"Why, what's the matter with you, Jack?" asked Stevenson.

"Nothin's the matter wi' me, old man--'cept--"

Here he indulged in another chuckle.

"Goin' mad, with over-fatigue," said Simkin, looking suspiciously at him.

"Ay, that's it, messmate, clean mad wi' over-fatigue."

He wiped his eyes with the hairy back of his hand, for the chuckling, being hearty, had produced a few tears.

"No, but really, Jack, what is it you're laughing at?" asked Armstrong.

"If there _is_ a joke you might as well let us have the benefit of laughing along wi' you, for we stand much in need of something to cheer us here."

"Well, Billy boy, I may as well make a clean breast of it," said Molloy, raising himself on one elbow and becoming grave. "I do confess to feelin' raither ashamed o' myself, but you mustn't be hard on me, lads, for circ.u.mstances alters cases, you know, as Solomon said--leastwise if it warn't him it was Job or somebody else. The fact is, I've bin shammin', mates!"

"Shamming!"

"Ay, shammin' _weak_. Purtendin' that I was shaky on the legs, an' so not quite up to the cargo they were puttin' aboard o' me."

"If what you've been doing means shamming _weak_, I'd like to see you coming out _strong_," observed Miles, with a short laugh.

"Well, p'r'aps you'll see that too some day," returned the sailor, with an amiable look.

"But do you really mean that all that groaning--which I confess to have been surprised at--was mere pretence?"

"All sham. Downright sneakin'!" said Molloy. "The short an' the long of it is, that I see'd from the first the on'y way to humbug them yellow-faced baboons was to circ.u.mwent 'em. So I set to work at the wery beginnin'."

"Ah, by takin' a header," said Simkin, "into one o' their bread-baskets!"

"No, no!" returned the seaman, "that, I confess, was a mistake. But you'll admit, I've made no more mistakes o' the same sort since then.

You see, I perceived that, as my strength is considerable above the average, the baboons would be likely to overload me, so, arter profound excogitation wi' myself, I made up my mind what to do, an' when they had clapped on a little more than the rest o' you carried I began to groan, then I began to shake a bit in my timbers, an' look as if I was agoin'

to founder. It didn't check 'em much, for they're awful cruel, so I went fairly down by the head. I had a pretty fair guess that this would bring the lash about my shoulders, an' I was right, but I got up wery slowly an' broken-down-like, so that the baboons was fairly humbugged, and stopped loadin' of me long afore I'd taken in a full cargo--so, you see, boys, I've bin sailin' raither light than otherwise."

"But do you mean to tell me that the load you've bin carryin' is not too heavy for you?" asked Moses.

"That's just what I does mean to tell you, lad. I could carry a good deal more, an' dance with it. You see, they ain't used to men o' my size, so I was able to humbug 'em into a miscalkilation. I on'y wish I could have helped you all to do the same, but they're too 'cute, as the Yankees say. Anyway, Moses, you don't need to trouble your head when I gives you a helpin' hand again."

"Ah, that expression, `a helping hand,' sounds familiar in my ears,"

said Stevenson, in a sad tone.

"Yes, what do it recall, lad?" asked Molloy, extending himself again on his broad back.

"It recalls places and friends in Portsmouth, Jack, that we may never again set eyes on. You remember the Inst.i.toot? Well, they've got a new branch o' the work there for the surrounding civilian poor, called the _Helping Hand_. You see, Miss Robinson understands us soldiers out and out. She knew that those among us who gave up drink and sin, and put on the blue-ribbon, were not goin' to keep all the benefit to ourselves.

She knew that we understood the meaning of the word `enlist' That we'd think very little o' the poor-spirited fellow who'd take the Queen's shillin' and put on her uniform, and then shirk fightin' her battles and honouring her flag. So when some of us put on the Lord's uniform-- which, like that of the Austrians, is white--and unfurled His flag, she knew we'd soon be wantin' to fight His battles against sin--especially against drink; so instead of lookin' after our welfare alone, she encouraged us to hold out a _helpin' hand_ to the poorest and most miserable people in Portsmouth, an' she found us ready to answer to the call."

"Ah, they was grand times, these," continued the marine, with kindly enthusiasm, as he observed that his comrades in sorrow were becoming interested, and forgetting for the moment their own sorrows and sufferings. "The Blue-Ribbon move was strong in Portsmouth at the time, and many of the soldiers and sailors joined it. Some time after we had held out a helping hand to the poor civilians, we took it into our heads to invite some of 'em to a grand tea-fight in the big hall, so we asked a lot o' the poorest who had faithfully kept the pledge through their first teetotal Christmas; and it _was_ a scrimmage, I can tell you. We got together more than forty of 'em, men and women, and there were about three hundred soldiers and sailors, and their wives to wait on 'em an'

keep 'em company!"

"Capital!" exclaimed Miles, who had a sympathetic spirit--especially for the poor.

"Good--good!" said Molloy, nodding his head. "That was the right thing to do, an' I suppose they enjoyed theirselves?"

"Enjoyed themselves!" exclaimed the marine, with a laugh. "I should just think they did. Trust Miss Robinson for knowin' how to make poor folk enjoy themselves--and, for the matter of that, rich folk too! How they did stuff, to be sure! Many of 'em, poor things, hadn't got such a blow-out in all their lives before. You see, they was the very poorest of the poor. You may believe what I say, for I went round myself with one o' the Inst.i.toot ladies to invite 'em, and I do declare to you that I never saw even pigs or dogs in such a state of dest.i.tootion--nothin'

whatever to lie on but the bare boards."

"You don't say so?" murmured Moses, with deep commiseration, and seemingly oblivious of the fact that he was himself pretty much in similar dest.i.tution at that moment.

"Indeed I do. Look here," continued the marine, becoming more earnest as he went on; "thousands of people don't know--can't understand--what misery and want and suffering is going on around 'em. City missionaries and the like tell 'em about it, and write about it, but telling and writin' _don't_ make people _know_ some things. They must _see_, ay, sometimes they must _feel_, before they can rightly understand.

"One of the rooms we visited," continued Stevenson, in pathetic tones, "belonged to a poor old couple who had been great drinkers, but had been induced to put on the blue-ribbon. It was a pigeon-hole of a room, narrow, up a dark stair. They had no means of support. The room was empty. Everything had been p.a.w.ned. The last thing given up was the woman's shawl to pay the rent, and they were starving."

"Why didn't they go to the work'us?" asked Simkin.

"'Cause the workhouse separates man and wife, in defiance of the Divine law--`Whom G.o.d hath joined together let no man put asunder.' They was fond of each other, was that old man and woman, and had lived long together, an' didn't want to part till death. So they had managed to stick to the old home, ay, and they had stuck to their colours, for the bit o' blue was still pinned to the tattered coat o' the man and the thin gown o' the woman, (neither coat nor gown would fetch anything at the p.a.w.n-shop!) and there was no smell o' drink in the room. Well, that old couple went to the tea-fight. It was a bitter cold night, but they came all the same, with nothing to cover the woman's thin old arms.

"The moment they appeared, away went one o' Miss Robinson's workers to the room where they keep chests full of clothes sent by charitable folk to the Inst.i.toot, an' you should have seen that old woman's wrinkled face when the worker returned wi' the thickest worsted shawl she could lay hold of, an' put it on her shoulders as tenderly as if the old woman had been her own mother! At the same time they gave a big-coat to the old man."

"But, I say," interrupted Simkin, "that Christmas feed an' shawl an'

coat wouldn't keep the couple for a twel'month, if they was sent home to starve as before, would it?"

"Of course not," returned the marine, "but they wasn't sent off to starve; they was looked after. Ay, an' the people o' the whole neighbourhood are now looked after, for Miss Robinson has bought up a grog-shop in n.o.bbs Lane--one o' the worst places in Portsmouth--an'

converted it into a temperance coffee-house, wi' lots of beds to send people to when the Inst.i.toot overflows, an' a soup-kitchen for the dest.i.toot poor, an' a wash'us for them and the soldiers' wives, an', in short, it has changed the whole place; but if I go on like this I'll send Moses to sleep, for I've heard 'im smotherin' his yawns more than once a'ready!"

"It's not for want of interest in what you're sayin' though, old man,"

returned Moses, with a tremendous unsmothered yawn, which of course set all his comrades off, and confirmed them in the belief that it was time to seek repose.

Scarcely a single comment was made on the narrative, as each laid his weary head on his arm or on a folded garment, and stretched himself out on the hard ground, in nearly as dest.i.tute a condition as the poor folk, about whom they had been hearing; for while their bed was as hard as theirs, and the covering as scant, the meal they had recently consumed was by no means what hungry men would call satisfying.

There is reason to believe, however, that their consideration of the sad lot of "the poor" at home did not render less profound or sweet that night's repose in the great African wilderness.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

ADVENTURES AMONG THE SOUDANESE, AND STRANGE MEETING WITH THE MAHDI.

Day after day, for many days, our captives were thus driven over the burning desert, suffering intensely from heat and thirst and hunger, as well as from fatigue, and treated with more or less cruelty according to the varying moods of their guards.

At last one afternoon they arrived at a city of considerable size, through the streets of which they were driven with unusual harshness by the Arab soldiers, who seemed to take pleasure in thus publicly heaping contempt on Christian captives in the sight of the Mohammedan population.

Their case seemed truly desperate to Miles, as he and his comrades pa.s.sed through the narrow streets, for no pitying eye, but many a frown, was cast on them by the crowds who stopped to gaze and scoff.

What city they had reached they had no means of finding out, being ignorant of Arabic. Indeed, even though they had been able to converse with their guards, it is probable that these would have refused to hold communication with them.

Turning out of what appeared to be a sort of market-place, they were driven, rather than conducted, to a whitewashed building, into which they entered through a low strong door, studded with large iron-headed nails. As they entered a dark pa.s.sage, the door was slammed and locked behind them. At first, owing to their sudden entrance out of intensely bright day, they seemed to be in profound darkness, but when they became accustomed to the dim light, they found that they were in the presence of several powerful men, who carried long Eastern-like pistols in their girdles, and curved naked swords in their hands. These stood like statues against the wall of the small room, silently awaiting the orders of one whose dress betokened him of superior rank, and who was engaged in writing with a reed in Persian characters. A tall, very black-skinned negro stood beside this officer.

After a few minutes the latter laid down the reed, rose up, and confronted the prisoners, at the same time addressing some remark to his attendant.