The Lonely Island: The Refuge of the Mutineers by R. M. Ballantyne (10 ebook reader .txt) 📖

More than eighteen years had now elapsed without the dwellers on that little isle of the Southern Sea having beheld a visitant from the great world around them. That world, meanwhile, had been convulsed with useless wars. The great Napoleon had run through a considerable portion of his withering career, drenching the earth with blood, and heaping heavy burdens of debt on the unfortunate nations of Europe. Nelson had shattered his fleets, and Wellington was on the eve of commencing that victorious career which was destined, ere long, to scatter his armies; but no echo of the turmoil in which all this was being accomplished had reached the peaceful dwellers on Pitcairn, who went on the even tenor of their way, proving, in the most convincing and interesting manner, that after all “love is the fulfilling of the law.”

But the year 1808 had now arrived, a year fraught with novelty, interest, and importance to the Pitcairners.

The first great event of that year was the birth of a son to Thursday October Christian, and if ever there was a juvenile papa who opened his eyes to the uttermost, stared in sceptical wonder, pinched himself to see if he were awake, and went away into the bush to laugh and rejoice in secret, that man was TOC.

“Boys and girls,” said Thursday, about a month after the birth, “we’ll celebrate this event with a picnic to Martin’s Cove, if you would like it.”

There was an assumption of fine paternal dignity about Toc when he said this, which was quite beautiful to behold. His making the proposal, too, without any reference to John Adams, was noted as being unusual.

“Don’t you think we’d better ask father first?” suggested Otaheitan Sally.

“Of course I do,” said Toc, on whose ear the word “father” fell pleasantly. “You don’t suppose, do you, that I’d propose to do anything of importance without his consent?”

It may strike the supercilious reader here that a picnic, even on Pitcairn, was not a matter of profound importance, but he must remember that that particular picnic was to be held in honour of Thursday’s baby. It may be that this remark is thrown away on those who are not in the position of Thursday. If so, let it pass.

“We will invite Father Adams to go with us,” continued Toc, ingeniously referring to Adams in a manner suggestive of the idea that there were other fathers on the island as well as he.

When Father Adams was invited, he accepted the invitation heartily, and, slapping Toc on his huge broad back, wished him joy of the “noo babby,” and hoped he might live to see it grow up to have “a babby of its own similar to itself, d’ye see?” at which remark Toc laughed with evident delight.

Well, the whole thing was arranged, and they proceeded to carry the picnic into effect. It was settled that some were to go by land, though the descent from the cliffs to the cove was not an easy or safe one. Others were to go by water, and the water-party was sub-divided into two bands. One band, which included Susannah and the amazing baby, was to go in canoes; the other was to swim. The distance by water might be about eight miles, but that was a mere trifle to the Pitcairners, some of whom could swim right round their island.

It turned out, however, that that charming island was not altogether exempt from those vicissitudes of weather which play such a prominent part in the picnicry of other and less favoured lands, for while they were yet discussing the arrangements of the day, a typhoon stepped in unexpectedly to arrest them.

It may be that there are some persons in Britain who do not know precisely what a typhoon is. If they saw or felt one, they would not be apt to forget it. Roughly speaking, a typhoon is a terrific storm. Cyclopaedias, which are supposed to tell us about everything, say that the Chinese name such a storm “Tei-fun,” or “hot-wind.” No-fun would seem to be a more appropriate term, if one were to name it from results. One writer says of typhoons, “They are storms which rage with such intensity and fury that those who have never seen them can form no conception of them; you would say that heaven and earth wished to return to their original chaos.”

Obviously, if this writer be correct, there would be no use in our attempting to enlighten those “who can form no conception” of the thing. Nevertheless, in the hope that the writer referred to may be as ignorant on this point as he is in regard to the “wishes” of “heaven and earth,” we will attempt a brief description of the event which put such a sudden stop to what may be called the Toc-baby-picnic.

For several days previously the weather had been rather cloudy, and there had been a few showers; but this would not have checked the proceedings if the wind had not risen so as to render it dangerous to launch the canoes into the surf on the beach of Bounty Bay. As the day advanced it blew a gale, and Toc congratulated himself on having resisted the urgent advice of the volatile Dan McCoy to stick at nothing.

About sunset the gale increased to a hurricane. John Adams, with several of the older youths, went to the edge of the precipice, near the eastern part of the village, where a deep ravine ran up into the mountains. There, under the shelter of a rock, they discussed the situation.

“Lucky that you didn’t go, Toc,” said Adams, pointing at the sea, whose waves were lashed and churned into seething foam.

“Yes, thanks be to God,” replied Thursday.

“It will blow harder yet, I think,” said Charlie Christian, who had grown into a tall stripling of about seventeen. He resembled his father in the bright expression of his handsome face and in the vigour of his lithe frame.

“Looks like it, Charlie. It minds me o’ a regular typhoon we had when you was quite a babby, that blew down a lot o’ trees, an’ almost took the roofs off our huts.”

As he spoke it seemed as if the wind grew savage at having been recognised, for it came round the corner of the rock with a tremendous roar, and nearly swept Adams’s old seafaring hat into the rising sea.

“I’d ha’ bin sorry to lose ’ee,” muttered John, as he thrust the glazed and battered covering well down on his brows. “I wore you in the Bounty, and I expect, with care, to make you last out my time, an’ leave you as a legacy to my son George.”

“Look-out, father!” shouted Matt Quintal and Jack Mills in the same breath.

The whole party crouched close in beside the rock, and looked anxiously upwards, where a loud rending sound was going on. Another moment and a large cocoa-nut palm, growing in an exposed situation, was wrenched from its hold and hurled like a feather over the cliffs, carrying a mass of earth and stones along with it.

“It’s well the rock overhangs a bit, or we’d have got the benefit o’ that shower,” said Adams. “Come, boys, it’s clear that we’re goin’ to have a dirty night of it, an’ I think we’d better look to our roofs an’ make all snug. If our ground-tackle ain’t better than that o’ the tree which has just gone by the board, we shall have a poor look-out.”

There was much cause for the anxiety which the seaman expressed regarding the roofs of the houses. Already, before they got back to the village, part of the roof of one of the oldest huts had been stripped off, and the women were beginning to look anxiously upwards as they heard the clattering overhead.

“Now, lads, all hands to work. Not a moment too soon either. Out wi’ the old tacklin’ o’ the Bounty. Get the tarpaulins up. Lash one over Toc’s hut. Clap some big stones on Quintal’s. Fetch the ladders, some o’ you youngsters. Out o’ the way, boys. Here, Mainmast; you get the little ’uns off to their bunks. Fetch me the big sledge-hammer, Charlie. Look alive, lads!”

While he shouted these directions, John Adams went to work as actively as the youngest among them. Every one wrought with a will. In a few minutes all moveables were carried under shelter, heavy stones were placed where they were required, tarpaulins and stout ropes were lashed over roofs and pegged to the ground, shutters and doors were made fast, and, in short, the whole village was “made snug” for a “dirty night” with almost as much celerity as if it had been a fully-manned and well-disciplined ship of the line.

As John Adams had said, it was not begun a moment too soon. They had barely finished, indeed, when the heavens appeared to rend with a blinding flash of lightning. Then came a thunder crash, or, rather, a series of crashes and flashes, that seemed to imply the final crack of doom. This was followed by rain in sheets so heavy that it seemed as if the ocean had been lifted and poured upon the island. To render the confusion worse confounded, the wind came in what may be called swirls, overturning trees as if they were straws, and mixing up rain, mud, stones, and branches in the great hurly-burly, until ancient chaos seemed to reign on land and sea.

“It’s an awful night,” said