Blue Lights by Robert Michael Ballantyne (black male authors .txt) 📖

Molloy that day, as if they regarded him as typical of British strength, and, therefore, an appropriate object of revenge. After the midday rest, they not only put on him his ordinary burden, but added to the enormous weight considerably, so that the poor fellow staggered under it, and finally fell down beneath it, with a very dismal groan indeed!

Of course the lash was at once applied, and under its influence the sailor rose with great difficulty, and staggered forward a few paces, but only to fall again. This time, however, he did not wait for the lash, but made very determined efforts of his own accord to rise and advance, without showing the smallest sign of resentment. Even his captors seemed touched, for one of them removed a small portion of his burden, so that, thereafter, the poor fellow proceeded with less difficulty, though still with a little staggering and an occasional groan.

That night they reached a village near the banks of a broad river, where they put up for the night. After their usual not too heavy supper was over, the prisoners were thrust into a sort of hut or cattle-shed, and left to make themselves as comfortable as they could on the bare floor.

"I don't feel quite so much inclined for sleep to-night," said Miles to Molloy.

"No more do I," remarked the sailor, stretching himself like a wearied Goliath on the earthen floor, and placing his arms under his head for a pillow.

"I feel pretty well used up too," said Simkin, throwing himself down with a sigh that was more eloquent than his tongue. He was indeed anything but Rattling Bill by that time.

Moses Pyne being, like his great namesake, a meek man, sympathised with the others, but said nothing about himself, though his looks betrayed him. Armstrong and Stevenson were silent. They seemed too much exhausted to indulge in speech.

"Poor fellow!" said Moses to Molloy, "I don't wonder you are tired, for you not only carried twice as much as any of us, but you took part of _my_ load. Indeed he did, comrades," added Moses, turning to his friends with an apologetic air. "I didn't want him to do it, but he jerked part o' my load suddenly out o' my hand an' wouldn't give it up again; an', you know, I didn't dare to make a row, for that would have brought the lash down on both of us. But I didn't want him to carry so much, an' him so tired."

"Tired!" exclaimed the sailor, with a loud laugh. "Why, I warn't tired a bit. An', you know, you'd have dropped down, Moses, if I hadn't helped ye at that time."

"Well, I confess I _was_ ready to drop," returned Moses, with a humbled look; "but I would much rather have dropped than have added to your burden. How can you say you wasn't tired when you had fallen down only five minutes before, an' groaned heavily when you rose, and your legs trembled so? I could _see_ it!"

To this the seaman's only reply was the expansion of his huge but handsome mouth, the display of magnificent teeth, the disappearance of both eyes, and a prolonged quiet chuckle.

"Why, what's the matter with you, Jack?" asked Stevenson.

"Nothin's the matter wi' me, old man--'cept--"

Here he indulged in another chuckle.

"Goin' mad, with over-fatigue," said Simkin, looking suspiciously at him.

"Ay, that's it, messmate, clean mad wi' over-fatigue."

He wiped his eyes with the hairy back of his hand, for the chuckling, being hearty, had produced a few tears.

"No, but really, Jack, what is it you're laughing at?" asked Armstrong. "If there _is_ a joke you might as well let us have the benefit of laughing along wi' you, for we stand much in need of something to cheer us here."

"Well, Billy boy, I may as well make a clean breast of it," said Molloy, raising himself on one elbow and becoming grave. "I do confess to feelin' raither ashamed o' myself, but you mustn't be hard on me, lads, for circumstances alters cases, you know, as Solomon said--leastwise if it warn't him it was Job or somebody else. The fact is, I've bin shammin', mates!"

"Shamming!"

"Ay, shammin' _weak_. Purtendin' that I was shaky on the legs, an' so not quite up to the cargo they were puttin' aboard o' me."

"If what you've been doing means shamming _weak_, I'd like to see you coming out _strong_," observed Miles, with a short laugh.

"Well, p'r'aps you'll see that too some day," returned the sailor, with an amiable look.

"But do you really mean that all that groaning--which I confess to have been surprised at--was mere pretence?"

"All sham. Downright sneakin'!" said Molloy. "The short an' the long of it is, that I see'd from the first the on'y way to humbug them yellow-faced baboons was to circumwent 'em. So I set to work at the wery beginnin'."

"Ah, by takin' a header," said Simkin, "into one o' their bread-baskets!"

"No, no!" returned the seaman, "that, I confess, was a mistake. But you'll admit, I've made no more mistakes o' the same sort since then. You see, I perceived that, as my strength is considerable above the average, the baboons would be likely to overload me, so, arter profound excogitation wi' myself, I made up my mind what to do, an' when they had clapped on a little more than the rest o' you carried I began to groan, then I began to shake a bit in my timbers, an' look as if I was agoin' to founder. It didn't check 'em much, for they're awful cruel, so I went fairly down by the head. I had a pretty fair guess that this would bring the lash about my shoulders, an' I was right, but I got up wery slowly an' broken-down-like, so that the baboons was fairly humbugged, and stopped loadin' of me long afore I'd taken in a full cargo--so, you see, boys, I've bin sailin' raither light than otherwise."

"But do you mean to tell me that the load you've bin carryin' is not too heavy for you?" asked Moses.

"That's just what I does mean to tell you, lad. I could carry a good deal more, an' dance with it. You see, they ain't used to men o' my size, so I was able to humbug 'em into a miscalkilation. I on'y wish I could have helped you all to do the same, but they're too 'cute, as the Yankees say. Anyway, Moses, you don't need to trouble your head when I gives you a helpin' hand again."

"Ah, that expression, `a helping hand,' sounds familiar in my ears," said Stevenson, in a sad tone.

"Yes, what do it recall, lad?" asked Molloy, extending himself again on his broad back.

"It recalls places and friends in Portsmouth, Jack, that we may never again set eyes on. You remember the Institoot? Well, they've got a new branch o' the work there for the surrounding civilian poor, called the _Helping Hand_. You see, Miss Robinson understands us soldiers out and out. She knew that those among us who gave up drink and sin, and put on the blue-ribbon, were not goin' to keep all the benefit to ourselves. She knew that we understood the meaning of the word `enlist' That we'd think very little o' the poor-spirited fellow who'd take the Queen's shillin' and put on her uniform, and then shirk fightin' her battles and honouring her flag. So when some of us put on the Lord's uniform-- which, like that of the Austrians, is white--and unfurled His flag, she knew we'd soon be wantin' to fight His battles against sin--especially against drink; so instead of lookin' after our welfare alone, she encouraged us to hold out a _helpin' hand_ to the poorest and most miserable people in Portsmouth, an' she found us ready to answer to the call."

"Ah, they was grand times, these," continued the marine, with kindly enthusiasm, as he observed that his comrades in sorrow were becoming interested, and forgetting for the moment their own sorrows and sufferings. "The Blue-Ribbon move was strong in Portsmouth at the time, and many of the soldiers and sailors joined it. Some time after we had held out a helping hand to the poor civilians, we took it into our heads to invite some of 'em to a grand tea-fight in the big hall, so we asked a lot o' the poorest who had faithfully kept the pledge through their first teetotal Christmas; and it _was_ a scrimmage, I can tell you. We got together more than forty of 'em, men and women, and there were about three hundred soldiers and sailors, and their wives to wait on 'em an' keep 'em company!"

"Capital!" exclaimed Miles, who had a sympathetic spirit--especially for the poor.

"Good--good!" said Molloy, nodding his head. "That was the right thing to do, an' I suppose they enjoyed theirselves?"

"Enjoyed themselves!" exclaimed the marine, with a laugh. "I should just think they did. Trust Miss Robinson for knowin' how to make poor folk enjoy themselves--and, for the matter of that, rich folk too! How they did stuff, to be sure! Many of 'em, poor things, hadn't got such a blow-out in all their lives before. You see, they was the very poorest of the poor. You may believe what I say, for I went round myself with one o' the Institoot ladies to invite 'em, and I do declare to you that I never saw even pigs or dogs in such a state of destitootion--nothin' whatever to lie on but the bare boards."

"You don't say so?" murmured Moses, with deep commiseration, and seemingly oblivious of the fact that he was himself pretty much in similar destitution at that moment.

"Indeed I do. Look here," continued the marine, becoming more earnest as he went on; "thousands of people don't know--can't understand--what misery and want and suffering is going on around 'em. City missionaries and the like tell 'em about it, and write about it, but telling and writin' _don't_ make people _know_ some things. They must _see_, ay, sometimes they must _feel_, before they can rightly understand.

"One of the rooms we visited," continued Stevenson, in pathetic tones, "belonged to a poor old couple who had been great drinkers, but had been induced to put on the blue-ribbon. It was a pigeon-hole of a room, narrow, up a dark stair. They had no means of support. The room was empty. Everything had been pawned. The last thing given up was the woman's shawl to pay the rent, and they were starving."

"Why didn't they go to the work'us?" asked Simkin.

"'Cause the workhouse separates man and wife, in defiance of the Divine law--`Whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder.' They was fond of each other, was that old man and woman, and had lived long together, an' didn't want to part till death. So they had managed to stick to the old home, ay, and they had stuck to their colours, for the bit o' blue was still pinned to the tattered coat o' the man and the thin gown o' the woman, (neither coat nor gown would fetch anything at the pawn-shop!) and there was no smell o' drink in the