shelidonDecember 30, 2024Leave a Comment

Third part of a Christmas ghost story by James Hume Nisbet. First part here. Second part here.

Chapter III. To Halifax, Nova Scotia

The misanthrope, who has a limited income and an indifferent digestion—for both these causes tend towards making a Timon of a man—may fly to the country and solitude, but when a man is gifted with youth, and the digestive faculties of a goat, without the wherewithal to gratify it, it is not the country he makes for, but the crowded streets of some city where at least he may have company, if nothing else.

Richard Harris on the 17th of January found himself within sight of the lights of Cardiff in the midst of a snow-storm, penniless, shirtless, and famishing.

He had asserted his manhood on that Christmas Eve, and greatly surprised as well as disappointed his magnificent patron, the consequence being that, as the church bells announced the anniversary of the birthday of the Saviour of Mankind, their joyous pealing rang out on the frosty air and greeted him as a wanderer and an outcast.

His refusal to corroborate his patron’s statement did not benefit the widows in the slightest degree, nor did Mr. John Dagget lose his self-possession or depart from his customary urbanity of manner; he merely held up his shapely, well-trimmed hand as a signal of silence to the rash young man before anything very criminating could be uttered, touched the bell, and when James appeared asked him politely to show Mr. Richard Harris to the outer door, and never to admit him again on any pretext whatever; then without another glance either at the unfortunate object who had been so promptly dismissed, or at the black-draped women who stood before him, he turned once more courteously to the clergyman, and repeated his false statements in an impressive and upright manner, which would have completely convinced his Reverence had not the proffered donation to the cause of charity done so already.

The six widows having no appeal except by the expensive process of law, and no moral support, now that the church had “gone over” to the enemy, took the pound apiece, which John Dagget offered as a Christmas gift, and their departure, shortly after Richard had taken his, leaving Mr. Penwiper to discuss the matter more at length with his gentlemanly host, over a cigar and a glass of wine.

Young Dick Harris managed to get, along with his overcoat, a parting interview with Mary Gray; what they said or did during that interview has no business with the present stage of this story; the effect of it, however, was that for the first few miles of his tramp, he felt warm and hopeful, and did not mind the icy air in the least.

When morning dawned, however, he found himself on a country road, rather cold and miserable, for he had walked all night, and also extremely hungry. Then he looked at his purse and discovered there thirty-five shillings, which for a moment he meditated upon throwing away, but afterwards thought better of it, which was a good thing for him as it carried him on until New Year’s Day.

This sum might have lasted him longer, only that, as yet, he was strange to the ways of catering for himself, and having always gone to good hotels, when travelling with the shipowner, he now went quite naturally to those places when he wanted anything, thereby paying the highest price and getting the smallest equivalent in return.

His watch and chain he parted with to the landlord of one of these village inns for a pound, a supper and a night’s lodging; he might have pawned them easily for ten or twelve pounds, but there were no pawn-shops near at the time, and he would have been ashamed to have entered such a place at this stage of his journey, therefore he accepted what was offered to him.

He tried his hardest as he went along to get work to do, but no one wanted an extra hand; indeed, he saw that the whole country was swarming with tradesmen and labourers out of work, as well as with professional tramps who pretended to want employment.

So the days passed over him, his pound melting to coppers, and then these also dissolved, after which he learnt, from stray acquaintances, picked up as he went along, how to raise money on his clothes.

His overcoat went, then his shirt, vest and underclothing, for the hunger was harder to stand than the cold. His boots also, with coat and trousers, the last left, seemed to wear out and look shabby with magical quickness; they had been a gentlemanly suit when he quitted Federation Hall, for he had taken time to change himself into his ordinary morning costume before leaving, but now they were out at elbows and down at heel, while the hat looked as if it had been worn for years with the rough weather he had gone through, and the sleeping in all sorts of odd places; he looked at last like a tramp, and hard necessity was swiftly tearing from him his high-flown notions and morbid shyness.

He had some vague idea of making his way to London, but outside of Monmouth town he fell in with a negro, also on the tramp, who was working his way on the chance of getting a ship at Cardiff, he having been paid off at Liverpool, and after spending his money there had been forced to take to the road.

Jeff Johnson was the name on this coloured man’s discharge papers, where he had been entered as a fireman, and when Richard met him they were both at a par as regards habiliments and funds, but Jeff was a cheerful and a mendicant negro who did not permit many chances to go by either to beg, borrow, or steal, and as he took it into his head to patronize this impecunious young man, it was by his advice that Richard also turned his thoughts towards Cardiff, and the getting of a ship to take him out of England.

He told Dick that if he wanted a ship, he must pretend to be a Dutchman, or what was better, said he would introduce him to a crimp-house that he knew, where the landlord would find them lodgings and a ship for a good discount from their advance wages.

Jeff Johnson proved a good, if darkly-coloured, angel to him, for he had pawned the last article of wearing apparel which he could spare, and spent the proceeds the day before, and as he did not yet know how to beg, he must perforce have starved but for his companion.

Jeff begged that first night for them both, and the next day taught him one or two choruses of sea-songs, so that whenever they came to a village, they sang their way through it, and generally managed to get enough to house them for the night, with something to eat.

At Newport they stayed a couple of days, and did fairly well in their new profession, while under the cheerful influence of this happy son of Africa, the miles seemed to shorten and the cold grow less intense. Richard Harris had fairly turned his back on the refinements of civilization as represented at Federation Hall, while his shame fell from him like filthy rags, and he was now pretty well prepared to do anything, except rob widows, for the sake of a square meal. Mary would not have recognised her chivalrous lover had she seen this grimy-looking beggar with his black mate singing for their bread through the streets of Newport.

The snowstorm was at its wildest as the pair of starving, thinly-clad wretches crept into Cardiff, and only for Jeff’s kindly help the youth would have lain down amongst the drifts a dozen of times during the last half-dozen miles, but Jeff was strong of limb, with plenty of warm blood in him, despite all the privations he had gone through, and so he urged Richard along, with his sable arms round the lad’s waist, part of the way, and an oath now and again breaking from his thick blue lips by way of comfort; that last half-dozen miles of beating together through the driving snow, made the oddly-joined pair chums for life.

Down by the wharf Jeff found his friend, the Dutch lodging-housekeeper, tout and crimp, and after a little aside talk, introduced Richard as his mate. After this, they had supper and lodgings on the credit system, their landlord promising to get them both a ship as soon as possible.

There was a strike going on at the time amongst the legitimate firemen and seamen, so that their chances were fairly good to be supplied soon, provided they were not Union men, and were willing to go at a reduced rate, this to Dick’s inexperienced mind seemed fair enough considering that he had never been to sea before; he was too hungry and cold to take anything into consideration except his supper that night, and the next morning he was too far in the power of the landlord to be able to object to whatever he liked to propose.

The next forenoon, the landlord brought two seamen’s rig-outs to them, of the roughest and cheapest description, and which he marked down to their debit at the highest rates; a pair of trousers, monkey-jacket and two coarse flannel shirts, also a cap; this was the complete outfit for the voyage, but as beggars could not be choosers, Richard was grateful enough to have them even at the price. The landlord also informed them that there were two vessels ready for loading, one a timber ship bound for Halifax, and the other a steamer bound for Quebec. Jeff could ship if he liked as fireman on board the steamer, or as A.B. on board the other, where there was an opening for Dick as ordinary hand.

Without a pause, Jeff decided to ship along with his lately found friend, even although by doing so, he was taking a post for which he was not qualified, as well as going for less wages. The A.B. certificates, this convenient landlord provided along with the suit of clothes, as well as one for Richard Harris, who now discovered that his sailing name was to be James Thompson, while Jeff was transformed into one Eric Van Dorn, foreigners having a much more likely chance than Englishmen to get a ship, although the owners did not object so strictly to the nationality of boys or ordinary hands.

A couple of hours afterwards, they were entered on the books of the Nancy Jane, outward bound with coal to Halifax, with a return load of timber to Cardiff, and while the landlord pocketed the greater part of their allowance notes for debts contracted, they were sent off to help in the loading, men being short at the wharfs.

Richard with his stalwart negro friend and several other half-starved scare-crows, had to battle their passage to and from the office, through crowds of hungry legitimate seamen, who were left unemployed because, unfortunately for them, they had the misfortune to be born free Englishmen, therefore they were to be punished for this accident of birth, by these free born English shipowners.

When the stoppages were explained fully to him, Richard Harris felt mean enough to be exempted from the despised title, but as he had taken the wages of a slave, he could no longer avoid the contract without further dishonour, therefore he slunk down alongside of his sable friend, and was very quickly about as tawny with the coal dust which so completely covered his blushes.

He was not very long in discovering the difference between holding a pen at the shipowner’s desk and hauling in a coal basket on board the ship itself, happily for him he had been fond of athletic sports, and his past privations rendered him not too particular, and as he knew that hands were not likely to be considered out at sea, he did his best not to wince at the raw places but worked with a will.

His comrades, with the exception of Jeff, were not much better at the task than he was himself, and many a narrow escape he had of loaded baskets coming down by the run on his head as the inexperienced loaders let the ropes slip through their wounded hands, while the unemployed regular men sat on the quay smoking and laughing over the mishaps.

It being a strike time, the blacklegs were exceedingly well treated by the owners, breakfasts, dinners, and suppers provided, with as much fresh beef, roasted and boiled, with potatoes and vegetables given and as much beer as they could swallow. To be a subordinate of the shipowners, during that strike at Cardiff, was to be a man replete with the good things of life, while the men who were fighting for their rights, with their wives and children, were famishing. Verily hunger is the grandest test of a hero.

The slaves of Sparta were surfeited with good things, while the children of the free men waited upon them fasting, this was how they were trained to be heroes, so the strikers waited upon the slavish blacklegs, of whom Richard Harris felt himself to be one of the vilest, and went fasting but resolute, free born Englishmen. As on Christmas Eve when the voice of his Mary could not raise his spirits, so until the anchors were raised and the Welsh hills receded from his view, the jokes of the light-hearted Jeff Johnson failed to lift him out of the valley of humiliation, it seemed to him that so long as he required to eat so must he sink his young manhood in the mire.

These were the sensations of a chivalrous boy of course, who had read a great deal and who had once possessed a trusting and true man as a father, but who had been driven through force of circumstances into the hard plains of daily battle; perhaps we all felt that way once ourselves before our weapons were blunted. I should be sorry for the veteran, who, like Mr. John Dagget, has not; it may be good in a pecuniary sense, yet desperately bad for the man in all other senses who has not been able to feel as Richard Harris at the age of nineteen felt.

After leaving England, with that load of carelessly trimmed coal on board of the Nancy Jane, he had not much leisure for emotions of any other kind, excepting the sensations of cold, hunger, nausea, and fatigue.

The vessel had not been docked since her last load of timber, so that she was leaking almost at every seam which required the pumps going constantly day and night, and as they were short handed, with only one or two properly qualified seamen on board, the labour was excessive and unremitting; luckily they had fairly good weather all the way in spite of the season, otherwise they must have foundered.

The fresh roast and boiled beef came to an untimely end after they were clear of the land and the casks which were broached after that were not such as might have tempted a devotee to break his fast. Dick had never been an epicure, few healthy young men are at that age, indeed he had often in his mind thought how splendid it would be to go as an explorer, and brave starvation, but at the first sniff he had at the newly broached cask of salt beef, he took vegetarian vows as far as he was able to take them with the only other thing left him as a diet, the biscuit. The others might poison themselves if they liked with that putrid meat, he resolved to stick to the only fresh meats to be had on board, which were, the multitudinous maggots that were hatched in the weevilly and stale biscuits.

Over the Atlantic these brave and dauntless heroes rolled, keeping down the water with super-human efforts; with good captain and mates, for if they blasphemed and kicked and bullied, it was no more than human nature could expect, with such an incompetent crew on board. These hardy tars, who ventured upon each voyage as the gladiators of old did the arena, passing before their tyrant owners with, “We salute thee, we are about to die.”

They had a fair run over, considering all things, from England to Nova Scotia, and at last could take a breathing spell at Halifax while the ship discharged cargo and took in her fresh load; with the men Richard Harris went ashore, and there enjoyed his first comfortable meal since leaving Cardiff.

See you tomorrow for the ending.