‘Eeegh,’ she commented. The fresh greenery smelled strange, almost like soap, but it smelled interesting too.
‘Look at the stingrays, sir!’ exclaimed Mr Gore, in his soft American accent.
Cook smiled. ‘You’ve named it then, Mr Gore,’ he said. ‘We’ll call this place Stingray Harbour.’
The Goat watched impatiently as the ship’s two small boats set out, then watched as one had to return at once, too leaky to float.
The smell of fresh water and fresh grass was tantalising. The crew might exclaim about the size of the trees, or stare fascinated at the local people, their dark skins and bare bodies, their spears and huts and canoes. She just wanted her fresh greens, and water that didn’t taste of age and salty barrels.
CHAPTER 28
Isaac
29th April, 1770
Isaac stared at the strange land around him, as the boat he was in followed the other two over to the shore. The land looked flat and sandy, and the trees were a weird dull green. There were small clusters of huts at both ends of the beach. They were rounded, a bit like the huts at Tierra del Fuego, but these looked as though they were just made of bark. Directly in front of the huts was a group of women and children, and a few men too.
Isaac had got used to bare breasts in Tahiti. But most of these women didn’t wear anything at all. Even as he looked, though, the women grabbed their children and ran from the beach, leaving only two men behind, with bushy beards and frizzy hair. They were both naked, too, and their skin decorated with strange white markings. One looked to be about nineteen, the other was older. They both carried spears, and what looked to be a spear thrower.
Back home Isaac had known every land was different. But he’d never guessed how different. Tierra del Fuego, Tahiti, New Zealand and now New Holland…how would anyone at home understand how even trees and mountains could be so incredibly strange?
If only he was in the first boat, with the captain and Mr Banks.
Suddenly Cook held up his hand to stop the other two boats coming any closer. The two men were walking towards the water, yelling and waving their giant spears, trying to scare off the newcomers.
There were only two of them, against a party of forty sailors, thought Isaac, admiring their courage.
For the next quarter of an hour the three boats stayed bobbing on the shallow waves, while Cook tried to signal that they meant no harm, and Tupia, the Tahitian navigator who had been able to understand the New Zealanders, tried to talk to the men on shore. But their language was just too different from the Polynesians’.
Even when the sailors threw beads and nails to the men they just looked pleased, and brandished their weapons as soon as the boat drew closer.
Finally Cook lifted his musket and fired above their heads. The men started at the noise. The youngest dropped his spear in shock at the noise, smoke and smell, but immediately picked it up again. The men ran back to what looked like a pile of throwing darts. The older man picked up a rock and threw it at the captain’s boat.
Cook ordered a musket filled with small shot—small pieces of metal that would scatter when the musket was fired, but do no great harm as long as they didn’t hit an eye or other vulnerable spot.
The small shot hit the leg of the older man and he ran to one of the huts to fetch his shield. The two men threw spears at the landing party, but although the spears landed in the middle of the group of boats, no one was hurt.
A third musket with small shot was fired. The men threw one more spear, then fled towards the trees.
Now at last the first boat pulled in at a big rock, like a jetty, with the other two boats close behind. As Isaac watched the captain started to get out, then gestured for young Isaac Smith, his wife’s cousin, to step out first.
The first foot on a new land, thought Isaac. If only it had been his.
Cook led the way to the nearest huts, as the other boats landed their passengers. Isaac tried to feel excited when his own feet touched the new land. But it just felt strange, as though the world wobbled a bit, as it always did after a long time at sea.
They caught up with the others at the huts. They looked even more flimsy than they had from the bay, with no furniture at all, or even bedding, just the ashes of small fires and more of the giant spears leaning up against the walls.
‘Looks like everyone’s vanished,’ Isaac said to Jonathan, who’d been in the second boat.
The captain must have heard him. Cook smiled, put his finger to his lips, and pointed to the door of one of the huts.
Isaac peered inside. He could just see a couple of children, hiding behind a big shield. He smiled as he withdrew. The children had no idea that they’d been seen.
Mr Banks looked up from examining one of the spears. It was enormous, nearly four times the height of a man, and tipped with a green substance. ‘Poison,’ he said.
Cook grasped the spear, and sniffed the end of it. ‘Seaweed, I think, Mr Banks.’ He tested one of the prongs on his finger. ‘Interesting. The tips are only fish bone, but they’re wonderfully sharp. I’d say we were mistaken back there. These are fishing spears, not war spears.’ Cook gestured to Sydney Parkinson, who carried the bag of trinkets. ‘Throw some beads and cloth into the huts. Ribbons too. We want them to realise we’re friendly. We may need their assistance to find fresh water.’ Cook paused. ‘But I think perhaps we’d better collect the spears—just in case.’
It looks like the captain was right, thought Isaac later that afternoon. The only fresh water was a small seep in the sand—enough for a few mouthfuls each, but nowhere near enough to fill the water barrels.
Maybe we’ll find more tomorrow, he thought happily, as they trudged back to the boats, passing the canoe pulled up on the sand. Exploring a new land—he could hardly wait.
But it turned out that he wasn’t to be one of the party sent out to look for water, like Jonathan, or even one of the party to go with Mr Banks to look for new plants and animals. The Goat needed fresh grass—and while the others explored he had to scythe it for her.
He wasn’t the only one to be kept close to the shore. The sail makers spread out the spare sails so they could repair the worn patches; there just wasn’t room on board. Other sailors were set to fishing, or collecting firewood, while Mr Gore took a party in one of the boats to collect oysters, and the carpenters took advantage of the calm bay to inspect the ship’s outer timbers.
Isaac was spreading out the cut grass to dry when Jonathan galloped up.
‘Did you find water?’
Jonathan shrugged. ‘Not much. There’s a small stream, and the captain ordered us to dig more holes by the spring. Between the two we should just about get the barrels filled. But it will take a while.’ He grinned. ‘All the more time to explore. I’m to go with the botanists tomorrow.’
‘Wish I had half your luck,’ muttered Isaac.
‘It’s good country,’ Jonathan went on. ‘Mr Banks says the soil looks fertile, though it looked sandy to me. And guess what? We found some trees that had been cut down—the natives must have done it with stone axes. And another had big steps cut in it to make it easier to climb. And there was this funny furry animal, like a hearthrug with legs. And the birds! There are a million of them! All different colours!’ Jonathan looked around, then looked a bit embarrassed. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘I could live in a place like this.’
‘Not Tahiti? Or New Zealand?’
‘Tahiti’s pretty crowded already. You couldn’t have a proper farm there. And the people are too fierce in New Zealand.’ He grinned. ‘Maybe when I’m an admiral and retired I’ll bring a colony out here and have a farm, as far as the eye can see. You can have the farm next door. We’ll tell our grandchildren how we caught a mermaid.’
Isaac shook his head. ‘By the time I’m an admiral,’ he said. ‘I think I’ll want to stay at home.’
‘Never,’ said Jonathan happily. ‘Do you need a hand lugging that grass?’
CHAPTER 29
The
Goat
29th April, 1770
The Goat was glad when the Boy returned—and even happier to see her grass, and water that didn’t taste of old barrels. She chewed the grass thoughtfully as the Boy emptied an armful into her pen.
‘Well?’ he asked her. ‘What do you think?’
The Goat considered. The grass was tougher than the grass of New Zealand, and not as sweet or succulent. But she rather liked having something more solid to chew. She took another mouthful and the Boy grinned.
‘You know what will happen when we get back home?’ he asked. ‘They’ll ask me “What did you see? What did you discover, Isaac?” And I’ll say, “Grass. I discovered lots and lots of grass. I spent most of my time on shore cutting green stuff for a goat.”’
But the Boy didn’t sound unhappy about it. Though his goat duties might mean he didn’t go exploring with Mr Banks and the gentlemen, they did mean that he was able to go ashore whenever possible, even if it was just to cut grass.
The Endeavour stayed a week in Stingray Harbour. The Goat didn’t get to go ashore while Mr Banks and the gentlemen explored and collected, and Mr Banks’s dogs hunted down game. But she was content to watch from the quarterdeck, as long as the Boy kept bringing her good stuff from the shore.
For a while, at least, both men and Goat had more fresh food than they could eat, and Cookie Thompson had all the wood he wanted for his galley fire.
Finally, well loaded with fresh water, grass, wood and meat—and two giant stingrays caught by Mr Gore, each weighing almost six hundred pounds—the ship sailed on her way. They left the first British grave in New Holland: that of Mr Sutherland who had died of consumption while they were there.
The captain looked at the profusion of specimens of new plants and animals, as well as the sketches brought on board by Mr Banks and his men, and decided to rename the harbour Botany Bay.
The breeze filled the sails. The nights were moonlit, and so bright it was possible to keep sailing up the coast even at night. It was a slow voyage, sailing into a strong southerly current and keeping the ship well away from the pounding surf, but so far it was a safe one.
And the Goat kept eating her fresh grass and sleeping on the fresh hay, dried in the hot sun of New Holland.
She was feeling her age. She was nine years old now, nearing old age for a goat. She had been constantly in milk for more than two years, since they left England. Her bones ached, especially when the wind blew cold from the south.
When she’d first gone to sea she’d hated the pen that confined her and stopped her exploring the ship, sticking her nose into barrels of grain or climbing up the giant coils of rope.
She’d tried to get out as often as she could, back then. But not these days. There was no need for a pen to keep her confined now, though the Goat liked it for its shelter, and its familiarity made her feel secure. Most days she spent dozing, while the crew shouted and exclaimed at the new sights each day brought: Mount Warning, Point Danger, the mountains shaped like glasshouses. There was even a small low-lying island, really only an islet, that the Boy had seen, from high up in the lookout, and that Cook named Manley Island…
Then suddenly the water grew shallow again. A thirty-mile sandbar barred their way. Luckily the weather was good and the water clear and they’d come across it in daylight, not night, otherwise they might have run aground. It was a warning that even this gentle coast might be treacherous.
The Goat understood none of this, but she did understand when the men around her grew anxious. That made her worried too. She’d learned enough, in her life at sea, to know that anxious sailors often meant bad times ahead: wind or storm or a smaller water ration.
But at least she had the coarse hay dried at Botany Bay, and her water. And now there seemed to be another safe harbour, lush and green, where they might find fresh water again.
They anchored just before darkness. Here in the subtropics the darkness dropped sharply, with little twilight. The days were growing shorter now too.
The Goat munched her oats and pease while the Boy milked her. He left her to take the milk below, and she began to doze.
A scream below woke her. She struggled to her feet in the darkness. What had happened? She could dimly make out a figure leaping up the companionway, his back bare, his clothes in rags, and blood streaming from his head…
More yells, and then the unmistakable roar of the captain. The Goat blinked. She had never heard Cook so angry.
‘Mr Magra!’
‘Sir!’
‘What is this?’ Cook’s voice was so furious it was shaking. ‘The clothes cut from this man’s back while he slept! And not only that—part of his ear cut off as well! I will not have it! Do you hear me? Drunk or not, there is no excuse.’
‘Captain…it wasn’t me…’ The seaman’s voice shook.
‘Was it not? You admit you have cut his clothes before in your drunken frolics? You admit you threatened to murder him?’
‘No, sir. I mean, yes, sir, maybe before. But not this time, sir…’
Cook paused. And then he said, ‘Very well, Mr Magra. You may go below. But I will not let this matter rest. To be frank, you are one of those men whom a ship can very well do without. And if I discover that you are guilty of this crime and have not admitted it, it shall be the worse for you. Dismissed.’
Magra went below. One by one the others of the crew went back to the hammocks too, except for those on watch. The Goat waited, in case anything else of interest might happen. But the ship was quiet, except for the lapping water, the creaking timbers, the scuttling rats.
The Goat slept too.
The bay was as lush as Cook had hoped. For the Goat, sheep and pigs there was fresh grass, and fresh water too; for Mr Banks and the gentlemen there were even more new plants to sample and collect. For the officers there were ducks, pelicans and giant bustards—so many and so easily shot that the entire crew was soon supplied with fresh meat.
But the plenty of Bustard Bay wasn’t enough to keep the ship at anchor. They sailed north again…
CHAPTER 30
Isaac
June 1770
If there was one thing he had learned aboard the Endeavour, thought Isaac, as he tossed the Goat’s old hay overboard and went back to sweep the deck more thoroughly—the captain would be furious if he stepped in a stray goat pellet—it was that things could change from one breath to another. A storm could rise out of a calm sea, or a whale out of a deserted ocean. And now suddenly their calm trip up the coast had turned into a nightmare.
No more plain sailing. Now they crept through a maze of sandbanks, islands and shallows where ferocious incoming tides might drop them dangerously low over the rocks below them in the space of a few hours.
There was a man on duty continuously, swinging the lead from the bows to measure the depth of water below them; often, too, Cook was forced to send one of the small boats ahead, to try to find a safe passage through the labyrinth of coral reefs and sandbars.
This was the hazard of sailing unmapped waters, Isaac realised. Yes, you got the glory when you came home safe—but what if you never did?
‘How is Her Ladyship?’ It was Jonathan.
Isaac grinned at him. ‘She’s in a good mood today. She only kicked me once.’ He looked down at the grey lumps in the bucket in Jonathan’s hand. The young man held a canvas sack in his other hand too. ‘What’s that?’
‘Some of the salted dog. The flies have been into it. Cookie wants me to get the maggots out. Says Mr Banks complained that his food was still wriggling yesterday.’
Isaac wrinkled his nose. The dog meat they’d brought from New Zealand was stringy and sour. But it was better than nothing. Sometimes he envied Banks and the gentlemen, who still had sheep for their occasional roast lamb. ‘Do you have to pick them out by hand?’
‘Nah. I’ve got this. Old sailor’s trick,’ said Jonathan confidently, pulling a big fish out of the canvas sack. He might be only a young sailor, but it seemed he�
�d picked up every bit of stray knowledge from every ship he’d been on. He tipped the dog meat onto the deck, then put the fish on top of it.
Isaac watched the fat maggots wriggling across the meat. ‘How is the fish going to help? It’s not even very fresh. Dead fish don’t eat maggots.’ Maggots from the salt meat were one of the best fishing baits of all.
Jonathan grinned. ‘Watch,’ he instructed.
Suddenly Isaac saw what he meant. The maggots were crawling out of the salt meat and onto the fish. ‘They’re abandoning ship!’ he cried.
‘It’s the smell, see,’ said Jonathan seriously. ‘Maggots love the smell of rotting fish. Hey, want to have a maggot race?’ He picked up a couple of particularly fat and juicy maggots and laid them a yard or two away on the deck. ‘First one back to the dead fish wins!’
‘Bet you my cheese from supper,’ said Isaac. He bent over his maggot. ‘Come on, boy!’ he urged.
‘If you don’t mind, Mr Manley!’
It was Cook, trying to get past him to the quarterdeck. Isaac sprang to his feet. ‘Sir! Sorry sir!’
Cook’s eyes were shadowed, and his face looked grim. But he smiled at the two boys. ‘Nay, don’t interrupt the race,’ he said. As always when he was tired, his accent was stronger. ‘Choose a good fat one for me,’ he said.
Isaac watched him go. ‘He’ll get us through,’ he said. ‘If there’s a way he’ll find it.’
‘If there is a way,’ said Jonathan softly.
The boys stared out at the clear blue water. It looked so innocent. But even as they watched, a wash of white-topped waves showed yet another reef they’d missed.
They were all feeling the strain of continual worry and watchfulness now. Cook ordered them to strike anchor again at the mouth of an inlet where he hoped there might be fresh water.
The Animal Stars Collection Page 24
