John C. Hutcheson

“ Ah, those days of long ago!
“Here we are at last, mother,” said Eric, slinging the bag containing his sea kit on to the railway platform. “The old engine is getting its steam up, and we’ll soon be off. Cheer up, little mother! As I’ve told you, it is not a good-bye for ever!”
“So you say, my son. The young ever look forward; but old people like myself look back, and it makes us reflect how few of the noble aspirations and longing anticipations of our youth are ever realised!” ”

“ One enormous sea elephant Fritz made for, just as he was on the point of sliding off into the sea from a little rocky jetty where he had ensconced himself.
The animal reared itself on its fore flappers and seemed to tower over the young German; but, on Fritz pluckily piercing it with his harpoon right through the chest, the warm blood gushed over him in a torrent and the portentous sea elephant sank down lifeless. ”

“ Eric, consequently, could see nothing beyond the wall of heaving water which the rollers presented as they thundered on the shingle, dragging back the pebbles in their back-wash with a rattling noise, as if the spirits of the deep were playing with dice in the depths below under the waves!
At his back, the lad could see the bonfire still blazing, casting the foreground in all the deeper shadow from its flickering light; and, never did he regret anything more in his life than the sudden impulse which had led him into so dangerous a freak, as that of lighting the bonfire. ”

“ Look sharp, old fellow, and get some of the light ballast out of her! I see a light scud creeping up from leeward, behind us, with the waves fringing up into a curl before it. The wind has chopped round at last and we’ll have to cut and run as soon as it reaches us.”
Fritz baled away with the tin pannikin for dear life.
“Now, brother,” cried Eric, a moment later, “get your knife ready, and go forwards into the bows. I want you, the instant I sing out, to give a slash across the painter holding us to our moorings.” ”

“ It was late in the afternoon when the lad first lit up the pile of rubbish and night came ere the fire had died out, its blazing light, reflected back by the glistening surface of the cliff, shining out to sea from the bay, like a beacon welcoming the passing mariner to friendly shores—instead of which, the cruel crags that encircled the island only grinned through the surf, like the pointed teeth of a pack of snarling wolves, waiting to rend and tear any hapless craft that should make for them! ”

“ In the Gulden Strasse again.
That was all.
“Sail ho!” shouted Eric in stentorian tones, his voice penetrating through the entire valley, and reaching probably the remotest extent of the island.
The shout was quite enough for Fritz; for, hardly taking time to dress, he at once rushed down to join his brother on the beach.
“Where is she?” he cried out anxiously, when yet some distance off. He panted out the question as he ran.
“Right off the bay!” sang out Eric, in quite as great a state of frenzied excitement. “She’s hull down to windward now; but she’s rising every moment on the horizon.” ”

“ Himmel! Sadowa and ’66 were child’s play to this here, with the fire of the chassepot and that infernal mitrailleuse! Hurrah, though we’ve won!” shouted out the veteran in a paroxysm of patriotism; and then, joining in with the chorus of “Die Wacht am Rhein,” which a Prussian corps was singing as they marched by, he thus sobbed out his last breath and so died!
“His was a patriot soldier’s end,” said Fritz, as he closed his eyes and covered over his face reverently with his pocket-handkerchief.
“Yes, so it was,” chimed in the others sententiously. “It is good so to die!” ”

“ Nor was Captain Brown satisfied with top-gallants alone; for, quickly, the order came to set the royals and flying jib before the men could climb down the ratlins; and, soon, the vessel was under a cloud of sail alow and aloft, taking advantage of every breath of air. Towards the afternoon, the north-westerly breeze still lasting, the ship cleared Narraganset Bay, running before the wind; when, shaping a course between the treacherous Martha’s Vineyard on the one hand and Gardiner’s Island on the other, she was steered out into the open Atlantic. ”

“ Bye-and-bye, there came the sound of another gun from the sea. The report sounded nearer this time; still, Eric could see nothing in sight on the horizon when some break in the clouds allowed him a momentary glimpse of the angry ocean—nothing but the huge billows chasing each other in towards the land and the seething foam at the base of the crags, on which they broke themselves in impotent fury when they found their further course arrested by the rocky ramparts of the island. ”

“ Fritz was silent, only half convinced, for the send of the sea appeared to be rolling their unhappy boat further and further from the island, which, only a bare speck on the horizon, could be but very faintly seen astern, low down on the water.
“It means,” said Eric, answering his own question, without waiting longer for his brother’s reply, “that the same wind which bore us away from our dear little bay is about to waft us back again to it; still, we must look out sharply to help ourselves and not neglect a chance. Oars out, old fellow!” ”

“ At first, the strong ammoniacal smell of the guano was so overpowering, combined with the fearful noise the penguins made—all screaming and chattering together, as if the denizens of the monkey house at the Zoological Gardens, which Fritz had once visited when in London, had been suddenly let loose amongst the parrots in the same establishment—that his senses were too confused to distinguish anything, especially as the thicket was enveloped in semi-darkness from the overhanging stems of the long grass which shut out the sunlight ”

“ In addition to that, the festival had too many painful memories of home, for which they now longed with an ardent desire that they had not felt in their first year on the island.
The fact was, that, now the whale-boat was destroyed, they were so irrevocably confined to the little valley where their hut was planted—shut in alike by land and sea, there being no chance of escape from it in any emergency that might arise, save through the unlikely contingency of some stray passing vessel happening to call in at the bay—that the sense of being thus imprisoned began to affect their spirits. ”

“ Fritz heaved a sigh of despair.
“Let us try it, anyhow,” he said in a melancholy tone, and Eric having, carved off with extreme difficulty a knob—it could be called nothing else—of the black mass in the mess tin he had before him, handed the plate containing it over to Fritz, who, sawing off a fragment, endeavoured to chew it unsuccessfully and then had finally to eject it from his mouth.
“Good heavens, Eric!” he exclaimed, “it’s as hard as a brickbat, as salt as brine, and burnt up as thoroughly as a piece of coke. How could you even think of trying to roast a bit of salt junk? ”

“ Burgher Jans came in as the old nurse went out, brushing by him with ill-concealed contempt and aversion. He was a fat little man, with long straight hair coming down over his coat collar, and a round, full-moon sort of face, whose effect of beaming complacency was enhanced by a pair of large-rimmed tortoise-shell spectacles out of which his owl-like eyes shone with an air of balmy wisdom.
“Most worthy lady,” he commenced, addressing Madame Dort with an elaborate bow, sweeping the floor with his hat. ”

“ At such a glorious sight, Eric could remain silent no longer.
“This is capital,” he exclaimed in high delight; “why, we’ve got a regular harvest, brother!”
“Yes, the great Mother Earth has rewarded our exertions,” said Fritz thoughtfully. “It is wonderful how she yields to those who cultivate her properly! I can see that we’ll have bushels of potatoes—enough to last us through the winter.”
“Aye, and peas and beans, too,” chorussed Eric. “Look, here, at this lot, Fritz! I believe we can have a dish of them to-day.” ”

“ The vessel was coming up under close-reefed topsails, bow on to the headland on the western side of the bay; and, almost at the very instant the brothers saw her, she struck with a crash on the rocks, the surf rushing up the steep face of the cliff and falling back on the deck of the ill-fated craft in sheets of spray like soapsuds.
Fritz and Eric clasped their hands in mute supplication to heaven; but, at the same moment, the spars of the vessel—she was a brig, they could see—fell over her side with a crash. There was a grinding and rending of timbers ”

“ There is my old cat, which another boy would have tormented according to the nature of all boys where poor cats are concerned; but Eric loved it, and petted it like myself! Many a time I see Mouser looking up at that model of his ship there, blinking his eyes as if he knew well where the young master is, for cats have deeper penetration than human folk give them credit for. I heard him miaow-wowing this morning; and, when I went to look for him, there he was on the top of the stove, if you please, gazing up at the little ship, with his tail up in the air as stiff as a hair-brush! ”

“ When the penguins got fairly out of the water, beyond reach of the surf—which broke with a monotonous motion on the beach in a sullen sort of way, as if it was curbed by a higher law for the present, but would revenge itself bye-and-bye when it had free play—they would stand together in a cluster, drying and dressing themselves, talking together the while in their gruff barking voice, as if congratulating each other on their safe landing ”

“ Malmaison, Vionville, and Rezonville were filled with war victims; and all the surgeons, French as well as German, that could be summoned to help, were as busy as they could possibly be. Carriages and stretchers covered the open places in front of every house, the Red Cross of Geneva being rudely depicted on the doors, with the neutral flag of the society floating above; while pools of blood marked the dressing places of the wounded, the pale white faces of whom looked down in mute misery from the carts in which they were being borne away to the rear to make room for others to be attended to. ”

“ Be that as it may, however, during this interval of inactivity, when the shattered fragments of the magnificent French army—which had so proudly assumed the offensive but a bare fortnight before along the frontiers of the Rhine—were idling away precious moments that were fraught with peril and disaster to the Gallic race, the huge German masses, animated by a sense of victory and the consciousness of a superiority in arms as well as in numbers, were sweeping forward like a whirlwind of destruction. ”

“ The dog looked up in his face, as if he understood what his new friend said; and, crawling off from the officer’s body, he came to Fritz and licked his hand, holding up the while one paw, which was bleeding as if from a cut.
“He is wounded,” said Heinrich, stooping down.
“Yes,” answered Fritz, examining the poor paw, much apparently to the dog’s satisfaction. “It’s from a piece of shell, probably the same that settled the horse there; but it’s not a bad wound, and will soon get well, doggie!” ”

“ We then, with a great deal of difficulty, as it was a dangerous operation on account of getting broadside on to the waves, managed to slew the jolly-boat’s head round; when, rigging up a scrap of a sprit-sail amidships, so as not to bury the little craft’s nose, which might have been the case if we had tried to step our proper mast more forward, with the captain steering with an oar out to windward to give him greater command of her than the rudder would have done, we scudded away towards the African coast, giving up the pinnace as lost, and looking out only for ourselves. ”

“ He is a great man, and has done much for Germany.”
“Oh, yes, I grant that,” replied the other warmly; “still, he is one who never forgets. He always pays out a grudge! You will see, now, if those poor Bavarians do not come in for all the thick of the fighting.”
“You talk as if there is going to be a lot more?”
“So there is, without doubt, without doubt,” said Burgher Jans, rubbing his hands together, as if he rather enjoyed the prospect.
“In that case, then, Fritz cannot return to Lubeck as soon as he thinks possible?” and Madame Dort looked grave again, as she said this half questioningly. ”

“ That was all; but it wasn’t a very agreeable collapse to the nice little enchanted “castle in Spain” he had been diligently building up ever since his meeting with Madaleine at Mézières:— it was a sad downfall to the hopes he had of meeting her again!
Of course, he wrote to his mother, telling her of his misery; but she could not console him much, save by exhorting him to live in hope, for that all would come well in good time.
“Old people can’t feel like young ones,” thought Fritz. “She doesn’t know what I suffer in my heart.” ”

“ The noise of the birds was exactly like that laughing sort of grating cry which a flock of geese make on being frightened, by some passer-by on a common, say, when they run screaming away with outstretched wings, standing on the tips of their webbed feet as if dancing—the appearance of the penguins rushing in and out of the tussock clump where their rookery was, bearing out the parallel. ”

“ Gelert is yet to the fore, and as good and brave an old dog as ever, albeit time has robbed him of some of his teeth and made him somewhat less active; but as for Mouser, he does not seem to have “turned a hair.” The highly intelligent animal still purrs and fizzes as vigourously as in his youth—occupying his leisure moments, when not after birds or mice, in basking in the sunshine on the window-ledge above the staircase in summer; while, in winter, he curls himself up between Gelert’s outstretched paws on the hearthrug, in front of the old-fashioned china stove. ”

“ Landing at one of the little caves, just under a tussock-grass-grown gully, like that close to their hut on the eastern side, Eric ascended with his rifle to the ridge above. He soon gained the tableland, returning anon with a well-grown kid which Fritz had told him to shoot, so that they might take it home with them. The ascent to the plateau, the lad said, was much easier from this part of the coast than by the waterfall; but, of course, as it would necessitate a voyage almost round the island whenever they attempted it, the other way was more preferable, although dangerous by contrast. ”

“ The penguins seemed so much at home on the island that it looked as if they never intended leaving it, albeit the brothers noticed that the birds barked and grumbled more discordantly than they had done of late. No doubt there was something on hand, they thought; but they never dreamt that this grand pow-wow was their leave-taking of the rookery; but, lo and behold! when Eric came out of the hut next morning to pay his customary matutinal visit to the beach, there was not a single penguin to be seen anywhere in the vicinity, either out in the water or on land! ”

“ He had made sure that some one would have escaped, if only for him to rescue at the last moment—perhaps just when the sinking swimmer might require a helping hand to drag him from the clutches of the grasping billows that sought to overwhelm him as he was getting beyond their reach!
“There’s no doubt of that,” echoed Fritz, who had got off his platform on the wheelbarrow with much more agility than he had been capable of a short time before. “The sea has swallowed up those who were not dashed to pieces on the headland! ”

“ Indeed, Eric, the cook, so greatly distinguished himself on this occasion that he blotted out all recollection of his previous mishaps when undertaking a similar rôle.
What say you to a splendid ham, one of those given them by Captain Brown; green peas, fresh and tender and dressed to perfection; and, new potatoes?
Many a person might have a worse meal on a warm summer day, like it was this anniversary of the festival on Inaccessible Island! ”

“ Fritz had thought, with that self-confidence which most of us possess, that no one could possibly have kept Herr Grosschnapper’s books or calculated insurances with such ability as he could, and that the worthy merchant would have been only too delighted to welcome so able a clerk when he walked into the counting-house again. He had not lived long enough to know that as good, or better, a man can always be found to fill the place of even the best ”