The Admirable Lady Biddy Fane. Barrett Frank

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СКАЧАТЬ of the fowls, who seemed to be at a loss what we were crowing so loud about. Yet from the presence of these fowls and the swine – which seemed to us not natural inhabitants of these parts, we clung to the idea that some sort of fellow-creatures were near, and so with a more cheerful heart than I, for one, had yet felt since we were put ashore, we continued our march when we had eaten and drunk to our satisfaction. But first we took of the thongs I had cut from the swine's hide and stretched to dry between two stakes, one apiece to serve as belts in which to sling our hatchets, another which I had fashioned for a sling, and two or three besides to serve for what occasion might arise. The rest we left behind us, marking well the spot. Our ham steaks were covered up in cool leaves to keep them fresh, and hung them also to the thongs about our middle.

      That night we came to a point projecting into the midst of a vast expanse of water, and seeming to cut the river into two, for we found that there were, as I may say, two currents – one running to the southeast, and the other northeast – so that we concluded we were not on the mainland at all, but upon an island in one of the great mouths of the Orinoco. This was made evident as we proceeded, for still marching with the water on our left hand, our faces were turned to the east, and not to the west as at first; and, in short, on the third day of our march we came again to the ocean, and about midday on the fourth to the very spot from which we had started.

      In all this time we had seen no human creature, nor had we met – thank God! – with any serious accident, though inconveniences not a few; and not the least of these was a multitude of flies and stinging gnats, especially upwards away from the sea, which were a great plague to us, and especially to Sir Harry, who had the more tender skin, and was tormented to that degree that he could get no peace night or day for the intolerable itching and smarting of their punctures. Nor did we meet any great beast, save a huge water-lizard that is called a cocodrill, which lies in the waters of these rivers and looks like nothing on earth but a log of timber at a distance. Birds there were in plenty, and with my sling I brought down enough for use, and more; and to speak of all the fruits here were a waste of time. Suffice to say that we lacked nothing to satisfy our appetite, and came to no harm by what we ate of strange things, for we were careful to eat of no fruit or herb but such as we found the swine and other animals feasted upon.

      CHAPTER X

      I QUIT THE ISLAND AND MY FRIEND

      And now, being come back to our starting-place, we had to consider our position and what we were next to be at.

      I say we, but in truth I might say I had to consider these things, for Sir Harry seemed to have neither care for the present nor hope for the future, and do what I might to bring him to a more cheerful complexion, it was all to no purpose.

      "What is there to do in this cursed island," says he, "but to eat and drink and sleep till we die?"

      "The more reason," says I, "for devising some means of getting away from this isle to where we may do better."

      He stretched out his hands towards the sea that laid void before us, and laughed bitterly.

      "Nay," says I, not to seem discouraged, though, indeed, my hopes were but slight; "it is not so impossible as you think. Take it that the day we left Trinidado the gale was in our favor, we could but have made twenty or thirty leagues at the utmost. Now say that the river to the north is three leagues broad, we may yet, by taking the current at our highest point, contrive to make our way across on some kind of raft, using a bough for paddle. There is nothing lacking to make us a raft."

      "Well," says he, "say by good hap you cross the river and get on another isle – what then?"

      "Then," says I, "will we make our way to the north of that island and cross to a third, or a fourth, after the same fashion, and so get on till we come to that part of Guiana due east of Trinidad, whence may we with no more difficulty cross the strait."

      "Suppose, after all," says he, "that we get to Trinidado – what then? Shall we be better off there than we are here? We run a fair chance of being captured for slaves by the Portugals, to be sure."

      "Also," says I, "run a fair chance of escaping them and being picked up by some English ship putting in as ours did to revictual."

      "Allowing that your fondest hopes be realized," says he, "is our case mended? Is it worse to sleep away our lives here than to be taken into England as a raree show for men to laugh at and women to pity? No," says he, with more passion than he had yet shown; "no, I say! It is not better, but a hundred times worse, and I for one will never go back to be scorned for a silly fellow who could not hold his own."

      It was not for me to reproach him, for had I not also abandoned myself under adversity? I was convinced, and so I am now, that a despair is a malady of mind as much as is ague a distemper of the body; and though men say one should not give way to despair, but should overcome it by an effort of will, yet, I say, that if the will be attacked by a great shock and enfeebled by misfortune, it is powerless to exercise its function. For such as suffer from this disease of the mind there is no help from within, but its only succor is from without. Wherefore, the kindly ministrations of a friend will do as much to restore health in this case as the help of a doctor in any other. For this reason I bore patiently with Sir Harry in his morose and sullen humors, and sought all I could to divert his spirit from brooding over misfortunes not to be undone. But I think all that I did in this way produced me more good than it did him; for whereas he continued despondent and dull, I grew more cheerful and humane. I waited upon him like a servant, and this service, with my pity to see a young, fine man so cast down, engendered a feeling of love in my breast such as I had never before felt for any man. Nay, I even looked to getting with him back to England, and seeing him married to Lady Biddy Fane, without any feeling of jealousy, being not only more gentle of heart, but more reasonable of mind.

      At this time we stayed on high ground to the south of our territory, over against that part where we first found the pine-nut; not only because of the shade we got there from the sun, but by reason that it was adjacent to the stream of good water, and not far from the fen where the swine came to wallow, and where there was abundance of fowl and fruit good to eat.

      While we were here, Sir Harry fell sick of a fever, bred partly, as I think, from his low, desponding spirit, and partly from the vapors that rose from the marshy valley below. When I found he could no longer sit upright and began to wander in his speech, I took him on my back, and, by stages of a dozen yards, carried him away from that unwholesome spot right down to the sea-shore, and there, finding an easy slope, I laid him down, and, as speedily as I could, set about making a kind of house to shield him from the sun. The night being fairly light, by dint of many journeys to and fro and much toil, I planted a dozen stakes in the sand, bending them down till they joined at the top, in the form of a great "A", and binding them to a cross tree, then I thatched this framework with those long and broad palmetto leaves of which I have spoken. Here he lay as comfortable as might be for one in his burning condition, the sea breeze passing through the shelter and tempering the heat of the sun.

      He could eat nothing; however I made shift to stew a fowl in the shell of a gourd, and when the broth was cold I got him to drink it, for he had a perpetual thirst; and that his drink might be cool and refreshing, I went a score of times during the day almost to the source of the stream, where the water was of the best. Of such fruits as were good also I gave him, particularly the apples from a low, square-boughed tree with egg-shaped leaves, which is called, I believe, guava.

      And now I prayed to God that this man's life might be spared, and that I might not be left alone, which more than all proves the great and good change which had been wrought in my heart since the time when I sought but to escape from the society of mankind, and wished harm to all men, and this one above all.

      At the end of seven days' very painful watching, Sir Harry's disorder took a turn, and soon after he began to mend (thanks be to God!) СКАЧАТЬ