Harry Heron: Midshipman's Journey

by Patrick G Cox

  “They seemed very hospitable, sir, and the militia seem to be well turned out.” He hesitated. “The servants, sir, are they from the Indies? I do not believe I have seen people like them before.”

  “They name them Malay, though they come from Java, I believe. Slaves, of course, as the natives here are too savage and too backward to be trained as servants and labourers on the farms, I am told.” The Captain moved toward the newly launched boat as it drew alongside the landing stage that stretched into the sea. He turned to Harry and said, “Into the boat then, young man. I wish to get everything in hand as soon as possible.”

  Chapter 22

  The Southern Ocean

  The excursion to the castle provided Midshipman Barclay with the excuse to attack Harry. “Don’t think your being in the Captain’s favour will get you any slack here,” he sneered when Harry returned to the gunroom. “Currying favour with the Captain will get you no credit from me.”

  “I beg pardon?” Harry was caught off guard by this assault. “I asked for no favours or for this assignment to accompany him. It could as easily have been anyone else.”

  “Don’t think I don’t know that your family is thick as the thieves they are with the Captain’s family,” Barclay snapped. “Be warned, I’ll not suffer your running to the officers any longer with tales. I’ll not have my position undermined by a whelp like you.”

  Harry’s temper was rising, and he would have made a retort had Tom Bowles not arrived. “Eamon, the first is demanding your attendance. You’re to accompany the purser to arrange fresh supplies.” He took in the fury in Harry’s face and the sneer on Barclay’s. “I’d not keep Mister Bell waiting if I were in your shoes,” he said calmly. “Nor should you be so quick to provoke an argument.”

  “Damn you,” Barclay spat. “I’ve not forgotten your standing up for that traitor O’Connor,” he said over Tom’s shoulder. “Or that you brought me into disrepute with the Captain over it. I’ll repay that when I find an opportunity.”

  “As I recall,” Harry shot back, unable to restrain his temper or his tongue any longer, “it was not I who concocted a false story in order to have a man flogged for my own vanity.”

  For a moment, it looked as if Barclay would attack him, but then Tom Bowles stepped between them again. “The first awaits you, Eamon,” he said levelly. Over his shoulder, he said to Harry, “I cannot permit you to escape punishment for your disrespect for your seniors either. You can accept a caning from me or spend your off watch time for the next week in the mizzen rigging.”

  For a moment, Harry considered refusing to accept any punishment, then he drew himself up to his full height and with contempt in his eyes said, “Then apply the cane, if I must be punished for no better reason than to uphold someone’s authority. Let us finish it.”

  “You’ll get a thrashing from me alright,” Barclay snarled, moving to seize Harry.

  “Leave him be,” Tom Bowles snapped, restraining the bigger man. “You’ve done more than enough already—don’t make it any worse! The first is waiting for you. Go now before he comes looking for you and makes further enquiry as to what delayed you.”

  Rage and disappointment chased each other across the bully’s face. Finally, he moved toward the companion ladder and threw over his shoulder, “I’ll have your hide yet, Heron. Don’t think you’ll get away easily.”

  With the governor’s approval, boats were soon ferrying working parties ashore to collect the supplies and water. For many of the trusted men there was also the opportunity to go ashore and enjoy a brief freedom from the confines of the ship.

  The boatswain called Ferghal to him. “Fergie, lad, get yersel’ in the boat wi’ t’ purser. Ye an’ me are goin’ ter see what may be got fer me stores.” He winked. “An’ mebbe a mug o’ something ter keep us refreshed.”

  Ferghal found that several of the older boys were also in the boat, and it made for a memorable run ashore, though the fruit with which they were plied and the heat worked on the stomachs of several in an unpleasant manner.

  Mister Bentley was almost beside himself as he tramped about the shore collecting specimens of plants, insects and the occasional bird, and he soon made plans for an expedition to the lower slopes of the mountain.

  “Mister Heron, Mister Tanner,” he addressed the pair. “I have obtained the first Lieutenant’s permission for you to accompany me ashore on a little expedition. There are a number of fascinating blooms to be obtained on the mountain and I may never have another chance. We will be rowed ashore at eight bells in the morning watch—it’s best to get to the mountain before the heat is too great.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Harry said in a strained voice, speaking through the pain he still felt from the caning, and he still had bruises to show for it too. He found walking and sitting uncomfortable. But at least an excursion ashore would take him away from the constant provocation of Barclay and his crony Peterson. “Shall I bring my sketch pad and paints, sir?”

  “Essential,” exclaimed the Parson. “I am certain there will be any number of things to be recorded.”

  As he departed, Kit shook his head ruefully. “I think it will be a hot, dry, and lengthy walk to see these flowers. I suppose we may hope that he at least arranges some refreshment for us.” He glanced at Harry. “And it will take us out of Barclay’s way for a few hours.”

  “Aye, and give him something else to resent and use against us,” Harry said. “Senior he may be, and though he beats me daily, I’ll never learn to show him respect; my contempt for him grows with each gibe.”

  “Learn to bend a little and it will all soon pass,” Kit remarked in an attempt to lighten Harry’s mood.

  The glowering presence of Midshipman Barclay overshadowed the gunroom and divided it into three camps. A group of sycophants used his protection to carry out their own petty campaigns of bullying against the smaller and younger members. The second group was those who resisted and tended to suffer the bullying in silence but without surrendering their allegiance, and the third group who tried to run with both the hares and the hounds. Harry and Kit both fell into the second group. Harry knew he had no hope of ever avoiding Barclay’s attention, though he had at least drawn a line against some of the sycophants who now knew they could not expect him to kowtow to their egos.

  The expedition started badly with Midshipman Peterson protesting that he had to undertake extra work because Harry was going ashore. Unfortunately for him, he made this protest within earshot of Mister Beasley.

  “Mister Peterson,” the Lieutenant said, “I suggest that the moment you cease trying to evade work and passing it to others, you may find yourself being offered opportunities for advancing your knowledge. Until then, it may be best for you not to draw attention to yourself in the manner you have just done. Be warned, I have my eye on you and your abuse of your juniors. Now see to your duties.”

  The parson’s party reached the saddle between Table Mountain and the great cone known as Devil’s Peak by mid-morning thanks to the use of a small pony trap driven by a Malay coachman who spoke almost no English, at least nothing intelligible to the parson, the midshipmen, or to Ferghal, tasked by Mister Billing with carrying the parson’s equipment.

  They dismounted at the invitation of the coachman, and Mister Bentley immediately spotted a bloom he had not before seen except in books.

  “A Protea!” he exclaimed. “A magnificent Nerifolia! I must have seeds and a specimen of this. I will need the bloom sketched, Mister Heron, and the leaves if you please. Mister Tanner, your assistance in collecting a good specimen—the presses are in my case, O’Connor—a large one will be required, I think.”

  The watching coachman seemed amused by this mad activity. After all, these plants were plentiful on the mountain, though as Mister Bentley soon discovered, they grew only in certain areas and in certain soils. Within the hour, he had identified and sampled at least six varieties, demanding Harry sketch an example of each. By the mid
-afternoon, the list had grown in extent as other varieties of plants were added, and Harry found himself almost overwhelmed by the sheer number of plants he was asked to draw.

  “There will not be time to do all of these in detail, sir,” he protested. “Can I not make notes and then complete the drawings from your specimens when there is time aboard?”

  The parson smiled. “Indeed, Mister Heron, it was most unreasonable of me to expect otherwise. Unthinking in my excitement is what it is; I am forgetting the labour I am putting you to. Dear me, yes, of course. Take notes and let us arrange for you to complete the drawings and colouring when it may be done in more leisurely fashion.” He studied the sketches Harry had already completed. “You have captured the detail of these so wonderfully already. Excellent work, Mister Heron; well done.”

  They returned to the ship at sunset, dusty, tired and laden with the parson’s specimens.

  The next expedition saw Harry accompanying Mister Bentley and Eamon Barclay who did not enjoy the experience of dashing hither and thither on the mountain’s slopes collecting blooms and insects for the Parson.

  On their return to the ship, he complained long and loudly. “These starts of the parson’s are not work for an officer. Children’s games—that is all they are.” He turned to where Kit and Harry sat completing their journals. “I shall see to it that the juniors are sent with him in future.”

  Tom Bowles forbore to point out that Barclay himself had protested at not being assigned a place on these “pleasure expeditions,” as he had called them.

  From Harry’s perspective, it silenced Barclay’s constant complaints at what he considered the favouring treatment accorded to Harry and Kit.

  The Dutch inhabitants treated these mad Englishmen with courtesy, but the language remained a barrier despite the recent occupation by the British. The Malay slaves intrigued Harry. Their alien speech, somewhat exotic dress, and their obvious adherence to their Islamic faith were all interesting and new to him. His brush with the Barbary slavers and his own family history, however, made him very dubious concerning the entire question of slavery and the ethics that underpinned it.

  The Maid of Selsey and the sluggish Chertsey sailed two days after their arrival for the shelter of Simon’s Bay on the other side of the great finger marked on the chart as the Cape Peninsula, escorted by the frigate Virago, herself seeking a place in which she could be careened and her copper repaired.

  A FORTNIGHT SPED BY BEFORE WORD CAME that the transports were repaired and ready to sail. A last round of official visits followed, and in the early light of a new day, Spartan and her diminished flock weighed and stood out of the bay. The course, once clear of the land, was south toward the long finger that was the Cape itself and the great Southern Ocean.

  Harry was on watch as they drew abreast of the famous Cape, and the lookout spied Virago and her charges leaving False Bay on its other side. Looking eastward, he exclaimed in surprise when he noticed the manner in which the two oceans seemed reluctant to mingle.

  Next to him, Mister Wentworth chuckled. “Aye, look well on it, Mister Heron. The Indian Ocean and the Atlantic meet here; see how the waters are dark on our side and lighter where Virago stands onward—there the waters of the tropics, and here the waters of the southern ice.” He pointed to the southwest and added, “See that line of dark cloud? It foretells hard weather, and we are standing down toward it. Our course from here will be through hard winds and seas that do not forgive mistakes.”

  They were interrupted by Midshipman Peterson’s voice. “Swallow is signalling, sir. She seeks permission to detach herself and the Indiamen and to join Virago.”

  “Lucky devils,” Mister Rogers remarked. “Not for them the southern route—they go east and north to Madras.” He nodded to the waiting midshipman. “Very well, acknowledge: Permission to proceed.”

  “They’ll not escape the blow those clouds predict,” the master told Harry, his attention on the slowly closing transports. “At least they will have the warmer weather sooner than we, but the coast they must pass on the way toward Ile de France is a treacherous one in wild weather.”

  Chapter 23

  Sinking the Dutchman

  Harry dangled his legs from the foretop and stared at the blaze of stars spread across the Southern Ocean sky. For the first time in the fortnight since departing the Cape, the sky was clear and still as the ship rolled and pitched slowly and steadily under the thrust of her sails. His latest confrontation compelled him to seek solitude and to avoid the gunroom, its aggressive senior, and the orlop. Retreating to the rigging where he could think and relax his temper was a sensible action, and it had the added benefit of escaping the all-pervading smell of the lower decks.

  The constant need to watch for the maliciousness of Eamon Barclay and his cronies and the need to guard his temper could get wearying. In the fighting tops he had found the perfect place for a little peace and quiet reflection when he was off duty. From here he could contemplate the unfamiliar southern skies and pick out the cardinal stars, there the great Southern Cross, there Orion and other bright markers useful to navigators. He wondered yet again what it would be like to travel among the stars. The strains of a fiddle floated up from the forecastle, the clear notes of a fife accompanying it, and Harry smiled when he recognised the tune. Ferghal needed little encouragement to play the music of their home in County Down overlooking the great sea lough of Strangford.

  Harry loved music, but with no talent for making it, could only envy his friend’s skill. Though he was an accomplished artist and mathematician, he considered the gift of music superior to his own and longed to be able to play even a simple instrument. Ferghal could seemingly pick up any instrument and coax from it music to make men dance or weep.

  The fiddle soared into a vigorous jig, and Harry looked down to see several men dancing in the space cleared for them by their watching messmates. He glanced aft and smiled again as he saw several of the Lieutenants gathered at the quarterdeck rail to watch and listen. A movement caught his eye, and he stiffened slightly when he saw that Captain Blackwood quietly stood apart from his officers on the windward side of the deck.

  “Yon Ferghal has the music in his soul, sir,” commented a topman Harry knew as Giles.

  “He has that,” said Harry. “It seems to flow from his fingers.”

  “Aye, sir,” responded Giles. He studied Harry carefully, trying not to make his scrutiny obvious. Ferghal’s loyalty to Harry was well known, and the men in Harry’s division had begun to understand why. It went beyond his care of his people, the Irish, unusual in a boy of just thirteen. He was scrupulously fair, but his innate courtesy masked an explosive temper coupled with an iron will. His resistance to the constant bullying was known throughout the ship. Mister Midshipman Heron was not a man to take liberties with, not if you wished to remain in his trust. He stood up for his men even if it meant taking an unjust punishment.

  “He’s a fair hand at the scrimshaw too,” Giles continued, still speaking of Ferghal. “The boatswain seeks him out for delicate work—lucky devil.”

  Harry laughed. “Aye, and a handy man with his fists as I recall.” He grinned at the seaman. “The red in his hair speaks of the fire in his heart, as some have already discovered.” He chuckled at the surprise in the man’s face. “The broken knuckles he sometimes displays were never broken in scrimshaw or the playing of his fiddle.”

  Giles laughed. “He’ll be mortified that you’ve guessed his secret, sir.” He cocked his head to listen as the fiddle took up another haunting strain.

  “Tell him then to have a care. I would not wish to see him flogged for fighting, and you may tell him that Mister Bell is suspicious already,” Harry said, his voice serious. His head swung sharply. “What is that? There, a light, low down to larboard.”

  Giles drew his breath sharply. “I see it, sir. It ain’t one of our’n.” He drew in his breath and bellowed, “Deck thar! Sail to larboard.” He changed
his stance and then called a moment later, “Broad on the larboard bow.”

  Harry jumped to his feet and swung himself onto one of the great shrouds, rapidly sliding to the gangway before hurrying aft to the quarterdeck.

  “Steady, Mister Heron,” the first Lieutenant called. “What have you seen?”

  “A light, sir, low down—possibly a ship. It moves oddly, as if to catch the eye, sir.”

  “Very good, sir,” Captain Blackwood interjected. “Mister Bell, have the master alter course to close with this mystery ship. We shall see who or what ventures this far south besides ourselves.” To Harry he said, “Mister Heron, take a night glass to the main crosstrees and see what you can make of it.”

  It was a long climb to the crosstrees with the telescope slung on his back. He was, despite his youth, a little breathless at the quick upward assent, and took a minute to steady his pulse as he joined the lookout.

  “I sees it, sir,” the man said, “now fine on our bow. I thinks they’s in distress; the light moves strangely.”

  Harry put the glass to his eye and focused it carefully. The night glass inverted the image turning sea into sky, something he had become accustomed to after getting used to it. He found the target and held it, a merchantman lying low in the water, the stumps of masts carrying scraps of sail. Someone in her remaining rigging was swinging a light.

  “You’re right, she’s been dismasted,” Harry said. “Ship, sir, merchantman,” he shouted to the quarterdeck. “Low in the water and jury rigged.”

  “Very good, Mister Heron,” said the first, his voice carrying up to Harry. “Remain where you are and do not lose them.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Harry called back. To the lookout he said, “We shall have to haul our wind close. It will be lively up here.”

  The seaman’s teeth flashed a broad grin as he said, “Aye, that it will, sor!”

  The ship heeled steeply and the mast spiralled as more hands swarmed up the rigging and spread out along the great yards. With the seas now on the beam, Spartan staggered and rolled under the thrust of sea and wind.