Goulding Francis Robert
The Young Marooners on the Florida Coast
But he was gone now-though he had been so near-gone without a word, or a sign, to say that he was coming back. Gone? Perhaps not. Perhaps a smoke might recall him, if the guns did not. Harold silently ascended the bluff, and with one of Frank's matches fired the grass placed beneath the heap of wood near the flag-staff. The smoke rose; it attracted the attention of the others, and soon they heard Harold call from a distance, "Come here, all of you! Here is something more."
They ran together, Robert and Mary taking each a hand of Frank; and when they reached the flag-staff, saw a paper fastened to it by wooden pins driven into the bark, and on the paper, written in large round characters:
"Five Thousand Dollars Reward
"Will be cheerfully paid to any one who shall restore to me in safety a boat's company, lost from Tampa Bay on the 26th of October last. They were dragged to sea by a devil-fish, and when last seen were near this island. The company consisted of my nephew, Harold McIntosh, aged nearly fifteen, having black hair and eyes; and my three children, Robert Gordon, aged fourteen; Mary Gordon, aged eleven; and Frank Gordon, aged seven years; all having light hair and blue eyes.
"The above reward will be paid for the aforesaid company, with their boat and boat's furniture; or one thousand dollars for any one of the persons, or for such information as shall enable me to know certainly what has become of them.
"Information may be sent to me at Tampa Bay, care of Major – , commanding officer; or to Messrs. – & Co., Charleston, S. C.; or to R. H-, Esquire, Savannah, Georgia.
"Dec. 9, 1830."CHARLES GORDON, M.D."
Underneath was the following postscript in pencil:
"P.S. The aforesaid company have evidently been upon this island within ten days past. I have searched the coast and country here in almost every direction. They appear to have left, and I trust for home. Should any fatality attend their voyage, they will probably be heard of between this island and Tampa Bay. C. G."
The young people were overwhelmed. "Poor father!" Mary said with a choking voice, "how disappointed he will be when he reaches home, and finds that we are not there! And poor mother! if she is there I know it will almost kill her."
"But father will come again-he will come right back-I know he will," Frank murmured resolutely through his tears.
"Yes, if mother is not too sick to be left," conjectured Mary.
"Come, children," said Robert, with an air of sullen resolve, "it is of no use to stand here idle. Let us go back to the prairie, and build our boats."
"But not before we have left word on the flag-staff to tell where we are to be found," Harold added. A bitter smile played around the corners of Robert's mouth, as muttering something about "locking the door after the steed is stolen," he took out his pencil, and wrote in deep black letters,
"The lost company, together with Sam, a servant, are to be found at a small prairie three or four miles south-east from this point. We have lost our boat, and are building another.
"Dec. 10, 1830. ROBERT GORDON."
They collected another pile of wood and grass for a fire signal near their flag-staff, and then with slow, sad steps, turned their faces once more to the prairie.
CHAPTER XXX
BEST CURE FOR UNAVAILING SORROW-MARY'S ADVENTURE WITH A BEAR-NOVEL DEFENCE-PROTECTING THE TENT
It was natural that the youthful company should be much cast down by this misfortune. But recent experiences had taught them many valuable lessons, and had caused them to practise, more fully than they would have otherwise, those wise maxims which had formed no small part of their education. While Robert and Mary were yet anguished with their sense of disappointment, Harold cheerfully remarked:
"I have often heard your father say, 'There are two kinds of ill that it is worth no wise man's while to fret about: – Ills that can be helped, for then why do we not help them? and, Ills that cannot be helped, for then what is the use of fretting?' I have also heard him say that 'the best cure for ills that cannot be helped is to set about doing something useful.'"
"But what can we do more than we have already tried to do?" asked Robert, in a questioning tone.
"Not much, I confess," was Harold's reply; "yet we can be on the lookout for something. Yes," he continued, pointing, as they walked, to one of the turkey pens which they had not visited for several days, "there is something now. Very likely that trap has caught, and possibly the poor creature that is in it, is now suffering more in body for want of food and water, than we are in mind. Let us go and see."
They turned aside accordingly, and found within the trap a fine young hen in a half-famished condition. She scarcely noticed them until they were within a few paces of her, and then ran with feeble steps around the pen, twitting mournfully, but without strength to fly. Robert proposed to let her go, saying that there would be no use in carrying home a starved bird; but to this Mary objected. She was beginning to believe with Harold that they were destined to stay a long time on the island. "I think," said she, "we had better take her home, and make a coop for her, and let her be the beginning of a stock of poultry. We can get some ducks, too, I have no doubt, and that will be so nice."
The picture which she drew was so comfortable and pleasant, that they agreed to put it into instant execution. They would make for her not a coop merely, but a poultry yard and house, and stock it for her with turkeys, ducks, and brant; and she and Frank should feed them every morning on acorns and chopped venison, and then they would live like princes. The only particular difficulty that suggested itself in the case was, that wild turkeys cannot be tamed. There is such an innate love of freedom in their very blood, that even those which are raised from the egg by tame hens will soon forsake the yard for the forest.
These little pleasant plans (for after all it is little things that make life pleasant or unpleasant), occupied their minds, and soon employed their hands; for immediately on their return home they commenced upon Mary's poultry house, and marked out also the limits of the adjoining yard. This occupied them for the two remaining days of that week, and it was not until the Monday following that they commenced working upon their boats.
In the midst of that week, however, another incident occurred, which threatened to be fearful enough in its consequences, and caused another interruption to their work. Robert, Harold, and Sam, were engaged upon the fallen tree; Mary was preparing their dinner, and Frank, having found a large beetle, was employed in driving down sticks into the ground, on the plan of the picket fence, "making," as he professed, "a house for his turkey." He had begun to feel hungry; and as the odour of the broiling venison floated to his olfactories, he suddenly became ravenous. He left his beetle half penned, and was on his way to ask his sister for a mouthful or two before dinner, when directly behind the tent he saw a great black object approaching the spot where Mary stood.
He looked a moment, uncertain what it could be, then gave a scream. "Run, sister! run!" he said. "Come here! Look! look!" She looked, but saw nothing, for the tent intervened. As Frank said "run!" he set the example, and reaching a small tree about six inches in diameter, climbed it as nimbly as a squirrel, crying as he ran, "Come here! Come here!"
Mary was astonished. She was sure from the tones of his voice that he was in earnest, yet she saw no danger, and hesitated what to do. Observing him, however, climb the tree, calling earnestly to her, she was about to follow, when in a moment it was too late. An enormous bear came from behind the tent, snuffing the odour of the meat, and looking very hungry. Almost as soon as it discovered her, it rose upon its hind legs, seeming surprised to meet a human being, and came forward with a heavy growl. Had any one been present to help, Mary would probably have screamed and fainted, but thrown upon her own resources she ran to the fire and seized a burning brand. Then another and very fortunate thought came to her mind. The dipper, or water ladle, was in her hand; and as she drew the brand from the fire, she dipped a ladle full of the boiling, greasy water, and threw it into the breast, and upon the fore-paws of the growling beast.
That expedient saved her life. The bear instantly dropped upon all fours, and began most piteously to whine and lick its scalded paws. Mary seeing the success of her experiment, dipped another ladle full, and threw it in its face. The bear now uttered a perfect yell of pain, and turning upon its hind legs, ran galloping past the tent, as if expecting every moment to feel another supply of the hot stuff upon its back.
All this time Frank was calling from his tree, "Come here, sister! He can't get you here! Come! come!" And Mary was about to go; but the bear was no sooner out of sight, than she felt very sick. Beckoning Frank to come to her, she ran towards the tent, intending to fire off one of the guns, as a signal for the large boys to return; but ere reaching the door her sight failed, her brain reeled, and she fell prostrate upon the earth. Frank looked all round, and seeing that the bear was "clear gone," sprang lightly from the tree, and ran to her assistance. He had once before seen her in a fainting fit, and recollecting that Robert had poured water in her face, and set him to fanning her, and chafing her temples and the palms of her hands, he first poured a dipper full of cold water on her face, then seizing the conch, blew the signal of alarm, till the woods rang again.
This soon brought the others. Harold came rushing into the tent, and by the time that Robert arrived, he had loosened Mary's dress, and was rubbing her hands and wrists, while Frank fanned her, and told the tale of her fighting the bear with hot water. The boys were powerfully excited. Harold's eye turned continually to the woods, and he called Mum, and patted him with one hand, while he helped Mary with the other.
"Let me attend to her now," said Robert. "I see by your eye that you wish to go. But if you will only wait a minute, I think sister will be sufficiently well for me to go with you."
"I am well enough now," she faintly replied. "You need not stay on my account. Do kill him. He can't be far away. Oh, the horrible" – she covered her eyes with both hands, and shuddered.
"But will you not be afraid to have us leave you?" asked Robert.
"No, no; not if you go to kill that terrible creature. Do go, before he gets away."
Sam had in the meantime hobbled in, and the boys needed no other encouragement. Frank showed them the direction taken by the bear, and they set out instantly in pursuit. Mum had already been smelling around, and exhibiting signs of rage. Now he started off on a brisk trot. They followed him to a moist, mossy place, where the bear appeared to have rolled on the damp ground, and drawn the wet moss around it to alleviate the pain of the fire; then to another low place, where he showed by his increasing excitement that the game was near at hand. Indeed, they could hear every minute a half whine, half growl, which proved that the troubled beast was there in great pain, and conscious of their approach. But it did not long remain. Seeming to know that it had brought upon itself a terrible retribution, by attacking the quiet settlement, it broke from the cover, and ran to a large oak, in the edge of the neighbouring hammock, and when the boys arrived, they found it climbing painfully, a few feet above ground. Its huge paws convulsively grasped the trunk, and it made desperate efforts to ascend, as if confident that climbing that tree was its only refuge, and yet finding this to fail it in its time of need. Both boys prepared to shoot, but Harold beckoned to Robert.
"Let me try him in the ear with a rifle ball, while you keep your barrels ready in case he is not killed."
He advanced within ten paces, rested his rifle deliberately against a tree, took aim without the quivering of a muscle. Robert saw him draw a "bead sight" on his victim, and knew that its fate was sealed. There was a flash, a sharp report, and the heavy creature fell to the earth, like a bag of sand, and the dark blood, oozing from ears and nose, proved that its sufferings and its depredations were ended for ever.
"He will give us plenty of fresh pork, the monster!" said Harold, endeavouring to quell his emotions, by taking a utilitarian view of the case, and, in consequence, making a singular medley of remarks, "What claws and teeth! I don't wonder that Mary fainted! She is a brave girl!"
"Yes, indeed," replied Robert; "there is not one girl in a thousand that could have stood her ground so well. And that notion of fighting with hot water-ha! ha! I must ask where she got it. It is capital. Only see here, Harold, how this fellow's foot is scalded; this is the secret of his climbing so badly."
Mary's hot water had done its work effectually. The bear was terribly scalded on its paws, breast, face, and back of its head. The boys bled it, as they did their other game, by cutting through the jugular vein and carotid artery; but wishing to relieve Mary's mind as soon as possible, they returned to inform her that her enemy was dead.
"And pray tell me, sister," said Robert merrily, after recounting the scene just described, "where did you learn your new art of fighting bears?"
"From cousin Harold," she replied.
"From me, cousin!" Harold repeated. "Why, I never heard of such a thing in my life. How could I have told you?"
"You said one day," Mary continued, "that wild beasts are afraid of fire, and that they cannot endure the pain of a burn. Now when I took up the brand to defend myself, according to your rule, I remembered that hot water hurts the most, and that moreover I could throw it. But if you had not mentioned the one, I should not have thought of the other."
"I think you deserve a patent," said Harold, patting her pale cheek. "You have beat the whole of us, not excepting Robert, who was a perfect hero in his day; for he conquered a panther with duck-shot, but you have conquered a bear with a ladle. Why, cousin Mary, if ever we return to a civilized country we shall have to publish you for a heroine."
She smiled at these compliments, but remarked that she was not heroine enough to covet another such trial; for that she was a coward after all.
"And you, Master Frank," said Robert, whose pleasurable feeling excited a disposition to teaze, "you climbed into a tree."
"Indeed I did," replied Frank, "as fast as I could, and tried to get sister Mary there too. But she would stay and fight the bear with hot water. Sister, why did you not come?"
"I did not know why you called," she answered. "I did not see anything, and did not know which way to run."
"I think, cousin," remarked Harold, "that if you had run when Frank called, you would have saved yourself the battle. The bear was after your meat, not after you; and if you had only been willing to give up that dinner, which you defended so stoutly, he would probably have eaten it, and let you alone."
With this lively chatting, Mary was so much cheered, that she joined them at dinner, and partook slightly of the choice bits that her brother and cousin pressed upon her. The afternoon was spent in preparing the flesh of their game. They treated it in every respect as they would pork, except that the animal was flayed; and they found the flesh well flavoured and pleasant. The parings and other fatty parts were by request turned over to Sam, who prepared from them a soft and useful grease. The skin was stretched in the sun to dry, after which it was soaked in water, cleansed of all impurities, and rubbed well with salt and saltpetre (William had put up a quantity), and finally with the bear's own grease. After it had been nicely cured, Harold made a present of it to Mary, who used it as a mattress so long as she lived upon the island.
Warned so impressively to protect their habitation against wild beasts, the boys spent the rest of the week in erecting a suitable enclosure. They planted a double row of stakes around the tent and kitchen, filling up the interstices with twigs and short poles. The fence was higher than their heads, and there was a rustic gateway so contrived that at a little distance it looked like part of the fence itself.
CHAPTER XXXI
HARD WORK-LABOUR-SAVING DEVICE-DISCOVERY AS TO THE TIME OF THE YEAR-SCHEMES FOR AMUSEMENT-TIDES ON THE FLORIDA COAST
For a fortnight the boys worked very hard, and yet made but little apparent progress. Previous to this, they had devoted two days to Mary's convenience, and three more to her protection. The rest had been spent in hacking, with dull axes, upon an immense tree. The log was three feet in diameter, and had been rough shaped into the general form of a boat, eighteen feet long. But having no adze, nor mattock, which might be used in digging, and receiving from Sam very little assistance more than the benefit of his advice, they began to feel somewhat discouraged at the small results of their unpractised labours. This caused them to cast in their minds for some device by which their work might be facilitated, and thankful enough were they to Indian ingenuity for suggesting the plan by fire. They set small logs of pine along the intended excavation, and guarding the edges with clay, to prevent the fire from extending beyond the prescribed limits, had the satisfaction to see, the next morning, that the work accomplished by this new agent during the night, was quite as great as that accomplished by themselves during the day.
For a few days they had been working under the pleasing stimulation produced by this discovery, when Robert, pausing in the midst of his work, said,
"Harold, have you any idea what day of the month this is?"
"No," replied Harold, "I know that it is Friday, and that we are somewhere past the middle of December. But why do you ask?"
"Because, if I am not mistaken, tomorrow is Christmas day. This is the twenty-fourth of December."
The announcement made Sam start. He looked at Robert with a half bewildered, half joyful gaze. The very name of Christmas brought the fire to his eye.
"Ki, Mas Robbut," said he, "you tink I remember Christmas? Who ebber hear o' nigger forget Christmas befo'? But for sure, I nebber say Christmas to myself once, since I been come to dis island. Eh! eh! I wonder if ee ent13 'cause dis Injin country, whey dey nebber hab no Christmas at all? Eh! Christmas? Tomorrow Christmas?"
Robert could have predicted the effect which his discovery would have upon Sam, but he was excessively amused to observe how unforgiving he seemed to be to himself for neglecting this part of a negro's privilege. As soon as it was settled, by a brief calculation, that the next day was indeed the twenty-fifth of December, another thing was settled, of course-that no work should be done, and that the day should be spent in enjoyment. Sam clapped his hands, and would have been guilty of some antic on the occasion, if his lame leg had not admonished him to be careful. So he only tossed his cap into the air, and shouted,
"Merry Christmas to ebbery body here, at Bellevue and at home!"
"Now comes another question," said Robert; "how shall the day be spent? We have no neighbours to visit. No Christmas trees grow here, and Frank may hang up his moccasins in vain, for I doubt whether Santa Claus ever heard of this island."
"O, yes, Mas Robbut," Sam merrily interposed. "Dere is one neighbour I been want to see for long time. I hear say I got a countryman14 libbin way yonder in a hollow tree. He is a black nigger, 'sept he is got four legs and a mighty ugly face."
"What does the fellow mean?" said Harold, seriously.
"O," replied Robert, laughing, "it is only his way of asking us to visit our friend the bear. What do you think of it?"
"We have promised to make Mrs. Bruin a visit," said Harold, entering into the joke; "and perhaps she may think it hard if we do not keep our word." Just then the conch called them home. "But let us hear what Mary and Frank have to say. I foresee difficulties all around."
When the question was discussed in general conclave, Mary looked rather sober. She had not yet recovered wholly from her former fright; but not willing to interfere with a frolic, from which the others seemed to anticipate so much pleasure, although it seemed to her to be one of needless peril, she replied that she would consent on two conditions-one was that they should go on the raft, to save the immense walk to the spot, and the other was that they should either put her and Frank in some place of safety while they fought the bear, or supply her with an abundance of hot water.
"That idea of the raft is capital," said Robert. "The tide will suit exactly for floating down in the morning and back in the afternoon. I think we can give sister all she asks, and the hot water too, if she insists upon it."
A word here about tides on the western coast of Florida. From Cape Romano, or Punta Largo, northward to Tampa, and beyond, there is but one tide in the course of the day, and that with a rise usually of not more than three feet. But south of Cape Romano, and particularly in the neighbourhood of Chatham Bay, there are two, as in other parts of the world, except that they are of unequal lengths, one occupying six, and the other eighteen hours, with its flood and ebb. People there call them "the tide and half tide." The plan of the boys was to float down on the nine hour ebb, and to return on the three hour flood.
Sam's notions about the observation of Christmas eve, as a part of Christmas, suited exactly the inclination of the boys; their hands were blistered, and they were glad of a good excuse for leaving off work, by an hour or two of the sun. In anticipation of the next day's absence, and of the Sabbath succeeding, Frank gathered during the afternoon plenty of acorns for the poultry, and grass for the deer and goats, which were to be kept in their fold; and the others laid up a supply of wood for the fire. Mary sliced some nice pieces of venison and bear's meat, and made some bread and Christmas cakes; all, which she packed away in a basket, with oranges, limes, and a bottle of transparent honey. Long before dark everything was ready for the expedition.