For the rest of the time the purveyors of rice docked his ration and served him last. They would probably even have starved him to death, had it not been for the good Burmese who had lent him his turban, and rescued Mrs. Bremner. He took John under his protection, and saved him from perishing with hunger. The stinting of food was not, however, without its good effects; for, had not the rice been parsimoniously served out, the party would have eaten more than was good for them, albeit small thanks were due to the natives for this niggardliness, seeing that their motives had no connection with the well-being of the castaways.

  In order to economize their stock of rice, the natives hunted down some deer, which they skinned and roasted close by the castaways, without offering them a morsel; the latter humbly collected the bones, making with them a soup which seemed to them delicious, and which they enjoyed to the last drop.

  Time passed on, but the unhappy party, fed only on water and a little rice, failed to recover strength. Mrs. Bremner, in particular, was so weak that she was unable to stand. She therefore entreated the Hindoos to carry her and her slave on a litter to the nearest village.

  A long discussion ensued; the rapacity of the natives was aroused; they thought poor Mrs. Bremner’s purse inexhaustible. At length it was settled that for twelve rupees the transportation should be made. Thus two rupees remained out of the thirty.

  For these two rupees, which Mrs. Bremner convinced them were the last, it was agreed that four persons should be supplied with rice till the village was reached. These four persons were Mrs. Bremner, her slave, John Mackay, and the youth who had left the ship with him.

  John Mackay, after testing his strength, feared that he should be unable to follow Mrs. Bremner’s palanquin; he therefore tried to make a bargain to be likewise carried in a litter, but the Hindoos, pretending that he was twice as heavy as she was, demanded sixteen rupees, paid in advance. He had, therefore, no alternative but to drag himself along on foot after Mrs. Bremner’s palanquin, leaning on a bamboo.

  The start was made on the 17th of July, the little band which accompanied the palanquin consisting of John, the gunner, the boatswain’s mate, and the boy. As for the Lascars, they made acquaintance with the natives, and, being of nearly the same race, remained with them.

  The first stage was about two miles; they then halted an hour. During this halt John slept. On awaking he felt so tired that he did not think he could possibly continue the journey. He nevertheless resumed it, but was obliged to stop so frequently that he perceived his remaining with the party would render the transport impossible. He therefore stayed behind, and the boy, who was very fond of him, kept him company. There was no fear of his getting lost, for he was in mortal dread of tigers, and never strayed away twenty yards from the beaten track.

  About four o’clock in the afternoon John and the boy had quite lost sight of their companions, when they perceived a party of natives of Arakan, called Maghs. These Indians were engaged in cooking rice near the seashore, and did not see the two travellers, or at any rate took no notice of them.

  John, left by the palanquin bearers without any food, was very anxious to share the dinner which was cooking on the beach; but not knowing the language, and, worse still, having no money, he did not know how to set about it.

  Begging seemed to him, if not the surest, the least dangerous plan; he therefore approached the Maghs, with an outstretched hand and a suppliant eye; his wretched appearance, the rags which covered him, left no doubt about his misery; at the first sight of him the chief of the party appeared moved with compassion, and addressing him in Portuguese, asked by what fatality he had been reduced to this miserable condition.

  Fortunately John, who spoke imperfectly the language in which the question was conveyed, was able to converse with him. He related his shipwreck, the frightful famine which he and his companions had endured for twenty days; how by a miraculous good fortune they had at length succeeded in landing; how, when on shore, thanks to Mrs. Bremner’s rupees, they had obtained some aid; and finally how, not being able to pay the palanquin bearers, he had been abandoned by them on the road.

  The chief found this story all the more probable, inasmuch as an hour before he had seen Mrs. Bremner’s palanquin go by, borne by the Hindoos, and followed by John’s two shipwrecked companions. He was a kind-hearted man; he cursed the unfeeling brutes who had left a poor wretch to die, and with the dignity of a king who offers hospitality to a neighbouring prince, he led John to his fire, and invited him and the youth who was with him to sit down beside it. He then served him with the best he had, advising him not to eat much, not out of parsimony, but for fear of overloading an enfeebled stomach, promising him sufficient supplies to suffice amply both for him and his companion, from now till they arrived at the next village.

  He was as good as his word, giving them three days’ rations of rice, and assuring him that the tigers, which have a great fear of fire and smoke, would never venture to meddle with them if they took the precaution of lighting a fire before going to sleep; and as they had neither flint nor steel nor tinder, he showed them how to light a fire by the friction of two pieces of bamboo.

  Moreover, as the wounds on his legs and feet were full of sand and caused him great suffering, he washed and dressed these wounds with his own hands, bathing them and rubbing them with ghee. He then swathed John’s feet in linen bandages, and, seeing him much cheered, he wished him a pleasant journey.

  After his experience of the greed of the Lascars and the callousness of the Hindoos, the behaviour of the Magh chief deeply moved poor John, who could not find it in his heart to leave him. Unfortunately the chief, who was a travelling merchant, was proceeding in a direction diametrically opposite to his, being on his way from Chittagong, his ordinary place of abode, to sell goods in Arakan. They were, therefore, forced to part; John knew not how to express his gratitude to the good merchant; his tears spoke for him, and the chief could not doubt that he had done a good action to a grateful heart.

  CHAPTER VII.

  CONCLUSION.

  AFTER marching two leagues, John and his companion overtook Mrs. Bremner and her escort, who had halted in a hut and were eating rice.

  John haughtily drew from a knapsack which he carried on his shoulders his and his companion’s rations of rice, and dined apart from them. Whilst so occupied, several Hindoos and Lascars, who had remained behind to plunder the vessel, likewise rejoined them. On the road they had met the merchant, who reproached them severely for their inhumanity. This would have produced little effect upon them, but as he went on to say that John Mackay was a man of consequence, who very probably might petition the Governor of Calcutta to make a severe example of them, they took his words greatly to heart, and from that moment treated him with the greatest marks of respect. But he contemptuously repulsed their tardy politeness, contenting himself with accepting the guide’s offer to carry his bag of rice.

  Next day they arrived on the banks of a river which, on sounding, they found to be so deep and rapid that its crossing at high tide would be attended with great difficulty. They therefore waited for low tide, and employed these few hours in constructing a raft of bamboos. When the water had gone down, they launched the raft on the river. Five or six Indians swam on either side to steady it and keep it from drifting, and they reached the opposite side without mishap.

  John’s limbs grew so stiff that he feared it would again be necessary to leave him behind; but, eventually, his will overcoming his weakness, he arrived at the halting- place almost as soon as the rest of the caravan.

  Next day they reached the village where the Hindoos lived. John was so fatigued that he entered the first hut which he found open, throwing himself, with apologies, on a mat, where he slept the same irresistible sleep which had previously overcome him. When he woke, he found himself surrounded by people who, pitying his condition, took him to the Zemindar of the village, by whom he was most cordially received, and orders were given to serve him with all kinds of refreshments.

  So little was John accustomed to this compassionate treatment, that he was greatly affected by the attentions of the Zemindar; but learning that this village was only four miles distant from Ramoo, the Company’s first post, and having made the reasonable request to the Zemindar to be furnished with means of transport thither, he was greatly surprised to find that, under pretext of care for his health, the latter made a thousand excuses to detain him, offering, in a fortnight, when he would be quite recovered, to send him to Calcutta in a thirty-oared canoe.

  John immediately suspected that this solicitude on the part of the Zemindar, and the great sympathy expressed with his misfortunes were all affected, and that the Zemindar was interested in his being kept away from a town where he could report the circumstances of the shipwreck. On further consideration he became more than ever convinced that, not only was the Zemindar sharing in the plunder, but that he wished to retain the monopoly of it for the future.

  The fact was that the cargo, consisting, as we have said, entirely of teak, must be perfectly uninjured, and this offered to the Zemindar’s cupidity an irresistible temptation.

  John therefore insisted on the Zemindar’s sending him to Ramoo; but, seeing that the latter was bent upon detaining him by every possible means, he pretended to give way, at the same time preparing to start by himself the next morning.

  Just as he was about to leave, the Zemindar came into his hut.

  The cunning rascal had guessed his intentions, and now came to meet the matter fairly and squarely, begging John to sign a certificate absolving him from any share in plundering the Juno; this certificate, he said, was necessary to prevent the magistrate for the district of Islamabad, who resided at Chittagong, from holding him responsible for what had occurred at the scene of the wreck, and might occur again. On his signing the certificate, the Zemindar would provide him with a canoe to take him to Ramoo or wherever he wished.

  John, desirous above all things of getting to Ramoo, signed the certificate as requested, but took care to preface it with a full history of the wreck of the Juno, so that the Zemindar could not present this document to the officer in charge at Ramoo without acquainting the latter that there were survivors of the wreck who were in need of help.

  The event proved John to be in the right in his mistrust, for next day, instead of being furnished with the promised facilities, it was the Zemindar who started off for Ramoo, furnished with his certificate, which he handed to the Phougedar. This official, seeing that the paper related to shipwrecked British subjects, forwarded it to Lieutenant Towers, in command of a detachment at Ramoo, who summoned the Zemindar, and having questioned him and noticed the shuffling answers he gave, immediately sent John a canoe, an escort, provisions, and money. The commander of the escort was further charged with a letter for John Mackay, who, it may be readily imagined, not having seen the Zemindar again, remained very uneasy in his village.

  On the evening of the 22nd, seeing that the promised canoe did not come, and that every time he called on the Zemindar he was told that he was out, John determined at all risks to start for Ramoo the next morning. In order not to arouse suspicion by requisitioning provisions, each of his companions saved a portion of his supper and put it aside for John Mackay, who slept with this food beside him. Everything was arranged for him to get clear off before daybreak; but, just as he was going to sleep, a knock came to his door. It was the escort and the boat which had arrived.

  Next morning all the party left the village on their way for Ramoo, which they reached about mid-day. Lieutenant Towers was at the landing-stage awaiting the castaways, whom he took immediately to his own house, providing Mrs. Bremner with an apartment to herself, and disposing of the others in the building. For three days he would not allow them to do anything but get up their health and strength, and during these three days, says John Mackay, he waited on us, doctored us, and even cooked for us.

  On the 26th the party were embarked in two canoes, and on the 28th they arrived at Chittagong, where Lieutenant Price was in command. Here they were received and treated as at Ramoo, Lieutenant Price doing for them what Lieutenant Towers had done before. After a day’s rest, which he greatly needed, John Mackay appeared before Mr. Thomson, District Judge for Islamabad, before whom he made a declaration. The Judge immediately sent a guard to the wrecked vessel to stop further plundering.

  A full account of all that had taken place was signed by Mrs. Bremner, the Captain’s widow, John Mackay, second mate, and Thomas Johnson, gunner, and sent to the ship’s owners at Madras. A week later, on the 8th of August, feeling pretty strong again, John Mackay started to return to the Juno and save what was left. He embarked on a canoe, taking with him carpenter’s and all other necessary tools.

  On the 12th he arrived at Ramoo, where he rested at Lieutenant Towers’s house; on the 14th he proceeded on his journey in a palanquin; and on the 17th he reached the bay where the ship struck, which he named Juno Bay.

  Two huts were constructed, and next day they commenced stacking the timber on the shore. When this work was finished, the hull was set on fire and the iron collected, this being the only remaining object of any value.

  About the beginning of November, Captain Galloway, ship Restoration, arrived in the bay, sent from Calcutta to load the iron and the timber. On the 25th everything was stowed, and the same day the Restoration, with John Mackay on board, sailed for Calcutta, where she arrived in safety on the 12th of December, 1795.

  Now, if the reader wishes to know, after reading the account of this terrible disaster, what became of the principal persons who figured in it, we will tell him.

  John Mackay, completely recovered from the effects of his sufferings, was, in the beginning of 1796, appointed to command one of the Company’s ships, which ship sailed for Europe and arrived in August, 1796.

  Mrs. Bremner recovered her health and strength, grew more beautiful and charming than ever, and made an excellent marriage.

  Lastly, the boy who had such a dread of tigers, dreading the sea equally, and with more reason, settled at Chittagong, where he lived and died in the honest avocation of a travelling merchant, — an avocation selected, no doubt, in remembrance of those Portuguese merchants who had so generously assisted him and John Mackay on the evening when they had been cruelly abandoned by the Hindoos.

  THE END

 

 

  Alexandre Dumas, THE JUNO

 

 

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