By England's Aid; or, the Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) by G. A. Henty (e reader books .TXT) 📗

"It was lucky for you that five or six of our number were killed by that discharge of grape you gave us," one of them said, "or they would have thrown you overboard at once. Although, after all, death is almost preferable to such a life as ours."

"How long have you been here?" Geoffrey asked.

"I hardly know," the other replied; "one almost loses count of time here. But it is somewhere about ten years. I am sturdy, you see. Three years at most is the average of our life in the galleys, though there are plenty die before as many months have passed. I come of a hardy race. I am not a Spaniard. I was captured in an attack on a town in the West Indies, and had three years on board one of your galleys at Cadiz. Then she was captured by the Moors, and here I have been ever since."

"Then you must be an Englishman!" Geoffrey exclaimed in that language.

The man stared at him stupidly for a minute, and then burst into tears. "I have never thought to hear my own tongue again, lad," he said, holding out his hand. "Aye, I am English, and was one of Hawkins' men. But how come you to be in a Spanish ship? I have heard our masters say, when talking together, that there is war now between the English and Spaniards; that is, war at home. There has always been war out on the Spanish Main, but they know nothing of that."

"I was made prisoner in a fight we had with the great Spanish Armada off Gravelines," Geoffrey said.

"We heard a year ago from some Spaniards they captured that a great fleet was being prepared to conquer England; but no news has come to us since. We are the only galley here, and as our benches were full, the prisoners they have taken since were sent off at once to Algiers or other ports, so we have heard nothing. But I told the Spaniards that if Drake and Hawkins were in England when their great fleet got there, they were not likely to have it all their own way. Tell me all about it, lad. You do not know how hungry I am for news from home."

Geoffrey related to the sailor the tale of the overthrow and destruction of the Armada, which threw him into an ecstasy of satisfaction.

"These fellows," he said, pointing to the other galley slaves, "have for the last year been telling me that I need not call myself an Englishman any more, for that England was only a part of Spain now. I will open their eyes a bit in the morning. But I won't ask you any more questions now; it is a shame to have made you talk so much after such a clip as you have had on the head."

Geoffrey turned round on the sand that formed their only bed, and was soon asleep, the last sound he heard being the chuckling of his companion over the discomfiture of the Armada.

In the morning the guard came in with a great dish filled with a sort of porridge of coarsely ground grain, boiled with water. In a corner of the yard were a number of calabashes, each composed of half a gourd. The slaves each dipped one of these into the vessel, and so ate their breakfast. Before beginning Geoffrey went to a trough, into which a jet of water was constantly falling from a small pipe, bathed his head and face, and took a long drink.

"We may be thankful," the sailor, who had already told him that his name was Stephen Boldero, said, "that someone in the old times laid on that water. If it had not been for that I do not know what we should have done, and a drink of muddy stuff once or twice a day is all we should have got. That there pure water is just the saving of us."

"What are we going to do now?" Geoffrey asked. "Does the galley go out every day?"

"Bless you, no; sometimes not once a month; only when a sail is made out in sight, and the wind is light enough to give us the chance of capturing her. Sometimes we go out on a cruise for a month at a time; but that is not often. At other times we do the work of the town, mend the roads, sweep up the filth, repair the quays; do anything, in fact, that wants doing. The work, except in the galleys, is not above a man's strength. Some men die under it, because the Spaniards lose heart and turn sullen, and then down comes the whip on their backs, and they break their hearts over it; but a man as does his best, and is cheerful and willing, gets on well enough except in the galleys.

"That is work that is. There is a chap walks up and down with a whip, and when they are chasing he lets it fall promiscuous, and even if you are rowing fit to kill yourself you do not escape it; but on shore here if you keep up your spirits things ain't altogether so bad. Now I have got you here to talk to in my own lingo I feel quite a different man. For although I have been here ten years, and can jabber in Spanish, I have never got on with these fellows; as is only natural, seeing that I am an Englishman and know all about their doings in the Spanish Main, and hate them worse than poison. Well, our time is up, so I am off. I do not expect they will make you work till your wounds are healed a bit."

This supposition turned out correct, and for the next week Geoffrey was allowed to remain quietly in the yard when the gang went out to their work. At the end of that time his wound had closed, and being heartily sick of the monotony of his life, he voluntarily fell in by the side of Boldero when the gang was called to work. The overseer was apparently pleased at this evidence of willingness on the part of the young captive, and said something to him in his own tongue. This his companion translated as being an order that he was not to work too hard for the present.

"I am bound to say, mate, that these Moors are, as a rule, much better masters than the Spaniards. I have tried them both, and I would rather be in a Moorish galley than a Spanish one by a long way; except just when they are chasing a ship, and are half wild with excitement. These Moors are not half bad fellows, while it don't seem to me that a Spaniard has got a heart in him. Then again, I do not think they are quite so hard on Englishmen as they are on Spaniards; for they hate the Spaniards because they drove them out of their country. Once or twice I have had a talk with the overseer when he has been in a special good humour, and he knows we hate the Spaniards as much as they do, and that though they call us all Christian dogs, our Christianity ain't a bit like that of the Spaniards. I shall let him know the first chance I have that you are English too, and I shall ask him to let you always work by the side of me."

As Stephen Boldero had foretold, Geoffrey did not find his work on shore oppressively hard. He did his best, and, as he and his companion always performed a far larger share of work than that done by any two of the Spaniards, they gained the goodwill of their overlooker, who, when a fortnight later the principal bey of the place sent down a request for two slaves to do some rough work in his garden, selected them for the work.

"Now we will just buckle to, lad," Stephen Boldero said. "This bey is the captain of the corsair, and he can make things a deal easier for us if he chooses; so we will not spare ourselves. He had one of the men up there two years ago, and kept him for some months, and the fellow found it so hard when he came back here again that he pined and died off in no time."

A guard took them to the bey's house, which stood on high ground behind the town. The bey came out to examine the men chosen for his work.

"I hear," he said, "that you are both English, and hate the Spaniards as much as we do. Well, if I find you work well, you will be well treated; if not, you will be sent back at once. Now, come with me, and I shall show you what you have to do."

The high wall at the back of the garden had been pulled down, and the bey intended to enlarge the inclosure considerably.

"You are first," he said, "to dig a foundation for the new wall along that line marked out by stakes. When that is done you will supply the masons with stone and mortar. When the wall is finished the new ground will all have to be dug deeply and planted with shrubs, under the superintendence of my gardener. While you are working here you will not return to the prison, but will sleep in that out house in the garden."

"You shall have no reason to complain of our work," Boldero said. "We Englishmen are no sluggards, and we do not want a man always looking after us as those lazy Spaniards do."

As soon as they were supplied with tools Geoffrey and his companion set to work. The trench for the foundations had to be dug three feet deep; and though the sun blazed fiercely down upon them, they worked unflinchingly. From time to time the bey's head servant came down to examine their progress, and occasionally watched them from among the trees. At noon he bade them lay aside their tools and come into the shed, and a slave boy brought them out a large dish of vegetables, with small pieces of meat in it.

"This is something like food," Stephen said as he sat down to it. "It is ten years since such a mess as this has passed my lips. I do not wonder that chap fell ill when he got back to prison if this is the sort of way they fed him here."

That evening the Moorish overseer reported to the bey that the two slaves had done in the course of the day as much work as six of the best native labourers could have performed, and that without his standing over them or paying them any attention whatever. Moved by the report, the bey himself went down to the end of the garden.

"It is wonderful," he said, stroking his beard. "Truly these Englishmen are men of sinews. Never have I seen so much work done by two men in a day. Take care of them, Mahmoud, and see that they are well fed; the willing servant should be well cared for."

The work went steadily on until the wall was raised, the ground dug, and the shrubs planted. It was some months before all this was done, and the two slaves continued to attract the observation and goodwill of the bey by their steady and cheerful labour. Their work began soon after sunrise, and continued until noon. Then they had three hours to themselves to eat their midday meal and doze in the shed, and then worked again until sunset. The bey often strolled down to the edge of the trees to watch them, and sometimes even took guests to admire the way in which these two Englishmen, although ignorant that any eyes were upon them, performed their work.

His satisfaction was evinced by the abundance of food supplied them, their meal being frequently supplemented by fruit and other little luxuries. Severely as they laboured, Geoffrey and his companion were comparatively happy. Short as was the time that the former had worked with the gang, he appreciated the liberty he now enjoyed, and especially congratulated himself upon being spared the painful life of a galley slave at sea. As to Boldero, the change from the prison with the companions he hated, its degrading work, and coarse and scanty food, made a new man of him.

He had been but two-and-twenty when captured by the Spaniards, and was now in the prime of life