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Title: The Memoirs of Admiral Lord Beresford

Author: Baron Charles William De la Poer Beresford Beresford

Release date: November 20, 2015 [eBook #50508]
Most recently updated: October 22, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEMOIRS
OF ADMIRAL LORD BERESFORD ***

Charles Beresford, Admiral

THE MEMOIRS OF

ADMIRAL
LORD BERESFORD

WITH TWENTY-THREE ILLUSTRATIONS

FOURTH EDITION IN ONE VOLUME

METHUEN & CO. LTD.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON

First Published (2 vols.) . . . . October 6th, 1914
Second Edition . . . . November, 1914
Third Edition . . . . December, 1914
Fourth Edition (1 vol.) . . . . September, 1916

TO
MY BROTHER OFFICERS
OF THE
ROYAL NAVY

PREFACE

This work is a record of my life from the year 1859, when I entered the
Royal Navy, to the year 1909, when I hauled down my flag and came on
shore.

For the Introduction and the Notes, which have been written in order to
amplify the personal narrative and to connect it with the historical events of
the period, Mr. L. Cope Cornford is responsible.

I have dedicated the book to my brother officers of the Royal Navy.

As luck would have it, my career has been of a singularly varied
character. And my hope is that, in reading its story, boys and girls, as well as
their elders, may find pleasure.

CHARLES BERESFORD
Admiral

1 GREAT CUMBERLAND PLACE, W.
June 1914

CURRAGHMORE

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

CHAP.

I. I SEE THE FLEET

II. THE BEGINNING OF SERVICE

III. THE SHIP OF HAPPIEST MEMORY

IV. THE SHIP OF UNHAPPY MEMORY

V. THE MIDSHIPMAN OF 1864

VI. STRICT SERVICE

VII. THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA—
I. TO THE ANTIPODES

VIII. THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (continued)—
II. MY TWO FAITHFUL SERVANTS

IX. THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (continued)—
III. TAHITI AND THE SANDWICH ISLANDS

X. THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (continued)—
IV. OLD JAPAN. NOTE

XI. THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (continued)—
V. WITH THE DUKE IN JAPAN

XII. THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (continued)—
VI. THE HOMEWARD VOYAGE

XIII. FLAG-LIEUTENANT AT PLYMOUTH

XIV. POLITICAL EVENTS OF 1873-80 AND POSTSCRIPT. NOTE

XV. AN IRISH ELECTION AND IRISH POLITICS

XVI. MEMBER FOR WATERFORD, AND COMMANDER, ROYAL
NAVY

XVII. WITH THE PRINCE IN INDIA

XVIII. THE EGYPTIAN WAR—
I. THE BEGINNING OF TROUBLE. NOTE

XIX. THE EGYPTIAN WAR (continued)—
II. THE BOMBARDMENT OF ALEXANDRIA

XX. THE EGYPTIAN WAR (continued)—
III. CHIEF OF POLICE

XXI. THE EGYPTIAN WAR (continued)—
IV. GARRISON WORK

XXII. PASSING THROUGH EGYPT

XXIII. THE SOUDAN WAR OF 1884-5—
I. SUMMARY OF EVENTS. NOTE

XXIV. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
II. HOW WE BROUGHT THE BOATS THROUGH THE GREAT GATE

XXV. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
III. UP THE CATARACTS AND ACROSS THE DESERT

XXVI. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
IV. THE FIRST MARCH OF THE DESERT COLUMN. NOTE

XXVII. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
V. THE DESERT MARCH OF THE FORLORN HOPE

XXVIII. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
VI. THE FIGHT AT ABU KLEA

XXIX. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
VII. THE FIGHT TO REACH THE RIVER

XXX. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
VIII. DISASTER

XXXI. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
IX. THE RESCUE

XXXII. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
X. THE EFFECT OF THE ACTION OF WAD HABESHI

XXXIII. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
XI. THE RETREAT

XXXIV. THE SOUDAN WAR (continued)—
XII. SEQUEL AND CONCLUSION

XXXV. ORGANISATION FOR WAR

XXXVI. THE TWENTY-ONE MILLION

XXXVII. H.M.S. UNDAUNTED—
I. WITH THE MEDITERRANEAN FLEET

XXXVIII. H.M.S. UNDAUNTED (continued)—
II. THE SALVING OF THE SEIGNELAY

XXXIX. THE SECOND SHIPBUILDING PROGRAMME

XL. STEAM RESERVE

XLI. VIEWS AND REVIEWS

XLII. COVETED CHINA. NOTE

XLIII. THE INTROMISSION OF THE ADMIRALS

XLIV. TRAFFICS AND DISCOVERIES—
I. CHINA

XLV. TRAFFICS AND DISCOVERIES (continued)—
II. JAPAN

XLVI. TRAFFICS AND DISCOVERIES (continued)—
III. THE UNITED STATES

XLVII. H.M.S. RAMILLIES

XLVIII. HER MAJESTY'S MIDSHIPMEN

XLIX. THE PARLIAMENTARY ANVIL

L. THE CHANNEL FLEET

LI. BOAT RACING

LII. THE MEDITERRANEAN STATION

LIII. SPORTING MEMORIES—
I. RIDING AND DRIVING

LIV. SPORTING MEMORIES (continued)—
I. SHOOTING

LV. SPORTING MEMORIES (continued)—
III. FISHING

LVI. HOME WATERS: THE LAST COMMAND

POSTSCRIPT. THE MAKING OF AN ADMIRAL

INDEX
(The "Notes" are by L. COPE CORNFORD)

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

THE AUTHOR … … … … … . . Frontispiece
From a photograph by Heath

CURRAGHMORE
From a photograph by G. D. Croker

SIR JOHN DE LA POER BERESFORD, 4TH MARQUESS OF
WATERFORD

CHRISTINA, MARCHIONESS OF WATERFORD
From paintings at Curraghmore

THE AUTHOR AS NAVAL CADET
From a photograph

H.M.S. MARLBOROUGH, 1861
From a painting in the possession of the Author

THE OFFICERS OF H.M.S. SUTLEJ, 1865.
From a photograph

H.R.H. THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH
From a photograph by J. Russell & Sons

PIETER BOTH MOUNTAIN, MAURITIUS
From a photograph

THE AUTHOR AS LIEUTENANT
From a photograph

THE AUTHOR ÆT. 27
From a photograph

LADY CHARLES BERESFORD
From a photograph

THE BOMBARDMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, 11TH JULY 1882
From a chart drawn by the Author at the time

ON BOARD H.M.S. CONDOR, 11TH JULY 1882
From a drawing by Frederic Villiers

PROVOST-MARSHAL AND CHIEF OF POLICE, ALEXANDRIA, JULY
1882
From a drawing by Frederic Villiers

THE AUTHOR'S METHOD OF HAULING BOATS THROUGH THE
BAB-EL-KEBIR
After a drawing made on the spot by the Author

THE NILE FROM WADY HALFA TO KHARTOUM

THE AUTHOR
From a photograph by Hallen, New York

"RUNNING THE GAUNTLET"—THE ACTION OF THE SAFIEH
AT WAD HABESHI, 4TH FEBRUARY 1885
From a painting in the possession of the Author

FIELD-MARSHAL THE RIGHT HON. VISCOUNT WOLSELEY
From a photograph by Elliott & Fry

THE AUTHOR SPEAKING IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS ON
HIS TWENTY-ONE MILLION SHIPBUILDING PROGRAMME,
13TH DECEMBER 1888
From the drawing by J. Walter Wilson in the possession
of the Author

THE AUTHOR, 1898
From a drawing by Phil May in the possession of the Author

H.M.S. KING EDWARD VII ENGAGED IN BATTLE PRACTICE, 1907
From a photograph
(Design of Cover by HAROLD WYLLIE)

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

THE HOUSE OF BERESFORD

Lord Charles William de la Poer Beresford, born in 1846, was the second
of five brothers, sons of Sir John de la Poer Beresford, fourth Marquess of
Waterford. Lord Charles's elder brother, Sir John Henry de la Poer Beresford
(to give him his full title), Earl and Viscount of Tyrone, Baron de la Poer of
Curraghmore in the county of Waterford, and Baron Beresford of Beresford
in the county of Cavan, in the Peerage of Ireland, and Baron Tyrone of
Haverfordwest in the county of Pembroke, in the Peerage of Great Britain,
Knight of the Most Illustrious Order of St. Patrick, succeeded to these titles
in 1866. Sir John joined the 1st Life Guards. He died in 1895, and was
succeeded by his son (nephew to Lord Charles), as presently to be noted.

Of the other three brothers, Lord William de la Poer joined the 9th
Lancers and became Military Secretary to five successive Viceroys of India,
was a patron of the Turf, and died in 1900; Lord Marcus de la Poer joined
the 7th Hussars, took charge of the King's racehorses, an office which he still
fulfils, and was appointed Extra Equerry to King George; Lord Delaval
James de la Poer (sixteen years younger than Lord Charles) ranched in North
America and was killed in a railway accident in 1906.

The five brothers were keen sportsmen, hard riders, men of their hands,
high-couraged, adventurous, talented in affairs, winning friendship and
affection wherever they went. Lord John-Henry, fifth Marquess, the eldest
brother, inherited the family tradition of good landlordship. There was never
any oppression of tenants on the Waterford estate. In the House of Lords and
in the country, Lord Waterford took a strenuous part in the troubled and
complex issues of Irish politics; although during the last years of his life he
was crippled and helpless, the result of an accident which befell him in the
hunting field. Lord William won the V.C. by an act of cool and audacious
gallantry in the Zulu war of 1879; renowned for reckless hardihood, there
was hardly a bone in his body which he had not broken; and it is probable
that his injuries, diminishing his powers of resistance, caused him to
succumb to his last illness. Lord Charles has broken his chest-bone,—a piece
of which was cut out in his boyhood, leaving a cavity,—pelvis, right leg,
right hand, foot, five ribs, one collar-bone three times, the other once, his
nose three times; but owing to his extraordinary physique and strict regimen,
he is younger and stronger at the time of writing than most men of half his
age.

The family home of the five brothers was Curraghmore, a noble estate
lying some twelve miles west of Waterford. The great house stands in a cup
of the hills, whose slopes are clothed with woods of oak, the primæval forest
of Ireland. The oak woods adjoining the house were planted with the design
of supplying timber to the Royal Navy. Built foursquare, like most houses in
Ireland, the mansion faces upon a vast gravelled quadrangle, closed in on left
and right by the long ranges of stables. Beyond the lawns of the terraced
garden, beyond the hanging woods, the bony shoulders of the mountains of
Comeragh hunch upon the changing sky; nearer hand, darkens the lone hill
of Croughaun; and day and night the noise of running waters, the voice of
the Clodagh River, flowing through tawny shallow and sombre pool,
breaking white-maned upon rock and fall, rises upon the quiet air. Looking
westward from the bare summit of the hill above the deer-park, you shall
view the rich valley parcelled into garden and farm and paddock, which are
set among deep groves; in the midst, flanked by a gleam of water, the house
darkens upon the westering sunlight; and beyond, the sparkling landscape
fades into the profound and aerial blue of the mountain wall. Eastward, the
rounded bosses of the forest clothe the hills; and in the valley's gentle
opening, the river Suir, like a scimitar laid on cloth of tapestry, glimmers
dark and bright upon the plain, which, studded with woods and dotted with
white specks of villages, stretches to where the dim sea-line merges in the
sky.

Over yonder, cloven through the heart of the ancient woods, a green drive
rises to the skyline, bordered on either side by rhododendrons, like huge
ropes of jewels, three miles long. In the forest there is silence. Few birds or
none nest in that deep labyrinth of silver-barked and shaggy trees, rooted for
centuries in the mould of their own perennial decay. The martin-cat is lord of
that hoary solitude. As a boy, Lord Charles trapped the martin-cats, and
presented his mother with a muff made from their skins.

High on the hill rising to the north of the house of Curraghmore, set in a
grove of beeches and enclosed within a wall, the last resting-place of the
Beresfords opens upon a great and shining prospect of wood and mountain.
Here is a wide and broad stone platform, like an ancient altar, the hue of
rusty iron, compact of the granite slabs whereon the names of the dead are
graven. On three sides it is walled with the tall silver stems of beeches,
whose branches high overhead interlace in a green canopy.

Hard by stands the private chapel, once the parish church of Clonegam, a
bleak and an unfeatured edifice. Within, there reclines the bronze effigy of
the third Marquess, he of the aquiline profile and the full beard, who broke
his neck out hunting in 1859. Opposite to him lies the white marble figure,
urbane and majestic, of Lord John, his successor, father of Lord Charles
Beresford. In the south wall of the chancel, in an arched recess cut out of the
thickness of the wall, the white light falls from an unseen opening above
upon the sculptured figure of a lady, sleeping recumbent, and beside her
nestles the tiny form of her child. She was the first wife of the fifth
Marquess, and she died in childbirth. Near by the private chapel, high
uplifted on the bare shoulder of the hill, stands a round tower, a mark for
leagues, the monument set up to the memory of the little boy, Marcus, Lord
le Poer, heir to Lord Tyrone, afterwards first Marquess. He died from the
effects of a fall from his pony, the accident occurring when he was jumping
hurdles just outside the great courtyard of the house. His portrait, painted by
Gainsborough, hangs in the drawing-room. It is a noble head, done with
Gainsborough's inimitable delicacy. The lad's blue eyes gaze frankly out of
the picture; his fair hair curls upon his shoulders; his coat is scarlet, with the
open falling collar of the time; the face is of a singular beauty.

Near by, in the centre of the wall, hangs Sir Joshua Reynolds's portrait of
Sir Francis Delaval, K.B. A tremendous figure, Sir Francis, posed in a
commanding attitude upon a hillside, right arm extended, grasping a musket
with fixed bayonet, and clad in a rich suit of claret colour and cocked hat. He
was the uncle of the wife of the second Marquess of Waterford. By reason of
that alliance, many of the Delaval family pictures came to Curraghmore.

Here is Lord Delaval himself, who died in 1808, a nobleman of a
somewhat rugged and domineering countenance. Here is the first Marquess
of Waterford, with a long hooked nose; he is thin-lipped, narrow-eyed (it
seems that he had a squint), wearing the ribbon and star of a Knight of St.
Patrick. Henry, second Marquess, was painted by Sir Thomas Lawrence; a
handsome head, crowned with a mass of fine light hair. In the hall hangs the
portrait of the third Marquess; he whose bronze effigy lies in the chapel. He
is reading. With his pale and finely cast features, his thick brown hair and
beard, he might have been (but was not) an ascetic student. He married the
Hon. Louisa Stuart, second daughter and co-heiress of Charles, Lord Stuart
dc Rothesay. The Marchioness was a lady of taste, and was considered the

most talented amateur painter of her day. She laid out anew the gardens,
where heretofore the horses used to graze close to the house, took great
interest in the improvement of the mansion itself, designed the Cawnpore
Memorial, designed Ford village, formerly the property of the Delavals in
Northumberland, and achieved a series of cartoons representing religious
subjects, which adorn the walls of the school at Ford.

These and many other ancestral portraits gaze from the walls of gallery
and hall and chamber, in the great house of Curraghmore. Each generation as
it grew up has traced in them its own lineaments fore-ordained, and has
marked the miracle of heredity repeated again and again, from Sir Tristram
Beresford, darkling in full armour, through the masterful Katherine le Poer
and the beautiful Susanna Carpenter, whose mother was a Delaval, to the
penultimate head of the house of De la Poer Beresford.

The entrance hall of the mansion of Curraghmore is the ancient keep,
which was built by the De la Poers in the late twelfth or early thirteenth
century, foursquare, the walls ten feet thick. The rest of the house is
eighteenth century. The original edifice is briefly described in The Antient
and Present State of the County and City of Waterford, by Charles Smith,
published in Dublin in 1740, and in The History, Topography and Antiquities
of the County and City of Waterford, by the Rev. R. H. Ryland, published by
Murray in 1824. Sir Marcus, first Earl of Tyrone, and his son, afterwards
first Marquess of Waterford, made considerable additions, which, according
to the date inscribed upon the lead work, were completed in 1771. From the
old keep, transformed into an eighteenth-century entrance hall, a flight of
steps leads to the inner hall, whence a wide staircase rises, following the
walls, and out of which open the reception rooms. These face upon lawn and
fountain and terrace. Over the entrance door are carved the family coat; and
the crest of the De la Poers, a stag couchant bearing a cross upon his
forehead, crowns the parapet. Upon the garden front are sculptured the
Beresford shield and their crest, "a dragon's head erased, the neck pierced
with a tilting spear, and holding the point broken off in the mouth." Motto,
Nil nisi cruce.

Such was the home of the five brothers, when their father, Lord John dc
la Poer Beresford, in holy orders, succeeded his brother in 1859. Lord
Charles Beresford, who had been for some years at school in England, joined

the Navy in that year. He came to Curraghmore in his brief and widely
spaced intervals of leave, while his brothers came home more frequently
during their vacations. In those days, the stables were filled with horses, the
house was populous with guests; and the great courtyard in front of the
house, now silent, resounded with the cheery bustle of a jovial company
coming and going. All winter the house was thronged; there was hunting six
days in the week; and more than a hundred horses were stabled at
Curraghmore. Lord Charles Beresford has told how that many a time, when,
as a midshipman, he was humping beef into the blood-boats for the Fleet,
did he think not without envy upon his brothers, each with his two or three
hunters, riding to hounds at Curraghmore.

The house of Beresford derives from the "very old and eminent English
family of Beresford of Beresford, in the county of Stafford," and from the
De la Poers, an ancient Breton family, and their quarterings include the noble
houses of Hamilton, Monck, Carpenter, Plantagenet, Lastile and Leon,
Mortimer, De Burgh, Holland, Wake, Wevill, Beauchamp, Delaval, Blake.
The Beresfords represented the English plantation in the North of Ireland,
until the marriage was made which united them with De la Poers, who were
of the first English plantation in the South.

SIR JOHN DE LA POER BERESFORD, FOURTH MARQUESS OF
WATERFORD, FATHER OF LORD CHARLES BERESFORD.

CHRISTINA, WIFE OF THE FOURTH MARQUESS OF
WATERFORD,
MOTHER OF LORD CHARLES BERESFORD

Tristram Beresford came into Ireland in the reign of James I., as manager
of the corporation of Londoners, known as "The Society of the New
Plantation in Ulster." The first Tristram settled at Coleraine, in county
Londonderry. His son, Sir Tristram, first Baronet, in common with the first
created Baronets of Ulster, bore on his shield the open red hand of Ulster,
hitherto borne by the forfeited O'Neils. Sir Randal, second Baronet, sat in the
first Parliament held after the Restoration.

Sir Tristram, his son, commanded a regiment of foot against King James
II., and was attainted. He it was who married the Hon. Nicola Sophia
Hamilton, concerning whom a legend of the supernatural is current. Briefly,

it is that the friend of her early years, the Earl of Tyrone, visited her after his
death, according to agreement, and, to prove the reality of his appearance,
touched her wrist, shrivelling nerve and sinew, so that ever afterwards she
wore a bracelet of black velvet. A picture, supposed to represent this lady,
hangs in Curraghmore. It must be said that the evidence of it extant is so
highly dubious, that the story is not worth telling in detail.

Sir Tristram was succeeded by his son, Sir Marcus, fourth Baronet, who
married the Lady Katherine de la Poer, who was Baroness in her own right.
Thus the two houses were conjoined. Lady Katherine was the only daughter
and heiress of James, third and last Earl of Tyrone. She was allowed the
Barony of La Poer in fee by resolution of the Irish House of Lords, on 16th
November 1767. Sir Marcus her husband was created Earl of Tyrone in
1746. The son of Sir Marcus and Lady Katherine, George De la Poer, was
created Marquess of Waterford in 1789, and Knight of St. Patrick at the
Institution of the Order in 1783. First Marquess, he was the first De la Poer
Beresford.

The De la Poer, Power, or Poher, family traces its descent from Comorre
I., Count of le Poher, who married the widow of Jonas, King of Domnonée,
and who died A.D. 554. Le Poher was one of the five independent states of
Brittany, of which the others were La Domnonée, La Cornouailles, Le
Vannes, and Le Leon. The genealogy of the Le Poers is interesting, if only
by reason of its romantic names. From Comorre I., Count of le Poher,
descended the Counts Comorre, Erispoë, Rivallon, Nominoë. Nominoë
married one Argantal, defeated Charles the Bald, drove the Franks out of
Brittany, and was proclaimed King of that country in 841. He was succeeded
by his son Erispoë, who married Mormohec. From the aforesaid Rivallon
descended Salomon, who (having achieved a little murderous intrigue)
succeeded King Erispoë, and married Wembrit. From the brother of
Salomon, Mathuedoi, descended Alain, Count of Vannes and Duke of
Brittany, who fought against the Normans, and who was driven by them to
take refuge in England. His son Alain (called Barbe-torte) returned to
Brittany, drove out the Normans in his turn, and united Le Poer to the
Duchy.

From the Pohers, in the female line, descended Arthur, Duke of Brittany,
who was done to death by John, King of England, A.D. 1203. There is this

other link between John of England and the De la Poers, that in the demesne
of Curraghmore an ancient bridge of stone, over which the English King is
said to have passed, spans the river and is called John's Bridge to this day.
From the Duchess Constance, the mother of Arthur of Brittany, descended
the Duchess Anne, who married King Louis XII. of France. Brittany was
thus incorporated in France.

The Pohers seem to have come to England with Duke William of
Normandy, called the Conqueror. In 1066 they are found in Devonshire; and
later, in Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Shropshire, Warwickshire,
Gloucestershire, Wiltshire, Herefordshire; a fructuous and an acquisitive
clan. They came to Ireland in the reign of the second Henry: then came Sir
Robert, Sir Roger, William and Simon. Sir Roger helped in the invasion of
Ulster. But the founder of the De la Poers of Curraghmore was Sir Robert,
who, in the year 1172, accompanied King Henry II. as Knight Marshal, and
to whom was given by the King, the town of Waterford and a great parcel of
county Waterford.

Towards the end of the sixteenth century, Sir Henry Sidney, in the course
of his account of the province of Munster, communicated to the Lords of the
Council, describes his visit to John, Lord le Poer, who was born in 1527.
"27th Feb., 1575. The day I departed from Waterford I lodged that night at
Curraghmore, the house that Lord Power is baron of, where I was so used,
and with such plenty and good order entertained (as adding to it the quiet of
all the country adjoining, by the people called Power country, for that
surname has been since the beginning of the Englishman's planting
inhabitants there), it may be well compared with the best ordered country in
the English Pale. And the Lord of the country, though he be of scope of
ground a far less territory than his neighbour is, yet he lives in show far more
honourably and plentifully than he or any other, whatsoever he be, of his
calling that lives in his province."

The "Peerage of Ireland" of 1768 urbanely observes: "It is very
remarkable, that in so long a succession in this family, and in a country
continually disturbed and torn by rebellion and civil wars, that not one of
this family was ever engaged in any rebellion against the crown of England,
nor was there ever a forfeiture in the family during the space of six hundred
years that they have been planted in Ireland; and they at this day enjoy the

family lands, and reside at the same place they were originally settled in, in
the county of Waterford. In a grant of letters patent from King Charles II. to
this Richard, Lord la Poer, bearing date the 9th May, the twenty-third year of
his reign, there is this recital. That the ancestors of the said Richard, Lord la
Poer, from their first planting in Ireland, for above four hundred years, had
entirely preserved their faith and loyalty to the crown of England, in
consideration therefore," etc.

Sir Tristram Beresford, up in the North, fought against King James
Second; but the De la Poers harboured that monarch; who in the course of
his retreat from Ireland, slept a night at Curraghmore, and departing thence
took ship at Waterford, and was no more seen in Erin.

Sir Marcus, the son of Sir Tristram, as above recited, united the two
houses by marrying the Lady Katherine le Poer; and their descendants, as in
1768, "at this day enjoy the family lands and reside at the same place they
were originally settled in." The earldom of Tyrone, which was extinguished
by the death of Lady Katherine's father, the third Earl, was revived in Sir
Marcus Beresford. Tracing back the direct line of the De la Poers of
Curraghmore, we find that Nicholas de la Poer was summoned to Parliament
in 1375, in 1378, and in 1383, by the most ancient writs contained in the
Rolls Office in Ireland. This Sir Nicholas of Curraghmore traced his descent
from Brian Boru, King of Erin, who died in 1014. The line of Irish Kings (as
recorded in Whitaker's Almanack) goes back to A.D. 4; and some say much
further.

A collateral branch of the De Pohers, or Powers, was the Barons of
Donoyle, or Dunhill, the ruins of whose castle remain to this day. It was
stoutly defended against Cromwell by the Baroness; and, according to
tradition, was betrayed into the hands of the enemy by the lieutenant of her
garrison. These Powers were then transplanted to Connaught, and their
estates were forfeited. Another collateral branch was the Powers of
Knockbrit, county Tipperary. In the year 1789, to Edmund Power and his
wife, who was a daughter of "Buck" Sheehy, was born Marguerite, who
became Lady Blessington. It seems that her father, "Buck" Power, dissipated
his fortune, as the mode was in those days; that he compelled his daughter to
marry one Captain Farmer, who ill-treated her; that Mrs. Farmer left her
husband, came to London with her brother, was painted by Sir Thomas

Lawrence, and, after Farmer's death, married Lord Blessington. Here is a
link with my Lord Byron.

The relation of the De la Poer Beresfords with the Delavals of Seaton-
Delaval in Northumberland, consists in the marriage of Sir Henry de la Poer,
second Marquess (1772-1826), with Lady Susanna Carpenter, who was the
granddaughter of Lord Delaval. Her mother, daughter of Lord Delaval,
married George, second Earl of Tyrconnel. The Lady Tyrconnel was famed
for her beauty. The portrait of her daughter, Lady Susanna, now at
Curraghmore, represents a singularly beautiful, fair-haired creature,
delicately featured, blue-eyed. The Delavals would seem to have been a
high-spirited, reckless, and spendthrift race. Extravagant entertainments
were devised at their house of Seaton-Delaval, which was built by Sir John
Vanbrugh, playwright and architect. The actor Foote was a friend of the
family; they were devoted to amateur theatricals; and Garrick once lent
Drury Lane Theatre to them. The Delavals were singularly addicted to
practical jokes; a tendency to the same diversion has reappeared in later
generations. Lord Delaval's only son died young, and the title expired. There
is a picture of the sturdy, brown-haired lad at Curraghmore. It is worth
noting that an ancestor of Lady Susanna, and, therefore, of Lord Charles
Beresford, was a naval officer of some distinction. George Delaval, vice-
admiral of the Red, was present at the action fought off Cape Barfleur in
May 1692.

The generation of the second Marquess, he who married the Lady
Susanna, produced an Archbishop: even the Right Honourable and Most
Reverend Lord John George de la Poer Beresford, Archbishop of Armagh
and Primate of all Ireland. He was born in 1773, and died in 1862.
Possessing great wealth, he was known for his immense benefactions. He
gave largely to Dublin University, and to the College of Saint Columba;
restored the Cathedral at Armagh at a cost of £30,000; and augmented the
salaries of his clergy. The bust of this magnificent prelate stands in the
private chapel at Curraghmore. His body is interred in Armagh Cathedral.
The Archbishop bequeathed his Property in county Cavan to Lord Charles
Beresford; the townlands on the estate bearing such euphonious names as
Ballyheady, Corraleehan Beg, Crockawaddy, Kiltynaskeelan, Derrynacrieve,
Gubnagree, Scrabby, Tullynamoultra.

The third Marquess, Sir Henry de la Poer, having met his death in the
hunting-field, was succeeded in 1859 by his brother, Sir John, who was Dean
and Prebendary of Mullaghbrack, in the Arch-diocese of Armagh. He
married, in 1843, Christina Leslie, daughter of Charles Powell-Leslie. She
was born in 1820, and lived until 1905. The Marchioness learned to ride
when she was between forty and fifty years of age, and speedily became a
noted rider to hounds. Their sons, as before recited, were Sir John-Henry de
la Poer, fifth Marquess of Waterford; Lord Charles, Lord William, Lord
Marcus, and Lord Delaval; of whom Lord Charles and Lord Marcus survive
at the time of writing. Lord Charles was born on 10th February 1846 at
Philipstown Glebe, Louth. It was the year of the great famine; and at
Curraghmore, half a regiment was then quartered in the house.

The fifth Marquess, elder brother of Lord Charles, was succeeded in 1895
by his son, nephew to Lord Charles. The sixth Marquess lost his life by a sad
accident in 1911. The present heir is a minor.

In this chronicle, brief as it is, three notable figures cannot be omitted:
Mr. Commissioner John Beresford, Admiral Sir John Poo Beresford, and the
Marshal. (For information concerning these worthies, I have drawn upon the
Dictionary of National Biography.)

John Beresford, whose name is even yet occasionally reproached by the
descendants of his political opponents, was born in 1738, and died in 1805.
He was the second son of Marcus, Earl of Tyrone (brother of the first
Marquess) and Lady Katherine, Baroness de la Poer. Appointed First
Commissioner of Revenue in 1780, John Beresford became in fact ruler of
Ireland. He was entrusted by Pitt with the management of all Irish affairs.
Viceroys came and viceroys went, but Beresford continued to hold a position
"greater than that of the Lord Lieutenant himself"; much to the indignation
of Lord Fitzwilliam, who, when he was appointed Lord Lieutenant,
permitted himself to address the First Commissioner in terms so indigestible
that Beresford promptly challenged him. The duel, however, was prevented.
John Beresford took a great part in the preparation and passing of the Act of
Union; was M.P. for Waterford and a Privy Councillor; and did much to
improve the city of Dublin, the fine Custom-house being built under his
auspices. He married Barbara Montgomery, who was one of the "Three
Graces" in the painting done by Sir Joshua Reynolds, now in the National

Gallery. The other two Graces were her sister, Lady Mountjoy, and the
Marchioness of Townshend.

Admiral Sir John Poo Beresford (1768 (?)-1884) was a natural son of the
first Marquess of Waterford. He entered the Royal Navy in 1782; fought a
smart action in the capture of the French store-ships in Hampton Roads on
17th May 1795; and performed distinguished service in the West Indies. He
took part in the famous eight months' blockade off Ferrol in 1808, and in the
blockade of Lorient, commanding one of those "weather-beaten ships upon
which the Grand Army never looked." In 1810 he was co-operating off
Lisbon with Wellington's army, with which his younger brother the Marshal,
in command of the Portuguese Army, was also co-operating. He represented
in Parliament, in succession, Coleraine, Berwick, Northallerton, and
Chatham. In 1835 he was Junior Lord of the Admiralty. His career, a
combination of fighting seaman, member of Parliament, and Junior Lord,
presents a singular resemblance to the career of his relative, Lord Charles
Beresford.

Marshal Beresford, or, more precisely, General Viscount William Carr
Beresford, was born in 1768 and died, full of years and honours, in 1854.
Son of the first Marquess, he also, like the Admiral, bore the bar sinister on
his escutcheon. As captain of the 69th Regiment, he was with Lord Hood at
Toulon in 1793, and commanded the storming party at the tower of Martello.
He was present at the captures of Bastia, Calvi, and San Fiorenzo. After
service in India, Beresford's brigade led the march across the desert in the
Egyptian campaign of 1801. Eighty-four years later, his relative, Captain
Lord Charles Beresford, took his Naval Brigade across the desert with Sir
Herbert Stewart's forlorn hope.

Beresford was present at the capture of Cape Colony under Baird in 1805.
Then he went up to Buenos Ayres, and with 1200 men took that place from
the Spanish. After three days' hard fighting, Beresford was driven out of
Buenos Ayres by an overwhelming force. Then he went with Sir Arthur
Wellesley to Portugal; where he commanded two brigades under Sir John
Moore. In the terrible winter retreat to Corunna, Beresford's brigade, told off
to assist the rescue, was constantly engaged with the French vanguard. At
Corunna, Beresford fought on the English left, achieving the greatest
distinction.

In 1809, at the request of the Portuguese Government, Beresford was
appointed to reorganise the Portuguese Army. Gifted with that marvellous
capacity for handling men and for organisation, which Irishmen of English
descent sometimes combine with a reckless gallantry, Beresford speedily
transformed an ill-found, insubordinate mob into an efficient, well-fed,
fighting force. He knew how to establish obedience to discipline, together
with the confidence that good conduct would be rewarded; or, in Lord
Charles Beresford's phrase, he coupled "commendation with condemnation."
The Portuguese Government made him marshal in the Portuguese Army
while he was lieutenant-general in the British Army; nor did the annoyance
discovered by British officers at the double rank, which gave Wellington
trouble, perturb the Marshal in the least. His Portuguese fought well
alongside the English at Busaco, an action which earned Beresford the
K.C.B. and other decorations.

He won the battle of Albuera, defeating Soult, though not without heavy
losses. The victory was said to be due to the action of one of his Staff, rather
than to Beresford's tactics; a good deal of controversy was waged on the
subject, in which the Marshal, after his retirement, took a vigorous part; but
the fact remains that Albuera was won.

Beresford was present at the tremendous siege of Badajoz and at the
battle of Salamanca, at which he was severely wounded. He speedily
recovered, and fought at Vittoria in 1813, in the battles of the Pyrenees, and
in the battles of Nivelle, Nive, and Arthez. He then returned to Portugal to
command the Portuguese Army; so that he was not present at Waterloo. At
the conclusion of the war he was created Baron. He left Portugal in 1822,
and took his seat in the House of Lords, where he was a sturdy supporter of
the policy of the Duke of Wellington. In 1828 he was appointed Master-
General of Ordnance. In 1830 he retired.

Wellington wrote of the Marshal in 1812: "All that I can tell you is that
the ablest man I have yet seen with the army, and that one having the largest
views, is Beresford ... he is the only person capable of conducting a large
concern." And upon another occasion, Wellington affirmed that if he were
removed by death or illness, he would recommend Beresford to succeed
him, not because he was a great general, but because he alone could "feed an
army."

General Lord Beresford married the Hon. Louisa Hope, his first cousin,
daughter of the Most Rev. William Beresford, Archbishop of Tuam and Lord
Decies, and widow of Thomas Hope, author of Anastatius. His stepson was
A. T. Beresford-Hope, sometime member for Cambridge University.

In 1824 the Marshal purchased the ancestral estate of the Beresfords in
Staffordshire. His portrait, which bears a singular resemblance to Lord
Charles, hangs in Curraghmore. It depicts a burly, martial figure, gorgeous in
full uniform, with a broad, jovial, open countenance, and a bold blue eye,
head thrown back, and a vast spread of chest and shoulder. Endowed with
extraordinary physical strength, he was a born fighter, a great administrator,
a big, warm-hearted, quick-tempered, irrepressible Beresford.

The formal list of his titles is: Viscount and Baron in the peerage of
England, Duke of Elvas in the peerage of Spain, Conde de Trancoso in the
peerage of Portugal, K.C.B., etc., colonel-in-chief 60th Rifles, colonel 16th
Regiment, general in the English Army, marshal in the Portuguese Army.

The generations pass: the House remains. The House of de la Poer
Beresford derives, from among other sources innumerable, from the Counts
of Brittany, in the sixth century; from Brian Boru, King of Ireland, in the
eleventh; from the Beresfords, that "very old and eminent English family,"
Norman in origin; from the Delavals of Northumberland, whose forefathers
fought in the Crusades. This is the virtue of ancient lineage: that from
generation to generation, an honourable tradition of service, of peculiar
obligation, gathers reinforcement. Every scion of the House is judged by the
stern company of his forefathers; who, together with his dower of body and
of mind and heritage of land or wealth, bequeath him warning or example.
No traffic in titles can purchase that unique inheritance, nor can any
forfeiture of material possessions diminish its essential value.

L.C.C.

THE MEMOIRS OF ADMIRAL
LORD CHARLES BERESFORD

CHAPTER I
I SEE THE FLEET

I saw the Navy for the first time in the year 1858, when I was twelve
years old. The Channel Squadron came into the Downs; the admiral, who
was a friend of my father, invited me to visit his flagship. The admiral put
off from Deal in a six-oared galley, and I was taken into a second boat. Both
crews began to pull with all their might. I remember being intensely excited,
beating with my hand on the gunwale and urging the men to row faster. We
were overhauling the admiral, when the boat in which I was slackened her
pace.

"Row!" I shouted. "Why don't you go on rowing?"

"We can't pass the admiral, sir," said the coxswain. And that was my first
lesson in naval etiquette.

As we drew near to the ships, there arose a great tumult of shouting, and I
could see the men running to and fro and racing aloft, and presently they
stood in rows along the yards, manning yards in honour of the arrival of the
admiral.

The neatness and order of the stately ships, the taut rigging, the snowy
sails, the ropes coiled down neatly on deck: these things left an abiding
impression upon my youthful mind.

It was in the winter of the same year, 1858-9, that a certain young soldier,
who had fought throughout the Indian Mutiny with great gallantry and
conspicuous ability, came to his home in County Waterford on his first

furlough. He was Lieutenant Roberts, V.C.; now Field-Marshal Earl Roberts
of Kandahar.

"During the winter months," he writes, "I hunted with the Curraghmore
hounds, and was out with them the day before Lord Waterford was killed.
We had no run, and at the end of the day, when wishing us good-bye, he said
'I hope, gentlemen, we shall have better luck next time.' 'Next time' there was
'better luck' as regarded the hunting, but the worst of all possible luck for
Lord Waterford's numerous friends; in returning home after a good run, and
having killed two foxes, his horse stumbled over quite a small ditch,
throwing his rider on his head; the spinal cord was snapped, and the fine
sportsman breathed his last in a few moments." (Forty-one years in India.
By Field-Marshal Lord Roberts of Kandahar. Bentley. 2 vols. London, 1897,
p. 451, vol. 1.)

My father, the Rev. Lord John Beresford, succeeded to the marquisate. In
the same year, 1859, I joined the Naval Service. I remember, some years
afterwards, thinking with some degree of envy of my two younger brothers,
each of whom had three hunters, while I was only the "blood-boat" (the
jolly-boat bringing beef to the ship) midshipman of a man-of-war.

At that time the Navy consisted of both sailing ships and steamships.
Steam was used as seldom as possible in those ships which were fitted with
masts and yards. The flagships of the Cape of Good Hope, East Indies and
China, South-east Coast of America, Pacific and North America and West
Indies stations were all sailing ships. The Navy List of 1859 gives the names
of no less than 548 "effective" ships, together with a list of 185 "steam
gunboats" and a list of 121 vessels employed in Harbour Service.

That there was so large a number of "steam gunboats" was the result of
the Crimean war, during which very many were built for service in the
Baltic. There is a story that an admiral returning from foreign service noticed
eight gunboats aground on the Spit. Upon his inquiry, he was informed by
one of his crew that they were "commanded by these old Baltic War mates
and second masters, the sort what knows nothing and fears nothing." But of
the sailing master there will be more to say.

The line-of-battle sailing ships which were flagships on naval stations
abroad were:—the Boscawen, 70 guns, Rear-Admiral Hon. Sir Frederick W.
Grey, Cape of Good Hope; Calcutta, 84, Rear-Admiral Sir Michael
Seymour, East Indies and China; Cumberland, 70, Rear-Admiral Sir Stephen
Lushington, S.E. Coast of America; Ganges, 84, Rear-Admiral R. L. Baynes,
Pacific; Hibernia, 104, Rear-Admiral H. J. Codrington, Malta; Indus, 78,
Vice-Admiral Sir Houston Stewart, North America and West Indies.

The number of ships distributed among the various stations in 1859 was
no less than 130. "Trade follows the flag."

East Indies and China . . . . . . . 36
Pacific . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
W. Coast of Africa . . . . . . . . 17
N. America and W. Indies . . . . . 14
S.E. Coast of America . . . . . . . 13
Mediterranean . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Cape of Good Hope . . . . . . . . . 5
Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
River Gambia . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Channel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
---
Total 130
===

The presence of so large a force in Chinese waters was due to the affair of
"the lorcha Arrow," which occurred on 8th October, 1856, in the Canton
River. The Arrow, a small vessel flying the British flag, was captured by the
Chinese authorities and the crew were arrested on a charge of piracy. In the
result, Admiral Sir Michael Seymour bombarded Canton. Operations were
suspended during the Indian Mutiny, to be resumed in 1858, with the
assistance of France. Canton was captured, and the treaty of Tien-Tsin was
concluded with China. It was not, however, ratified, and in June, 1859—six
months before I entered the Navy—hostilities were resumed, to terminate in
the burning of the Summer Palace at Pekin, and the subsequent signing of a
convention.

CHAPTER II
THE BEGINNING OF SERVICE

I was sent to sea for the somewhat vague reasons which so often
determine a boy's future. There was a belief that I was of a delicate
constitution, and an impression—perhaps justified—that I needed discipline.
I was sent to Bayford School in England when I was very young, together
with two of my three brothers. We were known as the three "wild Irish."
Among my schoolfellows were the present Lord Rosebery, James Lowther,
Lord Newport, Lord Claud Hamilton and Lord George Hamilton, Lord
Worcester, and Lord Methuen. From Bayford I went to the educational
establishment of the Rev. David Bruce Payne (afterwards Canon) at Deal,
where I first saw the ships of the Royal Navy, as already related. Canon
Payne was a splendid type of the best British clergyman, and I had a great
respect and affection for him. I was afterwards a pupil of the Rev. Mr. Foster,
of Stubbington, Fareham.

I received my nomination from Captain Charles Eden, C.B., and qualified
as a naval cadet on 12th December, 1859. The qualifying certificate must be
signed by the candidate; a regulation which, simple as it seems, was nearly
my undoing.

"Do you always sign your Christian name William with one 'l'?" asked
the examiner.

It was a critical moment. Irish resource supplied the answer.

I said, "Only sometimes, sir."

The examiner smiled grimly. But he passed me. It was my first narrow
escape in the Navy.

I have the faded blue paper before me as I write. The signature,
laboriously written in a round hand, is "Charles Wiliam Delapoer
Beresford."

The qualifying examination was not very formidable in those easy days.
The knowledge required consisted of a little "English," less French or Latin

(with the "aid of a dictionary"), a "satisfactory knowledge of the leading
facts of Scripture and English History," a certain amount of geography, and
an elementary knowledge of arithmetic, algebra and Euclid. The preliminary
course of education afforded to "Volunteers," as the naval cadets used to be
called, at the Royal Naval College, Portsmouth, had been abolished in 1837,
and for the next twenty years cadets were sent straight to sea. In 1857, cadets
were entered for training in the Illustrious, Captain Robert Harris. The
number of cadets exceeding the accommodation in the ship, the Britannia
was commissioned on 1st January, 1859, by Captain Harris. But not for
many years did the entrance examination become the competitive ordeal for
which cramming is the only preparation, known to the present generation.
But I remember Admiral William Bowles, commander-in-chief of
Portsmouth, taking me kindly by the shoulder and saying, "Well, my little
man, you are very small for your age. Why are you being sent to sea?"

I said that I wanted to go to sea.

"Are you good at your books?" asked the admiral. "Bless me, I know
many an admiral who could not pass the examination you have passed. Good
Heavens, what they expect boys to do nowadays!"

The Britannia was then moored at the entrance to Haslar Creek in
Portsmouth Harbour, where the depot ships of the submarines are moored to-
day. Alongside her, in the following year, lay the training frigate Eurydice,
which was afterwards capsized off the Isle of Wight on 24th March, 1878,
when 318 lives were lost out of a complement of 320. I learned to heave the
lead from the chains of the Eurydice.

THE AUTHOR AS NAVAL CADET

In addition to the ordinary school curriculum on board the Britannia, the
cadets were taught seamanship, gunnery and navigation. Book-work did not
interest me, but I took great pains to become proficient in seamanship, in
which I always secured a high place.

A cadet entering the Britannia under 14 years of age, would be rejected
from the Service if he failed to pass the fourth quarterly examination after
his entrance. Having entered the Britannia in December, 1859, I was sent to
sea in March, 1861. I was very happy during my time in the Britannia. Out
of school time, we did a great deal of boat-pulling. My boat was called the
Gazelle. I remember that one day, when I borrowed a private boat to put off
to the Gazelle, my comrades pushed me out into the stream, and I drifted out
to Spithead, without oars. There was nothing in the boat but a painter, which
I considered it to be my duty neatly to coil down. Then I sat still and waited
until a boat came to fetch me.

Seamanship was taught by the use of models, and sail-drill was taught
upon the mizen-mast. I remember being haunted by a doubt lest the handling
of small models, and going aloft in a stationary ship, might not enable me to
practise the knowledge thus acquired when I came to deal with the real full-
size objects and to go aloft in a ship at sea. My prevision was largely
justified; and when I came to command a ship, I made the youngsters learn
their business by handling real things and not the models of them. For if
anything goes wrong while teaching a youngster, for instance, to lay out a 6-
ton anchor upon a model, he puts it right with his finger and thumb and
thinks he can do the same with the real anchor.

The captain of the Britannia was Robert Harris, to whom the Service
owes the inestimable benefit of cadet training ships. The first lieutenant was
George S. Nares (now Vice-Admiral Sir George S. Nares, K.C.B.). He
commanded the Challenger in her voyage of scientific discovery of 1872,
during which he was recalled to proceed upon his celebrated voyage of
Arctic exploration. Another lieutenant was William H. Heaton, whose long
whiskers afforded the cadets much innocent amusement. On a windy day his
whiskers used to stream backwards over his shoulders. Lieutenant Heaton
chose to wear his stripes running longitudinally up his arm, a peculiarity
which exemplifies the prevailing latitude with regard to uniform. There was
no rule prescribing the pattern of cap or great-coat worn in the Service.

Officers might wear the mohair band and badge on any kind of cap that took
their fancy. Some of them used to transfer plain clothes buttons to a uniform
coat or greatcoat, if they were going ashore, for the sake of economy; for we
were nearly all poor in those days. The chaplain and naval instructor was the
Rev. Robert M. Inskip.

My chest on board the Britannia stood between the chests of poor "Andy"
Wauchope and Henry John Thoroton Hildyard. Both subsequently left the
Navy for the Army. The late Major-General Andrew Gilbert Wauchope,
D.S.O., was fatally wounded at Magersfontein during the South African war.
General Sir Henry J. T. Hildyard, G.C.B., K.C.B., retired in 1911, after long
and distinguished service. I was strongly inclined to follow the example of
my comrades and to join the Army; and I have since occasionally regretted
that I remained in the Navy, in which Service there is less opportunity for
attaining the highest rank.

I was raised to the rank of "captain" in the Britannia; but I regret to say
that my enjoyment of that dignity was singularly brief, for I was disrated
upon the same day, even before I had time to put on the stripe. For my
delight at my promotion so exhilarated me, that I forgot to resist the
temptation to empty a bread-barge upon the head of the old master-at-arms
as he was coming up the hatchway, and the spectacle was so amusing that I
stayed to laugh at it.

When I entered the Service, the system of training young seamen, as well
as cadets, was in operation. To Sir James Graham, First Lord of the
Admiralty, is due the credit of introducing the training of seamen. In 1854,
he caused the Illustrious, two-decker, to be commissioned for that purpose,
under the command of Captain Robert Harris. The fact was that as sails gave
place to steam and as the science of gunnery progressed, it became necessary
to enter seamen as boys and to train them for continuous service. For some
time the short service and long service systems were concurrent. When I
went to sea, captains still entered men direct from the merchant service, and
very good seamen they were. They were engaged for a commission, at the
end of which they could re-engage or not as they pleased. But in the
meantime, under the admirable administration of Captain Harris, "Jimmy
Graham's novices," as they were called, earned an excellent reputation in the
Fleet; and continuous service gradually replaced intermittent service. In the

continuous service system resided our chief superiority over foreign Navies.
The objection to it on the part of the Government was (and is) the increasing
permanent charge of pensions. But in the interests of the Service and of the
country, it cannot be too clearly understood that the system is well worth the
cost, and that the revival of the short service system is profoundly to be
regretted.

NOTE

H.M.S. Britannia.—She was the seventh ship of her name. She was
launched at Plymouth in 1820, was pierced for 120 guns, and her
complement was 900 men. Her length, beam and draught were 205 feet, 53
feet and 18 feet respectively. In the Crimean war, she landed 200 men as part
of the naval brigade which assisted the Army at the siege of Sevastopol, and
took part in the bombardment of that town. She was commissioned on 1st
January, 1859, by Captain Robert Harris, as a training ship for cadets. The
Britannia was stationed first in Portsmouth Harbour, then at Dartmouth. She
was broken up in 1869. The memory of Captain Robert Harris deserves to be
held in high honour. Vice-Admiral Sir William Fanshawe Martin, who
himself achieved great reforms in the discipline of the Fleet, while in
command of the Mediterranean Fleet, wrote to Captain Harris under date
18th January, 1861, "There is no man in England whose opportunity of
doing good to our country for ages to come is greater than yours; and
assuredly the Navy is greatly your debtor." (The Story of the Britannia, by
Commander E. P. Statham, R.N. Cassell.)

The successor of the Britannia in which Lord Charles Beresford received
his training, the eighth of her name, known and remembered with affection
by all naval officers save the new generation, lay at Dartmouth for more than
forty years, when her functions were transferred to the colleges on shore.
(The King's Ships, by H. S. Lecky, Lieut. R. N. Muirhead. Vol. 1.)

CHAPTER III
THE SHIP OF HAPPIEST MEMORY

On the 25th of March, 1861, I was appointed naval cadet in the
Marlborough. As I climbed up her side by the hand-rungs, while my chest
was being hoisted in over all, I perceived two huge men looking down upon
me, and I heard one say to the other:—

"That white-faced little beggar ain't long for this world, Dick."

The speaker was John Glanville (called Clamfy Glanville), boatswain's
mate (of whom more anon), and he addressed this lugubrious remark to
Dicky Horne, the quartermaster, a very fat man. It was a far from
encouraging welcome to the sea; but the fact was that I had been ill, and was
feeling very cold as I climbed up the side of the ship. At first, I was much
disappointed at having been sent to a large ship, for we youngsters had a
notion that there were more freedom and independence in a small ship; and
besides, I wanted to go to China. But I went to China all in good time.

The Marlborough was the flagship of the Mediterranean station. She was
a wooden line of battleship, three-decker, launched in 1835, 4000 tons
burthen old measure, 6390 displacement new measure, fitted with single
screw horizontal Maudslay engines. The length of her gundeck was 245 feet
6 inches, her extreme beam was 61 feet, her maximum draught was 26 feet.
Her complement was 950, and she always carried 100 or more
supernumeraries. She was pierced for 131 guns and she carried 121 guns.
She was one of the first ships to be fitted with wire lower rigging. In the
Marlborough the old 24-inch hemp cable was used for laying out anchor at
drill. It was the same class of cable as that which was used in Nelson's time;
it was superseded by the chain cable.

The vice-admiral in command of the Mediterranean station was Sir
William Fanshawe Martin (called "Fly" Martin); the captain, William H.
Stewart; the commander, Thomas Brandreth: three of the finest officers that
ever lived. The captain of the Fleet was Rear-Admiral Sydney C. Dacres,
C.B. His duties were those of what we should now call a chief of staff. The
office was subsequently abolished; and it was always my desire to see it
restored.

Ships in those days were manned according to the number of guns they
carried. The theory was that if the boats' crews were absent from the ship,
there should always be sufficient men on board to work the sails and the
guns. The watch-bills were made out upon this principle, the men being
distributed among what were called the "parts of the ship." In the case of a
newly commissioned ship, the making out of the watch-bills and assigning
his place to each man, was the first thing to be done. It was no small task,
especially as no printed forms were supplied for the purpose. The watch-bills
were ruled and entered by the officers on paper supplied by themselves, and
were arranged upon the tradition handed down for centuries. Even the
signalmen supplied their own pencils and paper. Each ship made its own
arrangement. It was not until 1860 that uniform watch-bills, quarter-bills and
station-bills were instituted.

H.M.S. "MARLBOROUGH," 1861

The men were classed in the following categories, each "part of the ship"
being divided into port watch and starboard watch.

The Forecastlemen
The Foretopmen
The Maintopmen
The Mizentopmen
The Gunners
The Afterguard
The Royal Marines
The Idlers

The Forecastlemen were most experienced seamen. They wore their caps
a little differently from the others. They manned the foreyard, and worked
the foresail, staysail, jib, flying jib, jibboom, flying jibboom and lower
studdingsails.

The Foretopmen worked the foretopsail, foretopgallant and foreroyal
yards, foretopgallantmast, foretopmast and topgallant studding-sails.

The Maintopmen worked the maintopsail, maintopgallant and main-royal
yards and maintopgallantmast, maintopmast and topgallant studding-sails.

The Mizentopmen worked the mizentopsail, mizentopgallant and mizen-
royal yards, and mizentopgallantmast, mizentopmast and mizencourse (if
there was one), also the driver.

The upper-yard men were the smartest in the ship, whose character
largely depended upon them.

The Gunners, assisted by the Afterguard, worked the mainsail and
mainyard. These were generally old and steady men, who were not very
quick aloft. The gunners were also responsible for the care and maintenance
of the gun gear, side tackles, train tackles and the ammunition. The senior
warrant officer was the gunner.

There were only three warrant officers:—gunner, boatswain and
carpenter.

The Royal Marines were divided between fore and aft, working on
forecastle and quarterdeck. I remember seeing a detachment of Marines,
upon coming aboard, fallen in while the blacksmith, lifting up each man's
foot behind him, wrenched off and dropped into a bucket the metal on the
heel of his boot, lest it should mark the deck.

The Afterguard worked on the quarterdeck and helped with the mainyard.
They were the less efficient men and were therefore employed under the eye
of the commander.

The Idlers were not idlers. They were so called because (theoretically)
they had their nights in, although actually they turned out at four o'clock
a.m. They were artificers, such as carpenters, caulkers, plumbers,
blacksmiths, etc. They worked all day at their several trades until their
supper-time. They were nearly all old petty officers, steady and respectable.
It was part of their duty to man the pumps every morning for washing decks.
I made up my mind that, if ever I was in a position to do so, I would relieve
them of an irksome and an inappropriate duty.

In action, the carpenters worked below decks, stopping holes with shot-
plugs, while many of the other Idlers worked in the magazines. Among the
Idlers was the ship's musician—unless the ship carried a band—who was a
fiddler. He used to play to the men on the forecastle after working hours and
when they manned the capstan. Personally I always considered the name of
Idlers to be anomalous. They are now called Daymen.

Among the ship's company were several negroes. At that time, it was
often the case that the captain of the hold and the cooper were coloured men.

An instance of the rapidity and efficiency of the organisation of the
Marlborough occurred upon the night before she sailed for the
Mediterranean. She was newly commissioned, and she carried a large
number of supernumeraries on passage. We took out 1500 all told. A fire
broke out on the orlop deck; the drum beat to quarters; every man instantly
went to his station, to which he had previously been told off; and the fire was
speedily extinguished. The event was my first experience of discipline in a
big ship.

The nature of the discipline which was then in force, I learned on the way
out to the Mediterranean. In the modern sense of the word, discipline was
exemplified by the Royal Marines alone. I cannot better convey an idea of
the old system than by means of an illustration. Supposing that a Marine and
a bluejacket had each committed an offence. The Marine was brought up on
the quarter-deck before the commander, and the charge was read to him. The
commander asked him what he had to say. The prisoner, standing rigidly to
attention, embarked upon a long rambling explanation. If his defence were
invalid, the commander cut him short, and the sergeant gave his order.
"Right turn. Quick march." The Marine, although continuing to protest,
obeyed automatically, and away he went. He continued to talk until he was
out of hearing, but he went. Not so the bluejacket. He did not stand to
attention, not he. He shifted from one foot to the other, he hitched his
breeches, fiddled with his cap, scratched his head.

"Well, sir," said he, "it was like this here, sir," ... and he began to spin an
interminable yarn.

"That'll do, my man," quoth the commander. But, not at all. "No, sir, look
here, sir, what I wants to say is this"—and so on, until the commander had to
order a file of Marines to march him below.

But both Marine and bluejacket had this in common: each would ask the
commander to settle the matter rather than let it go before the captain; and
the captain, to sentence him rather than hold a court-martial.

The explanation of the difference between the old system of discipline
and the new is that in the sailing days it was of the first importance that the
seaman should be capable of instant independent action. The soldier's
uniformity and military precision were wholly unsuited to the sailor, who, at
any moment, might have to tackle an emergency on his own initiative. If a
seaman of the old days noticed anything wrong aloft, up he would run to put
it right, without waiting for orders. Life and death often hung upon his
promptitude of resource.

In the old days, we would often overhear such a conversation as the
following:—

Officer: "Why the blank dash didn't you blank well do so-and-so when I
told you?"

Man: "Why didn't I? Because if I had I should have been blank well
killed and so would you."

Officer: "Damn you, sir, don't you answer me! I shall put you in the
report."

Man: "Put me in the ruddy report, then."

And the next day the commander, having heard both sides, would say to
the officer,

"Why, the man was quite right." And to the man, "You had no right to
argue with the officer. Don't do it again. Now get away with you to hell."

And everyone would part the best of friends.

The change came with the improvement and progress in gunnery, which
involved, first, the better drilling of the small-arm companies. In my early
days, the small-arm companies used to drill with bare feet. Indeed, boots
were never worn on board. It was of course impossible to wear boots going
aloft for a sailor going aloft in boots would injure the heads and hands of his
topmates. Occasionally the midshipmen went aloft barefooted like the men.
So indurated did the feet of the sailors become, that they were unable to
wear boots without discomfort, and often carried them when they were
ashore.

A sailor's offences were hardly ever crimes against honour. They rather
arose from the character induced by his calling. Its conditions were hard,
dangerous and often intensely exciting. The sailor's view was devil-may-
care. He was free with his language, handy with his fists and afraid of
nothing. A smart man might receive four dozen for some violence, and be
rated petty officer six months afterwards. Condemnation was then the rule.
Personally, I endeavoured to substitute for it, commendation. For if there are
two men, one of whom takes a pride in (say) keeping his rifle clean, and the
other neglects it, to ignore the efficiency of the one is both to discourage him
and to encourage the other.

Before the system of silence was introduced by the Marlborough the
tumult on deck during an evolution or exercise was tremendous. The
shouting in the ships in Malta Harbour could be heard all over Valetta. The
Marlborough introduced the "Still" bugle-call. At the bugle-call "Still" every
man stood motionless and looked at the officer. For in order to have an order
understood, the men must be looking at the officer who gives it. During the
Soudan war, I used the "Still" at several critical moments. Silence and
attention are the first necessities for discipline. About this time the bugle
superseded the drum in many ships for routine orders.

There were few punishments, the chief punishment being the cat. The
first time I saw the cat applied, I fainted. But men were constantly being
flogged. I have seen six men flogged in one morning. Even upon these
painful occasions, the crew were not fallen in. They were merely summoned
aft "for punishment"—"clear lower deck lay aft for punishment" was piped
—and grouped themselves as they would, sitting in the boats and standing
about, nor did they even keep silence while the flogging was being inflicted.
The officers stood within three sides of a square formed by the Marines.
Another punishment was "putting the admiral in his barge and the general in
his helmet," when one man was stood in a bucket and the other had a bucket
on his head.

Very great credit is due to Admiral Sir William Martin, who reformed the
discipline of the Fleet. The Naval Discipline Act was passed in 1861; the
New Naval Discipline Act in 1866. In 1871 a circular was issued restricting
the infliction of corporal punishment in peace time. Flogging was virtually
abolished in 1879. (Laird Clowes' The Royal Navy, vol. 7.) Now we have
proper discipline and no cat. In former days, we had the cat but no proper
discipline.

The men were granted very little leave. They were often on board for
months together. When they went ashore, there they remained until they had
spent their last penny; and when they came on board they were either drunk
or shamming drunk. For drunkenness was the fashion then, just as sobriety
is, happily, the fashion now. In order to be in the mode, a man would
actually feign drunkenness on coming aboard. In many a night-watch after
leave had been given have I superintended the hoisting in of drunken men,
who were handed over to the care of their messmates. To-day, an intoxicated

man is not welcomed by his mess, his comrades preferring that he should be
put out of the way in cells. It was impossible to keep liquor out of the ship.
Men would bring it aboard in little bladders concealed in their neckties.
Excess was the rule in many ships. On Christmas Day, for instance, it was
not advisable for an officer to go on the lower deck, which was given up to
license. I remember one man who ate and drank himself to death on
Christmas Day. There he lay, beside a gun, dead. Other cases of the same
kind occurred in other ships.

The rations were so meagre that hunger induced the men constantly to
chew tobacco. For the same reason I chewed tobacco myself as a boy. Nor
have I ever been able to understand how on such insufficient and plain diet
the men were so extraordinarily hardy. They used to go aloft and remain
aloft for hours, reefing sails, when a gale was blowing with snow and sleet,
clad only in flannel (vest) serge frock and cloth or serge trousers, their heads,
arms and lower part of their legs bare. Then they would go below to find the
decks awash in a foot of water, the galley fire extinguished, nothing to eat
until next meal time but a biscuit, and nothing to drink but water.

Seamen often curse and swear when they are aloft furling or reefing sails
in a gale of wind; but I have never heard a sailor blaspheme on these
occasions. Their language aloft is merely a mode of speaking. Although in
the old days I have heard men blaspheme on deck, blasphemy was never
heard aloft in a gale. To be aloft in a whole gale or in a hurricane impresses
the mind with a sense of the almighty power of the Deity, and the
insignificance of man, that puny atom, compared with the vast forces of the
elements.

In later life, I once said to a young man whom I heard using blasphemous
language in a club:

"If you were up with me on the weather yard-arm of a topsail yard reefing
topsails in a whole gale, you would be afraid to say what you are saying
now. You would see what a little puny devil a man is, and although you
might swear, you would be too great a coward to blaspheme."

And I went on to ram the lesson home with some forcible expressions, a
method of reproof which amused the audience, but which effectually

silenced the blasphemer.

The fact is, there is a deep sense of religion in those who go down to the
sea in ships and do their business in the great waters. Every minister of God,
irrespective of the denomination to which he belongs, is treated with respect.
And a good chaplain, exercising tact and knowing how to give advice, does
invaluable service in a ship, and is a great help in maintaining sound
discipline, inasmuch as by virtue of his position he can discover and remove
little misunderstandings which cause discontent and irritation.

The discomforts of the Old Navy are unknown to the new. The sanitary
appliances, for instance, were placed right forward in the bows, in the open
air. If the sea were rough they could not be used. On these occasions, the
state of the lower deck may with more discretion be imagined than
described. As the ship rolled, the water leaked in through the rebated joints
of the gun-ports, and as long as a gale lasted the mess-decks were no better
than cesspools. It is a curious fact that in spite of all these things, the spirits
of both officers and men rose whenever it came on to blow; and the harder it
blew, the more cheery everyone became. The men sang most under stress of
weather; just as they will to-day under the same conditions or while coaling
ship. After a gale of wind, the whole ship's company turned-to to clean the
ship.

In those days the men used to dress in cloth trousers and tunic with
buttons. The men used to embroider their collars and their fronts with most
elaborate and beautiful designs. They had two hats, a black hat and a white
hat, which they made themselves. The black hats were made of straw
covered with duck and painted. Many a man has lost his life aloft in trying to
save his heavy black hat from being blown away.

The fashion of wearing hair on the face was to cultivate luxuriant
whiskers, and to "leave a gangway," which meant shaving upper lip, chin
and neck. Later, Mr. Childers introduced a new order: a man might shave
clean, or cultivate all growth, or leave a gangway as before, but he might not
wear a moustache only. The order, which applied to officers and men (except
the Royal Marines) is still in force.

Steam was never used except under dire necessity, or when entering
harbour, or when exercising steam tactics as a Fleet. The order to raise steam
cast a gloom over the entire ship. The chief engineer laboured under
considerable difficulties. He was constantly summoned on deck to be
forcibly condemned for "making too much smoke."

We were very particular about our gunnery in the Marlborough; although
at the same time gunnery was regarded as quite a secondary art. It was
considered that anyone could fire a gun, and that the whole credit of
successful gunnery depended upon the seamanship of the sailors who
brought the ship into the requisite position. The greater number of the guns
in the Marlborough were the same as those used in the time of Nelson, with
their wooden trucks, handspikes, sponges, rammers, worms and all gear
complete. The Marlborough was fitted with a cupola for heating round-shot,
which were carried red-hot to the gun in an iron bucket. I know of no other
ship which was thus equipped.

The gunnery lieutenant of the Marlborough, Charles Inglis, was gifted
with so great and splendid a voice, that, when he gave his orders from the
middle deck, they were heard at every gun in the ship. We used to practise
firing at a cliff in Malta Harbour, at a range of a hundred yards or so. I used
to be sent on shore to collect the round-shot and bring them on board for
future use. I remember that when, in the course of a lecture delivered to my
men on board the Bulwark more than forty years afterwards, I related the
incident, I could see by their faces that my audience did not believe me;
though I showed to them the shot-holes in the face of the cliff, which remain
to this day. On gunnery days, all fires were extinguished, in case a spark
should ignite the loose powder spilt by the boys who brought the cartridges
to the guns, making a trail to the magazines. At "night quarters," we were
turned out of our hammocks, which were lashed up. The mess-tables were
triced up overhead. The lower-deck ports being closed, there was no room to
wield the wooden rammer; so that the charges for the muzzle-loading guns
were rammed home with rope rammers. Before the order to fire was given,
the ports were triced up. Upon one occasion, so anxious was a bluejacket to
be first in loading and firing, that he cherished a charge hidden in his
hammock since the last night quarters, a period of nearly three months, and,
firing before the port was triced up, blew it into the next ship.

In those days, the master was responsible for the navigation of the ship.
He was an old, wily, experienced seaman, who had entered the Service as
master's mate. (When I was midshipman in the Defence, the master's
assistant was Richard W. Middleton, afterwards Captain Middleton, chief
organiser of the Conservative Central Office.) The master laid the course and
kept the reckoning. As steam replaced sails, the office of master was
transferred to the navigating officer, a lieutenant who specialised in
navigation. The transformation was effected by the Order in Council of 26th
June, 1867.

The sail-drill in the Marlborough was a miracle of smartness and speed.
The spirit of emulation in the Fleet was furious. The fact that a certain
number of men used to be killed, seemed to quicken the rivalry. Poor Inman,
a midshipman in the Marlborough, a great friend of mine, his foot slipping
as he was running down from aloft, lost his life. His death was a great shock
to me.

The men would run aloft so quickly that their bare feet were nearly
indistinguishable. Topmasts and lower yard were sent down and sent up at a
pace which to-day is inconceivable.

I once saw the captain of the maintop hurl himself bodily down from the
cap upon a hand in the top who was slow in obeying orders. That reckless
topman was Martin Schultz, a magnificent seaman, who was entered by the
captain direct from the Norwegian merchant service, in which he had been a
mate.

Mr. George Lewis, an old topmate of mine, who was one of the smartest
seamen on board H.M.S. Marlborough, has kindly sent to me the following
interesting details with regard to the times of sail-drill and the risks
incidental to the evolutions.

Time allowed Time in
by Admiral.
_Marlborough_.
Min. Sec. Min. Sec.

Cross topgallant and royal yards 1 0 0 30
Down topgallant yards with royal

yards across 2 0 1 13
Up topgallant mast, cross upper
yards and loose sails 2 30 1 27
Shift topgallant masts from royal
yards across 7 0 5 40
Up topgallant mast and make all
plain sail 4 0 2 40
Up topgallant mast and make all
possible sail 6 0 3 0
Shift topsails from plainsail 6 0 4 50
In all boom boats from away aloft 7 0 6 0
Out all boom boats 7 0 5 40
Away lifeboat's crew 0 30 0 20

What Mr. Lewis means by "admiral's time," let him explain in his own
words. "When our admiral" (Sir William Martin) "was captain of the Prince
Regent, which was considered the smartest ship in the Navy, he brought all
her times of all her drills to the grand old Marlborough along with him; and
you know, my lord, that he allowed us six months to get our good old ship in
trim before we drilled along with the Fleet; but we started to drill along with
the Fleet after three months, and were able to beat them all."

"Now, my lord," continues Mr. Lewis, "I come to one of the smartest bits
of our drill. When we were sailing in the Bay of Naples under all possible
sail, our captain wanted to let the world see what a smart ship he had and
what a smart lot of men was under him. From the order 'Shift topsails and
courses make all possible sail again'"—which really means that the masts
were stripped of sails and again all sails were hoisted—"Admiral's time 13
minutes, our time 9 minutes 30 seconds. All went without a hitch, within 400
yards of our anchorage."

Mr. Lewis proceeds to recount a very daring act of his own. "We were
sending down upper yards and topgallant mast one evening, and it was my
duty to make fast the lizard. But I could only make fast one hitch, so I slid
down the mast rope and it turned me right over, but I managed to catch the
lizard and hold on to it, and so saved the mast from falling on the hundred
men that were in the gangway. No doubt if it had fallen on them it would
have killed a good many...."

What happened was that Lewis, in the tearing speed of the evolution, not
having time properly to secure the head of the mast as it was coming down,
held the fastening in place while clinging to the mast rope and so came
hurtling down with the mast. He adds that he "felt very proud"—and well he
might—when the captain "told the admiral on Sunday that I was the smartest
man aloft that he had ever seen during his time in the Service." He had an
even narrower escape. "I was at the yard-arm when we had just crossed"
(hoisted into place). "I was pulling down the royal sheet and someone had let
it go on deck, and I fell backwards off the yard head-foremost. I had my arm
through the strop of the jewel block, and it held me, and dropped me in the
topmast rigging, and some of my topmates caught me."

Mr. Lewis himself was one of the smartest and quickest men aloft I have
ever seen during the whole of my career. The men of other ships used to
watch him going aloft. "My best time," he writes—and I can confirm his
statement "from ''way aloft' to the topgallant yard-arm was 13 seconds,
which was never beaten." It was equalled, however, by Ninepin Jones on the
foretopgallant yard. The topgallant and royal yard men started from the
maintop, inside of the topmast rigging, at the order '"way aloft." The height
to be run from the top, inside of the topmast rigging, to the topgallant yard-
arm was 64 feet. From the deck to the maintop was 67 feet. At one time, the
upper-yard men used to start from the deck at the word "away aloft"; but the
strain of going aloft so high and at so great a speed injured their hearts and
lungs, so that they ascended first to the top, and there awaited the order
"away aloft."

The orders were therefore altered. They were: first, "midshipmen aloft,"
when the midshipmen went aloft to the tops; second, "upper-yard men aloft,"
when the upper-yard men went aloft to the tops, and one midshipman went
from the top to the masthead.

At the evening or morning evolution of sending down or up topgallant
masts and topgallant and royal yards, only the upper-yard men received the
order, "upper-yard men in the tops." The next order was "away aloft," the
upper-yard men going to the masthead.

At general drill, requiring lower- and topsail-yard men aloft, as well as
upper-yard men, the orders were: first, "midshipmen aloft"; then "upper-yard

men in the tops"; then, "away aloft," when the lower- and topsail-yard men
went aloft to the topsail and lower yards, and the upper-yard men went aloft
to the masthead.

These arrangements applied of course only to drill. In the event of a
squall or an emergency, the men went straight from deck to the topgallant
and royal yards.

Mr. Lewis's performance was a marvel. Writing to me fifty years
afterwards, he says:—"I think, my lord, it would take me a little longer than
13 seconds now to get to the maintopgallant yard-arm and run in again
without holding on to anything, which I have done many hundreds of times."

The men would constantly run thus along the yards—upon which the
jackstay is secured, to which again the sail is bent, so that the footing is
uneven—while the ship was rolling. Sometimes they would fall, catching the
yard, and so save themselves.

The foretopgallant-yard man, Jones, was as smart as Lewis, though he
never beat Lewis's record time. These two men were always six to ten
ratlines ahead of the other yard men, smart men as these were. One day
Jones lost a toe aloft. It was cut clean off by the fid of the foretopgallant
mast. But Jones continued his work as though nothing had happened, until
the drill was ended, when he hopped down to the sick bay. He was as quick
as ever after the accident; and the sailors called him Ninepin Jack.

Another old topmate, Mr. S. D. Sharp, writing to me in 1909, when I
hauled down my flag, says:—"I was proud of the old Marlborough and her
successor up the Straits, the Victoria. They were a noble sight in full sail
with a stiff breeze. No doubt the present fleet far excels the old wooden
walls, but the old wooden walls made sailors. But sailors to-day have to
stand aside for engine-men. Going round Portsmouth dockyard some few
years since, I was very sad to see the noble old Marlborough a hulk" (she is
now part of H.M.S. Vernon Torpedo School), "laid aside, as I expect we all
shall be in time" (Mr. Sharp is only between seventy and eighty years of
age). "I am doubtful if there are many men in the Navy to-day who would
stand bolt upright upon the royal truck of a line-of-battle ship. I was one of

those who did so. Perhaps a foolish practice. But in those days fear never
came our way."

There speaks the Old Navy.

When a ship was paid off out of Malta Harbour, it was the custom that
there should be a man standing erect on each of the trucks, main, mizen and
fore. Many a time have I seen these men balanced more than 200 feet in the
air, strip off their shirts and wave them. And once I saw a man holding to the
vane-spindle set in the truck, and I saw the spindle break in his hand, and the
man fall....

In the course of my experience, I have seen a man fall off the main-royal
yard, be caught in the belly of the mainsail slip down the sail, catch the
second reef-line with his legs, and hold on until a topmate ran aloft with a
bowline and saved him.

I have seen a man fall off the maintopsail yard, and be caught in the bight
of the mainsheet in the main rigging, and run aloft again. And this was at
sea.

And several times I have seen a man fall from aloft to be dashed to pieces
upon the deck.

One of the closest escapes I have ever had occurred aloft in the
Marlborough. Being midshipman of the mizenroyal, I was furling the sail,
leaning forward upon the yard, gathering in the canvas, my feet braced
backward upon the footrope, when another midshipman, leaping upon the
footrope, accidentally knocked it from under my feet. For two or three
seconds I hung by the tips of my fingers, which were pressed against the
jackstay of the mizen-royal yard (the rope running taut along the top of the
yard to which the sail is bent) under which I could not push my fingers, and
then, at the last moment, I found the footrope again. I have never forgotten
my feelings, when I saw certain death approaching while my feet were
clawing about for the footrope.

When the hands were turned out to bathe, John Glanville, chief
boatswain's mate, would go up to the main-yard, stand with one foot on the

yard and the other on the preventive braceblock, and thence take a header.
The height was between 50 and 60 feet. Once he struck the sea sideways,
and was injured, so that he was never quite the same man afterwards. But
any other man would have been killed.

On another occasion, when the ship was hove-to for the hands to bathe,
the captain of the forecastle hauled the jib sheet aft, and the ship began to
glide away from the officers and men, myself among them, in the water.
Luckily all got on board again.

In the spirit of emulation, I fell into deserved disgrace at sail-drill. In
order to be first in the evolution, I secretly unbent the foretopgallant sheet
before the men arrived at the masthead. Another midshipman did likewise at
the main. He was Arthur Gresley, one of the smartest midshipmen aloft, and
one of the best oars in the Service, a splendid, cheery, chivalrous, noble-
minded lad. We were discovered; and, before all the men, we were ordered
down on deck, and were severely reprimanded for having endeavoured to
gain an unfair advantage, thereby staining the character of a ship justly noted
for her scrupulous fair play. I was taken out of my top, deprived of the
command of my boat, and disrated to cadet; and I had serious thoughts of
ending a ruined career by jumping overboard. I have never been so
genuinely unhappy before or since. But upon the following day I was rated
up again, and replaced in my top and my boat.

At first in the Marlborough I was midshipman of the mizentop, and in
charge of the jolly-boat. The midshipman in charge of a boat learned how to
handle men. As he was away from the ship with them for long periods, he
was forced to understand them and to discover how to treat them, thus
learning the essential elements of administration. As all my delight was in
seamanship, I contrived to miss a good deal of school. It was not difficult,
when the naval instructor desired my presence, to find a good reason for
duty with my boat. I was afterwards midshipman of the foretop, and when I
was promoted from the jolly-boat to the second pinnace, and to the
command of the first subdivision of the three-pounder division of field-guns
for landing, being placed in charge of one three-pounder gun, I thought I was
an emperor.

We used to land with the guns for field-battery exercises, setting Marine
sentries all round to prevent the men getting away to drink. Returning on
board, we used to race down the Calcara Hill at Malta to the harbour. On one
occasion, we were going so fast that we couldn't turn the gun round the
corner, and gun and all toppled over the wharf into the water.....

I fell into another scrape in excess of zeal for marksmanship. We used to
practise aiming with rifles and muzzle-loading Enfields, the Service rifle of
that day. We fired percussion caps without charges, at little bull's-eyes
painted on a strip of canvas, which was stretched along the bulwarks below
the hammock-nettings. The marksman stood on the opposite side of the
deck. Another midshipman and myself contrived to fire a couple of caps as
projectiles, which of course entered the woodwork behind the targets,
making dreadful holes. This appalling desecration, involving the fitting in of
new planking, was discovered by the commander, Brandreth. His rage was
justifiable. We were stood on the bitts, and also mastheaded.

Captain Houston Stewart used to fish from the stern gallery when the ship
was at anchor. He tied his line to the rail, and went back into his cabin,
returning every few minutes to see if he had a fish. Beneath the stern gallery
opened the ports of the gunroom. With a hooked stick I drew in his line,
attached a red herring to the hook, dropped it in again, and when the captain
came to feel his line I jerked it. He hauled it up in a hurry. Instantly after, he
sent for all the midshipmen; and, for some reason or other, he picked me out
at once.

"You did that, Beresford," he said. "Most impertinent! Your leave will be
stopped."

Next day, however, he let me off.

Among the most delightful incidents were the boat-races. It was before
the time when fleet regattas were instituted. What happened was that a boat
would row round from their ship, to the ship they wished to race, and toss
oars under her bows in sign of a challenge. Then the boat's crew of the
challenged ship would practise with intense assiduity until they felt they
were fit to meet the enemy. The bitterest feeling was aroused. Even the
crews of "chummy ships" could not meet without fighting. Hundreds of

pounds were wagered on the event. In the Marlborough we had the cutter,
Black Bess, specially built for racing. Her stroke was John Glanville, the
gigantic boatswain's mate, who, when I joined the ship, told Dicky Horne,
the quartermaster, that I was not likely to live long. He was the son of Ann
Glanville, the redoubtable West country woman who pulled stroke in the
crew of Saltash women that raced and beat a crew of Frenchmen at
Cherbourg, under the eyes of the Queen, the Prince Consort, the Emperor
Napoleon III., and the British and French navies. That notable victory was
won in 1858, when Queen Victoria, accompanied by the Prince Consort,
visited Napoleon III. The Queen and the Prince sailed in H.M.S. Victoria
and Albert, escorted by a squadron of men-of-war. They were received by
the French Navy. After the race, the Queen invited the Saltash women on
board the Royal yacht. Later in life, it was my privilege to remove anxiety
concerning her livelihood from fine old Mrs. Glanville.

I steered the Black Bess, and we beat the two best boats in the Fleet; and
then we were challenged by the St. George. The St. George had taken the
upper strake off her boat to make her row easier. Now the stroke of the St.
George was George Glanville, brother to John, and of the same formidable
weight and size. The race was rowed in Malta Harbour, over a 3½-mile
course, and we were beaten. We could not understand it; but beaten we were.
That night George Glanville came aboard the Marlborough with a bag
containing some £300 the money put up to cover the stakes. George came to
receive the stakes, and according to custom he brought the cover-money to
show that all was above-board. To him came John his brother; and scarce a
word was said ere the two big men were fighting furiously, the bag of gold
on the deck beside them. They were torn apart with difficulty. Nor could the
respective crews be landed together for a long time afterwards. Next year we
beat the St. George.

When we lay in Corfu Harbour, the Marlborough was challenged by a
crew of artillerymen. It was I think on this occasion that John Glanville
headed a deputation to me, asking me to be the coxswain.

"Well, sir," he said, "it's like this here, sir, if you'll pardon me. Yew be
young-like, and what we was thinking was whether you have the power of
language that du be required."

I said I would do my best. I did. I astonished myself. As for the
artillerymen, they rowed themselves right under. There was a little seaway,
and they rowed the boat under and there they were struggling in the water.

"What! Yew bain't never going to pick 'em up?" cried John Glanville, in
the heat of his excitement.

I also rowed bow-oar in the officers' boat, the second cutter. I was young
and small, but I had great staying power. I could go on rowing for ever.

When my leave was stopped—which did occur occasionally—I had a
system by means of which I went ashore at night. I lashed a hammock-
lashing round the port stern-ring, crawled out of the stern port, lowered
myself to the water, and swam to a shore boat, waiting for me by
arrangement. Maltese boats are partly covered in, and I dressed in a spare
suit of clothes. On one occasion, upon landing, I nearly—but not quite—ran
into the arms of the commander.

One night I went ashore, taking a painter and two men. We lowered the
painter over the edge of the cliff, and he inscribed on the cliff in immense
letters, "'Marlborough,' Star of the Mediterranean." Next morning the whole
Fleet, not without emotion, beheld the legend. Another brilliant wit went
ashore on the following night and altered the word "Star" into "Turtle." My
reply was the addition "Until the 'Queen' comes out." After this exploit I was
sent ashore to clean the cliff.

There were numerous horses in Malta, and the midshipmen and
bluejackets used to hire them for half-a-crown a day. When the horses had
had enough of their riders, they used to gallop down to the Florian Gate, kick
them off, and return to their stable. I heard one sailor remark to another,
who, sticking to his horse, was bounding up and down in his saddle:

"Get off that there 'orse, Jack, 'e's a beast!"

"He aint no beast at all," retorted Jack. '"E's the cleverest 'orse I ever see.
He chucks me up and he catches me, he chucks me up and he catches me—
why, 'e's only missed me three times in a hour!"

There used to be very bad feeling between English and Maltese. Both
sailors and soldiers frequently lost their lives on shore. The seamen used to
be stabbed, and the soldiers were sometimes thrown over the fortifications at
night. I have seen a dead soldier lying on the rocks where he was thrown. A
party of Marlborough officers drove out in "go-carts" (two-wheeled vehicles
in which passengers lay on cushions) to Civita Vecchia, to hear the
celebrated Mass on New Year's Eve. The Cathedral was the richest church in
Europe until Napoleon confiscated its treasure. Somehow or other, there was
a row, and we were fighting fiercely with a crowd of Maltese. A clerk of our
party, a very stout person, was stabbed in the belly, so that his entrails
protruded. We got him away, laid him in a go-cart, drove back to Malta, a
two-hours' drive, and put him on board, and he recovered.

At nine o'clock p.m. the seniors in the gunroom stuck a fork in the beam
overhead, the signal for the youngsters to leave their elders in peace—too
often to drink. Sobriety—to put it delicately—was not reckoned a virtue. I
remember visiting a ship at Bermuda (never mind her name) to find every
member of the mess intoxicated. Two were suffering from delirium tremens;
and one of them was picking the bodies of imaginary rats from the floor with
a stick, His case was worse than that of the eminent member of a certain club
in London, who, when a real rat ran across the carpet, looked solemnly
round upon the expectant faces of his friends, and said, "Aha! You thought I
saw a rat. But I didn't!"

There was no rank of sub-lieutenant, the corresponding grade being a
"mate." Many of the mates were men of thirty or more, who had never
gained promotion and who never would gain it. I remember an old mate who
used to earn his living by rowing a wherry in Portsmouth Harbour. He was
then (1862) on half-pay, with seniority of 1820. His name was Peter B.
Stagg, as you may see in the Navy Lists of the period. In the Navy List of
1862, Stagg is rated sub-lieutenant, the rank of mate having been abolished
in the previous year.

Wisdom spoken by babes was not approved in the Marlborough. I
ventured to remark a thing I had observed, which was that the masts of men-
of-war were out of proportion tall as compared with the sails they carried; or,
in technical language, that the masts were very taunt, whereas the sails were

not proportionately square. I said that the masts ought to be lower and the
sails squarer, thus increasing the sailing power.

"D—n it! Listen to this youngster laying down the law as if he knew
better than Nelson!" cried an old mate. I was instantly sentenced to be
cobbed; and received twelve strokes with a dirk scabbard.

It was true that the rig had been inherited from the men of Nelson's day;
but it was not true that I had pretended to know better than the late admiral;
for, since his death, the ships had become longer; so that, whereas in
Nelson's time the masts, being closer together, were made taller, with
relatively narrow sails, in order that in going about the yards should not lock,
in my time the reason for the disproportion had ceased to exist. Very shortly
after I had been beaten for the impiety of thinking for myself, the merchant
clippers adopted the very plan I had in mind, lowering masts and increasing
the size of sails and thereby gaining a speed which was unrivalled.

I visited Corfu during my time in the Marlborough when that island,
together with the rest of the Ionian Islands—Cephalonia, Zante, Ithaca,
Santa Maura, Cerigo and Paxo—was an independent State under the
protection of Great Britain. In the following year, 1864, the Islands were
annexed to Greece. When the Great Powers agreed that a sovereign should
be nominated to reign over Greece, it was suggested that, as the integrity of
his kingdom could not be guaranteed, he should be provided with a place of
refuge in case of trouble. So at least ran the talk at the time. In any case,
Great Britain was induced to relinquish these magnificent Islands, which she
had won from the French in 1809. Their loss was greatly deplored by the
Navy at the time; for Corfu has one of the finest harbours in the world; a
harbour in which a whole fleet can be manoeuvred. The Islands, moreover,
had magnificent roads, and were furnished with barracks, and in all respects
formed an invaluable naval base. Prince William of Schleswig-Holstein was
proclaimed King George I of Greece on 30th March, 1863. The late King
was a most admirable sovereign, whose personal friendship I was privileged
to enjoy. When I was in Corfu there was a story current to the effect that
when Mr. Gladstone came to the Islands on his mission of inquiry in 1858,
he delivered a superb oration in the Greek tongue. He was, of course, an
excellent scholar in ancient Greek; but modern Greek differs in
pronunciation and other respects. When he had finished, the official in

attendance, while complimenting him upon his eloquence, observed what a
pity it was that Mr. Gladstone delivered his speech in the English language.

As I am writing, it is the fiftieth anniversary of the marriage of the late
King Edward with Queen Alexandra, who is still spared to us. I remember
that on the 10th March, 1863, the Marlborough was illuminated with a
dainty splendour I have never seen surpassed, even in these days of
electricity. Every port-hole was framed in sixteen little Maltese glass lamps;
the rails and yards were set with them; so that, ports being triced up, and the
ship being lit within, she was as though wrought in a glow of mellow fire.

Early in the year 1863 I was ordered home, to my great grief. I was
discharged to the Hibernia stationed in Malta Harbour, to await the
homeward bound P. and O. mail steamer. Many years afterwards, when
commanding the Undaunted, I was tried by court-martial in the old Hibernia
for running my ship ashore and was acquitted of all blame. While waiting in
the Hibernia for a passage, I learned that the Marlborough had gone to the
rescue of a Turkish liner, carrying troops, which had run aground on the
Filfola rocks, twelve or fifteen miles by sea from Malta Harbour. I was so
eager to see my old ship again, that I hired a duck-punt and pulled all by
myself to the Filfola rocks. Fortunately the sea was calm, or I must have
been drowned. I found a party from the Marlborough rolling the Turkish
vessel to get her off. Each British sailor took a Turkish sailor by the scruff of
his neck, and ran with him from side to side of the ship, until she rolled
herself into deep water. I had a delightful dinner on board the Marlborough
and then I pulled all the way back in the dark to the Hibernia. I was sad
indeed that my time in the Marlborough was ended; for, in the words of
George Lewis, my old topmate, "the dear old Marlborough was the smartest
and happiest ship that ever floated."

I took passage home in the mail steamer, and was appointed midshipman
to the Defence by Rear-Admiral Charles Eden, C.B., my "sea-daddy." He
very kindly said he wished me to gain experience of one of the new iron
ships.

NOTE

The Old Navy.—The Marlborough was a survival of the Old Navy, in
whose traditions Lord Charles Beresford and his contemporaries were
nurtured. It was a hard-fisted, free-living, implacable, tragic, jovial, splendid
Service; it was England at her valorous best.

The present generation hardly realises that the naval cadets, who, like
Lord Charles Beresford, entered the Service in the mid-nineteenth century,
were taught their business by the men who had served with Nelson. The
admirals and old seamen of fifty years' service who are alive to-day,
therefore represent the direct link between Nelson's time and our own. When
they entered the Navy, many of the admirals and the elder seamen had
actually fought under Nelson, and the Service was in all essentials what it
was at Trafalgar. Admiral of the Fleet Sir Edward Seymour relates (in My
Naval Career) that as a cadet he often talked with Master-Commander G.
Allen, who saw Nelson embark from the sally-port at Portsmouth for
Trafalgar.

The change from sails to steam was just beginning. Never again will the
Royal Navy be administered by men who were brought up in that stern
school, which produced a type of men unique in history.

The time-honoured divisions of the Fleet into Red, White and Blue were
still in use while Lord Charles Beresford was a midshipman. They were
abolished by an Order in Council of 9th July, 1864.

In the year 1858-9 there was only one admiral of the Fleet, Sir John West,
K.C.B. He entered the Navy in 1788, as a "first-class Volunteer," as a naval
cadet was then called. West served on the coast of Guinea, in the West
Indies, Newfoundland and the Channel in the Pomona. He was midshipman
in the Salisbury, 50, and the London, 98, and was in the Hebe, Captain
Alexander Hood. He was lieutenant in the Royal George, Captain Domett.
He was present at the action of Île de Groix of the 23rd June, 1795, under
Lord Bridport. He was promoted to captain in 1796. In 1807, commanding
the Excellent, 74, he was engaged off Catalonia, helping the Spaniards to
defend the citadel of Rosas, which was besieged by 5000 French. He was
promoted to rear-admiral in 1819, and to admiral of the White in 1841.

Here was an instance of an officer becoming a captain at the age of 22,
after no more than eight years' service; remaining a captain for 23 years; and
a rear-admiral for 22 years; and in 1859 he was still alive as an admiral of
the Fleet, being then 85 years of age.

The Board of Admiralty in 1858-9 consisted of: the Right Hon. Sir John
Somerset Pakington, Bart., M.P.; Vice-Admiral William Fanshawe Martin,
who entered the Navy in 1814; Vice-Admiral the Hon. Sir Richard Saunders
Dundas, K.C.B., who entered the Royal Naval College in 1814; Rear-
Admiral Sir Alexander Milne, K.C.B., who entered the Royal Naval College
in 1817; and the Right Hon. Lord Loraine, M.P.

A very brief survey of the services of the admirals of the Red, White and
Blue shows that they derived directly from the French wars and the time of
Nelson.

Admiral of the Red Sir William Hall Gage, G.C.H., had been acting-
lieutenant of the Minerva, when she bore the broad pennant of Commodore
Nelson; had fought in the battle of St. Vincent under Sir John Jervis; and
commanded the Indus under Sir Edward Pellew in the action off Toulon of
13th February, 1814.

Admiral of the Red Sir Edward Durnford King, K.G.H., in command of
the Endymion, watched 26 sail of the line and nine frigates put into Cadiz on
16th April, 1805, and carried the information to Vice-Admiral Collingwood,
who was cruising off Gibraltar with four ships. He had the ill-luck to be
detailed for special service at Gibraltar on Trafalgar Day.

Admiral Sir George Mundy, K.C.B., fought in the battles of St. Vincent
and of the Nile, and had a deal of other distinguished fighting service in his
record.

Then there was Admiral of the Red the Right Hon. Thomas, Earl of
Dundonald, G.C.B., whose skill in privateering amounted to genius. As Lord
Cochrane, commanding in 1800 the Speedy sloop, 14 guns and 54 men, he
captured in one year and two months 33 vessels containing 128 guns and
533 men. Among other spirited exploits, he boarded and carried the Spaniard
El Gamo, 32 guns, 319 men. Falling under the displeasure of the politicians,

his rank and his seat in Parliament were forfeited. In 1818, he accepted the
chief command of the Chilian Navy, then of the Brazilian Navy, and then
entered the Greek naval service. King William the Fourth upon his
succession reinstated Dundonald in his rank in the Royal Navy.

Admiral of the Red Sir William Parker, Bart, G.C.B., went with Nelson in
pursuit of the French Fleet to the West Indies and back in 1805.

Admiral of the White Sir Lucius Curtis, Bart, C.B., served in the
Mediterranean in 1804 and 1805.

Admiral of the White Sir John Louis, Bart., served in the Mediterranean
in 1804.

Admiral of the White John Ayscough was flag-lieutenant in the Queen
Charlotte, Lord Rowe's flagship, in the Channel in 1797; he afterwards
served with distinction in Holland, Quiberon, Cadiz, Egypt, the West Indies;
and, with two frigates and some sloops, protected Sicily against the invasion
of Joachim Murat.

Admiral of the Blue Sir Edward Chetham Strode, K.C.B., K.C.H., served
under Lord Hood in the Victory in the Mediterranean, taking part in the
evacuation of Toulon, in the sieges of St. Fiorenza, Bastia and Calvi, in
Corsica. In August, 1794, he was lieutenant in the Agamemnon, commanded
by Nelson. He performed much distinguished service until, in 1841, he
attained flag rank and went on half-pay.

Admiral of the Blue William Bowles, C.B., entered the Navy in 1796,
was employed in the Channel and off Cadiz, in the North Sea, West Indies,
and North American station. In command of the Zebra bomb, he went with
Lord Gambier to Copenhagen. In 1813, and again in 1816, he performed
excellent service in protecting British trade in Rio la Plata and the
neighbouring coasts.

Admiral of the Blue James Whitley Deans Dundas, C.B., entered the
Navy in 1799, took part in the blockade of Alexandria in 1800, and served
with distinction in the North Sea, Baltic and Mediterranean.

Admiral of the Blue Henry Hope, C.B., took part in the blockade of
Alexandria in 1800, and served in the Mediterranean.

Admiral of the Blue the Hon. Sir Fleetwood Broughton Reynolds Pellew
performed long and gallant fighting services in the Dutch East Indies.

Admiral of the Blue Sir Charles Napier, K.C.B., etc. etc., had a most
distinguished fighting record in the West Indies and on the coast of Syria. In
1841 he represented Marylebone in Parliament, in which respect, as in
others, his career resembled that of Lord Charles Beresford.

In 1854, Sir Charles Napier was appointed to the command of the great
fleet which sailed for the Baltic in the spring of that year. Admiral Penrose
Fitzgerald, who received his nomination to the Navy from Sir Charles
Napier, and who served in the second Baltic expedition of the following
year, makes some instructive observations in respect of the treatment of Sir
Charles Napier by the authorities.

"... The issue was really decided in the Black Sea, and both Baltic
expeditions were, practically speaking, failures. The admirals were told by
the Government that they were not to attack stone forts with their wooden
ships, and were then censured by the same Government for doing nothing,
when there was really nothing else to do. Sir Charles Napier, who
commanded the British Baltic fleet in the summer of 1854, was shamefully
treated by the politicians, and, being a hot tempered old gentleman, he
couldn't stand it. He got into Parliament as member for Southwark and gave
them back as good as they gave.... It was the old story—the politicians
shunting the blame on to the soldiers or the sailors when they fail to achieve
such success as is expected of them, but quite ready to take credit to
themselves for their magnificent strategy and foresight when it turns out the
other way.... When Sir Charles was peremptorily ordered to haul down his
flag, as a punishment for not disobeying orders, he was superseded in
command by Admiral Dundas, who had been a Lord of the Admiralty in
1854...."

Sir Charles Napier requested the Prime Minister, Lord Palmerston, to
grant an inquiry into his case. He then addressed the following letter to Lord
Palmerston:—"I sent your Lordship my case, which I requested you to lay

before the Cabinet, but you have not favoured me with a reply. I am aware of
the various occupations of your Lordship, but still there ought to be some
consideration for an old officer who has served his country faithfully, and
who has held an important command. Had my papers been examined by
your Cabinet, and justice done, instead of dismissing me, and appointing one
of the Lords of the Admiralty my successor, you would have dismissed Sir
James Graham and his Admiralty, for treachery to me." (Life of Sir Charles
Napier, by General Elers Napier. Quoted by Admiral Penrose Fitzgerald, in
Memories of the Sea.)

Sir Charles Napier, remarks Admiral Fitzgerald, "thus gave his wary
enemies a chance of accusing him of disrespect towards those in authority."

Admiral of the Blue Phipps Hornby, C.B., was promoted acting-
lieutenant from the Victory, flagship of Lord Nelson, to the Excellent, 74. As
captain of the Volage, 22, he received a gold medal from the Admiralty for
gallant conduct in the action off Lissa of March, 1811, when a British
squadron of 156 guns and 859 men defeated after six hours' action a Franco-
Venetian force of 284 guns and 2655 men.

Such is the tale of the admirals of the Red, White and Blue in the year
1858-9. Several of them had actually served in Nelson's ships; the most of
them had served under Nelson's command, when Lord Charles Beresford
joined the Navy.

In the same year, the number of officers receiving pensions for wounds
on service was 104.

Admirals . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Vice-admirals . . . . . . . . . . 10
Rear-admirals . . . . . . . . . . 4
Captains . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Commanders . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Lieutenants . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Masters . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Surgeons . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Mates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Second masters . . . . . . . . . . 1
Paymasters . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
---

104
===

The total number of men in the Royal Navy in 1858-9 was 53,700:
38,700 seamen, 15,000 Marines. In 1912-13, the total number was 137,500:
118,700 seamen, 15,800 Marines. In 1810, the number of seamen and
Marines was 145,000: 113,600 seamen, 31,400 Marines.

CHAPTER IV
THE SHIP OF UNHAPPY MEMORY

I did not like the Defence. I thought her a dreadful ship. After the
immaculate decks, the glittering perfection, the spirit and fire and pride of
the Marlborough, the "flagship of the world," I was condemned to a
slovenly, unhandy, tin kettle which could not sail without steam; which had
not even any royal-masts; and which took minutes instead of seconds to
cross topgallant yards, a disgusting spectacle to a midshipman of the
Marlborough. Instead of the splendid sun and blue waters of the
Mediterranean, there were the cold skies and the dirty seas of the Channel. I
wrote to my father asking him to remove me from the Navy.

The Defence was one of the iron-built, or iron-cased, armoured, heavily
rigged, steam-driven, broadside-fire vessels launched from 1860 to 1866.
They represented the transition from the Old Navy to the New, inasmuch as
they retained large sailing powers and broadside fire, combining with these
traditional elements, iron construction and steam propulsion. They were the
Warrior, Black Prince, Defence, Resistance, Hector, Valiant, Achilles,
Minotaur, Agincourt, and Northumberland. The Defence, launched in 1861,
was (in modern terms) of 6270 tons displacement, 2540 h.p., 11.6 knots
speed, carried 22 guns, and had a complement of 450 men. She was
commanded by Captain Augustus Phillimore, and was one of the Channel
Squadron, which, in the year 1863, was commanded by Rear-Admiral
Robert Smart, K.H.

CHANNEL SQUADRON
(NAVY LIST, 1863, DESCRIPTION)

Rate H.P. Name Guns Tons Com. Officer
Complement

2nd S. 800 Revenge (Flag) 73 3322 Capt. Charles
800
Fellowes
Iron-cased
ship S. 1250 Warrior 70 6109 Capt. Hon. A.
704
A. Cochrane,
C.B.
" S. 1250 Black Prince 40 6109 Capt. J. F. A.
704
Wainwright
" S. 600 Defence 16 3720 Capt. Augustus
457
Phillimore
" S. 600 Resistance 16 3710 Capt. W. C.
457
Chamberlain
Gunboat S. 60 Trinculo 2 --- Tender to
24
Revenge

The Channel Squadron at that time was employed in cruising round the
coasts of the British Isles, in order to familiarise people on shore with the
Fleet. In later life it fell to me, as commander-in-chief, to conduct similar
cruises, of whose object I thoroughly approve.

The Warrior and Black Prince, in particular, were stately and noble
vessels whose beauty was a delight to behold. Their great spread of sail,
their long hulls and yacht bows, the vast expanse of flush wooden decks,
their solidity and grace, set them among the finest ships ever built.

I was somewhat consoled in the Defence by being placed in charge of the
cutter; in which I succeeded, by a small feat of seamanship, in earning the
rare commendation of the first lieutenant. I was about to sail off to the Fleet
from Devonport, when I discovered that the yard of the dipping lug was
sprung. This was serious, as it was blowing fairly hard. Fortunately, I had
one of those knives so dear to boyhood, containing a small saw and other

implements; and with this weapon I shaped a batten and fitted it to the yard,
woolded it with spun-yarn and wedged it tight. I did not expect it to hold;
but, double-reefing the sail, I put off. All the way to the ship I had an eye on
the yard, and it held. Of course I was late on board; and the first lieutenant
declined to believe my explanation of the delay until he had had the yard
hoisted on deck. Then he was kind enough to say, "Well, my boy, if you can
do a thing like that, there's hope for you yet." Every little ray of hope is
worth having.

But by reason of my love for the cutter, I fell into trouble. In the dockyard
at Devonport, there stood a mast newly fitted with beautiful new white
signal halliards, the very thing for the cutter. I should explain that, as we
were kept very short of stores, stealing in the Service from the Service for
the Service, used to be a virtue. There was once an admiral who stole a
whole ship's propeller in order to melt the brass from it; and it was another
admiral who boasted to me of his brother officer's achievement. Of course,
no one ever steals anything nowadays; nothing is ever missing out of store;
and no midshipman would dream of attempting to convey signal halliards
from the dockyard into his boat.

But I did. I brought an end of the halliard into an adjacent shed,
concealed in which I revolved swiftly upon my axis, winding the rope about
me. Then I put on an overcoat, borrowed for the purpose. But my figure
presented an appearance so unnaturally rotund that a policeman experienced
in diagnosing these sudden metamorphoses, compelled me to divest and to
revolve, unwinding, in the public eye. He also reported me for stealing
Government stores. "Zeal, all zeal, Mr. Easy!"

It was during my time in the Defence that I was so fortunate as to be
enabled to save two lives. On one occasion, the ship was lying in the
Mersey, and visitors were on board. A party of these was leaving the ship,
when their boat was slewed round by the strong tide, and one of them, a big,
heavy man, fell into the water. I dived after him. Luckily there was a boat-
keeper in the galley secured astern of the ship. He held out a boat-hook,
which I caught with one hand, holding up my man with the other.

I received the gold medal of the Liverpool Shipwreck Humane Society,
and the bronze medal of the Royal Humane Society. The name of the man

who fell overboard was Richardson. More than forty years afterwards, the
son of Mr. Richardson sent me a kind letter, enclosing a photograph of his
father, who had died in 1882, nineteen years after his rescue.

"My mother," wrote Mr. J. Richardson, "was in very great terror, as my
father could not swim a stroke. He was a very fine man, and this made your
task you so quickly undertook not any the easier.... The clothes he wore on
that memorable occasion were, after their thorough wetting, too small for
him to wear again, so they were cut down for my elder brothers, and were
called by them their 'Channel Fleet' clothes, and jolly proud they were to
wear them too."

The boys' sentiment is pleasing, whether it arose from the exciting fact
that Mr. Richardson had fallen overboard in them—a thing which might
happen to any gentleman—or from his having in them been picked out by an
officer (however junior) of the Channel Fleet.

The second occasion when I was successful in saving a man from
drowning was in Plymouth Sound. A string of boats from the Fleet carrying
liberty men was pulling ashore, when a shore-boat crossed their bows and
was run down by the leading boat. I jumped in and held up one of the
passengers; and was again awarded the bronze medal of the Royal Humane
Society.

In the Defence, as in my other ships, my Service transgressions were few
and venial, as in the case of the signal halliards. My troubles arose from my
intervals of relaxation on shore. It is now so long ago that perhaps I may
without imprudence relate a sad episode in which I fell under the
condemnation of the law, with all that attendant publicity which—as one
journalist rather unctuously remarked at the time—is so often worse than the
penalty.

"Defence, PLYMOUTH

"MY DEAREST FATHER,—I am writing to you at once to tell you what
a sad scrape I have just come out of. On Friday night I was with some other
wild fellows on the outside of a cab, pea-shooting, myself the worst, when
unfortunately I hit a lady who was leaning on a gentleman's arm in the face.

The man chased us and with a good deal of difficulty, caught us; we were
then taken to the station-house, and given into custody. The hotel-keeper we
always go to, very kindly bailed us for the night. In the morning we went to
the station-house according to promise; and were tried; the result was my
paying £2, 10s. and costs, or one month's imprisonment, and another £1, or 7
days. The other two got off, no peas being found upon them. You will see all
about it in the papers I am sending you. I am writing to you in such a hurry,
as I am afraid you might believe the papers if you saw them before my letter.
I most solemnly swear to you on my honour that I was quite sober the whole
of the day that this took place. And as for behaving unbecoming a gentleman
in the Court, I certainly did laugh, but the judge made me, and all did so, as
he was chaffing all the time. The reason I did not apologise to the man was
because he swore on his oath that I was drunk; which was a lie. I had been
dining with Hutchinson (see in the paper), who was giving a dinner as he
was leaving the ship. All I drank was two glasses of Moselle. The papers I
sent you are Radical so of course they run me down.... All that remains to be
said is, I hope you will look upon it as a boyish lark and not as a disgraceful
action ... and will you send me 5 pounds as I have but 3 shillings left; and I
must have some money to pay mess, wine, etc. etc. So now write soon to
your prodigal son,

"CHARLIE BERESFORD"

I received in reply a severe but affectionate reproof from my father.

The gentlemen of the Press took upon themselves to improve the
occasion, having first taken care, of course, to describe the affair as a great
deal worse than it was. "Let this lesson be taken," says one kind journalist,
"it may be a guide and a warning for the future. The days are gone—gone for
ever—when the pranks of a Waterford would be tolerated; but while we
would hope his follies are lost, we would likewise hope that his manly,
frank, chivalrous nature is still inherited by his kinsmen."

Another reporter did me the justice to record that, on being called on for
my defence, I said: "I certainly do apologise if I did strike the lady, because

it was not my intention to do so; but I certainly don't apologise for striking
Mr. Yates." I trust he bears me no malice.

Yet another guardian of public morals observed that "his Worship, in
announcing the penalties, called attention to the inequalities of the law,
which exacted fines for the same offence alike from the man with whom
sovereigns were plentiful as hours and the man whose night's spree must
cost him a week's fasting." Had his Worship taken the trouble to refer to the
scale of pay granted by a generous country to midshipmen, comparing it
with the scale of rations and the price we paid for them, and had he (in
addition) enjoyed the privilege of perusing the financial clauses of the letter
addressed to me more in sorrow than in anger by my father, he might
perhaps have modified his exordium.

As an illustration of the strict supervision exercised by the senior officers,
I may record that I received—in addition to my other penalties and
visitations—a severe reproof from Captain Stewart, my old captain in the
Marlborough.

The Channel Fleet visited Teneriffe. It was the first iron fleet ever seen in
the West Indies.

In the cutting-out action off Teneriffe, Nelson lost his arm, and several
ensigns of the British boats were captured by the French. Ever since, it has
been a tradition in the Navy that the flags ought to be recaptured. A party of
bluejackets did once succeed in taking them from the cathedral and carrying
them on board; but the admiral ordered their restoration. They were then
placed high up on the wall, out of reach, where I saw them. We held a
meeting in the gun-room of the Defence to consider the best method of
taking the flags. But the admiral, who was of course aware that all junior
officers cherished the hope of recovering the relics, issued orders that no
such attempt was to be made.

I was invited by an old friend of my father, a religious old gentleman
living in Cornwall, to a couple of days' rabbit-shooting. I was overjoyed at
the opportunity, and was the object of the envy of my brother midshipmen.
Arriving after lunch, I was brought into the great room where the old
gentleman was sitting in an arm-chair, with his feet, which were swathed in

masses of cotton-wool, resting on gout-rests. Near him was a turn-table
laden with books.

"Don't come near me, my boy," he shouted, as I entered. "I am very glad
to see you, but don't come near me. I have a terribly painful attack of gout,
the worst I ever had in my life. Go and sit down on that chair over there."

With the breadth of the polished floor between us, we chatted for a while;
and then the old gentleman, pointing to the table of books, asked me to give
him a particular volume.

"Now be very careful," said he.

Full of ardour, delighted to think that I should now escape to the keeper
and the rabbits, I jumped up, ran to the table, my foot slipped on the parquet,
and I fell face forward with my whole weight upon the poor old man's feet,
smashing both foot-rests. The agonising pain shot him into the air and he fell
on my back. I have never heard such language before or since. As he rolled
off me, he shouted:

"Ring the bell, you —— ——!"

In came the butler.

"Take that —— —— out of my house! Send him back to his —— ship!
Never let me see his —— face again!" screamed my host.

So I departed in the dog-cart. It was many a long day ere I heard the last
of my rabbit-shooting from my messmates.

A few months afterwards, when I had been less than a year in the
Defence, Rear-Admiral Charles Eden appointed me to the Clio as senior
midshipman. He said he wanted me to learn responsibility.

NOTE

The New Ships.—The predecessors of the Defence and her class were
wooden vessels plated with iron armour. The first iron-built, armoured, sea-
going British vessel was the Warrior, launched in 1860. She was laid down
in the previous year, in which Lord Charles Beresford entered the Navy.
Several wooden ships (Royal Oak, Caledonia, Prince Consort, Ocean, Royal
Alfred, Repulse, Favorite, Research) were converted into armoured ships
during their construction. These were launched from 1862 to 1864. For some
years the Admiralty built wooden armoured ships and iron armoured ships
simultaneously. From 1860 to 1866, ten iron-built, armoured, sail and steam
ships were launched: Warrior, Black Prince, Defence, Resistance, Hector,
Achilles, Valiant, Minotaur, Agincourt, Northumberland. In 1864 and 1865,
five wooden-built, armoured ships were launched: Lord Clyde, Lord Warden,
Zealous, Pallas, Enterprise. The Royal Sovereign, launched in 1857 as a
wooden line-of-battle ship, was converted in 1862 to an armoured vessel and
was equipped with four turrets. She was thus the first turret-ship in the
British Navy. The next step was to group the guns in a central armoured
battery, and to belt the ship with armour along the water-line. At the same
time, more turret-ships were constructed. Earnest controversy was waged
among naval authorities as to what were the most important qualities of the
fighting ship, to which other qualities must be partially sacrificed; for,
broadly speaking, all warships represent a compromise among speed,
defence and offence—or engines, armour and guns. The controversy still
continues. The disaster which befell the Captain decided, at least, the low-
freeboard question in so far as heavily rigged sailing steam vessels were
concerned, for the Captain, a rigged low-freeboard turret-ship, capsized on
6th September, 1870. (The Royal Navy, vol. i., Laird Clowes.)

Lord Charles Beresford, entering the Navy at the beginning of the
changes from sails to steam, from wood to iron, and from iron to steel,
learned, like his contemporaries, the whole art of the sailing ship sailor,
added to it the skill of the sailor of the transition period, and again added to
that the whole body of knowledge of the seaman of the New Navy. He saw
the days when the sailing officers hated steam and ignored it so far as
possible; as in the case of the admiral who, entering harbour under steam and
sail, gave his sailing orders but neglected the engineer, and so fouled the
wharf, and said, "Bless me, I forgot I was in a steamship!"

Admiral Penrose Fitzgerald, who entered the Navy five years before Lord
Charles Beresford, describes the transitional period in his Memories of the
Sea. Speaking of the Hercules, one of the new central-battery, armoured-
waterline ironclads, to which he was appointed first lieutenant when she was
first commissioned in 1868, Admiral Fitzgerald writes:—"The Hercules was
the most powerful ironclad afloat, in this or any other country. She carried
18-ton guns—muzzle-loaders—and nine inches of armour, though this was
only in patches; but she had a good deal of six-inch armour, and her water-
line and battery were well protected, as against ordnance of that date. She
was full-rigged, with the spars and sails of a line-of-battle ship, and she
could steam fourteen knots—on a pinch, and could sail a little. In fact she
was the masterpiece of Sir Edward Reed's genius.

"Up to the advent of the Hercules the three great five-masted ships of
10,000 tons, the Minotaur, Agincourt and Northumberland, had been
considered the most powerful ships in the British Navy, and probably in the
world, and Sir Edward Reed's triumph was, that he built a ship of about 8500
tons which carried a more powerful armament, thicker armour, fifty feet
shorter and thus much handier, steamed the same speed, and I was going to
say—sailed better; but I had better say—did not sail quite so badly; and it
must ever be borne in mind that at this transition stage in the development of
the Navy, our rulers at Whitehall insisted that our ships of all classes should
have sail power suitable to their tonnage. 'For,' said they, 'the engines might
break down, and then where would you be?'" (Memories of the Sea, Admiral
Penrose Fitzgerald, chap. xiv.)

CHAPTER V
THE MIDSHIPMAN OF 1864

I wish I could convey to my readers something of the pride and delight
which a sailor feels in his ship. But who that has never had the luck to be a
deep-water sailor, can understand his joy in the noble vessel, or the uplifting
sense of his control over her matchless and splendid power, born of a

knowledge of her every rope and sail and timber, and of an understanding of
her behaviour and ability. For every ship has her own spirit, her own
personality. You may build two ships or twenty upon the same design, line
for line the same, and each will develop her own character. As there are no
two people alike, so there are no two ships the same.

What can be more glorious than a ship getting under way? She quivers
like a sentient thing amid the whole moving tumultuous lusty life. Men are
racing aloft; other men, their feet pounding upon the white decks, are
running away with the ropes; the ringing commands and the shouting fill the
air; the wind strikes with a salt and hearty sting; and the proud and beautiful
creature rises to the lift of the sea. Doctor, paymaster, idlers and all used to
run up on deck to witness that magnificent spectacle, a full-rigged ship
getting under sail. As for me, I blessed my luck when I returned from the
Defence to a sailing ship.

The Clio was a corvette pierced for 22 guns, of 1472 tons burthen, and
400 h.p. The screw was hoisted when she was under sail, which was nearly
all the time. She was an excellent sailer, doing fourteen to sixteen knots.

The midshipmen's mess was so small, that there was no room for chairs.
We sat on lockers, and in order to reach the farther side, we must walk across
the table. One of our amusements in this tiny cabin was racing cockroaches,
which were numerous. We used to drop a bit of melted tallow from a purser's
dip upon their backs, plant in it a piece of spun-yarn, light the spun-yarn, and
away they would go from one end of the table to the other. There was once a
cockroach—but not in the Clio—which escaped, its light still burning, and
set the ship on fire.

I began in the Clio by immediately assuming that responsibility of senior
midshipman desired by Rear-Admiral Charles Eden. I purchased the stores
for the gunroom mess, expending £67, accounting for every penny, with the
most sedulous precision. We paid a shilling a day for messing, and the stores
were to supplement our miserable rations. They were so bad that I wonder
we kept our health; indeed, only the fittest survived.

We sailed from Portsmouth in August, 1864. It was my first long voyage.
It is curious that the first week of a long voyage goes very slowly, and the

rest of the time very fast. I used to keep the first dog watch and to relieve the
officer in the morning watch. In the keen pleasure of handling the ship—
loosing sails, sheeting them home, reefing, furling, and all the rest of the
work of a sailor—I regained all my old delight in the sea which I had lost in
the Defence. Keeping watch under sail required unremitting vigilance,
perpetual activity, and constant readiness. The officer of the watch must be
everywhere, with an eye to everything, forward and aft; while the helmsman
handling the wheel under the break of the poop, keeps the weather leach just
lifting.

The memory of the continuous hard work of the daily routine, makes the
sober and pleasant background to the more lively recollection of events,
which were after all but the natural reaction from the long monotony of sea
life.

It was my duty to preserve order in the gun-room; and a lively lot I had in
charge. One of the midshipmen, a big fellow, was something of a bully. He
used to persecute a youngster smaller than himself, and one day the boy
came to me and asked what he could do to end the tyranny. I thought that
this particular bully was also a coward—by no means an inevitable
combination—and I advised his victim, next time he was bullied, to hit the
bully on the point of the nose as hard as he could, and I promised that I
would support him in whatever came afterwards. He did as he was told;
whereupon the bully came to me with a complaint that a junior midshipman
had struck him. I formed a ring and put the two to settle the matter with their
fists. The little boy was a plucky youngster, and clever with his fists. He
knocked out his enemy, and had peace thereafter.

I crossed the Line for the first time. In going through the usual
ceremonies, being ducked and held under in the big tank, I was as nearly
drowned as ever in my life, being hauled out insensible. We towed out the
Turtle, a Government vessel, bound for Ascension with stores. While towing,
it is necessary to wear instead of tacking, for fear of coming on top of the
tow. But the first lieutenant thought he would tack; so he tried to go about.
There was a gale of wind; the ship missed stays, and came right on top of the
unfortunate Turtle, dismasting and nearly sinking her. I was sent on board
her to give assistance; and I made excellent use of the opportunity to collect
from the Turtle's stores many useful little ship's fittings of which the Clio

was in need. We took the Turtle into Ascension, where the midshipmen
landed, collected the eggs of the "wideawake" gulls, and bottled them for
future consumption.

We put in at the Falkland Islands in November. The population consisted
of ex-Royal Marines and their families. It was considered necessary to
populate the Islands; and we always send for the Royal Marines in any
difficulty. There were also South American guachos and ranchers. The
governor came on board to ask for the captain's help. The governor wanted a
man to be hanged, and his trouble was that he was afraid to hang him. The
prisoner was a guacho, who had murdered a rancher, whom he had cast into
the river and then shot to death. The governor was afraid that if he executed
the murderer, the other guachos would rise in rebellion. So he wanted the
captain to bring the murderer on board and hang him to the yard-arm. The
captain refused this request; but he offered to hang him on shore, a proposal
to which the governor agreed. The boatswain's mate piped: "Volunteers for a
hangman—fall in." To my surprise, half the ship's company fell in. The
sergeant of Marines was chosen to be executioner. He took a party on shore,
and they constructed a curious kind of box, like a wardrobe, having a trap-
door in the top, above which projected the beam. The man dropped through
the trap door into the box and was no more seen, until the body was taken
out under cover of night and buried.

The shooting on that island was naturally an intense delight to a boy of
my age. We midshipmen used to go away shooting the upland geese. I
managed to bring aboard more than the others, because I cut off the wings,
heads and necks, cleaned the birds, and secured them by toggling the legs
together, so that I was able to sling four birds over each shoulder. The whole
island being clothed in high pampas grass, it was impossible to see one's
way. Officers used to be lost in the Falklands. The body of a paymaster who
was thus lost was not discovered for eight years. The cold induced sleep, and
a sleeping man might freeze to death.

Admiral Penrose Fitzgerald, in his Memories of the Sea, relating his
experience as a midshipman in the Falkland Islands, says, "Everybody has
heard of the Falkland Island geese, and they may be seen to-day in St.
James's Park. The upland geese—as they are generally called—are excellent
eating; but there are also immense numbers and different varieties of other

geese and these are known as 'kelp geese.' Alas! our ornithological education
had been so sadly neglected that we did not know the difference with the
feathers on, though we soon found it out, when we came to cook and eat
them. All the birds we shot were kelp geese, about as fishy as cormorants;
but they were not wasted, for we gave them to our Marine servants, who ate
them all and declared them to be excellent. 'Some flavour about them,' as
they said."

While we lay at the Falkland Islands a merchant ship came in whose
whole company was down with scurvy. When I joined the Navy, lime-juice,
the prophylactic, was served out under the regulation; but in the mercantile
marine scurvy was still prevalent. It is a most repulsive disease. The sufferer
rots into putrid decay while he is yet alive. If you pressed a finger upon his
flesh the dent would remain. He is so sunk in lethargy that if he were told the
ship was sinking he would decline to move. His teeth drop out and his hair
falls off. It is worthy of remembrance that the use of lime-juice as a
prophylactic was discovered, or at least largely introduced, by Captain James
Cook the navigator; whose statue, erected at Whitby, I had the privilege of
unveiling in 1912. Historically, I believe that Captain Lancaster,
commanding the Dragon, in the service of the Honourable East India
Company in the time of James I, was the first to cure scurvy by
administering three spoonfuls of lemon to each patient, with his breakfast.

From the Falkland Islands we proceeded to the Straits of Magellan, where
the natives of Terra del Fuego came off to us in boats. They were totally
naked, and were smeared all over with grease. It was snowing, and they had
made a fire in the boats; and when the sea splashed upon the fire and put it
out, they beat the sea in anger with their paddles.

At the convict settlement there used to be a box to hold mails fixed on the
top of a pole. The letters were taken on board the next ship passing
homeward bound. I posted a letter addressed to my mother, who received it
in due time.

We dropped anchor off Port Mercy. It came on to blow a hurricane. We
had two anchors down ahead, struck lower yards and topmast, and kept the
screw moving to ease the cables. Without the aid of steam, we should have
been blown away. Even so, the captain became anxious and decided to put

out to sea. We battened down and went out under trysails and forestaysail.
Instantly we were plunged into a mountainous sea, and the wind whipped the
canvas out of us. We set close-reefed foretopsail. A tremendous squall struck
us, we shipped water and were blown upon our beam ends. So strong was
the wind that each successive blast listed the ship right over. The captain
then determined to run back to Port Mercy. The master set the course, as he
thought, to clear the headland; and we steamed at full speed. I was standing
half-way up the bridge ladder holding on to the man-rope in a violent squall
of hail and snow, the hail cutting my cheeks open, when I saw land right
ahead. The fact was that the master had mistaken his course, and the ship
was driving straight on shore, where every man would have perished. I
reported my observation to the first lieutenant, who merely remarked that it
was probable that the master knew better than I did. But presently he too saw
the high rocks looming ahead through the smother of snow and spray, and
the course was altered just in time. The wind was on the port beam; we
edged into it out to sea; and so were able to clear the headland and get under
the lee of the land. The first lieutenant afterwards handsomely admitted that
it was a good job I was standing where I was "with my eyes open" at the
critical moment. It was in the height of this emergency, that I first heard the
pipe go "Save ship."

We proceeded to Valparaiso, where the ship put in to refit. At Valparaiso,
we were able to get horses, and we organised paper-chases.

It was about this time that the incident of the Impresario occurred. He
was conducting the orchestra from the stage itself, being seated in a hole cut
in the stage, so that his legs rested upon a little platform below. The
refreshment room was underneath the stage, and the Impresario's legs
projected downwards from the ceiling into the room, where were two or
three midshipmen and myself. The temptation was irresistible. We grasped
the legs; hauled on them; and down came the Impresario. Overhead, the
music faltered and died away.

From Valparaiso we proceeded to the Sandwich Islands, whence we were
ordered to take Queen Emma to Panama, on her way to England to see
Queen Victoria. Queen Emma was born Miss Emma Booker. She married
Kamehameha IV in 1856. We took the Queen on board with one native lady
as her attendant. The natives were devoted to their queen, and they insisted

on loading the ship with presents for her. They brought pigs, masses of
yams, sweet potatoes, water-melons and other fruit. The pigs were housed
forward on the main deck, and the other offerings were piled on the rigging
and hammock nettings and about the davit guys, so that the ship looked like
an agricultural show when we sailed for Panama.

We sighted a schooner flying signals of distress. The life-boat was called
away to go to her assistance. I was in charge of the life-boat. When a boat is
called away at sea, the crew of course take their places in her before she is
lowered. The whole operation, from the sound of the pipe to the moment the
boat touches the water, occupies no more than a few seconds in a smart ship.
There was a little sea-way on, and the movement of the boat caused a jerk to
the falls, unhooking the safety catch, and dislodging an enormous water-
melon, which fell through about eighteen feet upon the top of my head. I was
knocked nearly senseless. It was the melon that split upon the impact,
deluging me with red pulp; but I thought that it was my skull which had
cracked, and that they were my brains which were spoiling my uniform, and
I remember wondering that my brains should be so queerly and vividly
coloured.

But I recovered from the shock in a few minutes. Boarding the schooner,
I found she was short of water. But the remarkable thing about that schooner
was that although she carried a cargo of six thousand pounds in Mexican
dollars, they had only four men on board, all told—an easy prize for a pirate.

After touching at Acapulco, which was all heat and flies, we landed the
Queen of the Sandwich Islands at Panama.

Some years afterwards, I went to call upon her Majesty. In all my
voyages, I carried with me a set of tandem harness; and on this occasion, I
hired a light cart and a couple of ponies, and drove them tandem.
Approaching the royal residence, I took a corner too sharply, the cart
capsized, I was flung out, and found myself sitting on the ground in the
Queen's presence.

But before we quitted the Sandwich Islands, an event occurred (of which
I was the humble and unwitting instrument) which nearly brought about
what are called international complications. I should explain that feeling ran

pretty high between the English and the Americans in the Sandwich Islands
with regard to the American Civil War, which was then waging. It was none
of our business, but we of the Clio chose to sympathise with the South. Now
that these unhappy differences have been so long composed, there can be no
harm in referring to them. But it was not resentment against the North which
inspired my indiscretion. It was the natural desire to win a bet. A certain lady
—her name does not matter—bet me that I would not ride down a steep pass
in the hills, down which no horse had yet been ridden. I took the bet and I
won it. Then the same fair lady bet me—it was at a ball—that I would not
pull down the American flag. That emblem was painted on wood upon an
escutcheon fixed over the entrance to the garden of the Consulate. I took that
bet, too, and won it.

Having induced two other midshipmen to come with me, we went under
cover of night to the Consulate. I climbed upon the backs of my
accomplices, leaped up, caught hold of the escutcheon, and brought the
whole thing down upon us. Then we carried the trophy on board in a shore-
boat. Unfortunately the boatman recognised what it was, and basely told the
American consul, who was naturally indignant, and who insisted that the
flag should be nailed up again in its place. I had no intention of inflicting
annoyance, and had never considered how serious might be the
consequences of a boyish impulse. My captain very justly said that as I had
pulled down the flag I must put it up again, and sent me with a couple of
carpenters on shore. We replaced the insulted emblem of national honour, to
the deep delight of an admiring crowd. The Clio put to sea. We heard
afterwards that the American Government dispatched a couple of ships of
war to capture me, but I do not think the report was true.

Having landed the Queen of the Sandwich Islands at Panama, as I have
said, about the middle of June, 1865, we left the Bay early in July, and
proceeded to Vancouver, arriving there in the middle of August. There we
remained until early in December.

I was placed in charge of a working party from the Clio, to cut a trail
through the virgin forest of magnificent timber with which the island was
then covered. I was pleased enough to receive an extra shilling a day check-
money. Where the flourishing town of Victoria now stands, there were a few
log huts, closed in by gigantic woods. When I revisited the country recently,

I found a tramway running along what was once my trail, and I met several
persons who remembered my having helped to cut it, nearly fifty years
before.

I believe that Canada will eventually become the centre of the British
Empire; for the Canadians are a splendid nation, gifted with pluck, enterprise
and energy.

The free forest life was bliss to a boy of my age. To tell the truth, we were
allowed to do pretty well what we liked in the Clio, which was so easy-going
a ship that she was nicknamed "the Privateer." We used to go out fishing for
salmon with the Indians, in their canoes, using the Indian hook made of
shell. To this day the Indians fish for salmon in canoes, using shell hooks. I
made a trot, a night-line with a hundred hooks, and hauled up a goodly
quantity of fish every morning. I remember that a party of midshipmen (of
whom I was not one) from another ship were playing cricket on the island,
when a bear suddenly walked out of the forest. The boys instantly ran for a
gun and found one in an adjacent cabin, but there were no bullets or caps. So
they filled up the weapon with stones from the beach. In the meantime the
bear had climbed a tree. The midshipmen levelled the gun at him and fired it
with a lucifer match.

We used to go away into the forest deer-shooting, and on one occasion we
were lost for a day and a night. It was at this time that I made the
acquaintance of the celebrated Mr. Dunsmuir, who became a mayor and a
millionaire, simply because he slept one night in the forest—for the sake of
coolness. When he awoke in the morning, he found that he had pillowed his
head upon a lump of coal. He subsequently obtained an enormous
concession of land from the Government and amassed a huge fortune in
coal. Two of our lieutenants put money in the scheme. I wrote at the time to
my father, asking him to let me have a thousand pounds to invest in the coal
business. But he replied affectionately but firmly that, until I ceased to
exceed my allowance, he did not think it right that I should embark in a
gambling project. The two lucky lieutenants were eventually bought out by
Mr. Dunsmuir for a very large sum of money.

I was very happy in the Clio; but, for reasons, it was considered expedient
that I should be transferred to the Tribune. Accordingly, I turned over to the

Tribune early in December, by the orders of my constant friend, Admiral
Charles Eden. He said it would do me good to serve under Captain Lord
Gillford. He was right. It did.

CHAPTER VI
STRICT SERVICE

Captain Lord Gillford, afterwards Lord Clamwilliam, was one of the
finest seamen, and his ship was one of the smartest ships, in the Service. The
Tribune was what we used to call a jackass frigate. She was pierced for 31
guns, was of 1570 tons burthen, and 300 h.p.—not that anything could ever
induce the captain to use steam.

Before I joined the Tribune, she had sprung her foremast so she went up
the Fraser River to cut a new spar out of he forest. Such things were done in
those days. But on the way up she grounded on the bar. Everything—guns,
coal, stores—was taken out of her; anchors were got out; and every effort
was made to warp her off. Still she would not move. In this desperate pass,
when every man in the ship, except one, was hauling on the purchases, it is
on record that when the chaplain put his weight on the rope, away she came.
The power of the man of God is remembered even unto this day. Then the
Tribune sailed up the river, and they cut a new spar, set it up and rigged it,
and she came home with it.

Captain Lord Gillford prided himself on the speed of his ship under sail.
He had fitted her with all sorts of extra gear, such as they had in the famous
tea-clippers. His tacks and sheets were much thicker than was usual;
strengthening pieces were fitted to the sails; there were gaffs for topgallant
backstays, and extra braces. His order book was a curiosity, Day after day it
bore the same entry: "The course. Carry sail." Sailing from Vancouver to
Valparaiso, the Tribune beat the Sutlej, another fine sailing ship commanded
by another first-class seaman, by two days.

Captain Lord Gillford's orders were that sail should never be shortened
without his permission. One night when it was blowing hard I went down to
the captain's cabin to ask him if we might take in the topmast studding-sail.
The ship was then heeling over. The captain stuck one leg out of his cot and
put his foot against the side of the ship. "I don't feel any water here yet," says
he, and sent me on deck again. The next moment the sail blew away.

I can never be too grateful for the seamanship I learned on board the
Tribune. The captain lost no opportunity of teaching us. On one occasion, for
instance, we carried away the starboard foremast swifter, in the fore rigging
—the Tribune had rope lower rigging. Captain Lord Gillford, instead of
splicing the shroud to the masthead pennants, chose, in order to educate us,
to strip the whole foremast to a gantline. We got the whole of the lower
rigging over the masthead again. I was in the sailmaker's crew; and another
midshipman and myself, together with the forecastle men, fitted in the new
shroud, turned it in, wormed, parcelled, and served it; put it over the
masthead, and got the fore rigging all a-taunto again. I also helped to make a
new foresail and jib out of number one canvas, roped them, put the clews in,
and completed the job. Lord Gillford's object was to teach those under him
to carry out the work in the proper shipshape manner. The sailmaker's crew,
among whom was another midshipman, named Morrison, and myself,
numbered 15 or 20 men, including able seamen, and we were all as happy as
possible. We were taught by one of the best sailmakers in the Service, who
was named Flood. We always worked in a sailmaker's canvas jumper and
trousers made by ourselves. I could cut out and make a seaman's canvas
working suit, jumper and trousers, in 30 minutes, using the sailmaker's stitch
of four stitches to the inch.

I had a complete sailmaker's bag with every sailmaker's tool necessary—
serving and roping mallets, jiggers, seaming and roping palms, all-sized
marling-spikes, fids, seam-rubbers, sail-hooks, grease-pot, seaming and
roping twine, etc. etc.

Morrison and I worked together at everything. We turned in new boats'
falls, replaced lanyards in wash-deck buckets, as well as taking our turn at
all tricks sailmaker's crew. We put in new clews to a topsail and course. We
roped a jib and other fore-and-aft sails. Both of these jobs require great care
and practice, and both of them we had to do two or three times before we got

them right. A sailmaker knows how difficult it is to keep the lay of the rope
right in roping a sail. We used also to go aloft and repair sick seams in the
sails to avoid unbending.

Captain Lord Gillford himself could cut out a sail, whether fore-and-aft
or square. I have heard him argue with Flood as to the amount of goring to
be allowed, and Lord Gillford was always right. It was he who put it into my
head to try to teach myself all that I could, by saying, "If a man is a lubber
over a job, you ought to be able to show him how to do it, not tell him how
to do it."

We were never so proud as when Lord Gillford sent for us and told us
that we had made a good job of roping the new jib. Among other things, I
learned from the "snob," as the shoemaker was called, to welt and repair
boots. In after years, I made a portmanteau, which lasted for a long time, for
my old friend, Chief Engineer Roffey; and I made many shooting and
fishing bags for my brother officers.

Merely for the sake of knowing how to do and how not to do a thing, in
later years I have chipped a boiler (a devil of a job), filled coal-sacks,
trimmed bunkers, stoked fires and driven engines.

We used up all our spare canvas in the Tribune; and I remember that on
one occasion we were obliged to patch the main-royal with a mail-bag, so
that the main-royal bore the legend "Letters for England" on it thereafter.

While in the Tribune, two misfortunes occurred to me on the same day.
As we all know, misfortunes never come singly. The sailmaker had reported
me for skylarking; and it occurred to me that if he was going to put me in the
report, he might as well have a better reason for that extreme action. I
therefore rove a line attached to a sailmaker's needle through the holes of the
bench upon which he sat. When he seated himself to begin his work, I jerked
the line, and he leaped into the air with a loud cry. That was my first
misfortune. The second was entirely due to the rude and thoughtless conduct
of another midshipman, who, in passing me as I sat at my sailmaker's bench,
industriously working, tilted me over. I took up the first thing which was
handy, which happened to be a carpenter's chisel, and hurled it at his
retreating figure. It stuck and quivered in a portion of his anatomy which is

(or was) considered by schoolmasters as designed to receive punishment. I
had, of course, no intention of hurting him. But I was reported for the second
time that day. I was put on watch and watch for a week, a penance which
involved being four hours on and four hours off, my duties having to be
done as usual during the watch off in the daytime.

We sailed from Vancouver early in December, 1865. On 2nd January I
was promoted to be acting sub-lieutenant. I find that Captain Lord Gillford
endorsed my certificate with the statement that Lord Charles Beresford had
conducted himself "with sobriety, diligence, attention, and was always
obedient to command; and I have been much pleased with the zealous
manner in which he has performed his duties."

We arrived at Valparaiso towards the end of January. I continued to
discharge my duties in the Tribune until the middle of February, when I was
transferred to the Sutlej.

I was as happy on board the Tribune as I had been in the Marlborough
and the Clio, and for the same reason: the splendid seamanship and constant
sailorising.

THE OFFICERS OF H.M.S. "SUTLEJ," 1865. (THE AUTHOR IS
THE SECOND FIGURE ON THE LEFT OF THE CAPSTAN)

The Sutlej was a steam frigate pierced for guns, of 3066 tons and 500
h.p., flagship of the Pacific station. Before I joined her, the commander-in-
chief of the station was Admiral Kingcome, who had (as we say) come in
through the hawse-pipe. It was the delight of this queer old admiral to beat
the drum for night-quarters himself. He used to steal the drum, and trot away
with it, rub-a-dub all along the lower deck, bending double beneath the
hammocks of the sleeping seamen. On one of these occasions—so runs the
yarn—a burly able seaman thrust his bare legs over the edge of his
hammock, clipped the admiral under the shoulders, swung him to and fro,
and, with an appropriate but unquotable objurgation, dispatched him forward
with a kick.

Such (in a word) was the condition of the flagship to which Rear-Admiral
the Honourable Joseph Denman succeeded, after the enjoyment of twenty-
five years' profound peace in the command of the Queen's yacht.

The captain, Trevenen P. Coode, was tall and thin, hooked-nosed and
elderly, much bent about the shoulders, with a habit of crossing his arms and
folding his hands inside his sleeves. He was a taut hand and a fine seaman.
He nearly broke my heart, old martinet that he was; for I was mate of the
upper deck and the hull, and took an immense pride in keeping them
immaculately clean; but they were never clean enough for Captain Trevenen
P. Coode. In those days we had little bright-work, but plenty of whitewash
and blacking. The test of a smart ship was that the lines of white or black
should meet with absolute accuracy; and a fraction of error would be visited
with the captain's severe displeasure. For he employed condemnation instead
of commendation.

There was an old yarn about a mate of the main deck, who boasted that
he had got to windward of his captain. We used to take live stock, poultry
and sheep to sea in those days. The captain found fault with the mate
because the fowls and coops were dirty. The mate whitewashed the chickens
and blacked their legs and beaks. Now the poultry in question belonged to
the captain. Thereafter the fowls died.

It was the custom for the admiral to take a cow or two to sea, and the
officers took sheep and fowls. There is a tradition in the Navy that the cow
used to be milked in the middle watch for the benefit of the officer on watch;
and that, in order that the admiral should get his allowance of milk, the cow
was filled up with water and made to leap backwards and forwards across
the hatchways. Another tradition ordains that when the forage for the sheep
ran short, the innocent animals were fitted with green spectacles, and thus
equipped, they were fed on shavings.

When we put into Valparaiso the Spanish fleet was threatening to
bombard the town. Rather more than a year previously, in 1864, Spain had
quarrelled with Chile, alleging that Chile had violated neutrality, and had
committed other offences. In March, 1864, Spain began the diplomatic
correspondence with Chile in which she demanded reparation, which was
refused. Chile sent artillery and troops to Valparaiso. The Spanish admiral,

Pareja, then proclaimed a blockade of the Chilian ports, and Chile declared
war.

The European residents in Valparaiso, who owned an immense amount of
valuable property stored in the custom-houses, were terrified at the prospect
of a bombardment, and petitioned Admiral Denman to prevent it. An
American fleet of warships was also lying in the Bay. Among them was the
Miantonomoh, the second screw ironclad that ever came through the Straits
of Magellan, the first being the Spanish ironclad Numancia.

When the Miantonomoh crossed the Atlantic in 1866, The Times kindly
remarked that the existing British Navy was henceforth useless, and that
most of its vessels "were only fit to be laid up and 'painted that dirty yellow
which is universally adopted to mark treachery, failure, and crime.'"

The British and American admirals consulted together as to the
advisability of preventing the bombardment. The prospect of a fight cheered
us all; and we entered into elaborate calculations of the relative strength of
the Spanish fleet and the British-American force. As a matter of fact, they
were about equal. The Spanish admiral, Nunez, who had succeeded Pareja,
visited the Sutlej and conversed with Admiral Denman. It was reported by
the midshipman who was A.D.C. to the admiral that, upon his departure, the
Spaniard had said: "Very well, Admiral Denman, you know your duty and I
know mine." The information raised our hopes; but at the critical moment a
telegram forbidding the British admiral to take action was received from the
British Minister at Santiago.

So the British and American fleets steamed out to sea while the Spaniards
fired upon Valparaiso from eight in the morning until four in the afternoon,
setting the place on fire, and then retired to their anchorage outside. The
British and American fleets then returned to the Bay, and I accompanied a
landing-party to help to extinguish the conflagration.

Five of us were standing on the top of the high wall of a building whose
roof had fallen in, so that the whole interior was a mass of burning
wreckage, upon which we were directing the hose, when the men below
shouted that the wall was falling. We slid down the ladder, and no sooner
had we touched the ground than the whole wall tottered and fell inwards.

We put the fires out, but the inhabitants were so angry with us because we
had not prevented the bombardment, that they requested that the landing-
party should be sent back to their ships. Then the flames broke out afresh.
For years the resentment of the Valparaisians remained so hot that it was
inadvisable to land in the town men from British ships.

The meeting of the British and American seamen gave rise to much
discussion concerning the respective merits of the British and American
theories of gunnery. The Americans advocated the use of round shot to
deliver a "racking blow"; the British preferred firing a pointed projectile
which would penetrate the target instead of merely striking it. When an
American bluejacket asked his British friend to explain the new English
system of shell-fire, the British bluejacket said: "We casts our shot for the
new gun so many fathoms long, and then, d'ye see, we cuts off a length at a
time, regulatin' the length required according to the ship we uses it against.
For your ship, I reckon we should cut off about three and a half inches."

The Spanish fleet was afflicted with scurvy; and we used to pull over to
the Spanish ships in the evenings, bringing the officers presents of chicken,
fresh meat and fruit.

Having done with Valparaiso, the Spaniards went to Callao; but there they
had a more difficult job; for Callao was fortified, and the Spaniards were
considerably damaged by the gun-fire from the forts.

During the progress of hostilities between the Chilians and the Spaniards,
the Chilians constructed one of the first submarines. It was an American
invention worked by hand and ballasted with water. The Chilians intended,
or hoped, to sink the Spanish fleet with it. The submarine started from the
beach on this enterprise; but it was never seen again. It simply plunged into
the sea, and in the sea it remains to this day.

We left Valparaiso about the middle of April, 1866, and proceeded to
Vancouver. On the way, the Sutlej ran into a French barque, taking her
foremast and bowsprit out of her. Captain Coode stood by the rail, his arms
crossed, his hands folded in his sleeves, looking down upon the wreck with a
sardonic grin, while the French captain, gesticulating below, shouted, "O you
goddam Englishman for you it is all-a-right, but for it it is not so nice!"

But we repaired all damages so that at the latter end he was better off than
when he started.

We arrived at Vancouver early in June, and left a few days later, to
encounter a terrific hurricane. It blew from the 18th June to the 22nd June;
and the track of the ship on the chart during those four days looks like a
diagram of cat's-cradle. The ship was much battered, and her boats were lost.
On this occasion, I heard the pipe go "Save ship" for the second time in my
life.

We put into San Francisco to refit. Here many of our men deserted. In
those days, it was impossible to prevent desertions on these coasts, although
the sentries on board had their rifles loaded with ball cartridge. Once the
men had landed we could not touch them. I used to meet the deserters on
shore, and they used to chaff me. As we had lost our boats, the American
dockyard supplied us with some. One day the officer of the watch noticed
fourteen men getting into the cutter, which was lying at the boom. He hailed
them from the deck. The men, returning no answer, promptly pushed off for
the shore. The officer of the watch instantly called away the whaler, the only
other boat available, intending to send a party in pursuit. But the deserters
had foreseen that contingency, and had cut the falls just inside the lowering
cleat, so that the whaler could not be lowered.

While I was at San Francisco, I had my first experience of the American
practical view of a situation. Bound upon a shooting excursion, I had taken
the train to Benicia, and alighted with a small bag, gun and cartridges. I
asked a railway man to carry my bag for me to a hack (cab). He looked at
me, and said,

"Say, is it heavy?"

"No," I said, "it is quite light."

"Waal then," said he, "I guess you can carry it yourself." I had to, so I did.

Benicia is celebrated as the birthplace of John Heenan, the "Benicia Boy,"
the famous American boxer. The great fight between Heenan and Tom
Sayers was fought at Farnborough on the 17th April, 1860. Heenan was a

huge man, six feet and an inch in height; Sayers, Champion of England, five
feet eight inches. The fight was interrupted. Both men received a silver belt.
I remember well the event of the fight, though I was not present at it. More
than three years afterwards, in December, 1863, Tom King beat Heenan.

From San Francisco we proceeded to Cape Horn, homeward bound. On
these long sailing passages we used to amuse ourselves by spearing fish.
Sitting on the dolphin-striker (the spar below the bowsprit) we harpooned
albacore and bonito and dolphin, which is not the dolphin proper but the
coryphee.

We rounded the Horn, buffeted by the huge seas of that tempestuous
promontory. On that occasion, I actually saw the Horn, which is an
inconspicuous island beaten upon by the great waves, standing amid a
colony of little black islands. And off Buenos Aires we were caught in a
pampero, the hurricane of South American waters. It blew from the land; and
although we were three or four hundred miles out at sea, the master smelt it
coming. Indeed, the whole air was odorous with the fragrance of new-mown
hay; and then, down came the wind.

We were bound for Portsmouth. And when we rounded the Isle of Wight,
and came into view of Spithead, lo! the anchorage was filled with great ships
all stationed in review order. They were assembled for a review to be held
for the Sultan of Turkey.

We took in the signal containing our instructions, and fired a salute; and
then, standing in under all plain sail and starboard studdingsails, we sailed
right through the Fleet, and all the men of the Fleet crowded rails and yards
to look at us, and cheered us down the lines. For the days of sails were
passing even then; we had come home from the ends of the world; and the
splendid apparition of a full-rigged man-of-war standing into the anchorage
moved every sailor's heart; so that many officers and men have since told me
that the Sutlej sailing into Spithead through the lines of the Fleet was the
finest sight it was ever their fortune to behold.

In the Tribune and in the Sutlej it was my luck to serve under two of the
strictest and best captains in the Service, Captain Lord Gillford and Captain
Trevenen P. Coode. I may be forgiven for recalling that both these officers

added a special commendation to my certificates; an exceedingly rare action
on their part, and in the case of Captain Coode, I think the first instance on
record.

Part of the test for passing for sub-lieutenant was bends and hitches.
Captain Lord Gillford was highly pleased with a white line which I had
spliced an eye in and grafted myself. Knowing that I was a good sailmaker,
he once made me fetch palm and canvas and sew an exhibition seam in
public.

From the Sutlej I passed into the H.M.S. Excellent, in order to prepare for
the examinations in gunnery. In those days, the Excellent was a gunnery
school ship of 2311 tons, moored in the upper part of Portsmouth Harbour.
The Excellent gunnery school is now Whale Island.

While in the Excellent I had the misfortune, in dismounting a gun, to
break a bone in my foot; and although the injury seemed to heal very quickly
under the application of arnica, I have felt its effects ever since.

In 1867 I was appointed to the Research, which was stationed at
Holyhead, and in which I served for a few months. There was a good deal of
alarm felt with regard to the Fenians, who were active at the time, and the
Research was ordered to look out for them. With my messmates, Cæsar
Hawkins, Lascelles, and Forbes, I hunted a good deal from Holyhead with
Mr. Panton's hounds. I also hunted with the Ward Union in Ireland. I used to
cross from Holyhead at night, hunt during the day, and return that night.

Among other memories of those old days, I remember that my brother
and myself, being delayed at Limerick Junction, occupied the time in
performing a work of charity upon the porter, whose hair was of an
immoderate luxuriance. He was—so far as we could discover—neither poet
nor musician, and was therefore without excuse. Nevertheless, he refused the
proffered kindness. Perceiving that he was thus blinded to his own interest,
we gently bound him hand and foot and lashed him to a railway truck. I
possessed a knife, but we found it an unsuitable weapon: my brother
searched the station and found a pair of snuffers, used for trimming the
station lamps. With this rude but practicable instrument we shore the locks
of the porter, and his hair blew all about the empty station like the wool of a

sheep at shearing-time. When it was done we made him suitable
compensation.

"Sure," said the porter, "I'll grow my hair again as quick as I can the way
you'll be giving me another tip."

We had an old Irish keeper at home, whose rule in life was to agree with
everything that was said to him. Upon a day when it was blowing a full gale
of wind, I said to myself that I would get to windward of him to-day
anyhow.

"Well, Harney," said I. "It is a fine calm day to-day."

"You may say that, Lord Char-less, but what little wind there is, is terrible
strong," says Harney.

A lady once said to him, "How old are you, Harney?"

"Och, shure, it's very ould and jaded I am, it's not long I'll be for this
worrld," said he.

"Oh," said she, "but I'm old, too. How old do you think I am?"

"Sure, how would I know that? But whatever age ye are, ye don't look it,
Milady."

CHAPTER VII
THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA

I. TO THE ANTIPODES

After a brief spell in the royal yacht, I was promoted out of her to
lieutenant, and was appointed to the Galatea, Captain H.R.H. Alfred Ernest
Albert, Duke of Edinburgh, K.G., K.T.

H.M.S. Galatea had four months previously returned from the long cruise
of seventeen months, 24th January, 1867, to 26th June, 1868, during which
the Duke visited South Africa and Australasia. While he was in Australia, an
attempt had been made to assassinate his Royal Highness, who had a very
narrow escape. The pistol was fired at the range of a few feet, and the bullet,
entering the Duke's back, struck a rib and ran round the bone, inflicting a
superficial wound. A full account of the voyage is contained in The Cruise of
H.M.S. Galatea, by the Rev. John Milner and Oswald W. Brierley (London,
1869; W. H. Allen). The Galatea frigate was built at Woolwich and launched
in 1859. She was of 3227 tons burthen, 800 h.p.; she was pierced for 26
guns; maindeck, 18 guns, 10-inch, 86 cwt., and 4 guns, 10-inch, 6½ tons; on
the quarterdeck, 2 guns, rifled, 64-pounders; in the forecastle, 2 guns, rifled,
64-pounders. The 6½-ton guns threw a shot of 115 lb., and a large double-
shell weighing 156 lb. She stowed 700 tons of coal and 72 tons of water.
Previously the Galatea, commanded by Captain Rochfort Maguire, had been
employed from 1862 to 1866 in the Baltic, and on the Mediterranean and
West Indian stations. She took part in the suppression of the insurrection at
Jamaica, and, after the loss of H.M.S. Bulldog, destroyed the batteries on
Cape Haitien. Her sister ship was the Ariadne, and Admiral Penrose
Fitzgerald, who served in the Ariadne, in 1861, writes: "It would not be too
much to say that she and her sister ship, the Galatea, were the two finest
wooden frigates ever built in this or any other country" (Memories of the
Sea). Personally, I am inclined to consider, that fine sailor as the Galatea
was, the Sutlej was finer still.

The Duke of Edinburgh was an admirable seaman. He had a great natural
ability for handling a fleet, and he would have made a first-class fighting
admiral. The Duke's urbanity and kindness won the affection of all who
knew him. I am indebted to him for many acts of kindness, and I was quite
devoted to him.

The voyage of the Galatea lasted for two years and a half. We visited
Cape Town, Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, the Sandwich Islands, Japan,
China, India, and the Falkland Islands. It is not my purpose to describe that
long cruise in detail; but rather to record those incidents which emerge from
the capricious haze of memory. In many respects, the second long voyage of
the Galatea was a repetition of her first voyage, so elaborately chronicled by
the Rev. John Milner and Mr. Brierley. In every part of the Queen's

dominions visited by her son, the Duke was invariably received with the
greatest loyalty and enthusiasm. It should be understood throughout that,
when his ship was not in company, or was in company with a ship
commanded by an officer junior to his Royal Highness, he was received as
the Queen's son; but when a senior officer was present, the Duke ranked in
the order of his seniority in the Service.

H.R.H. ALFRED ERNEST ALBERT, DUKE OF EDINBURGH, K.G.,
K.T.

We left Plymouth early in November, 1868, and once more I was afloat in
a crack sailing ship, smart and well found in every detail, and once more I

entered into the charm of the life in which above all I delighted. We touched
at Madeira, where I grieve to say some of the junior officers captured a goat
and some other matters during a night on shore; touched at St. Vincent; and
arrived at Cape Town on Christmas Day.

At Cape Town, my set of tandem harness came again into requisition.
From the Cape we proceeded to Perth. The fact that an attempt upon his life
had been made in Australia, was one of the reasons why the Duke chose to
pay the Colony another visit.

Upon a part of our voyage to Australia we were accompanied by my old
ship, the Clio, and so admirably handled was she, that she sometimes beat
the Galatea in sailing. In every place to which we went in Australia and New
Zealand, we received the most unbounded hospitality, of which I shall
always retain the most pleasant recollections. We were asked everywhere;
livery stables were put at the disposal of the officers; we went to shooting
parties, and to every kind of festivity.

At Perth I visited the convict settlement; and there I found a relative or
connection of the Beresford family, who had been so unfortunate as to be
transported for forgery. He appeared to be a most respectable old gentleman,
and (with the permission of the governor) I presented him with a small
cheque. Alas! incredible as it may seem, the sight of my signature awoke the
ruling passion; and my gentleman promptly forged a bill of exchange for
£50, and (as I found when I came home) got it cashed.

It was in Perth, too, that I visited a prisoner, a fellow-Irishman, who had
been convicted of murder. He had been a soldier, and had slain his corporal
and his sergeant. This man inspired me with some ideas with regard to
criminals which later in life I tried to put into practice; and also aroused in
me an interest in prisons and prison discipline which I have always retained.
He was a gigantic person, of immense physical strength, with receding
forehead and a huge projecting jaw. He was considered to be dangerous; five
or six warders accompanied me into his cell; and they spoke to him as
though he were a dog. I looked at the man's eyes; and I was convinced then,
as I am convinced now, that his intellect was impaired. Criminal psychology
then hardly existed; and although it is now recognised as a science, it must
be said that existing penal conditions are still in many respects awaiting

reform. Subsequent experience has proved to me that I was right in believing
that many crimes of violence are due to a lesion of the brain, and cannot
therefore be treated as moral offences. I heard some time subsequently that
the Irishman had been shot for the attempted murder of a warder. Perth and
New South Wales were the only places in the British Dominions in which
there was a death penalty for attempted murder.

I may here mention that in after years I was appointed, together with the
(late) Duke of Fife, as civil inspector of prisons; an office which I held for a
year or two. I was able to institute a reform in the system then in force of
mulcting prisoners of good conduct marks. These were deducted in advance,
before the man had earned them, if he gave trouble. A prisoner sentenced to
a long term—who usually gives trouble during his first two years—found,
when he began to run straight, that good marks he earned had been deducted
in advance. I was able to change the system, so that no marks should be
deducted before they were earned.

It was after I had been placed in command of the police at Alexandria, in
1882, that I was offered the post of chief commissioner of police in the
Metropolis; and I was honoured by a gracious message from a very
distinguished personage, expressing a hope that I would accept the
appointment; but, as I wished to remain in the Navy, I declined it.

We returned to Australia on our homeward voyage, but for the sake of
convenience I may here deal with the two visits as one. At Sydney, I
purchased a pair of horses. They were reputed to be runaways, and I bought
them for £9 a pair, and I drove them tandem with ring snaffle bits. They
never ran away with me—except once. When they came into my possession,
I found that their mouths were sore, and I did what I could to cure them.
Many a drive I had, and all went well. Then one day we all drove to a picnic.
The Duke, who was very fond of coaching, drove a coach. I drove my
tandem, taking with me the commander, Adeane. On the way home, the road
was down a steep hill. We were beginning to descend, when one of the
Duke's mounted orderlies mixed himself up with the traces between the
leader and the wheeler. The leader, taking fright, bolted, and the sudden
tightening of the traces jerked the orderly head over heels into the bush.
Away we went down the hill as hard as the horses could gallop. The next
thing I saw was a train of carts laden with mineral waters coming up the hill

and blocking the whole road. The only way to avoid disaster was to steer
between a telegraph pole and the wall. It was a near thing, but we did it. I
gave the reins of one horse to the commander and held on to the reins of the
other.

Then I was aware, in that furious rush, of a melancholy voice, speaking
close beside me. It was the voice of the commander, speaking, unknown to
himself, the thoughts of his heart, reckoning the chances of mishap and how
long they would take to repair. It said: "an arm, an arm, an arm—a month. A
leg, a leg, a leg—six weeks. A neck, a neck a neck—O! my God!" And so
on, over and over, saying the same words. Thus did Jerry Adeane, the
commander, think aloud according to his habit. He continued his refrain until
we pulled up on the next rise.

"Thank God, that's over," said Jerry Adeane.

Before leaving Australia, I sold my pair of horses for more than I gave for
them.

When the Galatea was in New Zealand, Sir George Grey, who owned an
island called the Kanwah, gave me permission to shoot there. He had
stocked it for years with every sort of wild bird and beast. Indigenous to the
island were wild boar and wild cattle, which were supposed to have been
turned down there by the buccaneers. I landed early one morning to stalk the
wild cattle, with my servant, a pulpy, bulbous sort of rotten fellow who hated
walking. He carried my second rifle. We climbed to the top of a hill with the
wind against us, to get a spy round. When I came near the top, I perceived
the unmistakable smell of cattle; and, on reaching the top, there, within thirty
yards of me, were a great black bull and two cows.

The bull saw me. He shook his head savagely, bellowed, pawed the
ground, put his head about, and charged straight for me. I was standing in a
thick sort of tea scrub which was level with my shoulders, so that I could see
only the beast's back as he charged. I thought it was of no use to fire at his
back; and, remembering that the scrub was thin, having only stems
underneath, I dropped on my knee, hoping to see his head. Fortunately, I was
able to see it plainly. I fired, and he dropped within about five yards of me.

I said to my man:

"Well, that was lucky; he might have got us."

As there was no reply, I turned round, and saw my trusty second gun half-
way down the hill, running like a hare. I was so angry that I felt inclined to
give him my second barrel. On returning on board I dispensed with his
services, and engaged a good old trusty Marine to look after me.

I killed six of these wild cattle altogether, and a landing party bringing
them off to the ship, there was beef enough for the whole ship's company.

There was a number of sheep on the island, under the care of a shepherd
named Raynes, who was a sort of keeper in Sir George's service. He said to
me, "You have not killed a boar yet. Come with me to-morrow, and I will
take you where we can find one." I said, "All right, I will come at four
o'clock to-morrow and bring my rifle." "No," said he, "don't bring a rifle,
bring a knife. I always kill them with a knife."

I thought he was chaffing, but I said, "All right, I will bring a knife, but I
shall bring my rifle as well."

In the morning he met me at the landing-stage with three dogs, one a
small collie, and two heavy dogs like half-bred mastiffs, held in a leash. We
walked about three miles to a thick swampy place, with rushes and tussocks.
He chased the collie into the bush, and in about twenty minutes we heard the
collie barking furiously. Raynes told me to follow him close, and not on any
account to get in front of him. The heavy dogs fairly pulled him through the
bush. We soon came up to the collie, and found him with an immense boar in
a small open space.

Raynes slipped the heavy dogs, who went straight for the boar, and seized
him, one by the ear and the other by the throat. The boar cut both the dogs,
one badly. When they had a firm hold, Raynes ran in from behind, seized
one of the boar's hind legs, and passing it in front of the other hind leg, gave
a violent pull, and the boar fell on its side. Raynes immediately killed it with
his knife, by stabbing it behind the shoulder. I never saw a quicker or a more
skilful performance.

I suggested to Raynes that I should like to try it.

"Well," he said, "we will try and find a light sow to-morrow. A boar
would cut you if you were not quick."

On the following day, we got a sow, but I made an awful mess of it, and if
it had not been for the heavy dogs, she would have cut me badly; as it was,
she bowled me over in the mud before I killed her.

In New Zealand, we went up to the White Springs and we all bathed with
the Maories. You stand in the water warm as milk, close beside springs of
boiling water, and occasionally a jet of steam makes you jump. The person
of one of the guests, a very portly gentleman, suggested a practical joke to
the Maori boys and girls, who dived in and swam up to him under water,
pinched him and swam away with yells of laughter. The old boy, determined
to preserve harmony, endured the torment with an agonised pretence of
enjoyment. "Very playful, very playful!" he kept miserably repeating. "Oh,
very playful indeed. Tanaqui (how do you do), Tanaqui."

We had an excellent lunch, of pig, fowls, and yams, all boiled on the spot
in the hot springs. I saw a live pig chased by some Maori children into a hot
spring, and it was boiled in a moment.

In this region I rode over soil which was exactly like dust-shot; the whole
ground apparently consisting of ore. We visited the White Terraces, where, if
you wrote your name in pencil upon the cliffs, the silicate would preserve
the legend as if it were raised or embroidered. Some of the signatures had
been there for years. I have since heard that the place was destroyed by
volcanic eruption.

We witnessed the weird and magnificent war dances of the Maoris. Never
have I seen finer specimens of humanity than these men. When, after leaping
simultaneously into the air, they all came to the ground together, the impact
sounded like the report of a gun. A party of the Chiefs came to pay a
ceremonial visit to the Duke. It struck me that they looked hungry, and I said
so. They want cheering up, I said. I went to forage for them. I took a huge
silver bowl, and filled it with chicken, whisky, lobster, beef, champagne,
biscuits and everything else I could find, and presented it to them. You never

saw warriors more delighted. They ate the whole, using their fingers, and
were greatly cheered.

It was in New Zealand that I had an interesting conversation with a
cannibal—or rather, an ex-cannibal. I asked him if he ever craved for human
flesh, and he said no, not now—unless he happened to see a plump woman.
In that case, he said he lusted for the flesh of the ball of the thumb, which
(he gave me to understand) was the prime delicacy.

Some of the half-caste women were of great beauty. Their savage blood
endowed them with something of the untamed, implacable aspect of their
ancestry. I heard of one such woman, who, outwardly attuned to every tenet
of white civilisation, and received everywhere in white society, suddenly
reverted. A native rebellion breaking out, she rejoined her tribe and slew a
missionary with her meri—the native chief's badge of office. She cut off the
top of the missionary's skull, and used it thereafter as a drinking-vessel. Poor
lady, she was (I heard) eventually captured and was executed.

CHAPTER VIII
THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (Continued)

II. MY TWO FAITHFUL SERVANTS

They came to me first in the Galatea, so that their story may fitly be
related in this place. Tom Fat the China boy came to me at Kowloon. He was
brought to me by his uncle, who desired to dispose of his nephew, for a
consideration. The consideration was £5. Lest I should be accused of
Chinese slavery—and anything is possible in these days—I should explain
that the fiver was not the price of Tom Fat, but was in the nature of a delicate
compliment paid to his uncle. Tom was a free boy; he was entered in the
ship's books as my servant, at so much wages per month. Not that he valued
his wages particularly; he had wider views. He was an invaluable servant,
clever, orderly, indefatigable and devoted. I attired him in gorgeous silks,
and he bore my crest with perfect unassuming dignity. He kept my purse,
and expended my money with prudence, even with generosity. When I
wanted money, Tom Fat had plenty of ready cash. I sometimes wondered
how it was that he always seemed to be provided with a margin, for I was
not conscious of practising economy. The fact was, I was careless in those
days, and kept no accounts. It was not until he had been in my service for
some years, that I discovered the secret of his wealth. It was simple enough.
He was in the habit of forging cheques. Altogether, he forged cheques for
nearly twelve hundred pounds. How much of that amount he kept for
himself I never knew; but it is certain that a great deal of it he spent upon
me. Nor do I know why he did not ask for a cheque instead of forging it.
Apparently it was a point of honour with Tom not to ask for money. When I
asked him if he wanted a cheque to defray expenses, he usually replied
cheerfully that he had no need of it. Certainly he acquired a reputation for
economy by these means.

His methods were subtle. He was well aware that I kept no private
account book of my own, and that my bankers did not enter the names of
payees in my pass-book, but only the numbers of the cheques cashed, and
also that the bank returned cashed cheques from time to time. On these
occasions, Tom, finding pass-book and cashed cheques among my papers,

would abstract both the counterfoils and the cheques which he had forged,
knowing that as I should not take the trouble to compare the numbers of the
cheques with the numbers in the pass-book, I should not notice that some
cheques were missing. He was always careful to arrange that the last
counterfoil filled up—at which one naturally looks—should be that of my
cheque and not that of his; and he never drew large sums, varying his
amounts between £5 and £20, except on one occasion, when he forged a
cheque for £50. The Oriental mind is inscrutable; but whether or no Tom
considered that he was robbing me; whether, if he considered that he was
robbing me, he believed he was justified in so doing; he took the most
sedulous care that no one else should enjoy that privilege.

Tom was universally popular. I took him everywhere with me. In his way,
he was a sportsman. One day, hunting with the Duke of Beaufort's hounds, I
mounted him on a skewbald pony. We came to a nasty slippery place, a bad
take-off, a wall to jump, and the road beyond. Tom's pony took it safely. A
big, hard-riding guardsman who was coming up behind us, not liking the
look of the place, shouted to me, "Is it all right?"

"That hideous Chinaman has just done it!" I shouted back. Not to be
outdone by a Chinaman, the guardsman rode at the fence, his horse went
down, and he got a dreadful toss. When he got up, he was furiously angry
with me.

When Tom had been with me for some years, he came to me and said,
"Master, you never give me leave! You give others leave but not me leave. I
want leave."

The request was reasonable enough, and I sent Tom to my house in town,
there to amuse himself for a week. At the end of the week he did not return.
He was reported missing. I advertised for him, offering a reward. The next
day he was arrested at the Criterion Restaurant, being one of a party of
thirteen (of whom twelve were ladies) to whom Tom was about to play the
host.

It turned out that during his week in town, my faithful servant had spent
£70. He had also raised money at one of my clubs.

"Lord Charles want twenty-five pounds," he said to the porter, who took
him to the cashier.

"His lordship must give me his I.O.U.," says the cashier.

"What thing that?" says Tom.

The cashier explained.

"All-light," says the man of resource, and promptly forged my I.O.U. for
thirty-five pounds.

"You said twenty-five," remarked the cashier.

"I tink Lord Charles like little more," Tom replied.

Of course, the cashier sent me the document. When I investigated Tom's
transactions, I found a few of his forged cheques in the bank, and I could
hardly tell the difference between my signature and his forgeries. The
cheque-books were compared with the pass-book, and counterfoils were
found to be missing. I took legal action against him, and he was sentenced to
five years. Shortly afterwards, when I was in Scotland, I received a letter
from the hapless Tom, saying he was dying, and asking me to come and see
him. I went at once. I found him in the infirmary, a dying man indeed, with
his face to the wall. A Chinaman dies at will. He simply lies down and dies;
but by the same token, he can continue to live. So I determined to rouse him.
I hailed him in a loud and cheerful voice.

"Tom! Cheer up, Tom! What's the matter? You're not ill. Rouse up."

"Me die, master," said Tom.

"Not you," I said. "Come! Cheer up, and I'll try to get you out of this."

And sure enough, he turned back, became quite well, and I secured his
release after he had served a short term. I found him a place in China, sent
him East, and never saw him again. When I went to China subsequently, I
failed to find him. After his interval of Western service, China took him and
swallowed him up. And that was the end of Tom Fat.

He was in my service when, upon the return voyage to Australia of the
Galatea, we touched at Mauritius. In that strange island I came across a
youthful negro savage. I learned his history from his master, an amiable
French gentleman. Punch, as I named him, had been brought to Mauritius by
a British cruiser. The warship had chased a slaver, whose crew jettisoned the
slaves. They were fettered in chains and hove over the side. When the British
seamen boarded the vessel they found her holds empty, except for the odour.
In a dark corner was stowed a bundle of rags, into which a bluejacket thrust
his cutlass. The rags sprang to life with a yell, and there was Punch with a
wound in his thigh, of which he carried the scar to his end.

It occurred to me that Punch would serve me for a groom, and I said so to
his master.

"Tiens!" said that gentleman pleasantly. "You shall have him for five
shilling."

"Done!" said I, and paid him the money. He did not think I was serious;
but he made no bones about ridding himself of his garden-boy.

Punch was the most hideous savage I have ever viewed. He was black as
a boot; even his lips were black; his face was seamed with the cicatrices
which were the totem marks of his tribe, whatever that may have been; and
his countenance was exactly like the countenance of a bull-dog. The scars
wrinkled his cheeks, like a bull-dog's jowl. He was densely stupid, and wild
of temper. He attacked one of the men on board with his teeth. But he was
utterly fearless, and although he knew nothing about horses, he was never
afraid of them. He was apparently constructed of india-rubber. Nothing hurt
him. When I drove a tandem, it was his duty as tiger to spring up behind as
we started. But as my horses started at speed, Punch had not always time to
run from their heads to the back of the vehicle. I have known him catch a
spoke of the wheel and be whirled into the air, and the wheel to pass over
him, without harming him in the least.

At a race meeting in Australia, Punch begged for a mount, and I borrowed
a horse, which galloped away down the course, Punch clinging to him with
arms and legs exactly like a monkey. He took two big fences like a bird; but

at the third, the horse breasted it, fell backwards and rolled over upon his
rider. I thought he was killed, but he wasn't. He was not even damaged.

When I went on half-pay, I placed Punch in the stables. The women
servants took a fancy to him; but Punch, whatever he may have thought of
the women, had no love for the head groom, in whose arm he made his teeth
meet. So I found him a billet in a hairdresser's shop, which bore the legend,
"Hairbrushing by machinery." Punch was the machinery. I saw him at it,
turning a wheel in the window. I never saw him again, and know not what
became of him.

CHAPTER IX
THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (Continued)

III. TAHITI AND THE SANDWICH ISLANDS

We arrived at Tahiti in June, 1869. Here is the most lovely climate in the
world. The inhabitants never seemed to do any work, with the single
exception of carrying bananas. In this exercise they were extraordinarily
expert, bearing enormous weights upon the shoulders, the skin of which
becomes hard like leather. I considered myself to be fairly strong; but when I
tried to carry one of the masses of bananas under which the natives march
swiftly all day long, up hill and down, I found that I was able to carry it only
for a short distance, and with difficulty, on level ground. The people were
perfectly delightful. We went ashore and lived among them; and it was then
that I understood how it was that the men of the Bounty mutinied. The fact
was that those discontented mariners could not bear to leave islands so
delectable. I do not of course, desire to justify their very reprehensible
conduct. All I say is that I can understand the strength of its motive. It was
simply the desire to remain in an earthly paradise which inspired the men of
the Bounty when they left Otaheite in April, 1789, to set Captain Bligh adrift
in an open boat, with the nineteen men who stayed by him, and a small stock
of provisions. The captain and his men made an astonishing voyage of
nearly 4000 miles, and fetched up at the island of Timor, south of the

Malaccas, in the following June. Some of the mutineers were subsequently
brought to justice in the year 1792. Six of them were condemned and three
were executed. In 1814 it was discovered that ten among the mutineers had
colonised Pitcairn Island.

We in the Galatea stayed at Tahiti as long as we possibly could, and
enjoyed every moment of the time. One of our amusements was to float
down a narrow and swift stream and shoot the waterfall. At a point some
little distance from the coast, the stream ran deep and rapid between banks
which were about three feet apart. The natives, boys and girls, used to drop
into the stream and let themselves be carried down feet foremost to a
waterfall, which descended some 40 or 50 feet in a wide pool; and it
occurred to me that what they could do, I could accomplish. I watched these
intrepid children very carefully, and I observed that they always came to the
surface some distance away from the fall. In spite of some dissuasion, I
determined to attempt the enterprise. I floated down the stream feet
foremost, shot the fall, and the moment I reached the foot of it I struck out
under water. I was amazed to find that the water was just like air, or an
enormous cauldron of soda water, buoying one up, and I came to the surface
without the slightest difficulty. Afterwards I went down head first. The only
thing to remember was not to come up under the fall itself. Shooting the
waterfall became a popular amusement.

Another of our diversions was surf-playing. This enchanting exercise is
performed with the aid of a long board shaped like a wedge. The swimmer
takes his board, pushes it before him over the breakers, while he dives
through them, then turns, and, leaning on the board, rides back on the crest
of the surf. The speed, whatever it may be, feels like sixty miles an hour. It is
one of the most exhilarating pastimes in the world.

I remember that we all went to church on Sunday. During the service, the
Queen of Tahiti suddenly clapped her hands, whereupon the clergyman
desisted from his ministrations, while her Majesty distributed tobacco among
the congregation. When it was well alight the Queen again clapped her
hands, and the clergyman went on with the service.

We left Tahiti with profound regret, receiving and giving many presents
on parting. From Tahiti we proceeded to the Sandwich Islands, where I met

many old friends, made during my sojourn four years previously. The
American population had quite forgiven and forgotten my boyish freak,
which had so agitated them at the time. Our old friend Queen Emma, whom
we had taken to Panama on her way to England to see the Queen, had
returned. I went to call upon her, driving tandem, as already related. Turning
in at the gate, I took the corner too sharply, the wheels locked, and the buggy
capsized. In the meantime the Queen, having heard the jingling of the
Canadian sleigh bells attached to the harness, came out to find her visitor
sitting on the grass at her feet. The horses galloped on and wrecked the
vehicle and also themselves. Altogether it was a very expensive drive.

CHAPTER X
THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA

IV. OLD JAPAN

NOTE

When Lord Charles Beresford visited Nippon (from the Chinese Jih Pun,
the place or rising of the sun, changed by English pronunciation to Japan), it
was the old Japan that he saw; the Japan of centuries of isolation, inviolate
save for the intrusion of the Jesuit missionaries in the sixteenth century, and
the little wedge of Dutch traders. It had been the Japan of the Mikado, who
was as a god; of the Tycoon, his temporal representative, who, like a man
walking the tight-rope above a wood of transfixing swords, maintained a
delicate equipoise of power among the feudal seigneuralty, the great
Daimios, each lord of his domain and master of life and death over
thousands of retainers. It was the Japan of the Samurai, the two-sworded
rufflers; of the Ronins, the masterless men, the outlaws, who roved the
country in bands, patriotic, ferocious and pitiless. It was still the Japan in
which the common people, men and women and maidens, walked naked and
unashamed; in which the warriors went to battle clad in armour wrought of
tortoise-shell and silk, girt with swords and carrying bows and arrows; in
which the life of a barbarian foreigner was never safe from hour to hour, so

that he must be guarded by the two-sworded Yaconins, the Government
officers, who, knowing the hatred of the Government towards their charges,
seldom drew sword in their defence until it was just one blood-stained
second too late; in which a fault in honour was instantly expiated by hara-
kiri, the fatal cross-cut upon the belly, performed in the public eye, which
was justly offended if the incision were so clumsily executed that the entrails
protruded. Such, at least, is the ceremonial theory. In practice, the dagger is
driven in below the ribs, drawn horizontally across the belly, and up the
other side; an operation requiring inconceivable courage.

It is the land of tea-houses and temples, of running footmen and
palanquins; where houses and string and handkerchiefs are made of paper;
where the people wash themselves every day and their clothes never; where
the oldest profession in the world is counted honourable service, and the
pictures of courtesans adorn the temples in which the bonzes intone prayers
in the midst of games and dances: where the writing is done from top to
bottom, from right to left, and keys are turned from left to right, and
carpenters draw their planes towards them, and the houses are built from the
roof downwards, and horses are mounted on the off-side, and ladies black
their teeth. It was a land of immense processional pageants: the processions
of the high Daimios, who once a year quitted their ancestral homes with a
great train to dwell in Yedo, the capital of the Tycoon, for six months; and
returned again, leaving as hostages for their loyalty their wives and children
for another six months. The two-sworded Samurai march in front, crying
"Shitanirio!" and all the spectators drop upon their knees and hide behind
their legs while the long procession ambles by, spearmen and banners and
baggage-carriers and palanquins; the norimons, which are the palanquins of
the notable, and the cangos, which are the palanquins of the humble.

When the foreigner rode abroad in state, he was attended by the Ward-
guards, who marched in front, striking the earth at every step with their long
staves whereon loose iron rings were strung, so that their jingling warned the
populace to make way.

At night, festivals were celebrated by immense processions filling the
streets, in which everyone carried a lighted lantern swaying upon the end of
a flexible bamboo, and the lanterns were painted with bats and dragons, and
the people wore horrible masks, distended with the monstrous rictus of the

devil-gods. In the Yoshiwara, where the women, painted and gilded, sashed
and bedecked, sit in a double row, each with her price placarded upon her
knee, there were the great priapic processions, concerning which the English
works upon Japan preserve a shocked reticence.

In old Japan, the common ideal of the ruling classes was that their
country should maintain for ever intact its immemorial laws, traditions and
customs; an ideal whose attainment the entrance of the foreigner would
render impossible. As for the common people, they had no aspirations
beyond the day's work. Japan, in her own view, was complete, self-sufficient
and wholly satisfied with a civilisation compared with which the politics of
the Occident were of yesterday. The Islands of Nippon were ensphered in
holy crystal, whose flawless preservation was the highest duty of a patriot.

Into that rare atmosphere, surcharged with perilous elements, sailed
Commodore Perry of the United States Navy in the year 1853. Some fifty
years later, Pierre Loti entered Japanese waters in a French warship. "Et nous
entrions maintenant dans une espèce de couloir ombreux, entre deux rangées
de très hautes montagnes, qui se succédaient avec une bizarrerie symétrique
—comme les 'portants' d'un décor tout en profondeur, extrêmement beau,
mais pas assez naturel—on eut dit que ce Japon s'ouvrait devant nous, en
une déchirure enchantée, pour nous laisser pénétrer dans son cceur même"
(Madame Chrysanthème).

It was Commodore Perry who rent open the heart of Old Japan, and her
blood flowed. The gallant commodore, anchoring off Cape Idzu on 8th July,
1853, with two steam frigates and two sloops of war, demanded no more
than a treaty securing help and proper treatment to sailors shipwrecked on
the coasts of Japan. The Japanese Government said neither yes nor no;
whereupon Perry gave them a year to consider the matter, promising to
return at the end of it with a "larger fleet." And on 12th February, 1854, there
was Commodore Perry in the Bay of Yedo with three steam frigates and four
sloops of war. After long negotiations, a treaty of amity was signed,
including a promise to succour ships in distress, and (above all) opening two
new ports. From that moment the isolation of Japan was ended. The door
opened but a crack; but into that crack the wedge of commerce, driven by
the lust of gain, was thrust by America (1854), Russia (1857), England and
France (1858).

In 1859, Mr. (afterwards Sir) Rutherford Alcock, British representative of
H.B.M. Government in China was appointed her Majesty's Envoy
Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary in Japan. His book, The Capital
of the Tycoon (London, 1863. Longman, 2 vols.), gives one of the first
authoritative accounts of Old Japan presented to the British public. During
his three years in that country he was constantly in peril of assassination. In
August, 1859, an officer and a sailor from one of the Russian ships lying in
the harbour were cut down and slashed to pieces in the streets of Yedo, and a
steward was severely wounded.

In the following year the Japanese linguist attached the British Legation
was stabbed to death, and two Dutch ship-captains were cut to pieces in
Yokohama. The next demonstration of the hatred of foreigners was the
murder of the Gotairo, the Regent, Iko-mono-no-kami. His escort was
suddenly attacked as it was leaving his castle by some twenty swordsmen,
wielding the terrible Japanese two-handed weapon. The hands of the bearers
of his norimon were severed on the pole and the Regent himself decapitated,
his head being carried away as a trophy.

In 1861, Mr. Heuskin, attached to the American Legation, was murdered.
Soon afterwards, one of the Governors (or Under-Secretaries) of Foreign
Affairs, Oribeno-no-Kami, who had been especially friendly in his
intercourse with the Legations, "died," in the Japanese phrase, "without the
effects of medicine." To be more precise, he had committed hara-kiri.

In July, 1861, the British Legation at Yedo was attacked at night by a
band of swordsmen, who passed the guards and rushed the building. Mr.
Oliphant, who had recently been appointed Secretary to the Legation, was
severely wounded. One of the guards, a porter, and a groom, and two of the
assailants, were killed outright. One of the assailants was severely wounded,
to six of the Legation party who were severely wounded and eleven slightly
wounded.

Such were the beginnings of Western influence in Japan. Sir Rutherford
Alcock's voluminous account of his three years' ministry reveals a gallant,
honest, kindly gentleman sorely perplexed by the ethical problems involved
in the forcible interference of one powerful nation in the affairs of a weaker
nation, whose sole ambition was to be let alone. Hampered, on the one hand,

by the greed and discourtesy of the European traders, and on the other, by
the immitigable duplicity and the furtive and implacable enmity of the
Japanese, yet singly determined to do his duty to his Queen and country, Sir
Rutherford Alcock honourably fulfilled a task of extreme danger and
incredible difficulty.

Thenceforward, until the year 1869, the duel between East and West
continued with increasing ardour. The whole polity of old Japan was shaken
as by the earthquakes which agitate and rend its soil. There were frequent
assassinations of the foreign barbarians; the governing classes, which
consisted wholly of the military caste, employed every invidious method to
restrict trade with Europeans; while the Western nations, on their side,
brought their armed strength to bear in the enforcement of treaty rights,
which by the same means had originally been wrung from the Tycoon's
government. And here it falls to distinguish between the divine prestige of
the Mikado, descendant of the sun-goddess, and the temporal administration
of the Tycoon, or Shogun. In that dual administration resided a main factor
of the extraordinary difficulty of the situation. Both the spiritual and
temporal rulers, the Imperial Court and the Bakufu, or Tycoon's
Government, were equally inspired by hatred of the foreigner. But whereas
the Mikado, dwelling majestically apart, could avoid all contact with the
barbarians, the Tycoon was compelled by superior force to negotiate with
them. He was thus placed between two fires; on the one side, the Mikado
ordered him to expel the foreigner; on the other, the foreigner threatened him
with war unless the treaties were carried into execution.

For long the Tycoon, or his advisers, maintained his position with
singular address. But no man born of woman could have solved its
complications. For the great Daimios, the feudal nobility, held allegiance
primarily to the Mikado. The Tycoon could and did detach some of the clans
to his side; but the great body of the western clans defied him. The influence
of the Tycoon began swiftly to decline. At the same time the Imperial party
began to perceive that the expulsion of foreigners had become impossible.
The immediate result was the revolt of some of their adherents. Inspired as it
was by hatred of the foreigner, it was directed equally against Mikado and
Tycoon, and accompanied by expressions of loyalty to both parties.

In 1864 the troops of the Choshiu clan attempted to capture Kioto and to
obtain possession of the person of the Mikado. They were defeated after
heavy fighting. In June of the previous year, the Choshiu men had fired upon
the American ship Pembroke while she was passing through the Inland Sea,
and also upon the Dutch corvette Medusa. The French commander-in-chief
of the station, Admiral Jaurès proceeded to Shimoseki and destroyed the
batteries. In August a British naval force under the command of Vice-
Admiral Kuper proceeded to Kagoshima in order to enforce the payment of
the indemnity due for the murder of Mr. Richardson, bombarded the town
and destroyed the batteries. It was these two actions which for the first time
really convinced the ruling classes in Japan that it was hopeless any longer
to endeavour to prevent the intrusion of foreign influence.

In 1866 the Tycoon Iyemochi died. In the same year a new and enlarged
Convention was concluded with Great Britain, France, America and Holland.
In the following year Keiki, very unwillingly, became Tycoon, an office
which by this time had become exceedingly insecure. In the same year the
Mikado, Komei, died and was succeeded by his son Mutsuhito, a minor. In
the following year the Mikado assumed the whole administrative power
hitherto vested in the Tycoon, and a new system of Government was
promulgated. Followed, civil war and the defeat of the Tycoon, who retired
into seclusion. In the meantime the Mikado had invited the Representatives
of Foreign Powers to visit him at Kioto.

"That the Mikado of Japan, who claims to be descended from the sun-
goddess, and in whose person a peculiar odour of sanctity was considered to
exist, should voluntarily invite to his palace at Kioto the Envoys of nations
who had hitherto been looked upon as outer barbarians, and intercourse with
whom was a profane thing, was indeed a great step in advance. No foreigner
had ever yet crossed the Imperial threshold, or looked upon the face of the
sacred Emperor of Japan. It was a proof that a new order of things was
inaugurated, and gave good hopes for the future" (Adams, History of Japan.
Lond., 1875).

But although the Imperial Government perceived the wisdom of
accepting the inevitable, the hatred of the foreigner, bred in the blood of the
military caste, could neither be dissembled nor controlled; and the attack
made upon the British Envoy, Sir Harry Parkes, while actually on his way to

the Imperial Palace on 23rd March, 1868, illustrates the condition of affairs.
On the road to Kioto and in the sacred city itself, the Europeans had been
regarded by the people with a polite and respectful curiosity, nor was there
any sign of hostility.

Sir Harry Parkes left the temple of Chi-on-in, where he lodged, to
proceed to the audience, with a mounted escort of twelve ex-Metropolitan
mounted police, under the command of Inspector Peacock, with whom rode
a Japanese officer, Nakai Kozo. Behind these massive veterans rode Sir
Harry himself, accompanied by Goto Shojiro, of the Japanese Foreign
Department, and followed by Mr. Mitford, Mr. Satow, Dr. Willis, and other
members of the Legation. Then came a guard of forty men of H.M.'s 9th
Regiment under the command of Lieutenant Bradshaw and Lieutenant
Bruce. A native guard preceded the train, and another guard followed it. Just
as the policemen were turning the corner of a narrow street, Sir Harry
observed signs of confusion, and the next moment a Japanese, his great
sword flashing and hewing, dashed round the corner, closely pursued by two
policemen. Sir Harry cried out to the soldiers behind him to stop the
Samurai. Turning his head, he saw his companion, Goto Shojiro, on foot,
sword in hand rushing forward to attack a second Samurai, who was already
fighting hand to hand with Nakai Kozo, the Japanese officer who had been
riding alongside Inspector Peacock at the head of the policemen. Behind Sir
Harry, shots rang out as the soldiers fired at the first assassin. Sir Harry
Parkes was suddenly aware of the wild figure of a Japanese warrior,
advancing towards him through the press. His face was a mask of blood; in
one hand shone a long sword, dripping red from hilt to point; in the other,
the victor lifted the bloody head, shorn clean from the shoulders, of his
countryman. It was Nakai Kozo. Nakai gave the following ingenuous
account of his deed of arms to Mr. Adams, secretary of the Legation, who
quotes it in his History, as follows:—

"I saw a man running down the line cutting at one man after another. I
jumped off my horse, drew my sword, and rushed after him; he turned and
we engaged; he cut me on the head. Then Goto came up and dealt him a
blow which felled him to the ground. Unfortunately Goto's sword-hilt, which
was of lacquer, slipped from his hands, and I had to cope with the fellow
alone. I could only see out of one eye, the other being covered with blood,

but I kept chopping at him, and after about ten blows I managed to cut his
head off. I then took the head and showed it to Sir H. Parkes."

The soldiers bayoneted the first Samurai, who was still alive when he was
finally secured by Mr. Mitford. He was afterwards beheaded by the Imperial
Government. But those two desperate enemies of the foreigner wounded
thirteen men and five horses ere they were cut down. One of the wounded
was a soldier, another a native groom; the remaining nine, of whom two
were so seriously hurt that they were invalided home, were ex-Metropolitan
policeman to whom the methods of the Samurai must have been startling.
These trained fighters wield their two-handed swords, heavy, perfectly
balanced, razor-sharp weapons, with an appalling swiftness and dexterity. At
a single blow they can cleave a man to the chin, or cut off his head, or lop
off a limb.

In May, 1868 Sir Harry Parkes presented his credentials, which had
hitherto been addressed to the Tycoon, to the Emperor. On the 23rd was
celebrated the Queen's birthday, when many Japanese of high rank, some of
whom had never before made acquaintance with a foreigner, were
entertained by Vice-Admiral Sir Henry Keppel, commander-in-chief of the
China Station, on board H.M.S. Rodney. It was not until November that the
civil war was ended by the submission of the rebels. The Emperor then took
up his residence for a time in Yedo—now called Tokio—which had been the
capital of the Tycoon, and which was henceforth to be the eastern metropolis
of the Emperor, as Kioto was the western capital. In the following year, after
another insurrection had been suppressed, the great Daimios made their
memorable sacrifice, offering their lands and servants to the Emperor;
thereby deliberately exchanging their almost independent state for a
condition of subservience to the central Government.

Such, in brief, was the beginning of the New Japan; and it was at this
stage in its development that, for the first time in history, a foreign prince, in
the person of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh, visited the Mikado.

CHAPTER XI
THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (Continued)

V. WITH THE DUKE IN JAPAN

The Galatea arrived at Yokohama on the 29th August 1869. The Duke
with his suite, including myself, went up to Tokio (the old Yedo) and took up
his quarters at Hama-go-ten, which had been the summer residence of the
Tycoon. The estate marched with a piece of water opening into the bay; here
were many summer-houses; and a commodious building equipped for the
Duke by the orders of the Mikado. The name was changed to Yen-Rio-Kan,
signifying a place set apart for distinguished foreigners.

We were entertained with the most delicate and sumptuous hospitality by
this charming people whose courtesy greatly impressed us. Conjurers,
acrobats and wrestlers performed for the entertainment of his Royal
Highness; whenever we went abroad, thirty two-sworded Yaconins attended
us.

The Duke went in state to visit the Mikado in his palace. All along the
route the upper windows of the houses were sealed with paper, so that none
should look down upon he royal visitor; a precaution only taken in the case
of the highest nobility. The Duke, attended only by Sir Harry Parkes,
Admiral Sir Harry Keppel and Mr. Mitford (afterwards Lord Reedsdale and
author of the delightful Tales of Old Japan), had a private audience of the
Emperor, who was presented by his Royal Highness with a diamond snuff-
box. Six of us were afterwards admitted to the presence. I remember the dim
figure of a young man seated behind a screen at the end of the audience
chamber. Many years afterwards, when I again visited Japan, the Mikado,
who remembered my former visit, graciously invited me to lunch, and
entertained me with the royal sport of catching ducks in a hand-net. The
ducks are preserved in the royal gardens, which are charmingly diversified
with lawns and running water, and flowering shrubs. As you enter, the ducks
rise suddenly, and the sport was to net them as they rose.

As we remained no longer than a week in Tokio, my recollections are
few. I was tattooed by the native artificers, to the astonishment of the
Japanese officials and nobles; for in Japan none save the common people is

tattooed. The Japanese artist designs in white upon dark, working upon the
skin round the chief ornament in his scheme; whereas the English tattooer
designs dark upon white, using the natural skin as a background. Both
methods are beautifully illustrated upon my person.

I witnessed the decapitation of six criminals. The victims stand in a row,
their hands bound behind them: each in turn is tapped on the shoulder, when
he kneels down, and bows his head. With a single half-arm stroke, the
executioner slices through the neck. I also saw a crucifixion. The man's
hands and feet are extended and tied to cross-bars, so that he makes a figure
like an hour-glass. Then he is transfixed with a spear.

On the 8th September, the Duke returned to Yokohama by sea, taking
with him as his guest in the Galatea, Hiobukio-no-Miya, Prince of the
Blood, Minister of War, and other high dignitaries, who attended a ball given
at the British Legation. On the 16th, the Galatea sailed for China.

CHAPTER XII
THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. GALATEA (Continued)

VI. THE HOMEWARD VOYAGE

From Japan we proceeded to China, touching at Chefoo, Shanghai and
Hongkong. Nothing could exceed the princely hospitality of the great British
mercantile firms in China. It was then that I learned, what subsequent
experience confirmed, the remarkable integrity of the business dealings of
the Chinese. The head of the Chinese Bank told me that he never had a bad
account with a Chinaman. The Chinese keeps agreements to the letter, quite
irrespective of documentary contracts.

From China we proceeded to Manila, then a Spanish possession. My
principal recollection of Manila is the extraordinary prevalence of cock-
fighting. There was a cockpit in every street; and the sole occupation of the
inhabitants appeared to consist of betting upon their birds. One used

constantly to meet men walking in the street with their birds under their
arms. The cocks were armed with steel spurs shaped like a scythe, and
sharpened to a razor edge. I have seen a bird spring up and slice the head of
its adversary clean off, and I have seen the chest of a bird slashed open,
almost cutting its body in two. The use of the artificial spurs affected the
betting, making the fight very much more uncertain and therefore more
exciting. For, whereas if a cock uses its natural spurs, the best bird probably
wins, an inferior bird armed artificially might gain the victory.

From Manila we proceeded to Calcutta. Upon landing, I met my brother,
Lord Marcus, and with him I rode up, together with the staff, to Government
House. It is a singular coincidence that when I landed at Calcutta, six years
afterwards, on the corresponding date, when I was a member of the staff of
the Prince of Wales (afterwards King Edward VII), I met my other brother,
Lord William, and rode up with him to Government House.

The Galatea lay alongside the wharf. It was necessary to take the most
stringent precautions against cholera. Only one boy in the ship's company
was taken ill during our stay. He died inside an hour. But in the merchant
ships lying in the port there were many deaths. Men were employed in
working parties to push off with long bamboos the corpses that were
continually floating down from the Hooghli, lest they should foul the
moorings. The bodies used to come floating down with the birds perching
and feeding upon them.

We went up country, and enjoyed a great deal of excellent sport. We went
out pig-sticking, which is the finest sport in the world; we went out tiger-
shooting upon elephants; and riding upon elephants, we shot partridges—a
form of sport by no means easy. I remember an irascible old colonel of
artillery, who became very hot, and who missed a good many partridges,
saying indignantly to the Duke:

"This is all d——d rot. I could shoot more partridges on Woolwich
Common."

It was the same peppery soldier who, when one of the members of the
staff had fallen ill, went with me upon a visitation to the sick. We found the

invalid in a state of extreme agitation, and surrounded with books of a
religious nature.

"I think—I hope—" he kept saying, "that I shall be forgiven. I think I
shall—I hope so."

"What's he saying? What's he saying?" cried the colonel, who, as often
happens to people in hot weather, had become rather deaf.

"He thinks he's dying," I shouted.

Whereupon the colonel, turning angrily to the invalid, shouted,

"You d——d fool, you have only over-eaten yourself!"

The sick man was so infuriated that he hurled his books of religion at the
colonel, and sprang out of bed. Next day he was quite well.

Another member of the staff was mounted one day upon a red horse (they
paint their horses in India), a wild, half-broken Arab steed, which was giving
its rider a deal of trouble. I advised my friend to dismount, and left him.
Presently I rode back to find him on foot and alone. I asked him, where was
his horse?

"Gone," said he. "Whenever that d——d horse saw a mosquito, it sat
down and cried like a child. So I kicked it in the belly and it ran away into
the jungle."

We visited Trincomalee, where the elephants built the dockyard. They
carried the timber and they carried the stones, and they lifted the stones into
position and adjusted them with their feet. The remarkable thing about the
climate of Ceylon is its intermittent showers of tropical violence, followed
by bursts of sunshine. In the result, you actually see the foliage growing. I
remember the extraordinary beauty of the native decorations, which are
fabricated of palms and leaves and flowers.

From Colombo we went to Mauritius, arriving there in May, 1870. Here I
climbed the famous mountain called Pieter Botte, or, more correctly, Pieter
Both.

PIETER BOTH MOUNTAIN, MAURITIUS

The mountain is so named after Pieter Both, Governor-General of the
Dutch East Indies in the early part of the seventeenth century, and the
founder of Dutch power in that region. On his homeward voyage he was
wrecked in the bay overlooked by the mountain, which thereafter bore his

name. Previous ascents are recorded in the archives at Mauritius, from which
it appears that mine was the fourteenth. Admiral Sir William Kennedy
ascended Pieter Botte in 1861; he gives an account of his climb in his
interesting book, Hurrah for the Life of a Sailor (London, Nash). Kennedy
started with a party of fourteen persons, of whom five reached the summit.

At nine o'clock in the morning I started, together with the captain of the
maintop, Edward Hele. We took with us ropes, a rope ladder, cod-line, and a
small lead. These were all our appliances. We drove to the foot of the
mountain and began the ascent at 11.5 a.m. Now the mountain of Pieter
Botte is shaped like a church with a steep roof, from one end of which rises a
spire. This pinnacle of rock is crowned with a huge, rounded, overhanging
boulder.

Part of the ridge was so sharp that we were forced to sit on it and to
proceed astride. Then we came to the pinnacle. The ascent was so sharp and
difficult that we were obliged to take off both shoes and socks. At one point,
I lost my balance, and was only saved from falling backwards by Hele's
ready hand. Climbing the pinnacle was far more difficult than scaling the
overhanging boulder at the top. At the top of the pinnacle there was just
room to stand beneath the overhanging boulder. The only possible method of
climbing the boulder was to get the rope ladder over the top of it.
Accordingly, one end of the rope ladder was attached to the lead-line. In
order to swing the lead, one of us was roped with a round turn round his
body, while the other, lying on his back, held the rope while the leadsman,
leaning right backwards and outwards over the sheer precipice of some 3000
feet fall, swung the lead. We took it in turns to swing the lead; as we leaned
outwards, the rock spread over our heads like an umbrella; and it was an
hour and a half before we succeeded in casting it over the boulder. Then we
hauled the rope ladder over and made all fast. It was too short, and the last
few yards we hauled ourselves up hand over hand. So we climbed to the top,
which is a platform of about 20 feet square. It was then 1.59 p.m. We took
off our shirts, and waved them to the warships lying far below in the bay,
from which we were plainly to be distinguished with the aid of a telescope.
The ships each saluted us with one gun. We planted on the summit a flag
upon whose staff were carved our names and the names of our ships. When
we returned, my brother officers gave us a dinner to celebrate the event.

Hele was eventually promoted to warrant officer. When Hele died, I was
able to help his son to gain his education, and he did very well. It was in
Mauritius that we went out shooting with the native population; one of the
most dangerous amusements in which I have ever taken part, for the bullets
used to whistle in the air all round us.

From Mauritius we proceeded to Cape Town. Here, on the 12th July,
1870, the Duke inaugurated the new harbour, breakwater and docks. I kept a
team on shore, and used to drive up from Simon's Bay to Cape Town. Every
now and then we stuck in a quicksand. On one such occasion I had a brother
officer with me; and as he was afflicted with a cold, I took him on my back
to save him from wet feet. But I fell with him, and we were both soaked to
the skin. Upon another day, when we stuck, I put two of my messmates on
the leaders, and they pulled the coach right through. If you want horses to
pull a weight out of a tight place, put weight on their backs.

The Colonial Secretary at Cape Town was Mr. Southey. He was a most
delightful and sagacious person, and became a great friend of mine. He
prophesied in a most wonderful way what would be the future of South
Africa.

"If," said he, "we could only get a big man, a master-mind, to come out
here, all that I foresee would come true."

The right man presently arrived in the person of the late Cecil John
Rhodes, and my friend's prophecies have been most singularly fulfilled.

While at the Cape, we went up country, shooting. Both Dutch and English
families were most kind and hospitable to us. Upon one of these expeditions,
a member of the staff went out by himself very early in the morning to shoot.
Observing some ostriches in the distance, he stalked them with immense
labour and patience, and presently succeeded in shooting a couple of birds.
When he returned, he complained that it had been very difficult to get his
sights on, owing to some high rails which were between himself and the
birds. It had not occurred to him that he had been stalking tame ostriches on
a farm.

I once rode from Cape Town to Simon's Town and back, between lunch
and dinner, galloping the whole distance, with four changes of horses. The
distance between the two places is about 35 miles as the crow flies. My
errand was merely to postpone the arrival of a visitor who was to come to
the Galatea.

The ride, however, showed that I was in good condition. I have always
tried to keep myself fit, holding that condition of body regulates condition of
mind. Cheery people deserve small credit, because their frame of mind is
due to their being right inside. Quarrelsome people are wrong inside.

On our way to England we touched at the Falkland Islands where I visited
a relative of mine who kept a ranch. He used bull-dogs to catch his bulls,
when he required them for branding. The dogs seized the bulls by the nose
and held them while they were lassoed by the guachos.

When we touched at Montevideo, I remember conversing with various
persons, who foretold the immense profit which must eventually accrue if
the land there was purchased at that time. Their opinion has since proved
true. But I had no money to invest; so that the opportunity was only another
instance of what might have been.

The Galatea was badly strained in a gale of wind, her deck seams
opening so that the water streamed into the cabins beneath. One lieutenant
used to say to another:

"How did you sleep last night? It was pretty rough.

"Woke at one o'clock and saw them reefing tops'ls"—meaning that, lying
in bed, he could see clear through the seams.

I used my sail-making ability to make a canvas awning for my bed; fitted
it with a ridge rope, laced it down and hauled it taut, led a trough from it to
take the water into the slop-pail; and slept dry under it.

It was during the visit of the Galatea to Australia that I was made a
Freemason; and I have always regretted that I have never been able to devote
as much time to Masonry as I should have liked to give to the Craft. The

Australian Lodge into which I was admitted was under the impression that I
was the most timid neophyte who had ever joined it.

When the ceremony was ended, one of the members of the Lodge said to
me:

"You are safely through it. But do you know that of all the men we have
had through this lodge, we never had one so paralysed with fear as yourself.
You were shivering like an aspen!"

The fact was that during the initiatory ceremonies something
unaccountably struck me as extraordinarily funny. The effort to subdue my
emotions caused me to tremble all over.

One of our diversions in the Galatea when she was at sea, was to listen to
the conversations which used repeatedly to occur between a certain worthy
member of the Duke's suite and the old quartermaster. The member of the
staff in question had endeared himself to us by his high seriousness. He dealt
with the most trifling incidents of life in a spirit of preternatural and wholly
sincere solemnity. Supposing that you told him that a common friend had
fallen off his horse and bruised his leg, our member of staff would instantly
ship a countenance of intense concern.

"Bruised his leg? You don't say so! Good God! Has he indeed?"

"Yes—he's bruised his leg!"

"Has he now? Well, well. Bruised his leg! I hope it's not serious. I do
hope it's not serious. Tut-tut! Bruised his leg, you say?"

"It's not serious. But he's bruised his leg."

"I'm delighted to hear it's not serious. But—bruised his leg. I am really
distressed."

And so on.

Among other matters, our friend took his family very seriously. One of
his ancestors had been an admiral; and it was this distinguished officer who

made the link between the member of staff and the quartermaster. The
member of staff used to stroll on the quarterdeck in the evening, and fall into
talk with the seamen.

"Well, Jones. Good evening, Jones. I suppose, now, you've heard of my
uncle, the admiral?"

"Heard of 'im, sir? I should think I 'ad heard of 'im. Ah, he was a man, he
was. He could handle a ship, he could—ah, and handle the men, too!"

"Why, where did you serve with him, Jones?"

"Where, sir? Where not? All over the world, sir. Ah, he was a man!"

"I'm delighted to meet anyone who knew a member of my family so well,
Jones—delighted, I assure you."

"Knew 'im? Why, sir, to know 'im was to admire 'im, as the saying is.
Many a time I've seen the men turn out for to admire 'im, sir.

"Have you indeed, Jones—have you indeed! Dear me. Most interesting, I
am sure. I daresay a glass of grog would not come amiss to you, Jones?"

"Wery kind of you, I'm sure, sir. It 'ud be a pleasure to drink your health,
and the admiral's too, sir. Ah, he was a man!"

Mr Jones, afterwards, forward on the lower deck, to envious friends:

"Pretty sweet conversation that, mates. I wonder 'oo the b——y h—l 'is
uncle might 'a been!"

There was another member of the suite who surely deserves record—the
elephant. He was really a member of the ship's company, for he could do,
and did, the work of twenty men. He joined the ship in India, when he was
quite small, and he grew enormously on board. He lived in a house built aft,
and fed upon branches of trees and bran and biscuits and anything he could
get. I trained him myself. I taught him to obey the words of command, and
he would do anything for me. He would hoist me upon his shoulders with a
fore foot, or upon his back with a hind foot. In the dinner hour, when most of

the men were below, he used to take his share in working the ship. We slung
the rope in a bowline round his neck, and he would clew up the mainsail by
walking on till he was told to stop. He was never seasick. He used to balance
himself, swaying to and fro as the ship rolled. One night when the
midshipmen and I, having supper on deck aft, were called forward to trim
sails, the elephant finished the meal for us. He ate everything on the table,
put his foot on the plates and smashed them, and squashed the big coffee-tin
quite flat. Then he looked at us like a naughty child.

I was the only person who could persuade him to leave the ship or to
come on board again when he had been ashore. When we reached home, he
was put in a railway truck and directed to the Zoological Gardens. His
keeper, a marine artilleryman, went with him in the truck. Elephants have a
habit of rolling on their feet and squirming their vast bulk. When the marine
was trying to pass the elephant, the great beast unconsciously pinned his
keeper against the side of the truck, and against a projecting bolt, which
broke the man's rib, forcing it into his heart. He was taken out dead.

CHAPTER XIII
FLAG-LIEUTENANT AT PLYMOUTH

In 1871, I was appointed flag-lieutenant to Admiral (afterwards Admiral
of the Fleet) the Hon. Sir Henry Keppel, commander-in-chief at Plymouth.
His flag was flown in the Royal Adelaide. Sir Harry, as already recorded, had
been commander-in-chief upon the China station when the Duke of
Edinburgh visited Japan, and had accompanied his Royal Highness upon his
visit to the Mikado. It was at Plymouth that I first had the honour of serving
under Sir Harry Keppel: a splendid seaman, a most distinguished officer, a
fine sportsman, one of the best and kindest of men.

Admiral the Hon. Victor Montagu, who served as a midshipman under Sir
Harry, relates in his Reminiscences some interesting actions of his old
captain, which I may be permitted to quote. Commodore Keppel
distinguished himself by his personal gallantry and skilful leadership in the

battle of Fatshan Creek, 1st June, 1857; of which a full account is given in
Laird Clowes' The Royal Navy; and Admiral Montagu records his own
recollections of the affair:

"During the many years in which I knew him I never once Sir Harry lose
his temper, except when the Chinese war-junks beat us back on the first
attack we had made on them.... John Chinaman, seeing us retire, took the
hint, and began making off himself, which so infuriated Harry Keppel that
he jumped up on our paddle-box, shook his fist at the war-junks, some 500
or 600 yards away, and shouted out: 'You d——d rascals! I'll pay you out for
this! Man the boats, boys—man the boats at once! The beggars are trying to
escape!' I never saw such a rush. At no regatta could men have rowed faster."

Commodore Keppel commissioned the Raleigh frigate, 50 guns, for the
China station. Admiral Montagu states that she was "the last man-of-war that
ever sailed out of Portsmouth Harbour." Keppel would have none of your
steam-tugs. "We ran out with a fair wind with studding-sails set on both
sides." Alas! the Raleigh never came back any more. On 14th April, 1857,
she struck a sunken rock in the China Seas, near Macao. Keppel's
indomitable conduct turned a disaster into an achievement.

"Shortly afterwards," writes Admiral Montagu, who was a midshipman
on board at the time, "we descried a French squadron lying at anchor in
Macao Roads, with an admiral's flag flying, and, though we were firing
minute guns of distress as the water gained on our pumps, Keppel, nothing
daunted, called out: 'Up with the French flag. Give him his salute. Sinking or
not, let the Frenchmen hear us.'"

A French frigate coming to the assistance of the Raleigh, her captain
asked permission "to go below to see how high the water had risen in the
ship. 'Oh,' said Keppel, 'don't go below; look down the hatchway.' 'Ah! mon
Dieu!' exclaimed the captain." ...

Keppel kept the pumps going, crowded sail on the ship, and finally
beached her off Macao, just in time. He landed the ship's company, but
himself stayed aboard the vessel, sleeping on the bridge. The stores and guns
were saved. Keppel was deeply distressed at the loss of his fine ship,
"which," he wrote, "brings my career as a captain to an end." Fortunately he

was mistaken. In after years, when I told him that the Admiralty were about
to build a second Raleigh, Keppel replied, "Very glad to hear it, my dear boy.
I had the honour of losing the first one."

Admiral Montagu records that Keppel, while in command of the Raleigh,
challenged an American clipper ship to race from Penang to Singapore. "We
were constantly going at a speed of thirteen knots, during heavy squalls,
close-hauled, and trailing the muzzles of our main-deck guns through the
water on the lee side, and I sometimes used to turn into my hammock in
abject terror, fearing that at any moment we might capsize."

Sir Harry Keppel was famous throughout the Service when I was
appointed his flag-lieutenant. One of my first recollections of that office
concerned an old-fashioned "Eighteen-hundred-and-war-time," peppery,
strict-service captain, who, having just come home from the West Coast of
Africa, asked to see the commander-in-chief. It happened that Sir Harry and
myself were on the point of going out hunting when the old captain called,
and the admiral was attired in hunting kit.

"Tell him I'll see him to-morrow," said Sir Harry.

But that wouldn't do at all, nor would any other excuse serve.

"I insist on seeing the admiral," said the captain. "I have just come home
and it is my duty to see him at once."

"Bring him in, then," said Sir Harry impatiently, "Now, sir," said he, "my
flag-lieutenant informed you that I was engaged. Why couldn't you see the
secretary?"

"The secretary, sir? The secretary!" says the old captain wrathfully staring
at Sir Harry's informal attire. "Indeed I am told, sir, that the secretary is the
Commander-in-chief here. That's what they say, sir—that's what they say!"

"Do they?" returned Sir Harry placidly. "And a d——d good commander-
in-chief too!" says he.

When, in later years, I became commander-in-chief, I made it a rule that
all admirals and captains should have direct access to myself, no matter how

trifling the occasion.

In those days, there was a turnpike-gate outside the town. I was driving a
brother officer home late one night, after dining at a house some distance
away and when we came to the toll-gate, the keeper was in bed, and all my
knocking and shouting failed to wake him up. So I proceeded to heave a
large stone through his window. That fetched him; and down he came,
grumbling and swearing. I thrust a sovereign—the only coin I had—into his
hand to pay for his broken window and the toll. It was bad tactics, for he
promptly retreated into his house (with my sovereign) leaving us still on the
wrong side of the gate. There was nothing for it but to break the rest of his
windows, but still he wouldn't come out. Evidently a surly fellow, unfit to
take charge of turnpike gates, an office demanding tact and courtesy; and we
thought it well to remove his temptation. So my companion and I wrenched
the gate from its hinges and lashed it to the cart, vertically, so that it
projected over our heads like a kind of ornamental roof, its weight nearly
lifting the mare between the shafts off her legs and making her kick like
blazes. Then we drove into Plymouth, gate and all. The gate was reduced to
firewood before sunrise. Next day, the town was placarded with vain offers
of reward for information concerning "some evil-disposed person or persons
unknown who," etc.

At that time, I used to ride steeple-chases whenever I had an opportunity,
and kept myself in regular training by hard exercise; a habit which on one
occasion involved the commander-in-chief in an alarming rumour. It arose
from the trifling circumstance that I had borrowed his overcoat. The Fleet
was at Holyhead, to celebrate the opening of the new breakwater by the
Prince of Wales; I was just going for a training run up and down that
breakwater, when, finding I had no coat, I took Sir Harry Keppel's uniform
overcoat. I took it, without thinking, merely because I wanted it. The next
thing that happened was that the signalmen in the Fleet reported that the
Admiral must have gone mad on the breakwater, seeing that he was racing
up and down it clad in a shooting-cap, grey trousers, muffler and uniform
overcoat. As my face was almost hidden by cap and muffler, the signalmen
were deceived by the gold lace, took me for the admiral, and thought that
poor Sir Harry was smitten with insanity.

THE AUTHOR AS LIEUTENANT

We used to hunt a good deal with the Dartmoor hounds; and upon a day
when there was no run, and everyone was bored, one of the ladies present
begged me to provide some kind of sport, kindly suggesting that I should
personate the fox, a part I declined.

"You must do something to amuse us," she said.

"Very well, I will," said I.

Among the officers there were an elderly admiral and an elderly general,
and I pointed them out to the lady.

"I will get up a race between the two of them," said I.

She bet me I would not, and I took it. I began with the soldier.

Ambling alongside the general, I asked him casually if he had ridden
much in his life.

"Of course I have," says he irritably. "What do you mean, sir?"

"Nothing at all," says I. "I thought I would ask. The admiral——"

"What about the admiral?" cries the general, staring suspiciously at the
distant and unconscious officer.

"He was saying he didn't think you knew very much about a horse."

The general lost his temper. He swore. He said he would show the
admiral what he knew about a horse.

"You can easily prove it," said I; and before he understood what was
happening, he had agreed to ride a race. Then I went over to the admiral.

"Do you know what the general says? He says you look like a monkey on
a horse," said I; and it was the admiral's turn to swear.

"D——d impertinence!" says he. "I'll race him, and beat him any day in
the week." And he continued to use forcible language.

"You can do that," I said, for the admiral was riding one of my best
horses.

"If you really want a race, I'll arrange the whole thing," said I. And I
brought the two wrathful old gentlemen together, rode with them to the
starting-point, gave the word, and off they went as hard as they could pelt. I
followed, cheering them on. The general began to draw ahead, when his
horse baulked at a soft place. The admiral's horse did the same, throwing his
rider upon his neck.

"Get back into the saddle and he'll go through," I shouted, for I knew the
horse. The admiral hove himself into his seat, and won the race. He wouldn't
have won, if his adversary hadn't baulked.

The members of the Board of Admiralty came down to Plymouth to
witness the autumn military manoeuvres. I offered to drive them all in my
coach; and they were settled in their places—Mr. Goschen the First Lord,
Admiral Sir Alexander Milne, the Earl of Camperdown and Mr. Shaw-
Lefevre—when out of the house came Rear-Admiral Beauchamp Seymour.

"Get down!" he shouted. "Gentlemen, you must get down."

They asked him why.

"You don't know that boy," said Seymour. "He's not safe. He'll upset you
on purpose, just to say he's upset the whole Board of Admiralty!"

And he actually ordered my guests off my coach, so that they had to go in
barouches.

Sir Harry Keppel often came sailing with me in my little yacht. We were
out together, when I said to him,

"I cannot weather that ironclad, sir."

"Then run into her, my dear boy," said Keppel placidly.

"All right, sir—obey orders."

I held on, and we cleared the jib-boom of the ironclad by an inch.

Sir Harry had an old friend of his to stay with him, Captain Clifton, a
most remarkable and interesting man. In the old days, the passage for the
opium trade existing between China and India was taken only once a year—
the opium ships running up to China with one monsoon and down to India
with the other. Clifton went to the Government of India and undertook, if the
Government would permit him to build vessels to his own design, to build
clippers to thrash up against the monsoon as well as run before it, and so
double the income accruing from the opium trade. The Government
consenting, Clifton designed the Blue Jacket and the Red Jacket and vessels
of that class, which were the famous opium clippers of the "roaring forties"
and fifties.

The Indian Government gave Captain Clifton a lakh of rupees. On his
way home, Clifton, touching at what is now the city of Melbourne in
Australia, but which was then a small assemblage of wooden shanties,
noticed the possibilities of the magnificent harbour. He told me that he could
have bought the whole site of Melbourne for a lakh; but on consideration, he
decided against the project.

One of my great friends, Sir Allan Young, a brilliant seaman of the old
school, commanded, at the age of twenty-four, one of Clifton's opium
clippers.

Upon the occasion of the Prince of Wales's opening the new breakwater at
Holyhead, in 1873, his Royal Highness was entertained together with a large
party at a country house in the neighbourhood. The Prince called to me, and
said:

"This is very slow. You really must do something to enliven the
proceedings."

"Well, sir," said I, "I will run a hundred yards race with Lord ——. As he
is Irish, he is sure to take me up if I challenge him."

Sure enough, Lord —— accepted the challenge, but on conditions. These
were: that I should race in full uniform, excepting my sword, while himself

should "take his wardrobe from off himself." Lord —— then proceeded to
divest himself there and then of his Patrick ribbon, coat, waistcoat, and
boots, which he confided to the care of the wife of a certain distinguished
Liberal statesman. He dropped his Patrick ribbon into her lap, saying:

"Madam, will ye have a care now of me Jewel, for glory be to God there's
no saying what twist this mad one might give me!"

Entirely at ease, with the seat of his breeches patched with stuff of
another colour from the rest, and his toes sticking from his stockings, he was
wholly unperturbed by the laughter of the assemblage.

Although attired in cocked hat, frock coat, and epaulettes, I had the speed
of him, and waited on him. Then the devil entered into me; and when Lord
—— drew abreast of a big plant of pampas grass, I cannoned into him,
pitching him head first into the grass, not, of course, intending to harm him.
But to my consternation and sorrow, Lord ——'s leg was broken below the
knee. I put the poor lord into his coach—he had a coach and four-in-hand—
and drove him back to his hotel. That excellent and magnanimous sportsman
was perfectly unconcerned.

"You hit me a bad skelp, and I am destroyed," said he. "Never mind, they
all laughed, anny way."

It was about this period of my life, when, returning from a ball in London
in the early morning, I came upon a person selling whelks. He invited me to
sup—or breakfast—upon a plate of these delicacies.

"How much do you charge for a plateful?"

"Threepence," said he.

"I'll give you sixpence for every plateful you eat yourself."

"Done," said he.

He finished two platefuls, and had begun a third, when he was overtaken
by rebellion from within, swiftly followed by catastrophe.

"That's not fair," I said. "You can't count those two platefuls."

"O my Gawd," he said. "'Ave I got to begin again?"

To this time, too, belong my memories of a certain famous naval captain,
who was extraordinarily particular both as to his own dress and the wearing
of proper uniform by others. His regard for appearances, however, did not
prevent his diving overboard in full and immaculate uniform, including
white gloves, to save a seaman. Exceedingly precise in his speech, he owned
the singular trait of becoming deprived of utterance when he was angry; and
few things made him more angry than faulty attire in the Service.

He was driving with me in a cab towards Plymouth, when we met an old
warrant officer, who was wearing a purple woollen waistcoat and green
gloves. My friend, stopping the cab so suddenly that the horse slithered
along on its haunches, leaped from the vehicle. The old warrant officer, his
attention arrested, had halted and turned round. My friend went up to him.
Then I perceived that he was stricken speechless with wrath; for, continuing
to swallow nothing, as his habit was in these crises of emotion, he tapped the
warrant officer's waistcoat and gloves. Glaring at him and still silently
swallowing, he turned about and got into the cab. The old warrant officer
stood staring with dropped jaw, like a man petrified.

It was my friend who, being asked at a court-martial what he would have
done in certain difficult circumstances, replied deliberately:

"If I was where I was not I might have done something I did not do."

In after years, when he was commander-in-chief at the Nore, he was
walking along the road to Sheerness, dressed in plain clothes, when a
bluejacket, who was slightly intoxicated, lurched against him.

"Man, man," said my friend, with his picked elocution, "do you know
what you are doing? Man, you are colliding with the commander-in-chief."

"Ho," returned the seaman, totally unimpressed. "Har you, indeed? Then
all I've got to say, is to say you've got a ruddy good billet—an' wha's more,
you take care you don't lose it by getting drunk."

Despite of my diversions, I did a good deal of hard work. As flag-
lieutenant I was in charge of the signalling, a science which, as it was
understood in those days, I mastered completely.

My first independent command was the Goshawk gunboat, to which I
was appointed as lieutenant-commander for the manoeuvres and for review
in 1873, while I was still flag-lieutenant to Sir Harry Keppel. I had a narrow
escape from disaster at the very beginning. Fortunately I noticed that the
navigator was going the wrong side of the buoy off Drake's Island, and I was
just in time to point out his mistake. I remember my feeling of horror at the
prospect of running on a rock in Plymouth Sound in my first command.

The first thing I did in the Goshawk was to get from the flagship a big
working party of a hundred men to work at holystoning our decks until they
were as clean as a hound's tooth. From that day onwards I set myself steadily
against bright-work and spit-and-polish. My objection to bright-work is that
you have first to dirty it with brick and oil in order to clean it afterwards.
There are certain things in a ship which must be kept bright, and these I
would burnish; but everything that could be painted I would paint, and then
scrub the paint with soap and water. I remember the shock it was to the
commander when I told him to cover the brass rails with canvas and paint it.
Under the spit-and-polish system no doubt the men take a pride in keeping
the ship bright, but such a process involves perpetual extra bother and worry
and black-list, which are quite unnecessary. Cleaning bright-work makes the
men's hands filthy at divisions; and after ten minutes of bad weather, the
copper turns blue and the brass green, and the whole of the work must be
done over again.

At one time the bright-work system was carried to absurd extremes. I
have known a ship actually to have a bright cable. I have known another ship
with bright hammock hooks. The hatchways of some vessels were polished
and decorated with inlay and all kinds of ocean ornament until the ship
looked like a lady's boudoir or a transatlantic liner. The custom came in as
the old sailing ships gave place to steam ships, when the time hitherto
devoted to making a vessel all a-taunto, ropes taut, sail furling and mending
and so forth, was given instead to polishing, burnishing and making bright-
work shine, until the present system of gunnery and gymnastic training was
introduced. Captains and officers used to spend on their ships large sums out

of their private income, which very often they could ill afford. "Promotion
by paint" was not unknown. A ship ought to be scrupulously clean, but she
should have paint wherever possible, and soap and water should replace spit-
and-polish.

CHAPTER XIV
POLITICAL EVENTS OF 1873-80 AND POSTSCRIPT

NOTE

The following brief summary of political and international affairs is
introduced for convenience of reference. It may be skipped by the reader,
should he disdain politics.

The Government of Mr. Gladstone, returned to power in 1868, began to
disintegrate in 1873. The proximate cause was the Irish University
Education Bill, announced in the Speech from the Throne at the opening of
the session on 6th February, 1873. Irish affairs have always been the curse of
the Liberal Party. But a popular Government would have survived even the
Irish University Education Bill, which, designed to please all parties, failed
of course to please any. The truth is that, as people soon or late weary of all
administrations, so they turned from the Liberal Government. Mr. Disraeli
summarised the history of the Government in a piece of invective which has
become classic: "You have had four years of it. You have despoiled
churches. You have threatened every corporation and every endowment in
the country. You have examined into everybody's affairs. You have criticised
every profession and vexed every trade. No one is certain of his property,
and no one knows what duties he may have to perform to-morrow. I believe
that the people of this country have had enough of the policy of
confiscation."

The Government were beaten on the Irish University Education Bill; Mr.
Gladstone resigned; but Mr. Disraeli declined to take office. Mr. Gladstone
was therefore compelled to carry on the Government. Early in 1874 he

suddenly appealed to the electorate; which, however, chose to give his
opponents a majority. Mr. Gladstone resigned, or partly resigned, his
leadership, and plunged into the esoteric joys of a controversy dealing with
the doctrine of Papal infallibility. It would seem that a great ecclesiastic was
sacrificed, when the young Gladstone chose to give to politics talents which
would have won him the Archbishopric of Canterbury.

In Mr. Disraeli's Cabinet Lord Cairns was Lord Chancellor; Lord Derby,
Foreign Secretary; Lord Salisbury, Secretary of State for India; Lord
Carnarvon, Colonial Secretary; Mr. Cross, Home Secretary; Mr. Gathorne
Hardy, Secretary of State for War; Mr. Ward Hunt, First Lord of the
Admiralty; Sir Stafford Northcote, Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Duke
of Richmond, as Lord President of the Council, led the Conservative party in
the House of Lords. The Liberal leader, walking in the Gladstonian shadow,
was Lord Hartington.

In 1874 the Bill for the Regulation of Public Worship was passed. In the
following year Mr. Plimsoll, by the exercise of that dogged determination
and gallant defiance of Parliamentary conventions, by means of which
Parliament can sometimes be goaded into acts of justice, forced the
Government to pass the Merchant Shipping Bill. Mr. Cross, the Home
Secretary, introduced the useful Artisans' Dwellings Bill, which was passed.
Upon 25th November, 1875, the Government, at the suggestion of Mr.
Frederic Greenwood, purchased from the Khedive of Egypt, 176,000 Suez
Canal shares for the sum of £4,000,000.

In the same year, the Prince of Wales, afterwards King Edward VII, went
to India, whither he was accompanied by Commander Lord Charles
Beresford, M.P., as A.D.C. (Lord Charles was promoted to the rank of
commander on 2nd November, 1875.) The Prince received a telegram
informing him of the purchase of the Suez Canal shares when his ship was
passing through the Canal on the way to India. Lord Lytton was appointed
Viceroy of India. In 1876 it was announced that the Queen was to assume
the additional title of "Empress of India."

In July, 1875, there was trouble in the Near East, which, nearly two years
later, in April, 1877, resulted in the declaration by Russia of war against
Turkey. The Mediterranean Fleet was ordered to pass the Dardanelles. In

March, 1878, Lord Derby resigned, and Lord Salisbury succeeded him at the
Foreign Office. Mr. Gathorne Hardy went to the India Office, Colonel
Stanley to the War Office, and Mr. James Lowther became Chief Secretary
for Ireland. Sir Michael Hicks-Beach had already succeeded Lord Carnarvon
at the Colonial Office.

In the Parliament of 1875-80, young Mr. Parnell began his career.
Indomitable, subtle, cold and inscrutable, he speedily became a power. A
Protestant in faith, he had his foot on the necks of the Irish Roman Catholic
Nationalist members; half an Englishman by birth, he was an implacable
enemy of England. Utilising the tactics of obstruction, he succeeded in
bringing discredit upon a Government which was powerless to control him
and his led captains. He forced the Government to pass a Bill for University
Education in Ireland; and as the measure was no better, if no worse, than the
Gladstonian scheme which had been rejected, so the result upon the
Conservative administration was equally injurious.

Mr. Gladstone emerged from his studies in Papal infallibility to denounce
Bulgarian atrocities and the like. But the country declined to become excited
on the subject. In the meantime the Russian army was approaching
Constantinople. The British Government took public measures of military
and naval precaution clearly implying that Russia would not be permitted to
occupy Constantinople. Prince Bismarck thereupon intervened, and invited
the nations concerned to discuss matters at Berlin. Lord Beaconsfield (he
had received his peerage in 1876) and Prince Bismarck were the two most
powerful men in Europe. Beaconsfield chose himself to represent Great
Britain at the Congress, which opened at Berlin on 13th June, 1878. Lord
Beaconsfield returned in triumph, bearing with him "Peace with Honour."

The advance of Russian influence in Afghanistan induced the British
Government, in 1878, to dispatch an expedition to Cabul, which was
occupied by British troops, and from which the Amir, Shere Ali, fled.
Followed, the signature of the treaty of Gandamak by Yakoob Khan, son and
successor of Shere Ali; the treacherous murder of Sir Louis Cavagnan,
British Envoy, and the greater number of his staff; and the recapture of
Cabul by British troops. The true history of the whole affair, much distorted
at the time (and since) by political malice, is lucidly set forth in Lord

Roberts's Forty-one Years in India, by the great soldier who took so
distinguished a part in it.

Another frontier war broke out in 1879. In South Africa, Sir Theophilus
Shepstone had annexed the Transvaal; Sir Bartle Frere, Lord High
Commissioner, announcing to the Zulu king Cetewayo, that Cetewayo was
entitled to a strip of territory claimed both by Cetewayo and the Transvaal
Republic, ordered him to disband his army. The advance of British troops
was checked by their total defeat by the Zulus on 22nd January, 1879, at
Isandhlwana. Lord Chelmsford the commander-in-chief, prosecuted the
campaign, defeated Cetewayo and took him prisoner. During the war the
young Prince Louis Napoleon, son of the Empress Eugenie, lost his life.

In the meantime, the trade of the country had been profoundly depressed,
with the natural result that there was much discontent. On 24th March, 1880,
Parliament was dissolved; and the Liberal party were returned with a
majority of some hundred and twenty. The Queen sent for Lord Hartington;
sent for Lord Granville; and finally, for Mr. Gladstone.

The Russo-Turkish war of 1877 had brought Russia into opposition to
Austria-Hungary, thus destroying the alliance of the three Emperors; and
although Bismarck made peace between the two Powers at the Congress of
Berlin, Russia became estranged from Germany. In order to restore her
security, Germany concluded an alliance with Austria-Hungary and shortly
afterwards with Italy, which had quarrelled with France concerning her
occupation of Tunis. Thus was formed the Triple Alliance. Its counterpoise
was the drawing together of France and Russia, in view of whose
possibilities Prince Bismarck in 1887 increased the German Army. In 1900
Germany passed the Navy Law, which ordained that the German Fleet
should be so strong that any attack upon it would be dangerous to the
attacking party.

Nothing but the strength of the British Fleet, which had been largely
increased by the action of Lord Charles Beresford in 1888, and again by the
naval programme of 1893, and whose organisation had been brought to a
high state of efficiency by Admiral Sir Frederick Richards (afterwards
admiral of the Fleet), prevented the outbreak of war between England and
France at the time of the Fashoda incident in 1897.

The affair caused both nations to reconsider the situation; with the result
that they settled all outstanding difficulties; and the Triple Entente of Great
Britain, France and Russia balanced the Triple Alliance. Germany, in 1912,
added some 70,000 men to her army, while Austria and Italy increased their
fleets. By the time the Allied nations of the Near East had declared war upon
the Turkish Empire, in 1912, Russia had recovered from the disastrous
results of her war with Japan, so that the Triple Entente once more balanced
the Triple Alliance. But the war in the Near East, with the heavy losses it
inflicted upon Turkey, had opened anew the whole Eastern question. The
settlement concluded at the Berlin Conference thirty-four years previously
was abolished in a moment.

It has been thought worth while to trace the main developments of
European politics from 1873 to the present time; as it happened to Lord
Charles Beresford to be a member of that Parliament which saw the triumph
of the Beaconsfield policy in foreign affairs, and to be a member of
subsequent Parliaments confronted with the emergence of new and sinister
international conditions.

CHAPTER XV
AN IRISH ELECTION AND IRISH POLITICS

The political situation in Ireland at the time when I entered politics was
characteristically exemplified in the Kerry election of 1872, in which I took
part. It was fought entirely on the Home Rule issue, which had been revived
by Isaac Butt when, in 1870, he formed his Home Government Association.

In the Kerry election of 1872, the Roman Catholic hierarchy was opposed
to Home Rule. The anti-Home Rule candidate, Mr. Deas, was a Roman
Catholic, a local landlord and extremely popular. His opponent, Mr.
Blennerhasset, was a Protestant and a stranger to the locality. But because he
was a Home Ruler, he was elected in spite of the priests and of the personal
claims of Mr. Deas, winning by 839 votes. I may add that he won in spite
also of my exertions, which were considerable. I started at two o'clock in the

morning with Mr. Harry Herbert of Muckross, and led a band of 350 tenants
to the poll. (The Ballot Act was not passed until 18th July of the same year,
1872.)

Having polled the tenants, I was strolling in the street, when I was
stopped by one of my grand fellow-countrymen, a huge man of about six
feet five.

"Are ye for Home Rule?" says he.

"To hell with your Home Rule!" said I. Whereupon he hit me on the point
of the nose, knocking me over backwards, and effectually silencing my
arguments for the space of an hour and a half.

The nature of the problem of the land in Ireland may be exemplified from
my own experience as a landlord. I came into my property in 1866, and
when I returned from the sea two years later, being in need of money, I wrote
to my agent, telling him that I intended to inspect the estate. He replied
asking me to come as soon as I could, and adding that I should be able to
raise the rents all round. I told him to do nothing until my arrival. When I
went over, I drove to one of my farms upon which it was proposed to raise
the rent. The farm was about 48 acres in extent, situated in the middle of a
bog. Here I was entertained by one of the finest old Irishmen I have ever
seen, and his three sons. Said I to him:

"I want to talk to you about the rent. I hear that you are paying me only
2s. 6d. an acre, whereas I can get 18s. an acre in the market."

I shall never forget how the poor old man's face fell as he said:

"For the love of God, do not turn me out, Lord Charles, I will give you
12s. an acre sooner than you should turn me out."

And then he told me that he had occupied the farm during 48 years; and
in that time he and his sons had raised the original value to 18s. an acre. Of
course I told him to stay where he was at the old rent. But by the law of the
land I could have turned him out and put in a new tenant who would have
paid me 18s. an acre, the increased value being solely due to the exertions of
the old man and his sons. Had I been an absentee landlord, it would have

been an ordinary matter of business to have instructed my agent to turn the
man out and to raise the rent; and that very course was taken in thousands of
cases. There was no compensation for tenants' improvements before 1870;
and a farmer who did his best for the land, and to whose exertions alone
increased value was due, must pay the increased rent or go.

The monstrous land system in Ireland naturally caused the tenants to feel
distrust and enmity towards the landlords; for, although not many landlords
abused their powers, the knowledge that they could abuse them was alone
sufficient to create suspicion and hostility. Again, the great companies which
bought land on speculation, exacted rents at the outside market value. A
company cannot be expected to make allowances. Nor did the companies
know the tenants or care for them. But under the Irish custom they were the
tenants who had themselves by their improvements raised the value of the
land.

In fairness to the landlords, it should be understood that the tenants
objected to the improvement of property by the landlord. "If you, the
landlord," the tenant argued, "improve the land, you will be raising the rent
on me. I would rather make my own improvements."

The terms of tenure in Ireland were quite different from the terms of
tenancy in England, except in the north of Ireland, where was the custom of
tenant-right. In the south and west, the majority of tenants had a yearly
tenancy, and were liable to six months' notice, known as "the hanging gale."
When a landlord desired to get rid of a tenant, he "called in the hanging
gale." And a tenant habitually owed six months' rent.

I stood for Waterford at the request of my brother Lord Waterford. That I
was elected was due to his great personal popularity as a landlord and as a
sportsman and also to the powerful influence of a certain prominent
supporter of Home Rule, which he exercised on my behalf because, although
I was opposed to Home Rule, I supported denominational education. I
believed then, as I believe now, that a man's religion is his own affair, and
whatever it may be, it should be respected by those who own another form
of faith. I have always held (in a word) that the particular form of a man's
religion is necessarily due to his early education and surroundings.

THE AUTHOR. ÆT. 27

But when in the House of Commons I publicly declared that conviction, I
received about four hundred letters of a most violent character, most of
which were written by clergymen of my own persuasion. I have never asked

a man for his vote in my life. When I stood for Marylebone, in 1885, there
was a controversy concerning the Sunday opening of museums and picture
galleries. I was in favour of opening them, upon the ground that people who
were hard at work all the week might have opportunities for recreation,
which I would have extended beyond museums and galleries. But I was
waited upon by a solemn deputation of clerical gentlemen of various
denominations, who desired to make their support of me conditional upon
my acceptance of their views.

"Gentlemen," I said, "has it ever occurred to you that I have never asked
you for your vote? Let me tell you that if you disapprove of my opinions,
your only honest course is to vote for my opponent."

They were so astonished that they withdrew in shocked silence.

When I was in Parliament, Isaac Butt, who was failing in his endeavour
to promote an agitation, begun in 1870, in favour of Home Government, or
Home Rule, did his best to persuade me to join the Irish party, and to obtain
for it Lord Waterford's influence, because, he said, Lord Waterford was so
universally popular and so just. Although I was unable to join the Irish party,
I was much impressed with Butt's arguments in so far as the land question
was concerned; and I discussed the whole matter with Lord Waterford. I
suggested to him that he should form a league of landlords pledged not to
rack-rent their tenants; pointing out that if the Irish landlords failed to take
the initiative in reform, it was certain that the people would eventually
prevail against them, and that the reforms which would be enforced by law
would bear hardly upon the good landlords.

Lord Waterford sympathised with my view of the matter; but after long
consideration he came to the conclusion that the course I proposed might do
more harm than good. The question was inextricably complicated by the fact
that many of the landlords who had raised their rents, had been compelled to
raise them by force of circumstances; as, for instance, when they had been
obliged to pay very high charges upon succeeding to their estates. In his
position, Lord Waterford shrank from associating himself with a scheme
which must inflict hardship upon landlords poorer than himself. Events took
their course, with the result I had foreseen. My proposal was inspired by that
sympathy with the demands of the Irish people, and that recognition of their

justice, which had been accorded by both great political parties in turn, and
which ultimately found expression in the Wyndham Land Purchase Act.

Not long ago I asked one of my tenants, who had bought his holding
under the Wyndham Act, and who was a strong Home Ruler:

"Now you own the farm, are you still for Home Rule?"

"Faith, Lord Char-less," said he, "now I have the land behind me, shure if
it was a choice I could be given between Home Rule and a bullock, I'd take
the bullock."

In recording the beginning of my Parliamentary career, I may say at once
that I have always disliked politics, as such. I entered Parliament with the
desire to promote the interests of the Service; and in so far as I have been
successful, I have not regretted the sacrifices involved.

But in 1874 my approval of denominational education—in other words,
my support of the right of every parent to have his child educated in his own
religion—outweighed my opposition to Home Rule. One of my principal
supporters, himself a Home Ruler, suggested as an ingenious compromise
that I should so print my election address that the words Home Rule should
appear large and prominent, and the qualification "an inquiry into," very
small: a proposal I declined.

My opponents were Mr. J. Esmonde and Mr. Longbottom, who was
celebrated for his achievements in finance. He stood for Home Rule.
Concerning Mr. Longbottom, a certain parish priest, who was also a Home
Ruler, addressed his congregation one Sunday morning as follows:—

"Now, boys," says he, "a few words about th' Election that's pending.
First of all, if ye have a vote ye'd give ut to a genuine Home Ruler, if ye had
one standing. Ye have not. Secondly, ye'd give it to a good Conservative, if
ye had one standing. Well, ye have one in Lord Char-less Beresford, the gr-
reat say-captain. And thirdly, ye'd vote for the Divil, but ye'd never vote for a
Whig. But as for this Mr. Long-what's-'is-name, I wudn't be dhirtying me
mouth by mentioning the latter end of him."

One of my opponent's supporters retorted by urging the boys to "Kape th'
bloody Beresford out, for the Beresfords were never known to shmile except
when they saw their victims writhin' on th' gibbet": an amiable reference to
John Beresford, First Commissioner of Revenue at the period of the passing
of the Act of Union, and de facto ruler of Ireland.

Other incidents of that cheery time occur to my recollection. There was
the farmer who, ploughing his field, cried to me as I rode by, "Hurroo for
Lord Char-less."

I went up to him and asked him whether he really meant anything, and if
so, what.

"Will you do anything?" said I.

Said he, "Lord Char-less, if 'tis votes you want me to collect, begob I'll
quit th' plough an' travel for a fortnight."

There was the car-boys' race I arranged on Waterford quay. Ten of them
started, and I won, because I had taken the precaution to stuff some hay
under the pad, which I lit with a match. The horse was stimulated but quite
uninjured.

Then there was the affair of the bill-poster. I had been driving round the
country all day in a side-car, seeing the boys, and late at night we stopped at
a small inn. I was standing in the doorway smoking a pipe, and feeling cold
and rather jaded, when I noticed a bill-poster hard at work, pasting placards
upon the wall of an adjacent building. I could see that they were the green
placards of my opponent, my own colours being blue and white.

I strolled across, and sure enough, there was my bill-poster sticking up
"Vote for Longbottom, the Friend of the People."

"And what are ye doing, my fine peacock?" said I.

"Sure I'm posting the bills of Misther Longbottom, the Friend of the
People," said he.

"'Tis a grand occupation," said I. "Vote for Longbottom, the Friend of the
People, and to hell with Lord Char-less," said I.

"To hell with Lord Char-less," says he.

"Come," says I, "let me show ye the way to paste bills, ye omadhaun."

"And what do ye know about pasting bills?"

"Haven't I been a billposter all me life, then?" says I. "Here, let me get at
it, and I'll shew ye the right way to paste the bills of Longbottom, the Friend
of the People."

He handed me his long hairy brush, and a pailful of a horrible stinking
compound, and I pasted up a bill the way I was born to it.

"Sure," says he, "ye can paste bills with anny man that God ever put two
legs under. 'Tis clear ye're a grand bill-poster," says he.

"Didn't I tell ye?" says I.

And with that I caught him a lick with the full brush across the face, so
that the hairs flicked all round his head, and with a loud cry he turned and
fled away. Armed with the pail and the brush, away I started after him, but
my foot caught in the lap of the long coat I had on, and down I came, and
knocked my nose on the ground, so that it bled all over me, and I had to go
back to the inn. I took the rest of the placards, and the pail and the brush, and
drove home, arriving very late. My brother Bill was in bed and sound asleep.
Without waking him, I pasted the whole of his room with bills, "Vote for
Longbottom, the Friend of the People." I pasted them on the walls, and on
the door, and on his bed, and on his towels, and on his trousers, and on the
floor. Then I went to bed.

In the morning he awakened me, wearing a pale and solemn countenance.

"Charlie," said he, "there's some bold men among the enemy."

"What do you mean?" said I.

"They are great boys," says he. "Why, one of them got into my room last
night."

"Impossible," said I.

"Come and see," said he. "When I woke this morning I thought I had
gone mad."

Upon the eve of the election, a man whom I knew to be a Fenian, came
up to me and said, "I shall vote for ye, Lord Char-less. I don't agree with
your politics, but I shall vote for ye."

"And why would you?" I said. "You that's a Fenian, you should be voting
for Mr. Longbottom, the Friend of the People, like an honest man."

"Not at all," says he. "When ye go to the market to buy a horse, or a cow,
or a pig, what is it ye look for in 'um? Blood," says he. "An' it's the same in
an iliction. Ye are well-bred, annyway," says he, "but as for this Mr.
Longwhat's-'is-name, he's cross-bred."

When I was holding a meeting, one of the audience kept interrupting me;
so I invited him to come up on the platform and have it out.

"Now what is it, ye old blackguard," I said. "Speak out."

"Lord Char-less," says he, "ye're no man."

"We'll see about that," says I. "Why do you say so?"

"Lord Char-less," he said solemnly, "I remimber the time one of your
family stood for th' county of Waterford, I was up to the knees in blood and
whisky for a month, and at this iliction, begob, devil a drop of eyther have I
seen."

The old man referred to the election of 1826, in which Lord George
Beresford was beaten by Lord Stewart de Decies, an event which was
partially instrumental in bringing about the emancipation of the Roman
Catholics in 1829.

I have always preferred a hostile political meeting to a peaceable
assembly; nor have I ever failed to hold a hostile audience except upon one
occasion, during the York election. I had sent a speaker to occupy the
attention of an audience, largely composed of my own countrymen, till I
came, and by the time I arrived he had succeeded in irritating them beyond
the power of pacification.

But one can hardly save oneself from one's friends. During the Waterford
election I came one evening to Youghal and went to the hotel. I was
peacefully smoking outside the inn, when a party of the boys came along,
hooting me, and presently they began to throw stones. When I advanced
upon them they ran away and were lost in the darkness. As I turned to go
back to the hotel, a large missile caught me behind the ear, knocking me
over.

Next morning I related the incident to one of my most enthusiastic
supporters in the place.

"'Tis a disgrace," said I, "throwing stones in the dark. And as for that boy
who made a good shot, if I could get hold of him I would scatter his
features."

"Ye would not," said he.

"And why wouldn't I?" said I.

"Because," says he, "it was myself that threw that brick. An' didn't I get
ye grand!" says he. "But ye're not hurted. Sure ye're not hurted, or I wudn't
have told ye annything about it."

It wasn't disloyalty on his part. It was simply that he couldn't resist what
he considered a joke.

The result of the polling was: Beresford, 1767; Esmonde, 1390;
Longbottom, 446.

A salient characteristic of the Irish race is that they will not endure
condescension towards them. They admire resolution and determination, and
will submit to the sternest discipline if it is enforced upon them by a man

who understands them and whom they respect. Conversely, they will yield
nothing to weakness, and will return any assumption of superiority with
hatred and contempt. Hence it is that the English have so often failed in their
dealings with the Irish. In spite of the violence the Irish often exhibit in
politics, their pride of race and pride in one another remain their notable
characteristics.

I recently overheard a remark which illustrates the Irish master sentiment.
During the debates upon the Home Rule Bill which took place in the House
of Commons in 1912, one of his Majesty's Ministers, having made a long
and an eloquent speech in support of that measure, punctuated by
enthusiastic cheers by the Nationalist members, had it knocked to
smithereens by Sir Edward Carson. Afterwards, I heard one Nationalist
member say to another, "Wasn't that grand, now, to see the Irishman
knocking spots out of the Saxon!" Yet it was the Saxon who was fighting for
the Nationalist cause, which the Irishman, Sir Edward Carson, was
strenuously opposing.

CHAPTER XVI
MEMBER FOR WATERFORD, AND COMMANDER,
ROYAL NAVY

I shall never forget my first impressions, when, in 1874, I entered
Parliament. There was a discussion upon a matter of Local Government. I
listened to the speeches made on both sides of the House, each speaker
taking a different point of view, and I became more and more doubtful
concerning the solution of the problem in hand. At last a Radical member,
whose name I forget, drew all the yarns into one rope, making what
appeared to me to be a clear, concise and reasonable proposal.

Sitting among my friends, several of whom had been at school with me, I
said:

"That is the only man who has solved the difficulty, and if he divides I
shall vote with him."

My innocent remark was received with a volley of expostulations. I was
told that I had only just joined political life, and that I did not understand it;
that the Radical speaker's plan was excellent, but that the other side could
not be allowed to take the credit of producing a good scheme, because it
would do our side harm in the country; that the scheme would be thrown out
for the time, in order that our side might be able later on to bring in the same
scheme and reap the credit of it, and so forth.

"Well," I said, "if this kind of tactics is required in politics, it is no place
for me. I had better go back to sea."

Whereupon I was told that I should shake down to political methods
when I had been a year or two in the House. But I have spent years in
politics and I have never shaken down to political methods. A thing is either
right or wrong. I have never scrupled to vote against my own party when I
thought they were in the wrong.

Upon one occasion, someone told Disraeli that I was intending to vote
against the party. He put his arm on my shoulder, and said in his orotund,
deliberate enunciation:

"My boy, don't you know that it's your first duty to vote with your party?
If everyone voted according to his convictions, there would be no party
system. And without a party system the Government could not be carried on,
as you will discover in time."

I have also discovered that when politicians think only of issues as
affecting themselves and not as affecting the State, party politics fall to a
very low level, and those who believe in great national and Imperial ideas
are regarded as freaks and faddists.

Disraeli was very friendly both to my brother Waterford and myself.
Upon the first occasion of a division in which I took part, he walked through
the lobby with his arm on my shoulder, rather to the surprise of the old
members.

"Who the devil is that young man to whom Dizzy is talking?" I heard
them murmur.

I sat immediately behind Disraeli; and one night, Lord Barrington, a great
friend of his, hurried into the House, and squeezing himself in between me
and the next man, leaned over and said to Disraeli in a whisper:

"Poor Whyte-Melville has been killed!"

Disraeli turned slowly round, fitting his glass into his eye.

"Dear, dear," said he deliberately; "and pray, how did that happen?"

"Killed in the hunting-field!"

"How very dramatic!" said Disraeli solemnly.

We stayed at Sandringham, and went for long walks together, during
which Disraeli talked and laughed with the greatest enjoyment. But I
remember how, in the pauses of the conversation, he would stand still, and,
glass in eye, dreamily surveying the landscape, would make some such
observation as "The air is balmy ... and serene!" or "The foliage is stunted ...
but productive!" with the most weighty and measured emphasis, as though
these were prophetic utterances. I was quite bewildered; for I did not then
know whether he were serious, or were indulging a recondite wit. He was a
visionary, dwelling much in a world of his own; and I know now that he was
perfectly natural and serious on these occasions.

He and his wife were devotedly attached to each other. Having taken
Lady Beaconsfield in to dinner one evening, I noticed some red marks upon
her arm and her napkin. She was wearing red roses, and at first I thought
some petals had fallen from them. Then I saw that she was wearing a
bandage on her arm, and that blood was oozing from under it. I told her that
her arm was bleeding.

"Please don't say a word, Lord Charles," she said hastily, "it would
distress Dizzy so much." And she furtively twisted her napkin about her arm.
Lord Beaconsfield, who was sitting opposite to us, stuck his glass in his eye

and stared across the table—I was afraid for a moment that he had overheard
what his wife had said. Poor lady, she died shortly afterwards.

When I entered Parliament in 1874 it was still the day of the great
orators: of Disraeli, Gladstone, Bright, David Plunkett, O'Connor Power;
whose like, perhaps, we shall not see again. There was a tradition of
eloquence in the House of Commons of that time; members declined to
listen to a bore; and debate was conducted almost entirely by the two Front
Benches. It was in my first Parliament that Disraeli touched the zenith of his
extraordinary and splendid career; during which he formulated the principles
of a national policy, a part of which himself carried into execution, but
whose complete fulfilment remains to be achieved. Disraeli established a
tradition; and like all those who have a great ideal—whether right or wrong
is not here the question—he still lives in the minds of men, and his name still
carries inspiration. His great rival, who wore him down at last, bequeathed
no such national inheritance.

It was in this my first Parliament that Mr. Parnell emerged as the leader of
the Irish party. He was a cold, unapproachable person; he kept his party
under the most rigid control, with a tight hold upon the purse. He had great
ability. I have often seen him stalk into the House in the middle of a debate,
receive a sheaf of notes from his secretary, Mr. O'Brien, with whom he
would hold a whispered consultation, then rise and deliver a masterly
speech. He sat with me on the committee of the Army Discipline Bill;
speaking seldom, but always to the point.

Lord Randolph Churchill entered Parliament at the same time as myself;
and he was always a great personal friend of mine.

Although we were opposed in politics, the other four Waterford members
were on excellent terms with the only anti-Home Ruler in the five. There
were Dick Power, F. H. O'Donnell, J. Delahunty, and Purcell O'Gorman,
who weighed twenty-eight stone or so; and they all came to my wedding.
Another Waterford man was Mr. Sexton. As a boy, he manifested so brilliant
a talent for oratory, that he was sent into Parliament, where, as everyone
knows, he speedily made his mark. I remember, too, The O'Gorman Mahon,
who, if I am not mistaken, fought the last formal duel in this country.

When I entered Parliament the automobile torpedo was a comparatively
recent invention. Mr Whitehead had begun his experiments in 1864; after
four years' work and at the cost of £40,000, he produced the formidable
engine of war known as the Whitehead torpedo, the type from which all
subsequent improvements have been evolved. I have heard it stated that the
British Government could have bought the invention right out for £60,000.
Whitehead invented the device of using hydrostatic pressure to regulate the
depth of the immersion of the torpedo, and employed compressed air as its
motive power. The new weapon was adopted by the British Navy and by
other naval powers. In the year 1876 the type in use was the 14-in., length 14
ft. 6 in., weight 525 lbs.

In my view, the capabilities of the new weapon had not been fully
appreciated; that opinion may or may not have been justified; but I
considered it to be my duty publicly to insist upon the importance of the
torpedo in naval warfare. I spoke on the subject both inside the House of
Commons and on the platform, and was so fortunate as to win the approval
of The Times.

The Admiralty, however, were deeply affronted. The First Lord, Mr.
George Ward Hunt, informed me that the Board took great exception to my
speaking in the House upon naval subjects, and desired me to understand
that I must choose between the career of a sailor and that of a politician. My
reply was that I considered the request to be a breach of privilege. Mr. Ward
Hunt admitted the point; but argued that the employment in the House of
Commons of my knowledge of the Service was prejudicial to discipline. He
was of course right in so far as the conditions did undoubtedly afford
opportunities for prejudicing discipline; but as there was no regulation
forbidding a naval officer to sit in Parliament, a dual position which had
been frequently held by members of the Board of Admiralty, the
responsibility rested upon the individual.

However, it was not a case for argument; and I appealed directly to Mr.
Disraeli, telling him that I regarded the request of the Admiralty as a breach
of privilege; that I had no intention of relinquishing my naval career; and
that I had entered Parliament solely in the interests of the Service. Disraeli
listened with his customary sardonic gravity.

"What," he asked, "do you intend to do?"

I said that if the matter were pressed to a conclusion, I should resign my
seat, in which event Waterford would very probably be captured by a hot
Home Ruler.

"My dear boy," said Disraeli, in his deliberate way, "I am quite sure that
you will do nothing heroic. I," he added,—"I will see the Secretariat."

And that was the last I heard of the affair.

Among other Service matters in which I did what I could in the House of
Commons to obtain reforms, were the training of the personnel, the more
rapid promotion of officers, promotion from the lower deck to officers' rank,
and the necessity for building fast cruisers to protect the trade routes. I
advocated more time being spent by the men upon gunnery training, and less
upon polishing bright-work; and brought forward a motion to stop the men
of the Fleet "doing 'orses" (as they called hauling carts laden with stores
about the dockyard), instead of being trained in their proper work. These
subjects no longer possess any interest save in so far as the circumstances
resemble those of the present day. But I find recurring to-day many of the
difficulties of thirty or forty years ago.

At that time the Admiralty had abolished the short service system under
which highly efficient seamen were recruited direct from the mercantile
marine, and the Board had become responsible for the whole supply and
training of men for the Fleet. But the Admiralty had neglected to constitute
an efficient system of training. A very large proportion of men were
employed at sea upon duties which precluded them from receiving war
training of any kind; another large contingent was kept idle in hulks and
receiving ships while waiting to be drafted into sea-going vessels. The
suggestion was that barracks should be erected for their accommodation and
provided with attached vessels; and that a complete system of training
should be organised; so that every man upon going to sea in a ship of war
should be acquainted with his duties. Commander Noel (now Admiral of the
Fleet Sir Gerard H. U. Noel, K.C.B., K.C.M.G.) kindly sent to me a most
valuable memorandum upon the subject, in which he presented an admirable
scheme of organisation, the principles of which were afterwards carried into

execution. Of late years those principles have been infringed; but the
exigencies of the Service will compel the authorities to return to the essential
conditions laid down by Sir Gerard Noel, whose authority is entitled to the
greatest respect. I also received a sagacious letter on the same subject from
Commodore John Wilson, under whom I afterwards served as commander in
the Thunderer, indicating the necessity of framing a scheme of organisation
to come into force as soon as the barracks were completed.

With regard to the promotion of officers and men, the state of things
nearly forty years ago finds a parallel to-day. Then, as now, a very large
proportion of officers, from the rank of commander downwards, cannot hope
to be promoted. It was then suggested that the retiring allowance should be
increased. It is true that in 1873 Mr. Goschen, by granting an increased
retiring allowance for a limited period, had done his best to effect a
temporary relief. But the permanent reform, which is more necessary now
than ever before, still awaits achievement. In the meantime the discontent to
which I drew attention in 1875, is by no means less detrimental than it was.
The whole difficulty, as usual, is financial. Government after Government,
of what political complexion soever, refuse to pay the Services properly. The
condition of affairs is a national disgrace.

At that time, too, the Fleet was highly deficient in cruisers; and, in
consequence, the sea-borne trade of the country was exposed to great danger
in the event of war, as I explained to the House of Commons. In later years
the requisite ships were provided; only, in a moment of retrograde impulse,
to be abolished. After a period of insecurity and uneasiness, the cruiser force
is once more being slowly increased.

In later years my political opponents found great solace at elections in
saying that I had objected to the abolition of flogging in the Navy. The
question arose in my first Parliament. What I actually did—as a reference to
Hansard will confirm—was to point out that in many cases they were the
best men, the men who had the pluck to get into a row. High-tempered, full
of exuberance, they were flogged for offences against discipline, and
whereas a flogging was soon over and done with, the alternative proposed
would break a man's heart in prison and deprive the Navy of valuable
services. Which, then, was the more humane course? To-day, the

circumstances and conditions have changed. Discipline is better, and
flogging, thank goodness, is abolished.

But when the matter was under discussion, a certain ex-naval officer
assembled a public meeting, at which he attacked me with great vehemence
and impassioned eloquence. He was interrupted by an old fellow at the back
of the hall, who, refusing to be silenced, was asked to speak from the
platform. He did. He gave the meeting a dose of lower-deck phraseology, hot
and strong; and told the audience they were not to believe a word they had
heard concerning myself; that he had been shipmates both with the speaker
of the evening and with myself. He devoted some complimentary remarks to
me, "but," says he, "as for the other, he flogged every man in the ship three
or four times." Whereupon the audience rose in its wrath and drove my
opponent from the platform.

Mr. Disraeli asked me to survey the three battleships building for Turkey
and the one battleship building for Chile, and to give him my opinion as to
whether or not they were worth buying. Disraeli said he preferred to ask me
rather than the Admiralty, as I could, if necessary, speak on the matter in
Parliament. "And," said Disraeli, in his pontifical way, "I like young brains."
I advised the purchase of the ships; and purchased they were, being added to
the British Navy under the names of Superb, Belleisle, Orion and Neptune.

In those days I owned a bull-dog of marked personality. He never fought
unless he were attacked; but his favourite recreation was to rush at full
speed, head down, at every dog bigger than himself. The instant he caught
sight of a big dog, he shot away like a projectile discharged from a gun;
nothing stopped or turned him; and the unsuspecting object of the
manifestation would go down like a ninepin. Then, unless he were detained
by reprisals, Butcher would return to his master with the air of a dog who
knew his duty and who had done it. At that time the streets of London were
haunted by Italian image-venders, who carried the Twelve Apostles and
other sacred statuettes neatly arranged upon a board, which the merchant
balanced on his head. One of those pious venders was walking directly in the
headlong path of Butcher, who flashed between his legs. Down came the
Apostles, who were dashed to fragments, for which I had to pay about £12 to
the pedlar of saints.

When my dog thought I wanted a hansom, he used to scramble into it,
jump upon the seat, and sit there panting with his tongue hanging out. He
performed this feat one day when an old gentleman, without noticing him,
had hailed a hansom. The old gentleman, climbing slowly into the cab,
suddenly saw the dog on the seat, and was so startled that he tumbled
backwards and knocked his head on the pavement.

In 1876, having passed in torpedo work in the Vernon, I applied for the
appointment of second in command in a big snip, holding then, as I hold
now, that every officer who hopes to obtain flag rank should gain experience
in detailed routine work and in handling and organising men, which can only
be acquired as first lieutenant or commander. The second in command of a
man-of-war gains invaluable experience. He must always look ahead in
order to prevent things occurring which would cause confusion or
discomfort. He has literally not one minute to himself in the day; thinking
ahead, waylaying the wishes of his captain, and providing not only for what
will occur but for what may occur, and being ready to encounter the constant
unforeseen emergencies inseparable from life at sea in a man-of-war.

I was accordingly appointed to the Thunderer as commander. Her captain
was John Crawford Wilson (afterwards Rear-Admiral). The Navy lost one of
the best officers that ever sailed the seas when he died in 1885. He was
mentioned in the Admiral's dispatch for gallant conduct in the affair of the
Peiho Forts in 1859, served on the Pacific Station, and was commodore of
the Australian station. He was commander of the Bombay screw wooden
first-rate, when she was burned off Montevideo on the 14th December, 1864,
and when 97 officers and men perished. Many of those who were lost had
climbed out on the bowsprit, and when they were forced overboard by the
heat, the melting lead of the gammoning (the lead covering to the chain
gammoning securing the bowsprit) dropped on them and killed them. It was
largely due to the splendid discipline maintained by Wilson that the loss was
not far greater. The men held their posts although the flames were licking up
through the skids, so that the falls of the last boat, lowered from the yard-
arm, were actually burned through. It should be added that in this disaster
the Royal Marines enhanced their unrivalled reputation, 34 out of 97 lost
belonging to the corps, the sentries dying at their posts.

The Thunderer was of 9190 (4407) tons, 6270 (800) h.p., and belonged to
the Channel Squadron. She was an improved central battery twin-screw
ironclad, designed, with the vessels of a similar type, Devastation and
Dreadnought, by Mr. E. T. Reed, C.B. In these ships there was no propulsion
by mast and sail power. They also embodied the idea of limiting the
armament to heavy guns, the secondary armament of lighter guns being
omitted. This arrangement, after having been wisely abandoned for many
years, was repeated in the Dreadnought of the year 1906, only to be once
more recognised as a mistake. One of many reasons why a secondary
armament was essential, particularly with muzzle-loading guns, was that,
lacking it, the men might have been exposed to the enemy's fire for some
time before they could reply, a most demoralising position. These
considerations were constantly represented by Captain Wilson to the
Admiralty. While the science of gunnery progressed, the element of time has
remained a factor in the problem, though under different circumstances. The
Thunderer carried two pairs of muzzle-loading guns in two turrets; the
foremost pair being 38-ton guns, hydraulic loading, the after pair 35-ton
guns, hand-loading. She was belted with 14-inch armour along the water
line; and the armour projecting squarely from the hull, its edge struck the
water so hard when the ship rolled, that she was shaken throughout her
structure. To remedy this defect, wedge-shaped pieces were fitted along the
lower edge of the armour. Before I joined the ship she had burst a boiler, the
escaping steam causing great loss of life. Captain Wilson, who was in the
engine-room at the time, was saved by his stature; although he was scalded,
his face was above the level of the steam, being between the deck-beams
where there was an air cushion.

That the boiler exploded was due to the remarkable coincidence of two
factors. The box safety-valve jammed, owing to the two different metals of
which it was constructed expanding in different degrees. And the pressure-
gauge tell-tale, which was fitted in a cogged circle, had the needle forced
right round the circle twice or more, so that it showed a normal pressure. The
actual pressure must have been terrific.

And after I left the ship one of her guns burst. This accident contributed
another instance in favour of breech-loading as opposed to muzzle-loading
guns.

The accident occurred during practice at quarters in the Gulf of Ismid, on
2nd January, 1879, in the fore-turret. Captain Alfred John Chatfield had
succeeded Captain Wilson in command. Two officers and nine men were
killed, and thirty-five persons injured. The muzzle was blown off from about
two feet in front of the trunnions. There was much discussion then and
subsequently concerning the cause of the accident. The probability is that the
bursting of the gun was due to its having been double-loaded, after a
previous miss-fire, which, in the simultaneous discharge of the rest of the
guns, had not been noticed. The committee which reported on the matter on
1st March, 1879, adopted this hypothesis, in preference to the theory that
there had been a flaw in the material.

Captain Edward Seymour (afterwards Admiral of the Fleet the Right Hon.
Sir E. H. Seymour), who was then in command of the troopship Orontes, in
his book, My Naval Career and Travels, thus refers to the incident:—

"From Malta I brought home the main part of the ship's company of
H.M.S. Thunderer, on board which ship the terrible explosion of the 38-ton
muzzle-loading gun had lately occurred in her foremost turret. Both turret
guns were being fired simultaneously, but evidently one did not go off. It
may seem hard to believe such a thing could happen and not be noticed, but
from my own experience I understand it. The men in the turret often stopped
their ears, and perhaps shut their eyes, at the moment of firing, and then
instantly worked the run-in levers, and did not notice how much the guns
had recoiled. This no doubt occurred. Both guns were then at once reloaded,
and the rammer's indicator, working by machinery, set fast and failed to
show how far home the new charge had gone. This, too, may seem unlikely,
but no doubt it happened; and the gun on being then fired burst, killing two
officers and several men, and wrecking the turret. Experiments made with a
similar gun double-loaded, burst it in exactly the same way."

I agree. I have frequently been in the turret during practice, and I have
myself fired several rounds and I can testify that the concussion was so
tremendous that it was impossible to hear whether one gun was fired or both
guns were fired. Without insisting upon details, it was also the fact that the
men in the turret could not tell by the position of the hydraulic rammer
whether or not the gun had already been charged, as the rammer was three-
jointed and telescopic: the indicator which was designed to show the

position of the rammer was totally unreliable; while the actual loading of the
gun was done upon the battery deck below the turret. Hence the loading
crew must also have been unaware that there had been a misfire. The system
in use in the Thunderer was experimental, and after the accident its defects
were remedied. I then wrote to The Times explaining what the system had
been and how it had been improved, in order both to remove any
misapprehension there might have been with regard to the efficiency of the
officers and men who perished in the disaster, and with regard to the future
safety of guns' crews. I was reprimanded by the Admiralty for having
published the letter while on full pay in the command of the Osborne; but
the reprimand was (like the Bishop's apron) a mere form, for I also received
a private letter of thanks.

After the bursting of the boiler, but before the gun accident, the Prince of
Wales at my suggestion very kindly came on board, in order that the men's
belief that the Thunderer was an unlucky ship should be removed. The
Prince fired the fore turret guns at a target from the captain of the guns'
firing position, and made a rattling good shot.

The Thunderer was employed in experimental work, such as measuring
her turning-circle (the diameter of which is the smallest distance the ship can
set between the point at which she begins to describe a semi-circle and the
point at which she ends it), and noting her behaviour under various
circumstances and stresses of weather. I gained much valuable experience in
her, and I shall always remember Captain Wilson as one of those officers
from whose skill and experience I learned the most.

While I was in the Thunderer (1876-7) I made one of the first working
models of the telephone used in this country, and had the honour of
presenting it to H.R.H. the Princess of Wales. The invention was first
exhibited before the British Association by Mr. W. H. Preece on 23rd
August, 1877; and it was shown to Queen Victoria at Osborne on 15th
January, 1878. The Telephone Company was established during the same
year.

LADY CHARLES BERESFORD

The Thunderer was sent to blow up a vessel which had capsized and
which was floating in the Channel, a danger to mariners. Explosives attached
to her side tore pieces out of her, but the wreck continued to float. In these

cases it is necessary to disintegrate the vessel, whether sunk or floating, into
fragments. I suggested that the hull should be girdled with an iron hoop to
which explosives were attached at intervals, and the device was successful.
The explosion cut her into holes like the perforations of a sheet of postage
stamps and she broke up.

The Thunderer was lying off Queenstown, and I was watching a cutter
which was running out of the harbour. On the deck was a group of Irish
farmers. The cutter suddenly gybed, the boom knocking down the farmers.
Getting up, they instantly fell upon one another with sticks; and they were
hard at it when over came the boom again, and again felled them all to the
deck. It could be they had had a drop of liquor taken, which confused their
intellects.

In the year 1878 I married Miss Jeromina Gardner, daughter of the late
Richard Gardner, M.P. for Leicester, and of Lucy Countess Mandelsloh,
whose father, Count Mandelsloh, was for some years Minister in London,
representing Würtemberg.

Shortly afterwards I was appointed to command the royal yacht Osborne.
The Osborne was used by the Prince of Wales (afterwards King Edward
VII). In those days she was not kept in commission for more than a few
months in each year.

Several cruises were made to Denmark, and there were many shooting
expeditions. On one such occasion I was the only person present who was
not either a king actual or a king prospective. There were the King of
Denmark, the King of Norway and Sweden, and the King of Greece, the
Prince of Wales, the Cesarewitch, the Crown Princes of Denmark, of
Norway and Sweden, and of Greece. We shot foxes, hares, deer, and
anything that came along; and I was laughed at when my instincts forbade
me to shoot a fox.

Upon a return voyage, when all the Royal children were on board, a gale
sprang up just off the Skaw. The starboard paddle-wheel was smashed upon
some wreckage; and the next thing I saw was a small craft being driven on a
lee shore. The Osborne dropped anchor, in order both that the paddle-wheel
should be repaired and that the crew of the driving vessel might be assisted.

The only way to rescue them was to veer a boat astern with a hawser. Just as
the arrangement was ready, to my delight I perceived the crew—there were
four—embarking in their own boats. They reached the shore in safety, but
their ship was wrecked.

It was then the system in the royal yachts to retain the officers in her for
long periods. One officer had been in the Osborne for fourteen years. I
ventured to suggest to the Prince of Wales that under these conditions his
acquaintance with the officers of the Fleet was necessarily limited, and that
by means of restricting the time of service in the Osborne to two years, he
might become acquainted with a succession of officers. With his habitual
courtesy and address, the Prince adopted the suggestion.

Queen Victoria was, however, a little perturbed by the change. Her
Majesty said to me that she hoped I should not endeavour to change the
officers in the royal yacht.

"No, ma'am," I replied. "I have no such power. I only made a suggestion
to the Prince."

"You may be right," said the Queen, "but I am an old woman now, and I
like to see faces I know about me, and not have to begin again with new
faces."

We had some excellent boat-racing in the Osborne. One famous race was
rowed at Cowes between the officers of the royal yachts Victoria and Albert
and Osborne, in six-oared galleys. Her Majesty Queen Victoria came down
to the jetty to witness the contest. The stroke of the Victoria and Albert was
my old comrade in the Marlborough and Bellerophon, Swinton Holland. I
was stroke of the Osborne's crew. At first the Osborne drew ahead—rather, I
think, to the Queen's dismay—but eventually the Victoria and Albert won
the race, to the delight of Her Majesty.

Another great race was rowed between the Osborne six-oared galley and
the Dockyard boat. It took place off Southsea, the whole of the foreshore
being lined with people. The Osborne won. Her boat was manned by Irish
bluejackets whom I had trained myself.

While I was commanding the Osborne one of the crew met with a
singular accident. We were shooting the seine off Calshot, and, as it fouled, I
sent a man down to clear it. When he came up, he said that he had been
stabbed through the hand "by some beast." I examined the wound and found
that his hand had been pierced right through, and I thought that he must have
come upon a nail or a splinter in a piece of wreckage. But when we hauled
up the seine, there was a huge sting-ray. I cut out the sting and gave it to the
Princess. There is no doubt that the fish had transfixed the man's hand. The
sailor is still alive, and is well known in Portsmouth for his political
enthusiasms. It was in the same haul that we caught a red mullet weighing
about six pounds, the biggest I have ever seen.

I ought here to record the very great interest taken by the Royal Family in
all matters connected with the Navy. While I was in command of the
Osborne, the Prince of Wales graciously consented to attend one of the
gatherings of members of Parliament who came at my invitation to see
something of the Navy. On this occasion they visited Portsmouth Dockyard,
where they were shown everything of interest.

One of the experiments performed for the entertainment and the
instruction of the party was firing at a floating cask with bombs thrown by
hand, a method of warfare since discontinued owing to the danger it involves
to the person bombarding. When the cask exploded, a stave flew between the
Prince and the general commanding at Portsmouth, Sir Hastings Doyle. Had
it struck either of them he must have been killed.

The general's brother, Percy Doyle, a dear old gentleman well known in
society, had very bad sight. I once saw him trying to eat a red mullet done up
in paper. After a good deal of harpooning, he got it out, but put the paper in
his mouth. We always told him he had swallowed the births, deaths, and
marriages column of The Times.

On Sunday the 24th of March, 1878 (the date of my engagement to Miss
Gardner), the Eurydice, training frigate, capsized off the Isle of Wight in a
sudden squall and sank. The total loss of life was about 300, only two being
saved. She was on her way home from the West Indies. Coming under the
Isle of Wight, she hauled her wind for Spithead, thus closing the land, so that
it was impossible for the watch to see a squall coming up from windward.

The captain, the Hon. Marcus A. S. Hare, was anxious to reach the harbour
as soon as possible in order to give the men Sunday leisure. It was about four
o'clock in the afternoon when a sudden squall struck the ship, and she heeled
over; the lee main-deck ports being open, according to custom, she took in a
good deal of water, depressing her bows; so that instead of capsizing, she
simply sailed straight to the bottom, her fore-foot being broken off with the
force of the impact, and her topgallant masts remaining above the surface.
There was no time to shorten sail. When she was raised it was found that
only one rope, the mainroyal sheet, had carried away.

Rear-Admiral Foley, admiral-superintendent of Portsmouth Dockyard,
kindly invited me to be his guest to take part in the salvage operations
arranged for the raising of the Eurydice. That occasion was, I think, the first
upon which the newly invented wire hawsers were actually tested in
practical work. When they were introduced it was thought that they would
not be flexible enough for their purpose. They were, however, used with
great success in raising the Eurydice. The hawsers were passed under the
hull of the sunken ship and secured to lighters moored on either side of her.
As the tide went down, the hawsers were hove taut, and water was let into
the lighters so that they should be brought as low in the water as possible.
The water was then pumped out of the lighters, thus putting the utmost strain
upon the hawsers. Then, as the rising of the tide exerted a powerful lift upon
lighters and hawsers, the lighters were towed towards the shore, in order to
drag the wreck upon the beach. As soon as she grounded, the hawsers were
fleeted and the whole process gone through again until at low tide she was
nearly high and dry.

My old ship, the Thunderer, which took a hawser to her after capstan to
tow the Eurydice, had the solid iron spindle of the capstan pulled right out of
her, as a long nail is bent and dragged out of a piece of timber. I well
remember the intense excitement when the wreck first shifted from her bed.
Eventually we hauled her up the beach. I was just then taking a bearing for
Admiral Foley, and could not have given a better holloa if I had viewed a
fox.

Before the water was pumped out of her, and as she lay on her side on the
beach, I climbed in at a porthole, and sat there waiting till I could enter. As
the water fell, I saw emerge the sentry's clock on the main-deck. The hands

had stopped at 4.5. The bodies lay in heaps, tangled amid ropes; some had
lost a head and some a limb. Black mud had filtered in everywhere, even (as
Sir Edward Seymour remarks) into the closed drawers of the chests in the
cabins.

When, as a cadet, I was learning to heave the lead from the chains of the
Eurydice, which, as I have already related, was then moored off Haslar
Creek in Portsmouth Harbour, I little thought I should one day help to raise
her from the bottom of the sea.

Dr. Boyd Carpenter (late Bishop of Ripon), in his charming volume of
recollections, Some Pages of my Life, narrates a remarkable story concerning
the Eurydice, as it was told to him. Sir John MacNeill was the Bishop's
cousin and, like other members of his family, had the gift of second sight.

"Sir John MacNeill," writes the Bishop, "was looking out of the window
in Sir John Cowell's room at Windsor, when suddenly he exclaimed: 'Good
Heavens! Why don't they close the portholes and reef the topsails!' Sir John
Cowell looked up and asked him what he meant. He said, in reply, that he
hardly knew; but that he had seen a ship coming up Channel in full sail, with
open portholes, while a heavy squall was descending upon her. At the very
time this conversation was taking place the fatal storm fell upon the
Eurydice, and she foundered as she was coming in sight of home."

In 1880, while I was still in command of the Osborne, I lost my seat at
Waterford. In the following year, desiring to hold another independent
command before my promotion to captain, I applied to go to sea again, and
was appointed to command H.M.S. Condor.

CHAPTER XVII
WITH THE PRINCE IN INDIA

In September, 1875, I was appointed A.D.C. to the Prince of Wales (our
late King) to accompany his Royal Highness upon his visit to India. The

complete list of the suite was as follows: The Duke of Sutherland, K.G.; Sir
Bartle Frere; Lord Suffield, Head of the Prince's Household; Major-General
Lord Alfred Paget, Clerk-Marshal to H.M. the Queen; Lord Aylesford;
Major-General Probyn, V.C., Equerry to the Prince, in charge of the transport
and sporting arrangements; Colonel Arthur Ellis, Grenadier Guards, Equerry
to the Prince; Mr. Francis Knollys (afterwards Lord Knollys), the Prince's
private secretary; Surgeon-General Fayrer, Physician to the Prince; Captain
H. Carr Glyn, Royal Navy, A.D.C. to H.M. the Queen commanding H.M.S.
Serapis; Colonel Owen Williams; Lieutenant Lord Charles Beresford, Royal
Navy, A.D.C. to the Prince; Lord Carington, A.D.C. to the Prince; the Rev.
Canon Duckworth, Chaplain; Lieutenant (afterwards Colonel) Augustus
FitzGeorge, Rifle Brigade extra A.D.C. to the Prince; Commander Durrant,
Royal Navy, commanding royal yacht Osborne; Dr. W. H. Russell, hon.
private secretary to the Prince, chronicler of the voyage; Mr. Albert Grey
(afterwards Lord Grey), private secretary to Sir Bartle Frere; Mr. Sydney
Hall, artist.

The Indian officers, who joined the suite at Bombay, and whose energy
and ability were beyond all praise, were Major-General Sam Browne, V.C.,
in charge of transport; Major Williams, in charge of horses and grooms;
Major Bradford, head of the police and responsible for the safety of the
person of the Prince; Major Sartorius, V.C., in charge of tents and servants;
and Major Henderson, linguist.

The first announcement of the intention of the Prince to visit the Indian
Empire was made by Lord Salisbury to the Council of India on 16th March,
1875. The matter was subsequently discussed at length both in Parliament
and in the Press. The condition of affairs in India, where the mass of the
ruling princes and chieftains had still to realise that the rule of the
Honourable East India Company had given place to a greater governance,
rendered the visit of the future Sovereign of paramount importance; and the
Prince's sagacity was seldom more admirably exemplified than in his
determination to visit India as the Heir-Apparent of the Crown. That the
scheme was entirely and supremely successful in achieving the object for
which it was designed, was due to the Prince's zeal, ability, tact and
indomitable vigour. He gave his whole mind to the enterprise; thought of
everything in advance; and set aside his personal comfort and convenience

from first to last. Only one regret was present in the minds of all: the regret
for the unavoidable absence of the Princess.

The whole history of the episode has been so excellently well told by the
late Dr. William Howard Russell, the famous war correspondent, who was a
member of the suite, in his The Prince of Wales's Tour (London, 1877;
Sampson Low) that any detailed account of it on my part would be
superfluous.

The Prince left England on 11th October, 1875, and embarked in H.M.S.
Serapis at Brindisi on the 16th. In the Suez Canal we heard of the purchase
of Suez Canal shares by the British Government. The Serapis arrived at
Bombay on 8th November.

Thenceforward the Prince's tour was an unresting progress of Durbars,
receptions, dinners, visits, processions, ceremonies, speeches, addresses,
fireworks, entertainments, investitures, reviews, varied only by intervals of
sport. From Bombay, the Prince went to Goa, and thence to Ceylon, visiting
Colombo, Kandy, where he viewed the sacred tooth of Gotama Buddha, and
Ruanwalla, where there was an elephant hunt. Then he went to Tuticorin,
Madura, Trichinopoly, Madras, Calcutta, Bankipoor, Benares, Lucknow,
Cawnpore, Delhi, Lahore, Cashmir, Umritsar, Agra, Gwalior, and Jeypoor.
From Jeypoor he went into camp in the Terai and enjoyed excellent sport.
Then, in Nepal, under the auspices of Sir Jung Bahadur, there was the great
elephant hunt. From Nepal the Prince went to Allahabad, then to Bombay,
whence he sailed on 11th March, 1876, having been in India seventeen
weeks exactly. "The Prince," wrote Dr. Russell on that date, "has travelled
nearly 7600 miles by land and 2300 by sea, knows more Chiefs than all the
Viceroys and Governors together, and seen more of the country in the time
than any other living man."

On the outward voyage his Royal Highness visited the King of Greece.
When the King and Queen were leaving the Serapis after dining on board,
we showed them compliment and honour by setting them alight. The blue
lights burning at the main-yard being exactly above the boat in which their
Majesties were going ashore, dropped flakes of fire upon them. The Prince
also visited the Khedive. On the return voyage, the Prince met at Suez Lord
Lytton, who was on his way to India to succeed Lord Northbrook as Viceroy;

was again entertained by the Khedive; visited Malta; called at Gibraltar; and
visited the King of Spain and the King of Portugal. The Serapis was
accompanied by the royal yacht Osborne, Commander Durrant, and H.M.S.
Raleigh, Captain Tryon. The Prince landed in England on 11th May, 1876.

It is worth noting that Lord Lytton went out in the Orontes, one of the
Imperial Service troopships, as they were called. The troopship service was
then at times conducted by the Royal Navy, a practice since discontinued.
The Orontes was commanded by Captain E. H. Seymour (afterwards
Admiral of the Fleet the Right Hon. Sir Edward Seymour, G.C.B., O.M.,
G.C.V.O., LL.D.) In his very interesting book, My Naval Career and
Travels, Sir Edward Seymour writes: "At Suez, by arrangement, we met
H.R.H. the Prince of Wales (our late King) on his way home in the Serapis.
At Aden Lord Lytton landed in state, it being the first point reached of his
new dominions." The point illustrates the working in detail of the great
scheme of Imperial organisation which was conceived by the master-mind of
Disraeli, and which he continued to carry into execution so long as he was in
power.

Upon landing at Bombay, I rode up to Government House with my
brother, Lord William, precisely as I had ridden up with another brother,
Lord Marcus, exactly six years previously, on the same day of the year. Lord
William was then extra A.D.C. to the Viceroy, Lord Northbrook, having been
appointed to that post as a subaltern in the 9th Lancers. He was subsequently
appointed A.D.C. to Lord Lytton, in which capacity he attended the Viceroy
at the Durbar at which Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India. He
was afterwards military secretary to three successive viceroys, Lords Ripon,
Dufferin and Lansdowne; altogether he served on the personal staff of five
viceroys. From 1877 to 1879, while nominally in attendance upon the
Viceroy, Lord William fought in the Jowaki expedition of 1877-78, the
Afghan war, during which he was present at the capture of Ali Musjid, and
the Zulu war of 1879. "In the latter," wrote a military correspondent of The
Times (31st December, 1900), "he served as a staff officer during the
reconnaissance across the White Umvolusi River and at the battle of Ulundi.
It was in Zululand, in July, 1879, that Beresford won the V.C. for halting,
when closely pursued by the enemy, to take a wounded non-commissioned
officer on his horse. When the soldier at first declined to risk the officer's life
by giving the latter's horse a double burden, Beresford is understood to have

hotly declared that unless the man immediately got up on the saddle he
would himself dismount and 'punch his head.'"

For his services in the Burmese expedition of 1886, he received a brevet-
colonelcy; and in 1891 he was promoted full colonel; in 1894 he received
the K.C.S.I.; and thereafter remained on the active list of the Army, but
unemployed. Of his exploits on the turf it is not here the place to speak; but I
may be pardoned if I have placed on record in this place some account of
Lord William's Indian service which extended over nearly twenty years. Few
men have earned so universal an affection as that which Lord William
inspired, alike in European and native. His ability in matters of
administration was remarkable, and he acquired an extraordinary influence
over the natives of India. The correspondent of The Times, already quoted,
observes that Lord William might have had a distinguished career in any
profession; that he might have been a great soldier, a great diplomat, a great
political officer, had not his passion for the turf diverted a part of his
energies. It may be so; but perhaps one may be allowed to say that one liked
him for what he was and not for what he might have been; and also that he
did not do so badly. The warmest affection existed between my brother and
myself; and his death, which occurred in 1900, was a great grief to me. But
that was in the far future when I landed from the Serapis and we rode up to
Government House together.

Of the other members of the Prince's suite I retain the most pleasant
recollections. Among them I especially recall Major-General Probyn
(afterwards General the Right Hon. Sir Dighton Macnaghten Probyn, V.C.,
etc. etc.); Major-General Sam Browne, V.C. (afterwards General Sir Samuel
James Browne, V.C., K.C.S.I., etc.); Major Bradford (afterwards Sir Edward
Ridley Colborne Bradford, Bart., K.C.S.I., G.C.V.O.); Surgeon-General
Fayrer (afterwards Sir Joseph Fayrer, Bart.); and Dr. Russell (afterwards Sir
William Howard Russell, C.V.O., LL.D.).

Major-General Probyn, of magnificent presence, black-bearded, hawk-
eyed, a hero of the Mutiny, was universally respected and beloved by the
native population, over whom he owned a great influence. He was one of the
finest soldiers and most delightful companions it has been my fortune to
know. In 1876, he already had twenty-five years' service, including the
Trans-Indus frontier affair of 1852-57, the Mutiny (in which his name was a

terror), in China in 1860, in the Umbeyla campaign of 1863. He was Colonel
of Probyn's Horse, 11th King Edward's Own Lancers; afterwards Keeper of
the Privy Purse, Comptroller and Treasurer of the Household of the present
King when he was Prince of Wales; and since 1901, extra Equerry to the
King.

Probyn and I assisted at a surgical operation. A mahout had his hand
smashed; and we held him while the surgeon amputated his finger and
thumb.

Major-General Sam Browne, V.C., had served in the second Sikh war
with distinction, and during the Mutiny led the surprise attack upon the
rebels at Sirpura, at dawn upon 31st August, 1858. Almost single-handed, he
charged the guns, receiving the wound resulting in the loss of his arm. For
this service, he was awarded the V.C. During the Prince's tour he represented
the Indian Army; nor could a finer or more efficient representative have been
selected.

Major Bradford had performed gallant and distinguished service in the
Mutiny. He had lost an arm, under circumstances which may be worth
repetition. Together with a brother officer, Captain Curtis, and a trooper,
Bradford was tiger-shooting. Seated in a mechan (tree-shelter), he wounded
a tiger, breaking its back; his second barrel missed fire; and Bradford fell
from the mechan on the top of the tiger, which seized him. Bradford thrust
his fist down the beast's throat; and while Curtis was trying to get another
shot, the tiger mangled Bradford's arm up to the shoulder. Curtis eventually
killed the animal. The party had a long and painful distance to traverse
before they reached help. Bradford's arm was amputated without chloroform.
In 1890, Bradford was appointed commissioner of police in the Metropolis,
at a time when there was a good deal of discontent in the Force, and speedily
proved the worth of his unrivalled experience and ability.

Surgeon-General Fayrer, I remember, had a remarkable way with snakes.
He kept a selection of the most deadly reptiles in a wheelbarrow, nestled in
straw. With his naked hands he would uncover them, and, deftly catching
them by the neck, force them to exhibit their fangs.

Someone composed a set of irreverent verses dedicated to the surgeon-
general:

"Little Joe Fayrer
Sent for his bearer
And asked for his Christmas pie.
e put in his thumb,
And pulled out a plum,
And found it a K.C.S.I."

Dr. W. H. Russell, the famous war correspondent, who in his letters to
The Times during the Crimean war did so much good service, was a most
delightful companion. He is remembered by all who knew him, both for his
talents and for his sympathetic and affectionate disposition and his unfailing
sense of humour. He was one of my greatest friends. During the voyage, he
occupied the cabin next to mine.

The Prince having requested him to provide himself with a uniform, Dr.
Russell designed a kind of Ambassadorial dress of great splendour, with so
generous a gold stripe to his kersey breeches, that we told him he had gold
trousers with a white stripe inside. These effulgent garments unfortunately
carried away when the doctor was climbing upon an elephant, on his way to
a Durbar. I executed temporary repairs upon his person with safety pins; and
implored him not to stoop. But when it came to his turn to bow, bow he
must; the jury rig parted, and a festoon of white linen, of extraordinary
length, waved behind him. Fortunately, the assembled Indian Princes thought
it was part of his uniform.

At Mian Mir, during the ceremony of a great review of troops, Dr.
Russell, who was riding among the suite mounted on a half-broken Arab,
was suddenly heard to shout, "Whoa, you villainous brute!" At the same
moment, several of the suite were knocked endways. The Arab then got the
bit in his teeth, and tore away past the Prince down the whole line. Dr.
Russell's helmet was jerked to the back of his head, his puggaree unfurled in
a long train floating behind him, he vanished into the distance and we did
not see him again until dinner-time. He passed so close to the Prince, that

had the doctor another thickness of gold on his gold trousers, there would
have been an accident to his Royal Highness.

The Duke of Sutherland, during the Prince's journeys overland in India,
took an intense delight in driving the engine, from which it was hard to tear
him away. We had halted at a station where the customary ceremonial had
been arranged, and had changed into uniform, all save the Duke, who was
nowhere to be seen.

"Where can he be?" said the Prince.

I submitted that he might be on the engine, and went to see. Sure enough,
the Duke was sitting on the rail, his red shirt flung open, his sun-helmet on
the back of his head. In either black fist he grasped a handful of cotton
waste, with which he was mopping up the perspiration of honest toil. He
hurried to his carriage to change into uniform; and presently appeared,
buttoning his tunic with one hand. In the other he still grasped a skein of
cotton waste. The Prince looked at him.

"Can nothing be done?" said the Prince sadly.

The great elephant hunt in Nepal took place on the 25th February, 1876,
under the auspices of Sir Jung Bahadur (afterwards the Maharaja Sir Jung
Bahadur, G.C.B., G.C.S.I.). A herd of wild elephants, captained by a male of
gigantic size and valour, who had already vanquished Sir Jung's most
formidable righting elephants, had been tracked down in the forest. Sir Jung
determined that, come what would, he should be captured. Sir Jung led the
Prince and several of his suite, all well mounted on horses, into the forest, to
the rendezvous, to which the wild herd was to be driven. But in the
meantime, the big elephant had given the hunters the slip.

I was of the hunting party, and I had the stiffest run of my life, and at the
end of it there were left besides myself only my companion—I think he was
Mr. Greenwood—and six Indian notables. Mounted on swift pad elephants,
we pursued that tremendous beast at top speed from four o'clock in the
morning till six in the evening, bursting through the jungle, splashing
through rivers, climbing the rocky steeps of hills upon which there appeared
to be no foothold except for monkeys, and down which the elephants slid

upon their bellies. So we rode hour after hour, hanging on the ropes secured
to the guddee, lying flat upon the steed's back to avoid being scraped off his
back by branches, until the quarry, escaping us ran straight into Sir Jung
Bahadur's party of horsemen.

There, in an open space set with sword-like reeds, stood the elephant, his
flanks heaving, his head and trunk moving from side to side. He had one
huge tusk and the stump of the other.

It was the business of the horsemen in front to keep him employed in the
open while the champion fighting elephants, Jung Pershaud and Bijli
Pershaud, were being brought up. Again and again he charged, the riders
eluding his rushes, the Prince among them. A stumble or a fall—and nothing
could have saved the rider. Presently the elephant, wearying of these
profitless tactics, wheeled and took refuge in a swamp, where the reeds and
rushes hid him. But there was nothing to do but await the arrival of the
fighting elephants. The fugitive employed his respite in cooling himself by
pouring water over his heated person. In the meantime, Jung Pershaud, the
terrible rogue elephant, somewhat fatigued like his quarry, was drawing near.
Jung Pershaud, in order to give warning of his very dangerous presence, was
hung about the neck with a large bell, like a railway-station bell. When he
was not in action he was secured with ropes.

Presently, from out the jungle, there sounded the uneven, minatory
clangour of the bell. Everyone shouted that Jung Pershaud was coming. The
hunted elephant paused in his ablutions, turned about, and, pushing the
foliage aside with his trunk, gazed in the direction of the warning note. Then
emerged into view the vast head of Jung Pershaud, painted scarlet. He
moved steadily and directly upon his quarry, who lowered his head,
presenting his long sharp tusk. The tusks of Jung Pershaud were four to five
feet long and ringed with brass.

Jung swung his trunk and dealt the hunted elephant a blow on the head,
then charged him in the flank with a resounding impact, drew back and
charged the reeling beast from behind. The hunted elephant took to flight,
pursued by Jung Pershaud, heading straight for the place where I was
watching the combat among the pads and smaller fighting elephants. These
turned and fled in terror.

The hunted elephant plunged into the wood, ploughing his way through
the undergrowth, leaving Jung Pershaud behind him. Sir Jung Bahadur,
following with the Prince and the rest of the party, adjured us to keep out of
the way of the fleeing beast while keeping him in sight. The quarry checked
at an opening in the forest and remained in the shelter of the trees, while the
Prince, with Sir Jung Bahadur and Dr. Russell, rode across a stream into the
open space. Sir Jung Bahadur sat on his horse and cursed the elephant; who,
after hearkening attentively for a few minutes, suddenly charged the
horsemen.

At the same instant, the second fighting elephant, Bijli Pershaud, burst
out of the jungle, and the two animals met forehead to forehead with a crash.
Bijli Pershaud drew off and charged again, striking the hunted elephant on
the shoulder, and running beside him, charged him heavily again and again,
until the poor driven beast dropped his trunk and uttered a pitiable cry. He
was beaten at last.

As we came up, it was discovered that the elephant was blind of one eye;
everyone commiserated the defeated gladiator; and Sir Jung Bahadur offered
to let him go free should the Prince so desire.

The Prince having accepted the suggestion, the elephant was led captive
away and was secured with thick ropes to a tree. He bent his vast strength to
a last effort to escape, so that the tree creaked and shook under the strain. He
cried aloud in despair, and then stood silent, refusing all food.

They set him free upon the following day, having sawn off his great tusk;
which was presented by Sir Jung Bahadur to the Prince.

A few days before the great hunt took place in Nepal, Sir Jung Bahadur's
regiment of elephants paraded before the Prince. They numbered more than
700, and were drilled to manoeuvre in companies to the sound of the bugle.
After the hunt, the Prince reviewed Sir Jung's army: a corps which, as the
message from the Queen delivered by the Prince recalled in gracious terms,
had tendered valuable help to the British arms upon an important occasion.
The total strength of the army was 114,000 infantry and 420 guns. The
infantry, in addition to rifle and bayonet, carried the kukri, or curved knife,
the national weapon. We witnessed an exhibition of its use by the soldiers,

who vied with one another in cutting, with a single action, slices of soft
wood from a baulk, the cut making a diagonal section. More by good luck
than by merit, I succeeded in cutting the widest section; and perceiving it to
be extremely improbable that I could repeat the performance, I refused the
invitation to try again. Sir Jung Bahadur presented me with the kukri I had
used. I have the weapon now.

With this weapon, I slew a boa-constrictor. Riding an elephant after tiger,
on which occasion shooting at any other game was forbidden, I saw a boa-
constrictor, and dismounted. The great snake was lying asleep, coiled in a
hole in the ground and half hidden in foliage. Selecting a narrowing coil, I
cut nearly through it. The snake darted at me, and I finished it with a stick.
Although it was dead, its body continued to writhe until sunset. For a long
time I kept the skin, but unfortunately it decomposed.

My brother Lord William and I were out pig-sticking, and were riding
after a boar. I got first spear, when the boar knocked both me and my horse
clean over. The boar went on, then turned, and as I was in the act of getting
up, came right at me. Remembering what an old pig-sticker, Archie Hill, had
told me a man should do if he were bowled over and a boar attacked him, I
rolled over on my face, presenting my least vital aspect to the enemy. But
my brother, cleverly turning his horse, killed the boar within a few feet of
me. The beast's head is preserved at Curraghmore.

During the whole time of the Prince's stay in India, one of his suite, the
members of which took it in turns to discharge the duty, remained on guard
over his person at night. I have in my possession the pair of pistols with
which the gentleman on watch was armed.

On 10th January, 1876, the Prince visited the Cawnpore Memorial.
"There was deep silence," writes Dr. Russell, "as the Prince read in a low
voice the touching words, 'To the memory of a great company of Christian
people, principally women and children, who were cruelly slaughtered
here'—the name of the great criminal and the date of the massacre are cut
round the base of the statue. No two persons agree as to the expression of
Marochetti's Angel which stands over the Well. Is it pain?—pity?—
resignation?—vengeance?—or triumph?" Perhaps my aunt, Lady Waterford,

could have enlightened the learned doctor; for she it was who designed the
monument, which was carried into execution by Marochetti.

A certain officer in high command was extremely agitated concerning the
exact degree of precedence due to him—or rather, to the Service to which he
belonged; a matter not easy to settle amid the throng of British dignitaries
and Indian potentates. The officer chafed sorely at the delay; nor was he
soothed by the injurious remarks of a junior member of the suite, who dealt
with his dignity in a spirit of deplorable frivolity. At last, however, the junior
member approached him with the aspect of sympathetic gravity proper to the
occasion.

"I congratulate you, sir. That matter of your order of precedence has been
settled at last."

"I am glad to hear it—very glad to hear it," said the officer. "The delay
has been simply scandalous. What is to be my position?"

The junior member appeared to reflect.

"Oh, of course," he said, at length. "Now I remember. Your place, sir, is
between the Ram of (something) and the Jam of (something else)!"

The distinguished officer: "...!!!"

On 30th November, 1875, while the Serapis was on her way from
Bombay to Colombo, the Prince kindly presided at a dinner given in honour
of my promotion to the rank of commander. In a letter written to me by his
Royal Highness some years afterwards, he recalls that festivity, with a note
of regret that those jolly days were gone. Three years afterwards, upon the
occasion of my marriage, the suite presented me with a most beautiful silver
bowl, which remains one of my most highly prized possessions.

There were many Babu poems composed to celebrate the Prince's
prowess as a hunter. Among them, I remember the following:—

"Beautifully he will shoot
Many a royal tiger brute;

Laying on their backs they die,
Shot in the apple of the eye."

Seven years afterwards, I visited India again. It seemed to me that in the
interval the relations between the Indian and the Englishman had changed
for the better; in that the natives were less afraid of the white man, and that a
better feeling had grown up between East and West. The principle upon
which India is governed is the principle of establishing justice and humanity.
India is governed by the sword; but the sword is sheathed.

CHAPTER XVIII
THE EGYPTIAN WAR

I. THE BEGINNING OF TROUBLE

NOTE

The story of the Egyptian war may conveniently begin with an account of
the affair of the 9th September, 1881, when Tewfik, Khedive of Egypt, met
Arabi Pasha face to face in the Square of Abdin at Cairo, and failed to take
advantage of the greatest opportunity of his life. Had he acted there and then
upon the counsel of Mr. (afterwards Sir) Auckland Colvin, British
Controller, it is possible that the Egyptian war might have been avoided.

The beginning of the trouble was the jealousy existing between the native
Egyptian and the Turkish, or Circassian, elements of the army. Rightly or
wrongly, the Egyptian, or fellah, officers believed themselves to be slighted.
The Turkish, or Circassian, officers, being of the same race as the ruling
family, regarded themselves as the dominant caste. In the time of Ismail
Pasha, the predecessor of Tewfik, the Minister of War, Osman Pasha Rifki, a
Circassian, perceived that his dignity was compromised by his being obliged
to receive orders from the Khedive through Ali Fehmi, captain of the Guards

at the Palace, a fellah. In the East, such a situation does not continue. Ali
Fehmi mysteriously fell into disgrace. Naturally, he had a grievance; and he
joined himself to two other officers of his race, who also had grievances.
These were Abdel-el-Al and Ahmed Arabi, who was to become better known
as Arabi Pasha. They were called the "Three Colonels," and to them came
Mahmoud Sami Pasha, an exceedingly astute politician.

Arabi's particular injury was that he had been punished by Ismail for
creating a disturbance under the Palace windows, when he was one of the
officers of the guard. Ismail had bluntly remarked that Arabi was more noisy
but less useful than the big drum. Arabi joined a secret society of
discontented officers, and shortly afterwards again fell into trouble under a
charge of corruption while he was in command of transports during the war
between Egypt and Abyssinia. Subsequently, Ismail allowed Arabi to join a
regiment, whereupon he became chief of the secret society. One of its
members divulged the secret to the Khedive, who adopted the Oriental
method of buying the allegiance of the disaffected officers by promoting in
one day seventy of them to be lieutenant-colonels. He also presented one of
his slaves to Arabi to wife.

So much for Ismail Pasha. When, by order of the Sultan, he was
superseded by Tewfik, Arabi made haste to do obeisance to the new
Khedive, who made him a full colonel. But when Tewfik reduced the army,
the Three Colonels presented a petition to the Khedive, demanding, among
other matters, that an Egyptian should be made Minister of War in place of
Osman Rifki. The Three Colonels were thereupon arrested. Mahmoud Sami
Pasha, a member of the Cabinet, secretly arranged that when they were
brought before the Court-martial, the soldiers should rescue them. On the 1st
February, 1881, accordingly, the soldiers burst into the court, turned it inside
out, and carried the Three Colonels to the Palace. The Khedive, confronted
with physical force to which he had nothing to oppose, consented to
supersede his War Minister in favour of the crafty Mahmoud Sami, to
increase the army by 18,000 men, and to abolish favouritism.

The Khedive very soon discovered that Mahmoud Sami was by no means
a desirable Minister of War, and also that the Three Colonels and their
friends continued to stir up trouble. He therefore dismissed Mahmoud Sami
and appointed in his stead the Khedive's brother-in-law, Daoud Pasha, a

Circassian, and ordered the disaffected regiments to leave Cairo. At the same
time it was rumoured that the Khedive had obtained a secret decree from the
Sultan condemning Arabi and his friends to death. When the order to remove
his regiment from Cairo was received by Arabi, that leader of revolt
informed the Minister of War on 9th September, 1881, that the troops in
Cairo would proceed the same afternoon to the Palace of Abdin, there to
demand of the Khedive the dismissal of the Ministry, the convocation of the
National Assembly, and the increase of the army. Then came Tewfik's
opportunity, which, as already observed, he let slip.

When the Khedive entered the Square, accompanied by Mr. Colvin,
British Controller, and a few native and European officers, he was
confronted with some 4000 soldiers and thirty guns. The following account
of the critical moment is given by the Hon. Charles Royle, in his excellent
history of The Egyptian Campaigns (London, 1900).

"The Khedive advanced firmly towards a little group of officers and men
(some of whom were mounted) in the centre. Colvin said to him, 'When
Arabi presents himself, tell him to give up his sword and follow you. Then
go the round of the regiments, address each separately, and give them the
"order to disperse."' The soldiers all this time were standing in easy attitudes,
chatting, laughing, rolling up cigarettes, and eating pistachio nuts, looking,
in fact, as little like desperate mutineers as could well be imagined. They
apparently were there in obedience only to orders, and, without being either
loyal or disloyal, might almost be regarded as disinterested spectators.

"Arabi approached on horseback: the Khedive called out to him to
dismount. He did so, and came forward on foot with several others, and a
guard with fixed bayonets, and saluted. As he advanced, Colvin said to the
Khedive, 'Now is the moment, give the word.' He replied, 'We are between
four fires. We shall be killed.' Colvin said, 'Have courage.' Tewfik again
wavered, he turned for counsel to a native officer at his side, and repeated,
'What can I do? We are between four fires.' He then told Arabi to sheathe his
sword. Arabi did so at once, his hand trembling so with nervousness that he
could scarcely get the weapon back into its scabbard. The moment was lost.
Instead of following Colvin's advice, and arresting Arabi on the spot, a step
which would have at once put an end to the whole disturbance, the Khedive
walked towards him and commenced to parley."

The Khedive subsequently agreed to dismiss the Ministry at Arabi's
request; and Arabi thus advanced another step towards obtaining military
control of the country. For a time he prevented Cherif Pasha from forming a
Ministry, and summoned to Cairo the Chamber of Notables. The members of
the Chamber, however, whose office was purely advisory, supported Cherif
Pasha. By means of a skilful intrigue, Mahmoud Sami contrived to obtain
the appointment of Minister of War. Arabi then effected a temporary retreat
with his regiment to El Ouady, in the Delta, and waited upon events. It was
then October. The Khedive had convoked an assembly of the Chamber of
Notables at the end of December, and in the meantime the elections were
proceeding.

It should here be observed that Arabi did not merely represent discontent
in the army. He had behind him a genuine and largely just popular agitation,
the result of many evils suffered by the natives. "Ismail's merciless
exactions, and the pressure of foreign moneylenders, had given rise to a
desire to limit the power of the Khedive, and, above all, to abolish the
Anglo-French control, which was considered as ruling the country simply
for the benefit of the foreign bondholders. The control was further hated by
the large landholders, because the law of liquidation (with which the
Controllers in the minds of the people were associated) had in a measure
sacrificed their claims for compensation in respect of the cancelling of a
forced loan known as the 'Moukabaleh,' and it was still more detested by the
Pashas and native officials, because it interfered with the reckless
squandering of public money, and the many opportunities for corruption by
which they had so long been benefited. In addition to this, there was a great
deal of irritation at the increasing number of highly paid European officials
which the reformed administration inaugurated in the latter days of Ismail
involved. The people began to suspect that what was occurring was only part
of a plan for handing the country over to Europeans. The examples lately set
by England with regard to Cyprus, and by France in Tunis, were, it must be
owned, but little calculated to inspire confidence in the political morality of
either of these two Powers" (Royle, The Egyptian Campaigns).

In these things consisted the reserve strength of Arabi; and while he was
ostensibly in retirement at El Ouady (probably spending a good deal of time
in Cairo with his fellow-conspirators), the native press continued to excite
irritation against the Europeans; and when the new Chamber of Notables

assembled on 25th December, 1881, they at once presented demands which
brought the whole situation in Egypt to the notice of Europe. The Chamber
demanded control of the revenues outside those assigned to the Public Debt,
together with other new powers directly infringing the prerogatives of the
Sultan and of the Khedive. It seems that Mahmoud Sami inspired these
manifestations, not with any hope or desire that the demands of the Chamber
would be granted, but because, as they were inadmissible, the Ministry of
Cherif Pasha would be wrecked, and Mahmoud Sami thereby advantaged.

The British and French Governments declared that the demands of the
Chamber were unacceptable. At the same time they learned that the coast
fortifications were being strengthened and that the army was to be increased.
On behalf of the two Powers, a Joint Note was presented to the Khedive in
Cairo, on 8th January, 1882, stating that England and France were united in
opposing "the dangers to which the Government of the Khedive might be
exposed."

The presentation of the Joint Note marks the beginning of that European
intervention which might have prevented, but which did not prevent, the
massacre in Alexandria of the 11th June, 1882, and which eventually
resulted in the bombardment of that city on 11th July, 1882. The jealousy
existing between France and England at that time in respect of intervention
in Egypt, nullified the effective action of either party. Had M. Gambetta
continued in power, he would probably have forced Lord Granville to adopt
a decisive policy. But M. de Freycinet, who succeeded Gambetta while the
question was still under discussion, was as much afraid of responsibility as
Lord Granville was. Diplomacy thus returned to its customary routine of
addressing Circular Notes to the European Powers, and generally avoiding
definition as long as possible. Arabi seized his opportunity and announced
that intervention on the part of England and France was inadmissible. The
Chamber of Notables also saw their chance, and demanded the dismissal of
the Ministry. The Khedive, apparently deserted by England and France, and
much afraid of offending the Sultan, had no choice but to dismiss Cherif
Pasha and to appoint in his stead Mahmoud Sami, who thus attained his
object. Mahmoud Sami immediately appointed Arabi Pasha Minister of War.
Arabi thus achieved a military dictatorship. It will be observed that his
success was directly due to the vacillation of the English and French
Governments. Mahmoud Sami at once forced the Khedive to assent to the

demands of the Chamber, and the English and French Controllers resigned,
upon the ground that "the Khedive's power no longer exists."

The dictators, Mahmoud Sami and Arabi (now Arabi Pasha), strengthened
the coast fortifications, ordered ninety guns of Herr Krupp, and rapidly
increased the army. Then the dictators, considering that the hour of their
vengeance had arrived, arrested fifty of the hated Circassian officers, (it is
said) tortured them, and sentenced forty of them to perpetual exile. The
Khedive refused to sign the Decree; whereupon Mahmoud Sami threatened
that his refusal would be followed by a general massacre of foreigners. A
month later, on 11th June, such a massacre occurred. In the meantime, the
open quarrel between the Khedive on the one side, and his Ministers, backed
by the army, on the other, created general alarm. Mahmoud Sami convoked
the Chamber; only to discover that the Notables were afraid to support him.
Under these circumstances, Mahmoud Sami and Arabi Pasha informed the
Khedive that, on condition that he would guarantee the maintenance of
public order, they would resign. The Khedive replied in effect that it was not
he but Arabi that troubled Israel. On the next day, 15th May, 1882, the
English and French Consuls-General warned Arabi that in the event of
disturbance, England, France and Turkey would deal with him. Arabi
retorted that if a Fleet arrived, he could not be responsible for the safety of
the public. Upon the same day the Consul-General informed the Khedive
that an Anglo-French Fleet was on its way to Alexandria, whereupon
Mahmoud Sami and the rest of the Ministry made a formal submission to the
Khedive.

Such was the first influence, exerted from afar, of naval power. But when,
upon the 19th and 20th May, the ships arrived at Alexandria, the effect was
considerably lessened; for the force consisted of no more than one British
line-of-battle ship, H.M.S. Invincible, with two gunboats, and one French
line-of-battle ship, La Gallisonière, with two gunboats. The object of the
Granville-Freycinet diplomacy, to do something and yet not to do it, had thus
been triumphantly achieved.

The instructions given to the British and French admirals respectively are
worth noting.

The British admiral was told to:

"Communicate with the British Consul-General on arrival at Alexandria,
and in concert with him propose to co-operate with naval forces of France to
support the Khedive and protect British subjects and Europeans, landing a
force, if required, for latter object, such force not to leave protection of ships'
guns without instructions from home."

It will be observed that Admiral Sir Frederick Beauchamp Seymour was
not given enough men to form an efficient landing party; so that the futile
clause concerning "the protection of the ships' guns" is hardly worth
considering.

The French instructions were at least logical. The French admiral was
plainly told to do nothing except in an emergency.

"On arrival at Alexandria communicate with the Consul-General, who
will, if necessary, indicate to you what you will have to do to give a moral
support to the Khedive. You will abstain, until you have contrary
instructions, from any material act of war, unless you are attacked or have to
protect the safety of Europeans."

Acting on the advice of the Consuls-General, the Khedive endeavoured to
induce Mahmoud Sami and Arabi to resign. The dictators refused. The
Consuls-General thereupon presented them with an ultimatum, and the
Ministry resigned; but the Khedive was subsequently compelled by the
threats of the army and the prayers of the terrified notables to reinstate Arabi
Pasha. That leader at once published a proclamation stating that he
guaranteed the public safety, which failed, however, to allay the public fears.
On 29th May the European population of Alexandria drew up a memorial,
which was telegraphed to the Foreign Office, stating that they were placed in
extreme peril, against which the force at the disposal of the British admiral
was totally inadequate.

Upon the same day, Admiral Seymour reported that earthworks were
being raised on shore, and asked for reinforcements. On 30th May another
line-of-battle ship arrived, with two gunboats, and three French warships.
The rest of the British squadron in the Mediterranean were directed to cruise
within touch of the admiral.

On the 7th June an Imperial Commissioner, Dervish Pasha, dispatched by
the Sultan, arrived at Cairo. He was instructed to play a double part, the
object of his mission being to counteract European influence. It was a
complicated intrigue; but it is not worth unravelling, because Dervish Pasha
presently discovered that the ruler of Egypt was Arabi Pasha.

Such is a summary of events up to the eve of the riots in Alexandria. At
that moment, Arabi Pasha was military dictator; backed by the army and
supported by popular sentiment: the Khedive, still nominally ruler, was
deprived of power and went in peril of his life; the Sultan, his overlord,
whose dominant motive was the desire to avoid foreign intervention in
Egypt, wrapped himself in diplomatic ambiguity; England and France, the
only interested foreign Powers, each afraid of the other and both afraid of
incurring responsibility, were in a state of miserable vacillation, for which
(as usual) many helpless and innocent persons paid with their lives and
property. In these circumstances, the advantage lay with the man who knew
his own mind. That man was Arabi Pasha.

It seemed that nothing could better serve his ends than an organised
massacre of Europeans by the populace, during which the police and the
army should remain passive; for nothing could more effectually demonstrate
the power of the dictator, bring the Khedive into contempt, flout the foreign
Powers which had exhibited so contemptible a weakness, and delight the
populace.

Accordingly, on Sunday, 11th June, 1882, a devastating riot broke out in
Alexandria. The natives had been armed beforehand with naboots, or long
sticks; the mustaphazin, or military police, joined in the attack; the soldiers
remained immobile until Arabi telegraphed his orders from Cairo, when they
at once stopped the disturbance. During the day, men, women and children,
European and native, were shot, beaten, and murdered, and the town was
looted. The loss of life was estimated at 150 persons.

In the evening the troops restored order, and subsequently maintained it
up to the day of the bombardment. During that period, large numbers of
persons left the city. Refugees of all nations were embarked in the harbour.

Lord Salisbury, who was then in Opposition, trenchantly exposed the true
character of a policy whose direct result was that British subjects were
"butchered under the very guns of the Fleet, which had never budged an inch
to save them." The Government had not given the admiral an adequate force.
It was the old story of the naval officer being forced to subserve the ends of
the politicians.

In England, public indignation forced the Government to take action. The
Channel Squadron was dispatched to Malta, there to remain at Admiral
Seymour's disposal. Two battalions were sent to Cyprus.

Arabi Pasha brought more troops to Alexandria and continued to fortify
the coast defences. In the meantime the Navy was helping to embark the
refugees.

From this point, the general course of events may conveniently be related
in the form of a diary, thus supplementing, for the purposes of reference, the
detailed narrative of Lord Charles Beresford.

On 11th July the British Fleet bombarded the coast forts. The warships of
other nations took no part in the action. The British force consisted of fifteen
vessels and 5728 men; eight ironclads, five gunboats, a torpedo vessel and
dispatch vessel. The forts were silenced and the gunners were driven from
their batteries.

On 12th July the city was set on fire by the Egyptian troops. These,
accompanied by civilians, looted the city and so departed.

On 13th July the British admiral landed 800 men. It will be observed that
had Admiral Seymour been permitted to land a force upon the preceding day,
he could have disarmed the Egyptian troops and prevented the conflagration.
The Khedive had taken refuge in his Palace at Ramleh, and the Condor,
Commander Lord Charles Beresford, was sent to lie off the Palace to protect
him. Captain John Fisher, H.M.S. Inflexible, was ordered to take command
of the landing party. Upon occupying the outer lines, Captain Fisher, finding
chaos in the town, in rear of his position, applied for an officer to exercise
the duties of provost-marshal and chief of police, and suggested that Lord
Charles Beresford should be appointed.

On 14th July the British force was occupying all important positions.

On 15th July Admiral Dowell, commanding the Channel Squadron,
arrived in the Monarch. Lord Charles Beresford was appointed provost-
marshal and chief of police to restore order.

Mr. John Ross, the British merchant in Alexandria who gave unsparing
and generous assistance to the British forces,—services for which he has
never received recognition—writes to me as follows:—

"Lord Charles Beresford saved millions' worth of property, causing the
indemnity paid by the European Government to be much less than it would
otherwise have been. I can assure you that there was a chance of the whole
of Alexandria being burnt to the ground, had it not been for the wonderfully
prompt, energetic, and scientific arrangements made by Lord Charles
Beresford... I do not think England can ever be made to know properly and
understand and appreciate enough with regard to what Lord Charles
Beresford did for his country as well as for Egypt in 1882."

On 17th July 1000 Marines and 1700 soldiers arrived. General Sir
Archibald Alison took command of the whole of the land forces, now
numbering in all, 3686.

On the 20th July the British Government decided to dispatch an
expedition to Egypt.

On the 21st July the water supply of Alexandria began to fail, Arabi
having dammed the flow from the Nile into the Mahmoudieh Canal, and let
salt water into it from Lake Mareotis. Hitherto the supply had been
maintained by the gallant exertions of Mr. T. E. Cornish, manager of the
waterworks. Sir Archibald Alison began his attacking movements.

On the 22nd July the Khedive dismissed Arabi Pasha from his post of
Minister of War. Arabi Pasha was now at Kafr Dowar with 5000 to 30,000
men. A battalion of British troops sailed from Bombay.

On the 24th July Mr. Gladstone informed Parliament that the country was
"not at war." On the same day the British troops occupied Ramleh, a suburb
of Alexandria.

At this time Captain Fisher fitted out the armoured train.

On the 30th July the Scots Guards sailed for Alexandria. From the
beginning to end of the war, there were dispatched, or under orders, from
Great Britain and Mediterranean stations, 1290 officers and 32,000 men.
Add the Indian contingent, 170 officers, 7100 men, consisting of 1st
Seaforths, 1st Manchester, 1 Bombay and 2 Bengal battalions Native
Infantry, 3 regiments Bengal Cavalry, 1 field battery, 1 mountain battery, and
a section of Madras Sappers and Miners. Add to these, 3500 followers, 1700
horses, 840 ponies, 5000 mules.

On the 1st August Lord Charles Beresford, having in the space of a
fortnight saved the town of Alexandria from destruction and restored
complete order, was relieved by Major Gordon.

On the 2nd August Admiral Sir William Hewett, with six vessels of war,
occupied Suez.

On 3rd August the National Council declared its support of Arabi Pasha.

On 5th August General Alison attacked and defeated the enemy on the
Mahmoudieh Canal.

On the 7th August the Khedive issued a proclamation directed against
Arabi Pasha and rebellion.

On the 10th August Sir John Adye, chief of staff, with the Duke of
Connaught, arrived at Alexandria.

On the 12th August the Brigade of Guards, the Duke of Connaught at
their head, marched through Alexandria to Ramleh, greatly impressing the
populace.

On the 15th, General Commanding-in-Chief Sir Garnet Wolseley and
Major-General Sir Evelyn Wood arrived at Alexandria.

On the 18th August the greater part of the troops embarked for Port Said,
the transports being escorted by five ironclads.

On the night of the 19th-20th August the Navy took entire possession of
the Suez Canal. The Monarch and Iris took Port Said. The Orion,
Northumberland, Carysfort and Coquette took Ismailia. Admiral Hewett had
already seized Suez.

On the 20th of August the troops and warships from Alexandria arrived at
Port Said, together with Admiral Sir Beauchamp Seymour in the Helicon. M.
Ferdinand de Lesseps had done his utmost to prevent the seizure of the
Canal, which, he insisted, was neutral. It is said that when the troops began
to disembark at Ismailia, M. de Lesseps, erect upon the landing-place,
announced that "no one should land except over his dead body"; to which
defiance a bluejacket, gently urging aside the heroic engineer, replied, "We
don't want any dead bodies about here, sir; all you've got to do is to step
back a bit" (Royle, Egyptian Campaigns).

On the 21st August Sir Garnet Wolseley arrived at Ismailia in the
Salamis, and, by orders of the Khedive, issued a proclamation announcing
that the sole object of Her Majesty's Government was "to re-establish the
authority of the Khedive."

The advance into the Delta was begun.

On the 24th August Wolseley captured the dam on the Fresh Water Canal.

On the 25th August the enemy were driven back upon Tel-el-Kebir.
Mahmoud Fehmi Pasha, one of the original "Three Colonels," now Arabi's
chief of staff, was captured at Mahsameh railway station.

On the 28th August occurred the action at Kassassin, in which the
Egyptians were defeated. Kassassin was occupied. During the next few days
men and stores were assembled there.

On the 9th September Arabi attacked Kassassin in force and was driven
back to Tel-el-Kebir. Sir Garnet Wolseley made Kassassin his headquarters.

On the 12th September the army was concentrated at Kassassin. On that
night the troops advanced towards Tel-el-Kebir.

On the 13th September an attack at dawn was made in three places upon
the Egyptian entrenchments. The British carried them under a heavy fire at
the point of the bayonet. The action was decisive. Arabi's power was broken.
Arabi fled to Cairo.

The 6th Bengal Cavalry captured Zag-a-Zig the same evening; and the
Cavalry division occupied Belbeis.

On 14th August the Cavalry Division rode from Belbeis to Cairo, starting
at dawn and arriving at Abbassieh at 4.45 p.m. The same night, Captain
Watson, R.E., disarmed the troops in the Citadel and occupied Cairo.

On the 15th August Sir Garnet Wolseley and the Guards arrived at Cairo,
a day before scheduled time.

During the next week, Kafr Dowar, a place of equal importance with Tel-
el-Kebir, Aboukir, Rosetta and Damietta, surrendered.

From the bombardment of Alexandria to the capture of Cairo was sixty-
six days, of which the campaign occupied twenty-five days.

On the 25th September the Khedive returned to Cairo, where the greater
number of the British troops assembled. Subsequently, Admiral Sir
Beauchamp Seymour and Sir Garnet Wolseley were created Peers of the
United Kingdom.

Arabi Pasha was tried by court-martial on a charge of rebellion against
the Khedive, and was condemned to death, the sentence being commuted to
exile for life. In December, Arabi and six of his friends who had been
sentenced sailed for Ceylon.

CHAPTER XIX
THE EGYPTIAN WAR (Continued)

II. THE BOMBARDMENT OF ALEXANDRIA

My appointment to H.M.S. Condor was dated 31st December, 1881. The
Condor was a single-screw composite sloop gun-vessel of 780 tons and 770
h.p., carrying one 4½-ton gun amidships, one 64-pr. forward and one 64-pr.
aft, all muzzle-loading guns. In June, 1882, the Condor formed part of the
squadron lying off Alexandria under the command of Admiral Sir
Beauchamp Seymour.

On Sunday, 11th June, calling upon Captain Blomfield, the harbour-
master, I found him in great distress. He had heard that there was trouble in
the city, into which his wife had gone, and he was extremely anxious about
her safety. We took a light carriage harnessed to a pair of Arab horses and
drove into the town. Presently a great crowd came running down the street
towards us. They were mostly Greeks, many of whom were wounded and
bleeding. The next moment we were surrounded by a raging mob, armed
with naboots, or long sticks, with which they attacked us. The street was
blocked from end to end; and to have attempted to drive through the mob
would have been certain death. I seized the reins, swung the horses round,
cleared the crowd, and drove back to the harbour-master's house. In the
meantime his wife had taken refuge in an hotel, whence she safely returned
later in the day.

The officers and men of the Fleet were ordered back to their ships. I went
on board the flagship and reported to the admiral the condition of the town.
With the trifling force at his disposal, it was impossible that he should send a
landing-party ashore. Had he done so, in contravention of his orders, the
handful of British seamen and Marines would have had no chance against
the thousands of Egyptian soldiers who, under Arabi's instructions, were
waiting in their barracks under arms, ready to turn out at the first attempt at
intervention on the part of the Fleet.

During the ensuing month there poured out of Alexandria an immense
number of refugees of all nations and every class of society. These were
placed on board various vessels and were dispatched to the ports of their
several countries. I was placed in charge of these operations; which included
the chartering of ships, their preparation for passengers, and the embarkation
of the refugees. In the course of the work there fell to me a task rarely

included even among the infinite variety of the duties of a naval officer. My
working-party was stowing native refugees in the hold of a collier, when a
coloured lady was taken ill. She said: "Baby he come, sare, directly, sare,
myself, sare." And so it was. We rigged up a screen, and my coxswain and I
performed the office of midwives thus thrust upon us, and all went well.

On the 10th July all merchant vessels and all foreign men-of-war left the
harbour, and the British Fleet prepared for action. Admiral Seymour's
squadron consisted of fifteen vessels: the ironclads Alexandra (flagship),
Captain C. F. Hotham; Superb, Captain T. Le Hunte Ward; Sultan, Captain
W. J. Hunt-Grubbe; Téméraire, Captain H. F. Nicholson; Inflexible, Captain
J. A. Fisher; Monarch, Captain H. Fairfax, C.B.; Invincible, Captain R. H.
M. Molyneux; Penelope, Captain S. J. C. D'Arcy-Irvine: the torpedo-vessel
Hecla, Captain A. K. Wilson; gunboats Condor, Commander Lord C.
Beresford; Bittern, Commander Hon. T. S. Brand; Beacon, Commander G.
W. Hand; Cygnet, Lieutenant H. C. D. Ryder; Decoy, Lieutenant A. H.
Boldero; and dispatch vessel Helicon, Lieutenant W. L. Morrison. The coast
fortifications extended over a front of rather more than nine miles, from Fort
Marabout on the south-west to Fort Silsileh on the north-east. Midway
between the two, projects the forked spit of land whose northern arm
encircles the new Port, and whose southern arm, extending in a breakwater,
encloses the old Port. The twelve forts or batteries mounted in all 261 guns
and mortars.

THE BOMBARDMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, 11TH JULY, 1882.
FROM CHART DRAW BY AUTHOR AT THE TIME

The bombardment of Alexandria has been so thoroughly described in
standard works that repetition must be unnecessary; and such interest as the
present narrative may contain, must reside in the record of personal
experience. I may say at once that any notoriety attached to the part borne by
the Condor in the action was due to accidental circumstance. She happened
to fight apart from the rest of the Fleet and in full view of the foreign
warships and merchant vessels; and, in obedience to the orders of the
admiral, she had on board the correspondent of The Times, the late Mr.
Moberly Bell. The Condor was actually under way when I received
instructions to embark Mr. Bell. Mr. Frederic Villiers, the artist war-
correspondent, by permission of the admiral, had been my guest on board for
several days.

The following account of the action is taken from a private letter written
at the time:—

"The night before the action, I turned up all hands and made them a
speech. I said that the admiral's orders were to keep out of range until an
opportunity occurred. So I said to the men, 'Now, my lads, if you will rely
upon me to find the opportunity, I will rely upon you to make the most of it
when it occurs.' ... The Marabout Fort was the second largest fort, but a long
way off from the places to be attacked by the ironclads. So the admiral had
decided not to attack it at all, as he could not spare one heavy ship, and of
course he would not order the small ships down there, as it was thought that
they would be sunk. The orders given to the small ships were to keep out of
fire, and to watch for an opportunity to occur, after the forts were silenced, to
assist. Helicon and Condor were repeating ships for signals. I took station
just between the two attacking fleets.

"Just as the action began the Téméraire parted her cable and got ashore. I
ran down to her and towed her off and while doing so, saw Fort Marabout
giving pepper to Monarch, Invincible and Penelope. Not one of these ships
could be spared, as they were getting it hot and could not spare a gun for
Marabout from the forts they were engaging. Seeing the difficulty, directly I
had got the Téméraire afloat I steamed down at full speed and engaged Fort
Marabout, on the principle that according to orders 'an opportunity' had
occurred.... I thought we should have a real rough time of it, as I knew of the
heavy guns, and I knew that one shot fairly placed must sink us. But I hoped
to be able to dodge the shoals, of which there were many, and get close in,
when I was quite sure they would fire over us. That is exactly what occurred.
I got in close and manoeuvred the ship on the angle of the fort, so that the
heavy guns could hardly bear on me, if I was very careful. The smooth-bores
rained on us, but only two shots hit, the rest went short or over. One heavy
shot struck the water about six feet from the ship, wetting everyone on the
upper deck with spray, and bounded over us in a ricochet.

"I did not fire on the smooth-bores at all until I had silenced the heavy
guns which were annoying Invincible, Monarch, and Penelope. The men
fired splendidly. I put all down to the lectures I have given them at target
practice, telling them never to throw a shot away, but always to wait until
they got the sights on.

ON BOARD H.M.S. "CONDOR," 11TH JULY, 1882.
FROM A DRAWING BY FREDERIC VILLIERS

"Hedworth Lambton told me afterwards that the admiral had just sent on
the signal for the Monarch to go to Fort Marabout as soon as she could be
spared, when he heard a cheer from his own men. He asked, 'What's that?'
and they told him they were cheering the Condor. Just then our three guns
were fired, and each shot hit in the middle of the heavy battery, and the
Invincible's men burst into a cheer. The admiral said, 'Good God, she'll be
sunk!' when off went our guns again, cheers rang out again from the flagship
and the admiral, instead of making 'Recall Condor; made 'Well done,
Condor' ... at the suggestion of Hedworth Lambton, the flag-lieutenant.

"We then remained there two and a half hours, and had silenced the fort
all except one gun, when the signal was made to all the other small craft to
assist Condor, and down they came and pegged away. I was not sorry, as the

men were getting a bit beat. We were then recalled to the flagship, 'Captain
repair on board,' and the admiral's ship's company gave us three cheers, and
he himself on the quarterdeck shook me warmly by the hand, and told me he
was extremely pleased.... I never saw such pluck as the Egyptians showed.
We shelled them and shot them, but still they kept on till only one gun was
left in action. It was splendid.... Nothing could have been more clever than
the way the admiral placed his ships.... The wounded are all doing well. One
man had his foot shot off, and he picked it up in his hand and hopped down
to the doctor with it.... The troops hoisted a flag of truce the day after the
action; and while we waited I sent to find out why it was they were marched
away, having set fire to the town in many places. It has been burning ever
since." ...

The day after the bombardment, Captain Wilson (now Admiral of the
Fleet Sir A. K. Wilson, V.C., G.C.B., O.M., G.C.V.O) hauled down the flag
of the Marabout Fort and presented it to me. It is now in the Museum of the
Royal Naval College, Greenwich. The commandant of Fort Marabout was so
excellent an officer that when I was appointed provost-marshal and governor
of the town by the admiral, I placed him on my staff to assist me in restoring
order.

CHAPTER XX
THE EGYPTIAN WAR (Continued)

III. CHIEF OF POLICE

The bombardment took place on the 11th July. On the 12th, as I have
narrated, the Egyptian soldiery fired the city, looted it, and evacuated the
defences. On the same day the Khedive was surrounded in his Palace at
Ramleh by some 400 of Arabi's cavalry and infantry, a force subsequently
reduced to about 250 men. That evening Admiral Seymour was informed
that the Khedive was in danger. The admiral dispatched the Condor to lie
off Ramleh; and there we lay all that night, rolling heavily, with a spring on
the cable to enable the guns to be trained upon the sandy lane down which
the soldiers must advance if they intended to take the Palace.

It was arranged that, if the Palace were attacked, the Khedive should
hang a white sheet from a window, and I would at once take measures to
secure his safety. The night went by without alarm; and next day Tewfik,
escorted by a guard of native cavalry, went to the Ras-el-Tin Palace, where
he was received by Admiral Seymour and a guard of Marines. Commander
Hammill (who afterwards performed excellent service on the Nile), with a
landing-party of 250 bluejackets and 150 Marines, had already taken
possession of the Ras-el-Tin Peninsula.

Upon the same day Captain John Fisher, H.M.S. Inflexible (afterwards
Admiral of the Fleet Lord Fisher of Kilverstone, O.M.), was ordered to take
command of the landing-party whose business was to secure the outer
defences of the city. Captain Fisher, having occupied the lines, had a zone
of anarchy, incendiarism and chaos, comprising the whole city, in the rear
of his position. He at once made application for an officer to be appointed
provost-marshal and chief of police, suggesting my name for the post; and
the admiral gave me orders to assume this office. As a narrative written at
the time owns a certain intrinsic interest, I make no apology for transcribing
further passages from private letters.

"CHIEF OF POLICE OFFICE HEADQUARTERS, ALEXANDRIA
THE ARSENAL, 25th July, 1882

"... I landed on the 14th July, armed myself, got a horse and a guide and
an escort of about thirty Egyptian cavalry, and started to overhaul the town,
and see how I could best carry out my orders to 'restore law and order as
soon as possible, put out fires, bury the dead, and clear the streets.' I never
saw anything so awful as the town on that Friday; streets, square, and
blocks of buildings all on fire, roaring and crackling and tumbling about
like a hell, let loose Arabs murdering each other for loot under my nose,
wretches running about with fire-balls and torches to light up new places,
all the main thoroughfares impassable from burning fallen houses, streets
with many corpses in them, mostly murdered by the Arab soldiers for loot
—these corpses were Arabs murdered by each other—in fact, a
pandemonium of hell and its devils.

"I took a chart with me and arranged the different parts of the town
where I should make depots and police stations. The admiral could only
spare me 60 bluejackets and 70 Marines from the British Fleet; but he
obtained a proportionate number from the foreign warships. By sunset I had
620 men in the different depots, mostly foreigners.... I had only 140 men to
patrol the town, to stop the looting, to stop the 'fresh burning' of houses, to
bury the corpses, and to protect the lives of those who had come on shore.
By quickly sending the men about in parties in different parts of the town,
and by employing Arabs to inform me when and where certain houses
might be burnt, I often managed to get a patrol there just in time to stop it,
and the people thought there were 600 police in the town instead of 140.
For the foreign bluejackets were ordered to occupy their respective
Legations and not to take any part in restoring order. This was of course in
the first seventy-two hours, during which time neither myself nor my men
slept one wink, as at 12 o'clock on two occasions an alarm was sounded that
Arabi was attacking the lines, and all of us had to peg away to the front,
where we had to remain until daylight, expecting attack every moment.
These alarms lost many houses, as the mob set them alight while we were at
the front; however, it was unavoidable.

PROVOST-MARSHAL AND CHIEF OF POLICE. ALEXANDRIA.
JULY, 1882.
FROM A DRAWING BY FREDERICK VILLIERS

"On Monday, 17th July, I was sent 400 more men (bluejackets) in
answer to my urgent appeal to the admiral, as so many fanatic Arabs were
coming into the town, ... but on Tuesday the 18th the bluejackets were all
ordered off to their ships and 600 picked Marines were sent in their place....
After I had planned to get the town into order on the Friday (14th) I went to
the Arsenal and wrote a Proclamation....

"I went off to the admiral on the following (Saturday) morning, and
submitted that I should be allowed to post the Proclamation throughout the
town. Sir A. Colvin and the Khedive were strongly opposed to the
Proclamation; but the admiral approved of the scheme. Some of the
authorities suggested that if I shot anybody it would be well to shoot him at
night, or in the prisons, and then no one would know, and there would be no
row. This I stoutly refused, demanding my own way for restoring order, and
saying that a fair honest Proclamation was the proper line to take, as all
persons would then know what would happen to them if they committed
certain specified acts. I carried my point, and the admiral supported me, and
on Saturday night (15th) I had the whole town proclaimed in Arabic, stating
that persons caught firing houses would be shot, persons caught looting
twice would be shot; all persons to return to their homes, etc., with
confidence, and anyone wanting to get information or to lodge complaints
to repair instantly to the chief of police.

"By Wednesday (19th) I had perfect order in the town, and all firing of
houses had been stopped, life was comparatively safe, looting nearly
stopped. By Friday the 21st, one week after taking charge, all the fires were
put out, all the corpses buried, and things were generally ship-shape. I could
not have done this unless the admiral had trusted entirely to me, and given
me absolute power of life and death, or to flog, or to blow down houses, or
to do anything that I thought fit to restore law and order and to put the fires
out. I only had to shoot five men by drumhead court-martial sentence,
besides flogging a certain number, to effect what I have told you.

"I had a clear thoroughfare through every street in the town by Monday
(24th), and all débris from fallen houses piled up each side and all
dangerous walls pulled down. These things were done by organising large
working parties of from 100 to 200 hired Arabs. At first I collected them at

the point of the bayonet and made them work, but I paid them a good wage
every evening, and the bayonets were unnecessary after the first day, when
they found that England would pay well.

"I also collected all the fire-engines I could find, bought some, and
requisitioned others, got some artificers from the Fleet and got the engines
in order, had a bluejacket fire-brigade, and also a working party of Arabs on
the same footing as the road brigade. These worked exclusively at the fires,
and not at patrolling unless at urgent necessity. Besides these I had a
sanitary committee, which buried any bodies we might have missed, burned
refuse and remains of loot about the streets, and reburied any bodies which
might not have been buried deep enough, besides enforcing cleanliness
directly the town began to get a little bit shipshape. There was a corps of
native police to work under my patrols, and when I turned all the affairs
over, I had 260 of these men.

"I disarmed all Europeans found in the streets with revolvers, and by so
doing saved many a row in the town, as the class I have mentioned returned
in thousands after the bombardment, and they treated the Arabs as if they,
the Europeans, had silenced the forts and policed the town. I put many in
irons for looting, and for shooting at inoffensive Arabs.

"The greatest triumph was the formation of an Egyptian court to try the
serious cases I had on hand for life and death and long terms of
imprisonment. Not only did tret the court formed to try what cases I chose
to bring before it but after sentence of death I insisted on Egyptian
authorities making the Egyptian soldiers (the loyal ones) themselves
shooting the prisoners whom the court sentenced....

"I had four gallopers and four Marine orderly gallopers, in default of
whom I could not have done things so quickly in the many different
departments, nineteen horses, and a telephone to each station. I paid all the
carts requisitioned in the town for carrying my men's provisions, loot, etc.
etc. The officer using them signed a chit stating the hour he had taken a cart
and for what service, and then the man came to my office to be paid, which
he was instantly. By this means good feeling was established between the
people and the military police. Each depot had two interpreters attached to

it to avoid any misunderstanding, and for explanations when trying
prisoners and interrogating witnesses....

"The Marine officer thoroughly investigated each case, examined all
witnesses, and then placed the evidence on a regular charge-sheet, stating
whether he believed the prisoner guilty or not guilty, and his reason for that
opinion. If it was a serious case, I again tried it myself and judged
accordingly. There were several cases of blackmailing at first, but these
were soon stopped....

"Besides the courts held at the Police Depots, courts were held at the
Tribunal Zaptieh and the Caracol l'A'ban, at which Egyptian officers acted
as judges. In each court were three shorthand-writers, each placed behind a
separate screen, and under the charge of a sergeant of Marines, to prevent
collusion, who submitted their reports to me, in order that I should receive
three independent accounts of the proceedings, upon which I could
intervene if necessary, in order to prevent anyone being shot if there were
not the clearest and most uncompromising evidence of his guilt. If there
were any discrepancy in the reports, I had the prisoner retried. I did this in
three cases. Another case, in which the circumstantial evidence, though very
strong, was not conclusive, I reprieved."

The following troops assisted the British forces in restoring order: 125
Americans, about the American Consulate; 30 Germans, about the German
Consulate and Hospital; and 140 Greeks about the Greek Consulate and
Hospital. On the 16th July, Captain Briscoe (a son of an old Waterford man
who hunted the Curraghmore hounds after the death of my uncle, Henry
Lord Waterford) of the P. and O. Tanjore volunteered his services, and with
20 Italians of his crew, did excellent work. Other volunteers who assisted
me were Mr. Towrest, a member of the Customs, and Mr. Wallace. Major
Hemel, R.M.L.I., and Captain Creaghi, R.M.L.I., were appointed
magistrates. These Marine officers performed invaluable services.

I had special reason to be grateful to Mr. John Ross, a British merchant
of Alexandria, who gave me every assistance in his power. He knew every
yard of the place. He gave me invaluable advice with regard to the

organisation of the city, obtained interpreters, and helped to supply the
troops, placing his stores at my disposal. He would have dispensed with
receipts for articles supplied, had I not insisted upon his taking them. Mr.
Ross supplied the whole Fleet with coal, fresh meat, and all necessaries; his
help was quite inestimable, his energy and patriotism beyond praise; but
although he must have suffered considerable losses, he received no
recognition of any kind from the Governnment except the naval medal.

Mr. Ross gave me great assistance also in parcelling out Mehemet Ali
Square among the country purveyors of produce, each of whom received a
permit, written in English and in Arabic, to occupy a certain space, duly
pegged out, in which to put up their booths. This measure restored
confidence. One old lady, a stout person of Levantine origin, thought that
the permit entitled her to perpetual freehold; and she subsequently
attempted to sue the Egyptian Government for damages, producing my
permit as evidence.

Upon first going ashore to restore order, I found whole streets blocked
with smouldering ruins. Putting my horse at one such obstacle, I scrambled
over it; and I had scarce reached the other side when a wall fell bodily
behind me, cutting off my escort, who had to fetch a compass round the side
streets to rejoin me.

Without taking the smallest notice of me or of my escort, men were
shooting at one another, quarrelling over loot, and staggering along, laden
with great bundles, like walking balloons. The streets were speedily cleared
of these rioters by the use of machine guns. The method adopted was to fire
the gun over their heads, and as they fled, to run the gun round turnings and
head them off again, so that they received the impression that the town was
full of guns. On no occasion did I fire the gun at them. The principles upon
which order was restored were to punish disobedience, to enlist labour and
to pay for it fairly.

The prisoners taken were organised in separate gangs set to work, and
paid less than the rest of the labourers! The most critical part of the business
of extinguishing fires and preventing incendiarism occurred at the Tribunal,
which was stored with property worth many thousands of pounds. A fire-
engine was purchased for its protection at a cost of £160, 18s. 1d. The total

expenses of the restoration or order were, I think, under £2000. During the
fortnight I was on shore, every station and port was visited at least once a
day and twice a night.

On one such inspection I gave my horse to an Arab lad to hold. A few
minutes afterwards there was the crack of a pistol. I ran out, and there was
the boy lying on the ground a bullet-wound in his chest. To satisfy his
curiosity he had been fingering the 4-barrel Lancaster pistol in the holster,
and that was the end of him, poor lad.

Upon another occasion, when I was at work in one of my stations, a
sudden tumult arose in the street. I went put, to perceive a huge Irish
Marine Artilleryman engaged in furious conflict with five or six men of the
patrol. They had got handcuffs on him, and he was fighting with manacled
hands. I asked the sergeant what was the matter.

"He's drunk, sir. We are going to lock him up."

"Let him go," I said.

The men fell back; and the Irishman, seeing an iron railing, raised his
hands above his head and brought them down upon the iron, smashing the
handcuffs, and turned upon me like a wild beast at bay. The man was in a
frenzy. Standing directly in front of him, I spoke to him quietly.

"Now, my lad, listen to me. You're an Irishman." He looked down at me.
"You're an Irishman, and you've had a little too much to drink, like many of
us at times. But you are all right. Think a moment. Irishmen don't behave
like this in the presence of the enemy. Nor will you. Why, we may be in a
tight place to-morrow, and who's going to back me then? You are. You're
worth fifty of the enemy. You're the man I want."

As I talked to him, the expression of his face changed from desperation
to a look of bewilderment, and from bewilderment to understanding; and
then he suddenly broke down. He turned his head aside and cried. I told the
sergeant to take him away and give him some tea.

Having heard from the Governor of Alexandria that a quantity of arms
was concealed in a village lying a few miles outside the city, I took thither a
party of Egyptian military police and a guard of Marines. On the way we
were joined by some 800 British soldiers, who surrounded the village, while
the police conducted a house-to-house search. A certain newspaper
correspondent accompanied me. The police knocked at the door of a house,
and received no reply; whereupon the correspondent drew his revolver and
incontinently blew in the lock. I told him that he had no right to do such a
thing; that he might have killed innocent persons; and that he must not do it
again.

"Oh, but," says he, "you don't understand how to do these things."

I requested him to understand that I was provost-marshal, and that unless
he obeyed orders, he would be sent back to Alexandria.

"Oh, but," says he, "you can't do that. You don't understand——"

"Sergeant!" said I, "a file of Marines."

"Oh, but," protested the correspondent, "you can't——"

"Sergeant, take this gentleman back to Alexandria."

It was a long walk and a hot walk home.

On the 17th July, General Sir Archibald Alison took command of the
land forces. At the request of the general, the admiral ordered me to remain
in command of the police until 1st August, when I was relieved by Major
Gordon. It was about this time that Captain Fisher devised his armoured
train, which, carrying armed bluejackets, made daily sorties. A bluejacket
sitting on the rail was ordered to come down by his officer.

"I can't see 'em from down below," he said. The next moment he was hit
by a bullet. "They've found the range, sir," said he, as he tumbled over.

Admiral Sir Beauchamp Seymour was good enough to address to me a
very gratifying letter of commendation for my services. Among the many

kind congratulations I received, I valued especially the letters from the
captains under whom I had served in various ships, and many admirals with
whom I had served. On 11th July I was promoted to the rank of captain. In
the following September the Admiralty forwarded to Admiral Sir
Beauchamp Seymour (raised in November to a peerage as Baron Alcester)
the expression of their satisfaction at the services of Captain Fisher and of
myself.

I overheard a lady finding great fault with my old chief, Sir Beauchamp
Seymour. I asked her what she had against Lord Alcester.

"Why," said she, "he is a Goth and a Vandal. Did he not burn the
Alexandrian Library?"

A sequel to the work in Alexandria was my conversation with Mr.
Gladstone on the subject, which took place upon my return home some
weeks later. Mr. Gladstone sent for me; and after most courteously
expressing his appreciation of my services, he discussed the question of
compensation to the inhabitants of Alexandria who had suffered loss and
damage. The information he required I had carefully collected in Alexandria
by means of an organised intelligence corps, upon each of whom was
impressed the fact that if he gave false information he would most certainly
be punished. My view was then, and is now, that the whole of the claims
might have been justly settled for a million sterling, upon these conditions:
that the question should be tackled at once; that all palpably unwarranted
claims should be repudiated from the outset, because if they were recorded
as claims there would eventually be no way of rebutting them, and it would
be found necessary to pay them ultimately; that doubtful claims should be
held over for consideration; and that the proved claims should be paid
immediately. The important point was that in order to avoid difficulties in
disputes in the future, the matter should be dealt with at once.

I knew of a case (and of other similar cases) in which a jeweller who had
contrived to remove the whole of his stock into safety after the riot, put in a
claim for the value of the whole of the said goods.

These considerations I laid before Mr. Gladstone, informing him also, in
the light of the special information which had come to my knowledge, that

if the matter were allowed to drift, the sum to be disbursed, instead of being
about a million, would probably amount to some four millions.

In the event, the International Commission of Indemnities paid
£4,341,011.

CHAPTER XXI
THE EGYPTIAN WAR (Continued)

IV. GARRISON WORK

When I was relieved, on 1st August (1882), of the post of provost-
marshal and chief of police, the Condor was ordered to keep the Mex lines
and citadel, which defended the south-western boundary of Alexandria,
forming a barrier across the long and narrow strip of land which extends
between the sea and Lake Mareotis, and upon which the city is built. The
fortifications of the sea front were continued, with a brief interval, at right
angles to the sea face, extending no more than some three-quarters of the
distance across the strip of land, so that between one end of the
fortifications and the sea, and between the other end and the shore of Lake
Mareotis, there were undefended spaces. It was therefore necessary to
frame a plan of defence with the force and materials at command, sufficient
to hold this left flank of the city against the large bodies of rebel soldiery
and Arabs hovering in the vicinity. Thirty men from the Condor were
brought on shore, with the band, which, consisting of one drum and one
fife, was few and humble but convincing.

The two forts on the earthwork were manned; a 40-pounder smooth-bore
taken from one of the Mex Forts was mounted on the roof of the fort nearest
to Lake Mareotis, whence it was fired at regular intervals at the enemy
occupying the earthworks on the farther shore of the Lake. After five days
they were knocked out of the place. Charges were made for the gun out of
the miscellaneous ammunition found in the Mex Forts.

The gun used to capsize almost every time it was fired. It was served by
a Maltese gunner, who became so superstitiously devoted to his
commanding officer, that when I was relieved by Colonel Earle, my
Maltese never received an order without observing that "Lord Charles
Beresford not do that, sare"; until Earle lost patience, as well he might.

"D—n Lord Charles Beresford!" said he.

Wire entanglements were fixed along the face of the earthworks. In the
two open spaces at the ends of the line of fortifications, rockets were buried,
and a lanyard was led along from the firing tube to a peg in the ground, so
that anyone passing that way at night would trip over the lanyard, thus
firing the rocket, and causing a beautiful fountain of fire to spring from the
ground, lighting up the whole locality. The device soon stopped nocturnal
intrusions.

The open space at the Mareotis end was also commanded by a Gatling
gun mounted on the roof of the fort. In the forts and earthworks were about
twenty miscellaneous guns. These were all kept loaded; the powder being
taken from the vast amount of loose powder stored in the Mex lines. The
guns were connected with trigger lines to the forts, so that the whole lot
could be fired from one place. The railway lines leading from Mex Harbour
through the fortification, and, on the other side of the strip of land, from the
causeway leading across Lake Mareotis into the city, were repaired. The
railway bridge by Lake Mareotis was repaired, and a torpedo was placed
beneath it in case of attack. A picquet of Marines occupied a truck placed on
the bridge. The train was set running. The two drawbridges leading to the
forts were repaired. The men garrisoning the works were housed in tents
made out of the sails of the Arab dhows lying in Mex camber. A tank was
obtained from Alexandria, and fresh water brought into it. On the sea side
of the position, the Condor commanded the flank of the approaches.

Having thus secured this flank of the city against attack, so that it could
be held against a large force, it was necessary to make reconnaissances into
the surrounding country. The little landing-party went ashore every evening
at 5.30 (with the band, few and humble but convincing) and occupied the
lines. Every morning at seven o'clock they returned to the ship; and during
the afternoon went out upon reconnaissance, accompanied by a boat's gun

mounted in a bullock cart, and a rocket-tube mounted on another bullock
cart. Two horses were harnessed to each cart, assisted, when required, by
bluejackets hauling on drag-ropes. The men of the Condor were reinforced
from the Fleet on these expeditions, so that the total force of bluejackets
and Marines was 150. The cavalry being represented solely by the colonel
and the major of Marines, and myself, who were mounted, we had no
sufficient force wherewith to pursue the flying foe.

We used to play hide-and-seek with the soldiery and Bedouin among the
sandhills. When they approached on one flank, we shelled them with the
little gun until they retired; and then, hauling the gun-cart and rocket-cart
over the roughest ground, we suddenly appeared and shelled them on the
other flank, to their great amazement. All hands enjoyed these expeditions
amazingly.

In the course of these reconnaissances, large quantities of stores and
ammunition were found in the neighbouring villages. About three miles
from the lines, an immense store of gun-cotton and Abel's detonators was
discovered in a quarry among the low hills, stored in a shed. As no hostile
force appeared during the next two days, I determined to destroy the gun-
cotton. Captain A. K. Wilson of the Hecla sent 20 bluejackets and six
Marines to assist me. These were embarked and landed within half a mile of
the place. Outposts were set, with orders to signal should the enemy appear,
and the rest of the party set to work.

Although gun-cotton does not, strictly speaking, explode except by
detonation, it is extremely difficult to define where ignition ends and
detonation begins; and there had been instances of its explosion, supposed
to be due to the internal pressure of a large mass. A tremendous explosion
of gun-cotton had occurred in 1866 at Stowmarket, where its manufacture
was being carried on under the patent of Sir Frederick Abel, then chemist to
the War Office. On another occasion, when Sir Frederick was conducting an
experiment designed to prove that ignition was harmless, he had his clothes
blown off his body, and narrowly escaped with his life. Recollecting these
things, I thought it advisable to spread the stuff in a loose mass upon the
hillside sloping to the quarry. The gun-cotton was packed in boxes. These
were unpacked, and the contents were spread on the ground. Next to the

pile, a bucket of loose powder was poured on the ground and over the fuse,
to make sure of ignition. Into the powder was led one end of a Bickford's
fuse, which was then threaded through the discs of gun-cotton. The fuse
was timed to burn for five minutes.

The work was highly exhausting to the men, and more than once I felt
inclined to call in the outposts to help; but I decided that it would not be
right to take the risk of a surprise attack; for we were working in a trap,
being closed in by the quarries on one side and by the low hills on the other.
And sure enough, when the men had been working for five hours, up went
the outpost's signal, and the corporal of Marines with his three men came
running in to report that large numbers of the enemy were in sight.

Hastening out, I saw about 50 scouts running up, an action so unusual
that it was evident they were strongly supported. Presently, about 200
skirmishers appeared, and behind them a large body of cavalry, probably
about 700 in number. The outposts were at once recalled. The men were
ordered out of the quarry, divided into two companies of twelve men each,
and retired by companies over the hill towards the shore, out of sight of the
enemy. Mr. Attwood, the gunner of the Hecla, a bluejacket and myself,
remained to fire the fuse. It was a five-minute fuse. The retreating men had
been told to count as they ran, and at the end of four minutes, or when they
saw us lie down, to halt and lie down. I gave the order in case there should
be an explosion. When the men were lying down, I fired the fuse. Then the
gunner, the bluejacket and I ran about 300 yards, and flung ourselves down.

Then there came a noise as though a giant had expelled a huge breath;
the blast of the ignition burned our cheeks; in the midst of a vast column of
yellow smoke, boxes and pieces of paper were whirling high in air, and a
strong wind sucked back into the vacuum, almost dragging us along the
sand. The enemy were so interested in the spectacle that they gave us time
to get back to the boats.

It is probable that information had been given to the hostile forces by the
inhabitants of the village past which we went to reach the quarry where was
the gun-cotton; for, in retreating to the boats, when I looked back, instead of
the 20 or 30 native women who were usually sitting about the place, I saw

about 200 men eagerly watching us from the house-tops, evidently in the
hope of enjoying the gratifying spectacle of our destruction.

From the summit of the slope falling to the sea, I signalled to the
flagship, with a handkerchief tied to a pole, that I was surrounded: one of
the many occasions upon which a knowledge of signalling proved
invaluable. There was a haze upon the water, and I could not clearly discern
the answering signal; but the signalman of the flagship had seen my figure
silhouetted on the sky-line. Instantly after, Captain John Fisher of the
Inflexible manned and armed boats, came ashore, and the enemy
immediately retreated.

Shortly afterwards, as I was now a captain, I was relieved of the
command of the Condor by Commander Jeffreys, and went on half-pay. I
should naturally have much preferred to remain in my little ship; but she
was not a captain's command; and I left her (as I see I wrote at the time)
with a tear in each eye. Commander Jeffreys discovered the place where she
had been hit during the bombardment, one of her under-water plates having
been started. Until then, it was thought that the only damage consisted of a
hole through her awning and the smashing of a boat.

At the conclusion of this period of my service, I was most gratified to
receive a gracious message of congratulation from Her Majesty the Queen.

H.H. the Khedive wrote to me, kindly expressing his sense of my
services, and at the same time offering me an appointment upon his staff, in
which capacity I was to go to the front. Lord Granville and the Admiralty
having signified their permission that I should accept the post, I left
Alexandria for Ismailia, together with several members of the Khedival
staff.

We went by steamer, which towed a huge iron lighter carrying horses. A
beam ran from stem to stern of the lighter, and to it the horses were tethered
with halters. I remarked to the captain of the steamer that it would be
advisable, in order to avoid injuring the lighter, to take every precaution to
prevent the steamer from having to go astern. But in Ismailia Bay, which
was crowded with shipping, a vessel crossed the steamer's bows, the
steamer was forced to go astern, and she cut a hole in the lighter with her

propeller. One of the ship's officers instantly descended the Jacob's ladder
into the lighter with me, and we cut the halters of the horses, just in time to
free them before the lighter sank, and there we were swimming about
among the wild and frightened stallions. By splashing the water into their
faces, we turned one or two shorewards, when the rest followed and came
safely to land.

Upon discussing the matter of my appointment to the staff of the
Khedive with Sir Garnet Wolseley, to my surprise he declined to permit me
to accept it. Discipline is discipline, and there was nothing for it but to
acquiesce.

I was about packing up my things, when Mr. Cameron, the war
correspondent of The Standard, informed me that he was authorised to
appoint a correspondent to The New York Herald, and also that he had
permission to send the said correspondent to the front, where I particularly
desired to go. The notion attracted me. I applied to the military authorities
for permission to accept the offer. Permission was, however, refused. So
there was nothing to do but to go home. But before starting, I consoled
myself by sending some provisions, privately, to the unfortunate officers at
the front, who, owing to the substitution by the transport people of tents for
food, were short of necessaries. I obtained from the Orient four large boxes
filled with potted lobster, salmon, sardines, beef, tins of cocoa, and so forth,
and sent one box each to the 1st Life Guards, the Blues, the Guards, and the
Royal Marines. The orders were that no private supplies were to go up.
These I ventured to disregard; got up bright and early at three o'clock in the
morning; and had the boxes stowed under the hay which was being sent up
in railway trucks, before officialdom was out of bed. Then I went home.

I consider that Sir Garnet Wolseley's conduct of the campaign, and his
brilliant victory at Tel-el-Kebir, were military achievements of a high order.
The public, perhaps, incline to estimate the merit of an action with
reference to the loss of life incurred, rather than in relation to the skill
employed in attaining the object in view. The attack at dawn at Tel-el-Kebir
was a daring conception brilliantly carried into execution. Many persons,
both at the time and subsequently, have explained how it ought to have been
done. But Sir Garnet Wolseley did it.

The public seem to appreciate a big butcher's bill, although it may be
caused by stupidity or by lack of foresight on the part of the general. But if
he retrieves his mistakes, the public think more of him than of the general
who, by the exercise of foresight and knowledge, wins an action with little
loss of life.

I carried home with me a 64 lb. shell fired from the Condor at the Mex
magazine, intending to present it to the Prince of Wales. I found it in the
sand. It had passed right through the walls of the magazine, and it had not
exploded. Having brought it on board the Condor, I caused the gunner, Mr.
Alexander Greening, to sound it with a copper rod: and he came to the
conclusion that it was empty of gunpowder. I therefore thought that it had
never been filled. I intended to have it cut in two and a lamp for the Prince
made of the pieces, and took it to Nordenfelt's works for the purpose. The
foreman, desirous of taking every precaution before cutting it, had it again
filled with water and sounded with a copper rod, when it suddenly
exploded, blowing off the foot of the workman who held it, and doing other
serious damage. The explanation seems to be that the force of the impact
when the shell was fired had solidified the powder into a hard mass. But
explanation would have little availed had the shell burst in the smoking-
room at Sandringham, where a fragment of it remains to this day.

CHAPTER XXII
PASSING THROUGH EGYPT

At the beginning of the year 1883 I was on my way out to India with
Lady Charles in the P. and O. s.s. Malwa. Proceeding into Ismailia Lake, the
Malwa was rammed by another vessel which tried to cross the Malwa's
bows. I was looking over the side of the Malwa and I saw a curious thing. I
saw the colliding vessel rebound from the Malwa and strike her again. I ran
up to the bridge, where the captain had already given orders to stop the
engines. The ship was sinking; it was no time to stand upon ceremony; and
I ventured to suggest to the captain that he should put his engines full steam

ahead, when he might hope to beach the vessel, whereas if she stayed where
she was, she would infallibly go down in deep water. The captain, like a
good seaman, gave the order, and the chief engineer carried it into
execution with admirable promptitude. I went down into the engine-room
and found the water already rising through the foot-plates.

As the ship steamed towards the shore, settling down as she went, I
stood with Lady Charles on the bridge, telling her that, if the vessel sank, I
should throw her overboard—although she could not swim—and should
jump in after her. To which she merely replied, "That will be very
disagreeable!"

The ship was safely beached, though not before the water had risen to
my cabin. She was afterwards salved by the help of the Navy. H.M.S.
Carysfort, commanded by Captain H. F. Stephenson, C.B. (now Admiral Sir
Henry F. Stephenson, G.C.V.O., K.C.B., Gentleman Usher of the Black
Rod), sent a carpenter and a working party; and they did excellent service in
the Malwa.

Our party went to Cairo, there to await the next steamer.

Hicks Pasha and his staff dined with us upon the night before they left
Cairo, upon their fatal expedition. Colonel W. Hicks had been appointed by
the Khedive chief of the staff of the Army of the Soudan. In the following
August he was appointed commander-in-chief. From Cairo he went to
Souakim, thence to Berber, and thence to Khartoum. On the 28th April, he
fought a successful action on the White Nile, south of Khartoum, in which
his Egyptian troops did well. In September, Hicks left Duem with his staff
and some 10,000 men and marched into the desert, which swallowed them
up. The whole army was exterminated by the Mahdi's dervishes. Gordon
said that the Mahdi built with the skulls of the slain a pyramid.

I applied for permission to accompany Hicks Pasha, but my old friend
Lord Dufferin was determined that I should not go upon that hazardous
enterprise. I believe he telegraphed to the Government on the subject. At
any rate, he had his way, and so saved my life.

In October, before the news of the disaster had reached Cairo, the British
Army of Occupation had been reduced from 6700 men to 3000.
Subsequently, the British Government proceeded with the policy of
abandoning the Soudan, in one phase of which I was to bear my part.

In the meantime, Lady Charles and I joined the Duke of Portland and his
party, among whom were Lord de Grey and Lord Wenlock; went to India;
enjoyed some excellent sport; and returned home.

CHAPTER XXIII
THE SOUDAN WAR OF 1884-5

I. SUMMARY OF EVENTS

NOTE

A year before the British forces restored order in Egypt, trouble was
beginning in the Soudan. One Mahomet Ahmed, who was the son of a boat-
builder, and who had the peculiar conformation of the teeth which
betokened the fore-ordained of the Prophet, announced that he was the
Mahdi. In July, 1881, the holy man dwelt upon the island of Abba, on the
White Nile, above Khartoum. Thence he caused it to be made known that
he was the chosen instrument for the reformation of Islam, and that all those
who denied him would be abolished. Reouf Pasha, who was then Governor-
General of the Soudan, summoned the Mahdi to Khartoum, there to give an
account of himself. The Mahdi naturally refused; and when Reouf sent
soldiers to fetch him, the Mahdi slew most of them, and departed into the
hills, he and all his following. The Governor of Fashoda took an expedition
to Gheddeer, and was also slain, together with most of his men. Then
Giegler Pasha, a German, acting as temporary Governor-General of the
Soudan, succeeded in defeating the forces of the Mahdi. But Abdel Kader,
who, succeeding Reouf, took over the command from Giegler, was defeated
in his turn. On 7th June, 1882, the Egyptian forces were cut to pieces near

Fashoda. In July, the Mahdi was besieging Obeid and Bara. By October,
1882, both places were in danger of falling, and Abdel Kader was
demanding reinforcements from Egypt.

The Soudan is a country as large as India; at that time it had no railways,
no canals, no roads, and, excepting the Nile during a part of the year, no
navigable rivers. In November, 1882, the British Government informed the
Khedive that they declined to be responsible for the condition of the
Soudan. Lord Granville's intimation to this effect was the first step in the
policy which progressed from blunder to blunder to the desertion and death
of General Gordon.

The Egyptian Government, left in the lurch, hastily enlisted some 10,000
men, the most part being brought in by force, and dispatched them to Abdel
Kader at Berber. At Abdel Kader's request, Colonel Stewart and two other
British officers were sent to Khartoum to help him to deal with the raw and
mutinous levies.

In December, a number of British officers were appointed to the
Egyptian Army in Egypt, in accordance with the recommendations of Lord
Dufferin, and Sir Evelyn Wood was appointed Sirdar. The British Army of
Occupation had now been reduced to 12,000 men, under the command of
General Sir Archibald Alison, who, in the following April (1883) was
succeeded by Lieutenant-General F. C. S. Stephenson.

In January, 1883, Colonel W. Hicks, afterwards Hicks Pasha, was
appointed by the Khedive chief of the staff of the Army of the Soudan.
Before he proceeded to the theatre of war, Abdel Kader had lost and won
various engagements, and had reoccupied the province of Sennar; while the
Mahdi had taken El Obeid and Bara and occupied the whole of Kordofan.

In February, it was announced in the Queen's Speech that "the British
troops will be withdrawn as promptly as may be permitted by a prudent
examination of the country"; a declaration provoking intense alarm among
the European inhabitants of Egypt. Their protests, however, were totally
disregarded. The Egyptians naturally concluded that England owned no real
interest in that reform of administration which her influence alone could
achieve.

On 7th February, 1883, Colonel Hicks left Cairo for Khartoum, with his
staff, consisting of Colonels Colborne and De Coetlogon, Majors Farquhar
and Martin, and Captains Warner, Massey and Forrestier-Walker. Upon the
night before their departure, Colonel Hicks and his staff dined with Lord
and Lady Charles Beresford in Cairo. Lord Charles Beresford, who was
then on half-pay, had expressed a wish to accompany Colonel Hicks, but
Lord Dufferin disapproving of his suggestion, Lord Charles Beresford
withdrew it.

Hicks and his men disappeared into the desert, which presently
swallowed them up.

On the 28th April, Hicks defeated a large force of the Mahdi's army on
the White Nile. The Egyptian Government then decided to reconquer the
province of Kordofan, and dispatched reinforcements to Khartoum. On the
9th September, Hicks Pasha, at the head of 10,000 men, marched for Duem.
The last dispatch received from him was dated 3rd October, 1883. Upon a
day early in November, Hicks and his whole army were annihilated.

His defeat left Khartoum in great danger. On 9th November, before the
news of the disaster reached England, the British Government stated that all
British troops were to be withdrawn from Egypt. When the fact was known,
the decision of the Government was modified; but they still declined to
interfere in the Soudan; and advised the Egyptian Government to evacuate
at least a part of that territory. The Egyptian Government protesting, the
British Government, on 4th January, 1884, sent a peremptory message
insisting that the policy of evacuation should be carried into execution. The
inconsequence of Her Majesty's Ministers is sufficiently apparent.

In the meantime, during August of the preceding year, 1883, trouble had
arisen in the Eastern Soudan, where Osman Digna, a trader, joined the
Mahdi, and brought all the tribes of that country to his standard. At the
beginning of November, 1883, just at the time when Hicks Pasha and his
army had come to their end, an Egyptian force under Mahmoud Talma
Pasha was defeated by Osman Digna in the attempt to relieve Tokar,
besieged by the rebels, Captain Moncrieff, Royal Navy, British Consul at
Souakim, being killed in the action. A second expeditionary force under
Suleiman Pasha was cut to pieces on 2nd December at Tamanieh.

The Egyptian Government then dispatched reinforcements under the
command of General Valentine Baker, among whose staff were Colonel
Sartorius, Lieutenant-Colonel Harrington, Lieutenant-Colonel Hay, Majors
Harvey, Giles, and Holroyd, Morice Bey and Dr. Leslie. On the 4th
February, 1884, Baker was defeated at El-Teb, with the loss of nearly two-
thirds of his force. Morice Bey, Dr. Leslie, and nine other European officers
were killed. Souakim being threatened, Admiral Hewett, on 10th December,
was given the command of the town, having under him some 3800 troops.
Two days later came the news of the taking of Sinkat by the rebels, and of
the massacre of the garrison. During the period in which these successive
disasters occurred, the British Army of Occupation was kept idle in Cairo
by the orders of the British Government.

The current of events now divides, one leading to Khartoum, the other
still flowing in the Eastern Soudan. The British Government, hopelessly at
fault, turned to General Charles Gordon, as the one man in the world who
could apparently perform miracles. Ten years previously, "Chinese"
Gordon, as Governor-General of the Soudan, and again in 1877, as
Governor-General of the Soudan, Darfur and the Equatorial Provinces, had
freed the country from Turkish rule, broken the slave trade, established
peace, opened trade routes, and laid the foundations of civilisation. Since
1877 he had been engaged in setting wrong things right in Egypt in the
Soudan again, in Abyssinia, in China, in the Mauritius, at the Cape, in
Palestine, and in the Congo.

On 18th January, 1884, Gordon was instructed by the British
Government to report upon the best method of evacuating the Soudan.
When he arrived at Cairo, these instructions were radically altered by Sir
Evelyn Baring (afterwards Lord Cromer), who, on the 25th January,
informed Gordon that he was required actually to direct the evacuation of
Khartoum and of the whole Soudan, and afterwards to establish an
organised government in that country. Gordon arrived at Khartoum on the
18th February, where he was hailed as the father and saviour of the people.

On the same day, Major-General Sir Gerald Graham left Suez to join at
Souakim the force which had been placed under his command. That force
was chiefly drawn from the British Army of Occupation in Egypt. The

object of the expedition was the relief of Tokar, or, if that place had already
fallen, the protection of Souakim, an alternative which involved an attack
upon Osman Digna's victorious army. Tokar was in fact taken by the enemy
before the expedition started.

The British Government, whose original intention had been to refrain
from any action in the Soudan whatsoever; which had been compelled by
force of circumstances, including the most frightful bloodshed, to change a
wholly negative policy to a definite scheme of evacuation; now perceived,
of course too late, that if the European population was to be brought away,
at least some measure of military force must be employed. What Her
Majesty's Ministers were unable to see, or what, if they saw, they chose to
ignore, was the plain fact that the same force and the same measures and the
same promptitude would be required for the salvation of Europeans in face
of the enemy, as for the reconquest and reoccupation of the country. In this
delusion, or dereliction, resides the explanation of an affair which has left
an indelible stain upon British honour.

On 28th February, 1884, Graham defeated the enemy, inflicting upon
them severe losses, at El-Teb, near the spot upon which Baker's disastrous
action had occurred some three weeks previously. On 13th March, after a
hard and at times a dubious fight, Graham won another victory at Tamaai,
and the power of Osman Digna was broken. Graham was then ordered to
return, and the expedition was over.

By withdrawing Graham's troops, the Government both threw away the
fruits of his success, and deliberately abandoned the control of the
Souakim-Berber route from Khartoum, by which alone Gordon could have
brought away the refugees. Berber was the key to the Soudan. Thenceforth,
the Souakim-Berber route was impracticable; and it was for this reason that
Lord Wolseley was obliged to take the much longer Nile route.

On the very day after Graham's victory at El-Teb, and before Graham
had left Souakim, Gordon had telegraphed from Khartoum as follows:—

"There is not much chance of the situation improving, and every chance
of it getting worse; for we have nothing to rely on to make it better. You
must, therefore, decide whether you will or will not make an attempt to save
the two-thirds of the population who are well affected before these two-
thirds retreat. Should you wish to intervene, send 200 British troops to
Wady Halfa, and adjutants to inspect Dongola, and then open up Souakim-
Berber road by Indian Moslem troops. This will cause an immediate
collapse of the revolt."

On 2nd March he telegraphed again to the same effect; but Lord
Granville declined to accede to General Gordon's suggestions. A few days
later, when the Eastern Soudan and the Souakim-Berber route had been
definitely abandoned, Sir Evelyn Baring strongly advised the British
Government to obtain command of the Souakim-Berber route. But the
advice was refused by Lord Granville, and the most urgent appeals
continued to be addressed to him in vain.

Deserted by the Government, Gordon tried, and failed, to raise money
privately for the purpose of engaging Turkish troops. Early in April,
Khartoum was closely besieged. At this time, Lord Wolseley urged upon the
Government the necessity of relieving Gordon. In May, preparations for
war were begun. A part of the British Army of Occupation in Egypt was
sent up the Nile; and Commander Hammill and other naval officers were
employed to report upon the navigation of the river. These facts did not
prevent Lord Hartington from informing the House of Commons, early in
July, that the Government had no intention of sending an expedition to
relieve General Gordon, unless it were made clear that by no other means
could he be relieved, and adding that the Government had "received no
information making it desirable that we should depart from that decision"
(Royce, The Egyptian Campaigns). On 24th July, Lord Wolseley made a
spirited protest against the procrastination of the Government. The pressure
of public opinion could no longer be entirely withstood. On 30th July,
Gordon sent a message in which he declared his retreat to be impossible.

On 5th August, Mr. Gladstone asked and obtained a vote of credit. Then,
and not until then, were the preparations for war begun in England. Having