that he was obliged to be carried ashore. She was the child of a military officer, and had come out there with her sister, who was married, to. one of the owners of the silver mine, and who had three children with her. It was easy to see that she was the light and spirit o' the look at her, I gruntedtoTnySelf again, in an even worse state of mind than before, “I’ll be damned, If I dont hate him, whoever he is 1 ’ My officer. Lieut. Linder wood, was as ill as the captain of the sloop, and was carried ashore, too. They were both young men of about my age, who had been delicate in the West Indian climate. I even took that in bad part. I thought 1 was much fitter for the work than they were, and that if all of us had our deserts, I should be both of them rolled into one. (It may be imagined what sort of an officer of marines I should have made, without the power of reading a. written order. And as to any knowledge how to command the sloop—Lord! I should have sunken her in a quarter of an hour!) However,such were my reflections; and when we men were ashore and dismissed. I strolled about the place alone with Charker, making my ob-

servations in a similar spirit. It was a pretty place: in all its arrangements partly South, American and partly English, and very agreeable to look at on that account, being like a bit of home that had got chipped off and had floated away to that spot, and had accommodated itself to circumstances as it drifted along. The huts of the Sambos, to the number of five-and-twenty, perhaps, were down by the beach to the left of the anchorage. On the right was a sort of barrack, with a South American flag and the Union Jack flying from the same staff, where the little English colony could all come together, if they saw occasion. It was a walled square of building,, with a sort of pleasure ground inside, and inside that again a sunken block like a powder magazine, with a little square trench around it, and steps down to the door. Charker and I were looking in at the gate, which was not guarded, and I had said to Charker, in reference to the bit like a powder-magazine, “that’s' where the keep they silver,you see;” aud Charker had said to me, after thinking it over, “And silver ain’t gold, is it, Gill?” when the beautiful I young English lady I had been so billious about, looked out of a door or a window —at all events looked out, from under a bright awning. She no sooner saw us two in uniform, than she came out so quickly that she was still putting on her broad Mexican hat of plaited straw when we saluted. “Would you like to come in and see the place?” she said. “It is rather a curious place." We thanked the young lady, and said we didn’t wish to be troublesome; but she said it could be do trouble to an English soldier's daughter to show English soldiers how their countrymen and country- ' women fared so far away from England, and consequently we saluted again and went in. Then, as we stood in the shade, she showed us (being as affable as beautiful) how the different families lived in their separate houses, and how there was a general house for storesand a general reading-room, and a general room for music and dancing and a room for church, and bow there were other houses on the rising ground called the Signal Hill, where they lived in the hotter weather. l< Your officer has been carried up

there,” she said, “and my brother, too, for the better air. At present our few are dispersed over both spots, deducting,, that is to say, such of our number as are always going to or coming from or staying at the mine.” ( “He is among one of those pa rties. ” I thought, “and I wish somebody would knock his head off. ' 7 ) ■ ■ Some of ladies live here”, she said, “during at least half the year, as lonely as widows, with their children.” “Many children here, ma’am?” ‘"Seventeen. There are thirteen married ladies, and there are eight like me.” There were' not eight like hertherewasnotonelikeher—inthe world. She meant single. “ Which, with about thirty Englishmen) of various degrees.” said theyoung lady, “form the little colony on the Island. I don’t count the sailors, for they don’t belong to e». Nor the soldiers,” she gave us a gracious smile when she spoke of the soldiers, “for the same reason,”n I 'NortheSaml7OS,ma’ain,’ r saidil. “ Under your favor and with your they trustworthy?” “Perfectly! We are all very kind to them, and they are very grates ul to us.” “Indeed, ma'am? Now —Christian, George King?- ” ‘‘Very much attached t»> us all. Would die for us.” She was, as in my uneducated way I have observed very beautiful women almost always to be. so composed that her composure gave great weight to what she said., and I bellevod it. Then she pointed out. to us the building like a powder magazine and explained to us in what manner the silver was brought from the mine and was brought over from the mainland and was stored there. The Christopher Columbus would have a rich lading, she said, for there had been a great yield that year, a much richer, yield than usual, and there was a chest of jewels besides the silver.

When we had looked about us, and were getting sheepish, through fearing we were troublesome, she turned us* over to a young woman, English born but West India bred, who served her as her maid. This young woman was the widow of a non-com-missioned officer in a regiment of the line. She had got married and widowed at St. Vincent, with only a few months between the two events. She was a little saucy woman, with abright pair of eyes, rather a neat little foot and figure and rather a neat little turned up nose. The sort of young woman, I considered at the time, who appeared to invite you to give her a kiss, and who would have slapped your face if you accepted the invitation. I couldn’t make out hir name at first; for, when she gave it in answer to my inquiry, it sounded like Beltot, which didn’t sound right. But, when we became better acquainted —which was while Charker and I were drinking sugarcane sangaree, which she made in a most excellent manner —I found that her Christian name was Isabella, which they shortened into Bell, and that the name of the deceased non-commis-sioned officer was Tott. Being the kind of neat little woman it was natural to make a toy of —I never saw a woman so like a toy in my life —she had got the plaything na:*o of Belltott. In short, she had no other name on the island. Even Mr. Commissioner Pordage (and he was a grave one!) formally addressed her as Mrs. Belltott. But I shall come to Mr. Commissioner Pordage presently. The name of the captain of the sloop was Capt. Maryon, and therefore it was no news to hear from Mrs. Belltott that his sister, the beautiful unmarried young English lady, was Miss Maryon. The novelty was that her Christian name was Marion, too. Marion Maryon. Many a time I have run off those two names in my thoughts, like a bit of verse. Oh many, and many, and many a time! We saw out all the drink that was produced, like good men and true, and then took our leaves and went down to the beach. The weather was beautiful; the wind steady', low and gentle; the island a picture; the sea a picture, the sky a picture. In that country there are two rainy seasons in the year. One sets in about our English midsummer; the other about a fortnight after English Michaelmas. It was the beginning of August at that time; the first of these rainy seasons was well over, and everything was in its most beautiful growth and had its loveliest look upon it. “They enjoy themselves here," I says to Charker, turning surly again. “This is better than private soldiering.” We had come down to the beach to be friendly with the boat’s crew who were camped and hutted there, and we were approaching towards their quarter over the sand when Christian George King bomes up from the landing-place at a wolf's trot, crying. “Yup, So-Jeer!" —which was that Sambo Pilot's barbarous way of saying ' “Hallo, Soldier!” I have stated myself to be a man nf no learning, and, if I entertain prejudices, I hope allowance may be made. I will now confess to one. It may be a right one or it may be a wrong one, but I never did like Natives, except in the form of oysters. (TO BE CONTINUED.) Mrs. Mary Ranlett has built up an extensive business in a sailors' shipping office. She furnishes seamen in any desired number.

A CENTURY OF INVENTION.

Patents Boonring at The Bate es 25,000 New Thing* * Year. Globe~Democr«t. An interesting centennial was overlooked a few days ago. The first 100 years of American patents was completed this month. Patent No. 1 wasissued April 10, 1790. The century closed with No. 425,395. In the first half of the 100 years the patent laws were not so encouraging. In fifty years onfiy 12,421 patents were issued. But we are now making up* lost time.. There were issued last year patents. The United States Patent Office paid expenses from the fees taken in and* laid up a balance of a clean s2so,ooo'in the year 1889. Instead of American ingenuity exhausting itself, the exercise of it seems* to make it mdre ; prolific. Every yearshows a larger number of inventionsthan the year which preceded it. Here are a few of the novelties which have been patented since 1890 began: ' The approach, of fly time has suggested an idea for a cow-tail holder. A ciamp like a clothes pin catches the bushy end of the tail, and two cords with a snap attachment fasten the tail to the cow’s- leg, to a post, or to- the milking stool. The sama day that the Nebraska man got his patent for a cow-tail holder a man in Maine got one also for the same end. The Maine man’s tailholder is made of a single piece of wire coiled so as to connect the tail with the cow’s leg. “A candle for killing insects” is a mixture of insect powder and tallow, or something else that will burn, moulded around a wick. The estimable wife of President Andrew Jackson once accounted to the British Minister for an awful cold in the head by telling him that “the Gineral had kicked the kivvers off” the night before. There is no longer any excuse for people who - -kick the kivvers off.” A clamp and a spring are now patented for attachment to the bedstead. By this simple device the covers are fastened down. The spring gives sufficient play, so that there is no danger of one getting choked in the act of turning over. Any one might guess that a Kentucky man is entitled to the credit which attaches to the invention of a “combinedink stand, pistol case, and burglar alarm.” No Kentucky editor’s desk should be without it. The application may be illustrated: An editor sits at his desk writing. One of the Hatfields or one of the McCoys enters to ask a correction of the report about that row over on Hell-for-Sartin creek. The editor reaches forward as if to dip his pen in the ink. He touches a spring in the top of the ink stand. A shallow drawer flies open toward him and his hand drops upon the revolver. At the same time the alarm goes off like one of those new devices to call people at sa.m. in country hotels. The mountaineer jumps back as if he heard the b-r r-r of a rattler, and before he recovers he is covered. The editor is master of the situation. This inventor lives in Louisville. A handoar which moves along the tracks and mows weeds fifteen feet away, is one of the innovations in railroad machinery. It will do to go very well with the rotary snow plough as an illustration of automatic intelligence. Dress reform is sweeping away the barriers of sex. The Patent Office has been called upon this month to protect the idea of a bifurcated skirt, and has done it. There is a genius in Cohasset, Mass., who spends his time getting up startling effects for the stage. He has recently taken out two patents. One of them is for an arrangement of slides and springs by which a man, or rather a dummy, goes all to pieces. At a signal the head flics toward the ceiling, the legs move to the sides, and the arms drop to the floor. The body remains in the chair. A beheading apparatus is another of this inventor’s ghastly devices. The axe drops into a socket in the block and the head drops. The arrangement of mirrors at the proper angles in a tub so as to enable a person to see what is going on in a room at some distance has been patented within a month. The mirrors may even be moved so as to bring into view various portions of the room. There is a suggestiveness about this devise which is paralyzing. The probabilities of its improper use strike the imagination much quicker than the possibilities of proper employment. The uses of electricity extend. An electric flatiron is one of the new things under the sun. The iron is aollow and the wire passes into the center and is so arranged that when the electricity is turned on the flat face of the iron is kept at an even degree of heat—just sufficient to do good work. From the edge of prohibition Kansas comes a curiously contrived stopper, which, placed upon the neck of a bottle, registers every drink taken out of IL There are people who still believe In the practicability of cow milkers. One of them has just got a patent for a four-tube arrangement by which he expects to draw off the contents of the udder without being kidked over for his smartness. The idea of combining various uses in a single article is a favorite one with inventors “The combined cap, pillow, and life preserver" is to be made of some air-tight material. As a cap It looks like the double-visored headgear which is considered the thing for steamer wear. The centre pulls out What appears to be a ventilator in the top proves to be a mouthpiece. You blow into it until the interior is about half filled with air, and you

have a very fair imitauon 91 -uie air: pillow. If you awake at night andl find that the boat is sinking, you blow' some more air in through the mouth-* piece and have a life preserver as big| as a good sized bladder. There i» even a piece of tape attached for tying the preserver to the breast. i One of the contributions from the* new State of North Dakota is a ma-' chine for burning prairie grass. The driver mounts nis seat in front, turn*! on the gasoline, strikes a match, andl moves across the prairie, leaving a broad black line. The grass over which the big sheet iron box is drawn is entirely consumed, but no fire ea--capes outside of the box. - The magnlfieent and wonderful frosting with which the caterer's art covers the wedding cake is now removable before the cake is cut, so that it may be used again and again. A new garden implement is made by twisting a single piece of wire rod, but the person wbo tries to make one for himself will find that he is infringing a patent. The improvement of coffins has long been a flavorite field for ingenuity. The latest idea is to have the name plate in the form of a scroll. At the top the scroll turns into a hollow cylludei with a cap which can be unscrewed This cylinder is intended for the preservation of any record which may be enclosed in it at the time of burial. With a view of robbing the grave of its terrors somebody has patented a lining to conceal the mother earth. The lining consists of evergreen attached) to cloth or matting. After the coffin is lowered the decoration can be pulled out and used again until the evergreen wears out or turns brown. The inventor proposes to bring the scenic effects within the reach of poorer people by having an imitation) of evergreen painted on canvas for cheaper use. Another of these funeral-minded inventors has patented what he calls a “cab for pall-bearers.” The vehicle has side doors and will hold eight persons, two of whom, however, must ride backward. The design seems to be to save the expense of an extra carriage, at the same time encouraging sociability on the part of those performing the last sad Offices. And, as if this was not enough, a fourth inventor has obtained letters on what he calls “a funeral carriage.’* He carries the coffin and the bearers, and if there are not too many mourners he accommodates the whole procession with one vehicle. The funeral carriage is built like an omnibus, with, a compartment on top for the coffin. The provides skids, an endless chain, and a pulley for running the coffin up into the place intended for it over the heads of the bearers. 1A ho ever heard of a man lifting himself by his boot straps? Only small children believe in the performance of “The Seven League Boots.” Well, the Patent Office has just granted papers to a Russian upon a device which is a combination of the hitherto deemed impossible boot-strap act, with a little of the seven-league business added. The Russian Ilves in St. Petersburg. He calls his invention an “apparatus for walking, running, and jumping.” The apparatus consists of bows and strings fastened to the feet, the legs, the waist, and shoulders. As the knees are bent either to walk or run or jump, the tension of the bows and springs is increased, and the man shoots upward and forward. At least that is what the drawings and specifications of the invention say will happen. The Russian did not send over any actual samples of his contrivance, and the TatenFOffrce"pcople have to act upon theory only. The young German emperor is not without peculiarities. He makes a practice of prowling around barracks in the darkness of night, sometimes in the disguise of a policeman and sometimes of an officer. He is also liable at any hour of the day or evening to break in unheralded upon any of his acquaintances and, being the Kaiser, he has to be made welcome. • It was not a fortnight ago that Herbert Bismarck was entertaining a party of friends in his bachelor quarters when, all of a, sudden, the Emperor walked in. A seat was put for his Majesty at the table, and for an hour or so the Emperor chatted gaily with the guests; then, apologizing graciously for his intrusion, the Kaiser hade the company good evening and went his way.

A Troublesome Issue.

Aroostook (Me.) Star. We irei obliged to omit our supplement this week. Our foreman is a capable man. but a five-column supplement and a ten pound boy are more than he can manage both together, and in as much as he can drop the supplement with less damage than he can the infant we trust our readers appreciate the gravity of the situation and let us off for this week. Such coincidences do not often happen in our establishment, and when they do they call for some leniency on the part of our subscribers. The Rev. John Prince, a Methodist clergyman, aged eighty, and Mrs. Cynthia Wood, aged eighty-four, were married recently in Montreal, They were lovers in childhood, and would have been Harried sixty years ago. but their parents prevented the match. Love lingers a long while in the human * heart. -r The Kimberly diamond mines. South Africa, control the price of African and Brazilian stones. A week’s output is $500,000. The workmen, Zulus and Kaffirs, receive about |6 a week and never think of striking. The European overseers get rich.