The Hot Swamp by R. M. Ballantyne (latest novels to read .txt) 📖

The day that followed the wreck was well advanced before the sleepers awakened.

Their first thoughts were those of thankfulness for having escaped with life. Then arose feelings of loneliness and sorrow at the sad fate of the crew of the Penelope, for though it was just possible that some of their comrades had reached the shore on the beach that extended to the westward, such an event was not very probable. Still the bare hope of this induced them to rise in haste. After a hurried breakfast on the remnants of the previous night’s supper, they proceeded along the coast for several miles, carefully searching the shores of every bay.

About noon they halted. A few scraps of the dried meat still remained, and on these they dined, sitting on a grassy slope, while they consulted as to their future proceedings.

“What is now to be done?” asked the captain of Bladud, after they had been seated in silence for some minutes.

“I would rather hear your opinion first,” returned his friend. “You must still continue to act as captain, for it is fitting that age should sit at the helm, while I will act the part of guide and forester, seeing that I am somewhat accustomed to woodcraft.”

“And the remainder of our band,” said little Maikar, wiping his mouth after finishing the last morsel, “will sit in judgment on your deliberations.”

“Be it so,” returned Bladud. “Wisdom, it is said, lies in small compass, so we should find it in you.”

Captain Arkal, whose knitted brows and downcast eyes showed that his thoughts were busy, looked up suddenly.

“It is not likely,” he said, “that any ships will come near this coast, for the gale has driven us far out of the usual track of trading ships, and there are no towns here, large or small, that I know of. It would be useless, therefore, to remain where we are in the hope of being picked up by a passing vessel. To walk back to our home in the east is next to impossible, for it is not only far distant, but there lie between us and Hellas far-reaching gulfs and bays, besides great mountain ranges, which have never yet been crossed, for their tops are in the clouds and covered, summer and winter, with eternal snow.”

“Then no hope remains to us,” said Maikar, with a sigh, “except to join ourselves to the wild people of the land—if there be any people at all in it—and live and die like savages.”

“Patience, Maikar, I have not yet finished.”

“Besides,” interpolated Bladud, “a wise judge never delivers an opinion until he has heard both sides of a question.”

“Now, from my knowledge of the lie of coast-lands, I feel sure that the Isles of the Cassiterides must lie there,” continued the captain, pointing westward, “and if we travel diligently, it is not unlikely that we shall come down upon the coast of this land almost opposite to them. There we may find, or perhaps make, a boat in which we could cross over—for the sea at that part is narrow, and the white cliffs of the land will be easily distinguished. Once there, I have no doubt that we shall find a ship belonging to one of my countrymen which will take Maikar and me back to our homes, while you, prince, will doubtless be able to return to your father’s court on foot.”

It will be seen from this speech that the Phoenician captain included the southern shore of England in his idea of the Cassiterides. His notion of the direction in which the islands lay, however, was somewhat incorrect, being founded partly on experience, but partly also on a misconception prevalent at the time that the islands referred to lay only a little way to the north of Spain.

“Your plan seems to me a good one,” said Bladud, after some thought, “but I cannot help thinking that you are not quite right in your notion as to the direction of the tin islands. When I left Albion, I kept a careful note of our daily runs—being somewhat curious on such points—and it is my opinion that they lie there.”

He pointed almost due north. The captain smiled and shook his head. Bladud looked at Maikar, who also smiled and shook his head.

“If you want my opinion,” said the little man, gravely, “it is that when two great, good and wise men differ so widely, it is more than likely the truth lies somewhere between them. In my judgment, therefore, the Cassiterides lie yonder.”

He pointed with an air of confidence in a north-west direction.

“It does seem to me,” said Bladud, “that Maikar is right, for as you and I seem to be equally confident in our views, captain, a middle course may be the safest. However, if you decide otherwise, I of course submit.”

“Nay,” returned the captain, “I will not abuse the power you have given me. Let us decide the matter by lot.”

“Ay, let us draw lots,” echoed Maikar, “and so shove the matter off our shoulders on to the shoulders of chance.”

“There is, there can be, no such thing as chance,” said Bladud in a soliloquising tone. “However, let it be as you wish. I recognise the justice of two voices overriding one.”

Lots were drawn accordingly, and the longest fell to the little seaman. Without further discussion, therefore, the course suggested by him was adopted.

“And now, comrades,” said the prince, rising and drawing his knife—which, like his sword, had been procured in Egypt, and was of white metal—“we must set to work to make bows and arrows, for animals are not wont to walk up to man and request to be killed and cooked, and it won’t be long before Maikar is shouting for food.”

“Sorry am I that the good javelin of my grandfather went down in the carcase of the pirate chief,” remarked the captain, also rising, “for it seems to me by the way you handled it, Bladud, that you could have killed deer with it as well as men.”

“I have killed deer with such before now, truly, but the arrow is handier and surer.”

“Ay, in a sure hand, with a good eye to direct it,” returned Arkal, “but I make no pretence to either. A ship, indeed, I can manage to hit—when I am cool, which is not often the case in a fight—and if there are men in it, my shafts are not quite thrown away, but as to deer, boars, and birds, I can make nothing of them. If I mistake not, Maikar is not much better than myself with the bow.”

“I am worse,” observed the little man quietly.

“Well then,” said Bladud, with a laugh, “you must make me hunter to the party.”

While conversing thus they had entered the forest, and soon found trees suitable to their purpose, from which they cut boughs,—using their swords as hatchets.

We have already shown that the prince had brought his sword, shield, and knife on shore with him. Captain Arkal and Maikar had also saved their swords and knives, these having been attached to their girdles at the time they leaped from the wreck. They were somewhat inferior weapons to those worn by Bladud, being made of bronze. The swords of the seamen, unlike that of the prince, were short and double-edged, shaped somewhat like those used long afterwards by the Romans, and they made up in weight for what they lacked in sharpness.

It did not take many hours for the party, under the direction of the prince, to form three strong and serviceable bows, with several arrows, the latter being feathered with dropped plumes, and shod with flint, according to the fashion of the times. Bowstrings had to be made at first out of the tough fibrous roots of a tree, split into threads and plaited together.

“Of course they are not so good as deer-sinews for the purpose,” remarked Bladud, stringing one of the bows and fitting an arrow to it, “but we must be content until we kill a deer or some other animal. Perhaps we shall have an opportunity soon.”

The remark seemed to have been prophetic, for, as the last word passed his lips, a fawn trotted out of a glade right in front of the party and stood as if paralysed with surprise. The captain and Maikar were reduced to much the same condition, for they made no attempt to use their bows.

“Ho!—” exclaimed the former, but he got no further, for at the moment Bladud’s bow twanged, and an arrow quivered in the breast of the fawn, which fell dead without a struggle.

“Well done!” exclaimed the captain heartily. “If such luck always attends you, prince, we shall fare well on our journey.”

“It was not altogether luck,” returned the other. “See you that spot on the bark of yonder tree—about the size of Maikar’s mouth as it now gapes in astonishment?”

“I see it, clear enough—just over the—”

He stopped abruptly, for while he was yet speaking an arrow quivered in the centre of the spot referred to.

After that the captain talked no more about “luck,” and Maikar, shutting