by K. T. Tomb
I have read with considerable interest the second volume of your great work, which arrived with your letter and provided me with something to occupy my mind while I was convalescing. While of course I will assist you in the cataloguing of the species of all animals on the islands between India and China, as a Christian I must protest that the conclusion of your book; life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one, speaks naught of the life the Lord put unto Adam. Do you mean to suggest that we developed over time, as did the animals? Or merely that evolution is the modus operandi of design? I would be most eager to hear your thoughts.
The plan I have arranged with the ship’s captain, a Captain Sykes, once of Her Majesty’s Navy, but now pursuing trade, is that we leave Mangalore and follow the trade routes to the East. Captain Sykes has shown me several remote islands that, he says, will undoubtedly provide me with excellent samples for study. I have refreshed my supply of inks and paints—the Indians have such a wide variety of ingredients for the production of pigments—that I am sure whatever creatures we shall find, I will be able to render them in perfect accuracy. In any case, once we reach Kowloon, Captain Sykes will be trading for at most a week, and then laden with tea we shall fly home to England. I long to see Worcester Cathedral again, and to boat on the river. India has been kind enough these last five years, kind enough to make a wealthy man of me, but not so kind that I do not resent the crowding, the heat and the terrible monsoon that is all too welcome following the summer, but ‘soon’ outstays its welcome! In any event, we aim to arrive in Portsmouth no later than March of next year. Please conduct my warmest regards to Emma.
I remain your friend, and humble servant,
Dr. O.B. Pikeham
—Mangalore, the Seventeenth of August, 1860
***
A New Crew
His name was not John Lee, but what did that matter. John Lee had died of dysentery in Goa some time the night of New Year’s Day. It was a simple matter to swap their papers, and the new John Lee—who had himself by fortune been bitten by a cobra and was recovering from the venom—was free at last to make his way back to England. In his previous life, John had been a soldier. In his previous life, John had been a criminal, wanted for court martial for the heinous crime of refusing to shoot an unarmed man during the uprising of 1857. For the three years since, he had walked across India, sometimes begging, sometimes stealing. In Madras, he learned many things from a Yogi who contorted his body into strange fashions, and had never cut his beard. John also grew his facial hair out in the local style, and was soon sun darkened so that from a distance, he could not be recognized as an Englishman. In Lakhnauti, he encountered Thuggees, with whom he traveled for a while and learned several methods for extracting money from unwary travelers. On the banks of the Ganges he sang the funeral ghat for a woman who had given him shelter in her house and fed him when he was hungry. He had worked with elephants, run from British soldiers from his former unit and hunted a tiger that had terrorized a village for weeks. India had made him a man, more so than the army had ever done. The army told him what was right, what was wrong, and that those he was told were wrong should rightfully be killed. India taught him dharma—what is right.
Before he had made his way to the dockside that morning, John Lee had washed at one of the public baths. He had arrived before dawn to ensure that he would have the cleanest water, as it would not do to go before a deity with a dirty beard and fingernails. Suitably cleansed, he had arrived at the temple only a few moments after the priests themselves. When he had first asked for the ritual of Archana he had attracted a little suspicion from the priesthood, but they had allowed him in after some explanation in Hindi—which itself was a surprise, being that Englishmen rarely spoke the tongue, and even less frequently wished to pay tribute to Lord Ganesh, elephant-headed and the remover of obstacles. John dutifully offered the small bag of nuts he had brought as an offering, the one hundred and eight names of the god were chanted, the blessed lamp was swung, and the now sanctified nuts were returned to him. An old priest sat to one side of the altar. He watched John intently throughout the ritual and when it was over and John turned to leave the temple, he held firmly onto his hand.
“Take this, traveler,” the old man had whispered, as he placed several pages of paper into John’s hand. “Where you are going is not as peaceful as it is here. You will need this for the strength and courage it will give you. I have blessed these sacred pages myself.”
John thanked him and stuffed the papers into his little bag before he walked back out to the street. Suitably blessed, carrying only his pack of meager belongings and little else, John Lee sought the captain. The dockside, as usual at this time of morning, was thronging with humanity of all colors and creeds. Asian dock workers unloaded boxes of silks and tea directly on the quayside, where Indian stevedores loaded the high quality items directly onto boats bound for England and Europe. John wished that he could stow away on one of those boats, to go directly to England and skip this whole unnecessary journey east. But without much experience at sea, he had to take what passage in exchange for work that he could get. Along the quay fishermen bartered loudly in Hindi, English, a dozen Indian dialects. Within an hour there would be the smell of cooking fish from tiny stalls; cooking the morning’s catch and selling directly back to some of the people who had caught it. A Dutch trader was trying and failing to make himself understood to a man leading a team of horses pulling a great wagon full of exotic vegetables along the harbor. The cart was blocking the Dutchman’s own dock workers from loading his ship, but the language barrier was apparently too great to overcome.
Wandering here and there with notebooks and heavy purses were the representatives of the East India Company, to whom all the traders, merchants and captains must pay a tithe as a catholic must pay to the collection plate. Nothing was allowed to pass the docks of Mangalore that did not enrich the Company. The officers were accompanied by at least two local men bearing rifles and heavy clubs, a silent affirmation of who was in charge. The Indian people were therefore doubly deprived of income, once by the East India Company, and again by the British Empire itself, for as many Indians would wish for independence, many more were directly employed as servants to British men and companies. John Lee knew to steer clear of any Englishman in a position of power. It was almost impossible for an Englishman to understand why one of his countrymen had adopted the style and even religion of a subservient culture when his own country was the most powerful in the world and, as everyone knew, God was an Englishman Himself. John slowly wound his way along the dock, past the boats from around the world, past the Indian merchants, past the English and Dutch merchants, past the officials from the East India Company too, until he found the ship at the end of the quay. He took his consecrated nuts out of his pocket and ate a few. Until he had gotten this close John had been unable to see the tea clipper Nannie Dee at all, hidden as it was behind a Chinese junk of enormous dimensions, being loaded by crane with huge wooden boxes. By the stink of them, John knew that it was not every Chinese who was against the opium trade.
The captain of the Nannie Dee had eagerly accepted John’s service as a seaman, despite his limited, which was to say non-existent, experience. The Nannie Dee was easily the shabbiest clipper at dock, barely in better condition than some of the Indian fishing vessels. The crew were mainly Indians, save for the first mate, the captain and the cook. John suspected that his presence on the crew was partly to increase the number of Englishmen on board; not in case of a mutinous uprising by the crew, but more for more people for the captain to talk to on the long voyage. A seaman’s cant was not a good basis for speaking Hindi. Captain Sykes was visible to John as he passed a giant Chinese junk, smoking a long pipe and simultaneously stroking his thick mustache as a thin reed of an Englishman was instructing a dockhand as he loaded many heavy leather cases, what looked like an easel of some kind and a telescope up the narrow gangplank. The
dockhand was sweating profusely and it was evident that the luggage on the dockside was only part of the gentleman’s effects. Captain Sykes was nodding occasionally in response to the gentleman’s occasional questions, but looked entirely uninterested. John approached and saw that the thin man’s clothes were those favored by colonials who had spent some years in India but could not quite apart from English standards of sartorial elegance. His suit was made of fine thin cottons, bleached white to reflect the furious Indian sun, but offset with a brown waistcoat and tie over a white shirt, buttoned up to the top of the starched collar. Captain Sykes was only noticeably different from a regular seaman by his black and beaten bicorn hat, worn in the fore-and-aft style of the British naval officer. Otherwise he was in the worn breeches and simple shirt worn by all men of the sea. So intent was Sykes on looking uninterested in the wealthy passenger that he did not notice John until he was standing right next to him.
“Mornin’, Cap’n Sykes,” he said. “Does your guest need a hand with his luggage?” Sykes, a man who had already shown himself to be a man who saw no need in moving at any speed other than the slowest possible while not being overtaken by passing snails, creaked his neck around to look up at John, who was a good six inches taller than the captain, bicorn included, and spoke in his dry Yorkshire accent.
“Nay, lad. The good doctor ‘as it well in his care. Ye ready for sailing? Clouds on t’horizon tells me we want to be underway afore long.” The old captain looked John up and down. “Are you planning on dressing like a British sailor, or an Indian elephant driver?” John looked down at his simple shirt and dhoti, a long rectangular and unstitched cloth that wrapped and knotted at his waist. He had become used to the scorn of his countrymen about his attire, but there was no scorn in Sykes’ voice, only curiosity.
“I’m comfortable in this,” said John. “The Indian sailors wear these. I’ll be working with Indian sailors; I might as well fit in as best I can, Cap’n.”
Sykes grunted. “Aye. Guess you better had. It’s a new crew, but they should be good enough. They’ve all got experience at sea—unlike you, I might add.” Sykes might have continued, but the English gentleman interrupted him, blustering through the slightly stilted conversation between new captain and new crewman.
“Gosh, I declare these natives are willfully ignorant, Sykes. I do hope the crew speak more English than that fellow—no offense, my good man.”
The gentleman, now that John had a chance to get a good look at him, reminded John of a rather inquisitive woodpecker that he had once seen back home in England as a boy. The man shared the slightly hopping gait and bobbing head, and then his head indeed inclined to the right just as the woodpecker had done so many years before, regarding John for a moment with puzzlement at his appearance.
“Ah, Doctor. I’m afraid many of t’crew speaks Hindi, or Bengali, or a mix of both perhaps, as well as the Indian seamen cant that serves for talking o’er high winds—and beg y’pardon, this lad ain’t a lad from India.” Sykes’ accent butchered the name of the country, mashing it into an In-djuh. John smiled through his long beard at the doctor.
“John Sykes, sir. I’ll be sailing with you, all the way back to England. I am at your service.” He offered his hand, which the doctor took.
“Doctor Oliver Pikeham, botanist, astronomer and naturalist. Military man, eh? Good show. Right, I’ll be aboard in my cabin. Do let me know when we are ready to go, would you Sykes? There’s a good chap.” And with that, he twitched up the gangplank, looked about the quay once, and disappeared aboard the clipper. John was taken aback. How could this strange doctor possibly have known that he was military? Was it something that he had said? His dress was as far from that becoming an army soldier as it was possible for an Englishman in India to look. Captain Sykes seemed bemused, and shared a knowing look with John, one that told him that the sea captain was not too sure that Pikeham was in full command of his faculties.
“Should’ve seen all the gubbins he brought on. All manner of funny spyglasses and such, paints and things. Says he’s researching a book or summat, he's why we’re stopping off so much on the way, and had to take on extra provisions. His coin is good though. Never held with rich folk. Got too many of us poor folk killed, when we fought the French. Before your time, that. Get on board, John. Look to Mandeep, he’s first mate. You’ll know him as he’s the only real English speaker out of the lot of them.” Sykes beckoned John to follow him up the gangplank, and then stopped. “Course, you said you spoke their language, right? Mandeep will be the one with the mustache that runs down ‘is chin, in that case. As you were, Ensign Lee.”
John had a funny feeling about this ship, as it bobbed and creaked under the lapping of the waves that heralded a storm in the next day or so. Not so much about the ship, but some intangible thing, acid at the back of his tongue. He boarded the ship in the captain’s wake, and under his breath, he recited some words of obeisance to Lord Ganesh, throwing in a few to Saint Christopher, seeing as he was about the business of asking for protection from the heavens. He found a dry, quiet corner below decks and set up his bunk.
When he had made himself as comfortable as was possible, he lay back in the cot and placed his head on his bag. There was a rustling sound that he didn’t recognize and John sat up to check what could have made it. Smiling, he withdrew the crumpled papers the priest had given him earlier in the temple. Curious, John unfolded them and began reading. As he began to recognize the text, he remembered the old man’s words. “Take this, traveler. Where you are going is not as peaceful as it is here. You will need this for the strength and courage it will give you. I have blessed these sacred pages myself.”
It was the Ramayana. John sighed, leaned back in the cot and began to read.
Chapter Two
“Men who listen to the Ramayana will live a long life. They will be free of sins and will have many sons. Women who listen to the Ramayana will be blessed with children like Rama and his brothers. All those who listen please Rama. Such is the glory of this story. May all who recite it or listen to it regularly find increased love, wisdom, and strength.”
—Ramayana
At Sea
The routine of life aboard the Nannie Dee settled rapidly once out at sea, and fleeing swiftly before the monsoon that was encroaching on Mangalore. John found it strangely therapeutic, having wandered India for three years, begging, stealing and working when he could find labor. Aboard ship, the days followed the watch pattern set by Captain Sykes; four hours on, eight hours off, in teams, twenty-four hours a day. The system ensured that the Nannie Dee was constantly crewed, constantly moving eastwards. Mandeep, the first mate, assigned John to the crew run by the bosun, Rajeev. A short, muscular man, as most of the Indian sailors were, Rajeev bore many deep scars on his back that he claimed were from a jellyfish. John recognized the scars for what they were; the marks of the lash. John learned from Rajeev the basics of the nautical directions, the difference between close hauled and close reach, in irons and running. John dutifully recited the directions back to Rajeev, although he had not experienced the apparently curious effect of the wind being in beam—which is to say, coming over the side of the ship, and using the sail as a bird uses its wing to tack along the air current—as the monsoon was directly to the west, providing strong running winds, pushing the Nannie Dee swiftly.
On his hours off, John often eschewed running to his bunk in favor of taking in more of the wondrous sights of the Indian Ocean. The bunks were in any case perpendicular to the keel, so he found that when he did try to sleep, the rolling of the ship pushed the sailors to and from with a regularity that was at once hypnotic and completely disconcerting. Unlike the sailors on his watch, John had not spent the requisite time at sea to ignore this pendulous effect, so he slept only when his body forced him into unconsciousness. If he was on watch during the day, he found that as the least skilled of the body of unskilled sailors—which Captain Sykes dubbed “beef on a rope,” much to the chagrin of the firs
t mate who as a Hindu considered cows sacred—John was usually on the toughest end of the seemingly unending rope, hauling and mast climbing. The respite after his four hours were rung off the ship’s bell was to eat of the fine Indian food cooked by Montgomery. Montgomery, assisted by a tiny Indian man by the name of Raj, seemed never to sleep. Below decks, he worked tirelessly, creating dal and rice and even Indian flat breads. The Indian crew members were overjoyed with having food from their own nation, and John felt that the British Navy could certainly learn a trick or two in the culinary aspect of life at sea. On the long voyage on the troop ship Magdalena four years previously on his way to India, the diet had been water, rum and dry oat cakes. Following the daily meal with his watch, John walked the top deck, or if the ship had come across any sea creatures, he would watch them. On more than one occasion, great whales were spotted, and all the crew, including their sole passenger Dr. Pikeham, clamored to the prow of the ship to see the giant beasts breaching. On other days there were shoals of fish that flew through the air, and schools of dolphins in pursuit, using the wake from the Nannie Dee to leap through the air, snatching at the fish apparently as much for sport as for pleasure. If there was any way for life aboard ship to be an idyll, it was surely nowhere closer than that on board the little tea clipper out of Mangalore.
On the sixteenth day at sea, John found himself at his usual spot, overlooking the figurehead of the ship, a carved bust of the Irish witch for which the ship had been named. Unlike other days, when he had been left alone with his thoughts, he was joined after a short while by the doctor who, despite the lack of shade, was still persisting in dressing for high tea in Cambridge rather than high noon on the ocean.
