my stores of “goodies” were summarily seized by, and devoured in, the midshipmens’ mess, who, less favoured, had not been allowed even a scamper on shore.
Prior to embarkation my father’s last words were—“A few months on board one of His Majesty’s ships will give you an idea of the world.” Most truly had he spoken. Barely one month from the parental roof, I had already acquired some experience. I already found out that a sea life was not couleur de rose, as I had painted it in imagination. The petty tyranny of my messmates soon knocked out of me all boyish, nursery, and even college notions of self-importance.
The Peak of Teneriffe was soon lost in the far horizon; the gallant ship, once more under canvas, sped her course through lovely weather, shaping a direct course for the South American coast. Gradually getting accustomed to what at first seemed a hard life, making good friends in the gun-room—more especially with our portly head surgeon and the purser, to whose kindness I was indebted for leave to use the surgery and the clerk’s room, as well as the free run of the ship’s library—time hung less wearily. Besides, we were nearing the Brazilian shores. The land breeze every evening wafted to sea the balmy-scented air of orange groves; all eyes strained throughout the day to follow the varied indentations of distant ranges. We passed daily a number of quaintly rigged vessels and coast boats.
At last we reached our rendezvous with the Gloire, and paid the penalty of our treachery. She was not there, and for five dreary long days we had to tack off and on in view of one of the most lovely harbours in the world, scanning the blue line of the sky for the pennant of the old admiral. He came at last—his pride in finding the Heroine newly painted, scrubbed, and in every plank, spar, or rigging—a perfect picture of neat, trim beauty—made him overlook the otherwise unpardonable sin of having out-sailed his old boat.
IV.
FIRST LESSON IN FINANCE.
WE sailed into port together, simultaneously fired our royal salute, and cast anchor among several scores of ships of war of all nationalities, with whom visits of naval etiquette were exchanged for several days, keeping our poor gunners busy from daylight till dark. As I often thought at the time, if our chronometers could not withstand 21 guns on the Saint Philippe’s day two months before, their condition after our firing at Rio must have been sadly affected. But I suppose, like myself, they had by this time got their “sea-legs,” and consequently did not mind a slight jerking.
The captain did me the honour of taking me with him when he made a call on board the Gloire—to my great delight I found that the admiral was a friend of my father’s. I was kept on board to dine with the “great man,” and from that day got my “promotion” amongst my messmates and the gun-room officers of our own ship. Ahem! the friend of the admiral! The sequel was, that wherever our captain went this individual followed—aye, even to that most lovely of all royal palaces, the Emperor’s country house at San Cristopho, where the despatches of the King of the French were delivered to H.I. Majesty Don Pedro—then a fat boy of twenty odd years—who received “Us” most graciously, and introduced us to his two lovely sisters—one the Duchesse de Joinville in prospective. From that day until our departure from that charming country, every hour of the day—even very, very late at night—was taken up by parties, balls, pic-nics, excursions, visiting—a perfect and endless carnival of gaieties, on shore or on board the ships of the station.
I must not omit two incidents which even now I recall with a certain amount of amusement. It seems but yesterday that in order to seal for ever the truce my friends the middies had granted on my return from the first visit to the admiral, I invited our mess—nine young, hairbrained, jolly fellows—to dine with me on shore at Faroux’s hotel, the crack place in Rio in those days. I had still in my bag a few hundred francs left from the small store of pocket money given to me at the start. This—the largest amount of cash I had ever been blessed with—gave me sufficient aplomb to order a first-rate dinner, a variety of choice wines—even that forbidden luxury to our mess, champagne—liqueurs, coffee, and cigars!
This grand feast was a decided success—until the head waiter placed before me “the Bill,” with a total showing FIVE figures in its first column! If ever a poor boy’s digestion after a good dinner received a disturbing shock, it did on that occasion. I sat in a perfect state of amazement! As the dinner progressed I had gradually risen in the estimation of my guests, until I had with the “pop” of the last bottle of “fizz,” reached the apogee of glory. What could be done? Appeal to my guests to pay for the feast?—there was no other alternative. I put on as bold a front as I could, and went through with it. My appeal in forma pauperis was received with apparent good grace. It was proposed, seconded and carried that I should order a bedroom to be prepared and a breakfast for say five next morning, when four of the middies would attend, bringing with them the necessary funds to pay all expenses.
Relieved of my first monetary embarrassment, I retired to my solitary chamber to meditate on the extravagance of a fast life. After a long night of mature cogitations—and many grateful mental thanks to my generously-disposed messmates—the four young rascals made their appearance to share the delicate breakfast prepared at their instigation. When coffee was served, the youngest, E. Dubois (now a hoary-headed old professor of mathematics at the Naval School at Toulon) rose, and in—to them—a most amusing speech, gave me to understand that mil reis represented only 2f. 75c. (£0 2s. 3d.), so that the dinner, the bed, and the breakfast we had just despatched with true midshipman’s appetite, only absorbed a portion of my pocket-money (£6)! But, as he said in conclusion, “Dear boy, you can still face the world boldly. Though ignorant of the value of foreign coins—which proves that your mathematical education has been sadly neglected—you can pay all your creditors twenty shillings in the pound; and you have the satisfaction to think that you have treated your mess royally.” This, and the amount of “chaff” I was met with on board, had to be got over. It was soon done in the turmoil of festivities I have already mentioned.
My young madcap friends, however, having once tasted of the forbidden fruit—a dinner at a swell hotel—decided upon calling a meeting of all the middies in harbour to get up an “International Farewell Dinner.” Alas! my last coin had to be parted with. But had I not to keep up an appearance? If you can imagine a large banquet hall—between sixty-five and seventy young scapegraces, ranging from 14 to 17 years of age, promiscuously sitting around a handsomely decorated table—English, French, Germans, Americans, Dutch, Italians, Spaniards, Greeks, Egyptians—all mixed up together, not two out of the lot able to understand a word of his neighbour’s language on either side of him. For the first half hour it was very much like a Quaker’s meeting. Nothing was heard beyond the clatter of knives and forks, broken by occasional calls from one to another across the board. But what a strange power champagne has on the human intellect! We sat down at 7 sharp; at 8.30 we were all talking to one another; at 11 I was strolling down the Rua del Ovidor arm-in-arm with a Russian on the right and a Dutchman on the left, exchanging ideas on the most knotty points of international naval legislation; and next morning woke up in the swing cot of a Dutch frigate, whilst my Russian friend had somehow got into my hammock on board the Heroine.
We all suffered from intense headaches—owing, no doubt, to the great pressure on the brain caused by the “polyglot” experiment of the previous night.
The two incidents have, however, had a beneficial effect. I have learned the comparative value of the various foreign coins, and have never since attempted to understand more than one foreign language at one time, even with the assistance of Moet’s champagne.
Our stay in this lovely Brazilian capital at last came to and end. A few days after our international “spree” we were coursing for the Cape of Good Hope, where we made a stay of only three days—just enough to