as soon as the fort was captured. Harry had foundhis men at last. And not a whit too soon, for at the very moment when,waving his victorious sword on high, he scaled the last parapet, theywere being ordered out for instant execution.
Ordered out? From what? Out, dear reader, from one of the mostloathsome dungeons it is possible to imagine, dark, slimy, dismal, andfilled with noisome vapours, a dungeon that for months they had sharedwith centipedes and slimy, slow-creeping lizards.
And all this time their food had been only raw cassava root and amodicum of half-putrid water.
And now Harry Milvaine, their beloved officer, stood in their midst.
They had not forgotten their discipline, for each and all touched theirbrows by way of salute.
"My poor fellows?" said Harry, his voice half-choked with emotion.
It was the first kind words they had heard for years. No wonder theybroke down, and that those once sturdy British sailors--babies now intheir very weakness--sobbed over Harry's hands or hugged him in theirfeeble arms.
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Harry had been telling Walda that, in all probability, there would be aquarrel with 'Ngaloo about his shipmates, the survivors of the_Bunting's_ men, and that there would possibly be some fighting.
"But," said Walda, "I know the people of King 'Ngaloo well; they do notlove fighting, they would rather cross the hills to their own homes."
"Yes, true, Walda; but the king--the king. Remember that he rules overthem, and if he bids them fight, then fight they must, and will."
"Ah! the king!" replied the wily Walda. "Yes, to be sure, only theywill not fight if he does not order them to do so."
"No, Walda. But why do you smile? Now you are laughing outright. Whatamuses you, Walda?"
"Not anything much," said Walda, "but--leave the king to me."
Harry with his men and Googagoo's army were to start the very nextmorning, against all odds, however fearful these might be; so, to beready for any emergency, he drew his people well to the north, at somedistance from those of 'Ngaloo's. And then they camped all night readyarmed.
But Walda had managed matters very prettily. He had sat up with King'Ngaloo nearly all night, telling him wonderful stories of his owninvention, and every now and again helping his majesty to another doseof his beloved fire-water.
The consequence of all this was, that when Googagoo and Harry went tobid him goodbye next morning in the hammock where he still lay, theyfound him rather forgetful of all recent events, but otherwise in a mostamiable mood indeed.
The king said farewell at least a dozen times.
He shook hands with each of his visitors _more_ than a dozen times.
And his last words were these:
"'Ngaloo is the greatest king in all the world. Don't forget 'Ngaloo.Come again and see the greatest king in all the world. Don't forgetNgaloo."
"I'm not likely to," said Harry, shaking hands again.
Then away he went, laughing.
And the march northwards was commenced at once.
Two of the men of the _Bunting_ had to be carried a great part of theway, but they got stronger and stronger as the time went on, and couldsoon both stand and walk.
They found the boats precisely where they had left them, and in a fewhours all were back once more--though sadly thinned in ranks--at theirhomes in the hundred islands.
Raggy, rejoiced beyond measure, met them at the beach. He was notcontent with shaking hands with his old messmates; shaking hands wasslow work.
Raggy must dance. And dance he did, a regular sailor's hornpipe.
"As sure as I'm alive, by Heaven's mercy," said Nicholls, the bo's'n, "Ithink I could dance a bit myself."
"And so do I," cried another sailor.
And they both joined Raggy.
It was as merry a hornpipe as ever was seen.
No wonder the king cried "Lobo! Lobo!" and laughed till the tearsgushed out of his eyes, or that the welkin rang with the admiring shoutsof the sturdy amazons.
Then Raggy, who had reigned here so long and so well, resigned hisregency, and in a day or two more all the old, quiet life had settleddown upon the islands.
For a whole month longer Harry and his men lived with this innocentking; then, the strength of his men being now thoroughly recruited, theyall said farewell to the good King Googagoo, with many regrets, andcommenced the long and tedious march to the eastern coast, which theyreached at last safe and sound, having met only the usual excitingadventures, and come through all the hardships incidental to Africantravel.
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Dear young readers, I have little more to do now, except to say"Goodbye." I sincerely trust that, while I do my best in my tales tointerest and instruct you, no one can accuse me of painting the life ofthe sailor wanderer in too rosy colours. I speak and write from my ownexperience of sea-life and of other lands. And--yes, I will confess it,I love the sea, and ever did.
Here are some lines I wrote in a journal of mine many years ago:--
"While I write all is peace within and around our barque. I am sittingin my little cabin. It is a summer's evening. Yonder is my bed; theport-hole close by my snowy pillow is open, and playfully through itsteals the soft cool breeze of evening, and wantonly lifts and fluttersthe blue silken curtains. Not far off I can catch glimpses of thewooded hills and flowery vales of a sunny land. It is the rosy shoresof Persia, and every night the light wind that blows over it is ladenwith the sweet breath of its flowers; while between there lies theocean, asleep, and quiet, and still, and beautiful with the tints ofreflected clouds. Often in the cool night that succeeds a day of heathave I lain awake for hours, fanned by the breath of the sea, gazing onthe watery world beneath and beyond me, and the silvery moon andglittering stars that waft my thoughts homewards, till sleep stolegently down on a moonbeam and wafted me away to dreamland."
Thus I wrote when a young man. Thus I still do feel.
The first glimpse that one catches of the chalky shores of old Englandafter a long cruise thrills every nerve in his heart with hope and joy.To experience even this it is worth while going to sea.
Probably some such thoughts as these stole through the mind of HarryMilvaine as his homeward bound vessel came in sight of land.
His passage had been a good one all the way from Zanzibar to the Cape,and from the Cape to Southampton.
If the thought of presenting himself at Beaufort Hall without firstwriting ever came into his head at all, it was speedily banished.Pleasant surprises are very well under certain circumstances, but theymay be so painfully pleasant as to be positively dangerous, for joy cankill as well as cure.
So Harry telegraphed and wrote, and waited anxiously for the returnletter.
It came in good time.
With a beating heart he tore it open.
All were well. Even his old dog Eily was mentioned by his mother--forof course the letter was from her--in terms of affection.
"She knows you are coming," she wrote, "and whenever I mention your namerushes to the gate to look, and barks in a kind of half-joyful,half-hysterical way that is most peculiar."
Harry is back in the Highlands at last. He has come a good two hoursearlier than he expected. But he does not mind that He likes to walkslowly on towards the home of his boyhood. Every little cottage, everyhill--the hills are all heather-clad, for the summer's bloom bedecksthem--every wood, ay, every tree recalls some sweet memory of thebygone.
He is still within half a mile of Beaufort when he sees a dog.
It is his own.
It is Eily.
She has been out hunting for stoats at the hedge-foot.
He calls her by name. She stops and stares, bewildered for a moment,then with a few joyful bounds she is at him. She is _at_ him, and _on_him, and _round_ him, and _round_ him all at once apparently.
Her dear old master risen from the dead!! She
can hardly believe hereyes, and is fain to stand a little way off and bark at him for veryjoy. Then off she flies homewards, to tell that she has found hermaster.
So that Harry's father, bareheaded and with his newspaper in his hand,but hale and hearty as of yore, and Harry's mother, more fragile andolder-looking, are both at the gate to welcome him.
And behind them comes old Yonitch to shake her dear boy by the hand.
Harry has a companion, whom he now introduces, and he is no less apersonage than Raggy himself.
I think everybody is half afraid of Raggy at first, but Raggy smiles sopleasantly, and laughs with such ringing joy, that he is soon at home,and even Yonitch and Eily forgive him for being so dreadfully black.
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That last line is meant to be left to the reader's own translation. Itrepresents exclamations of wonder and joy at Harry's long story,