told of the exact obedience and punctilious respect between those who served and those who commanded. It might be, however, that those of which I had read were ships of war, and that in others the discipline was very different. As I had no previous knowledge of seamen, or their mode of life, I concluded that the rude behaviour of the Pandora’s crew might be a fair specimen of it, and I was both pained and humiliated by the conclusion. It was a sad realisation – or contradiction rather – of all my young dreams about the free happy life of the sailor, and I was disgusted both with him and his life at the very outset.
Another circumstance attracted my attention at the same time – that was the number of hands on board the Pandora. She was not a very large ship – not over 500 tons by registry. In fact she was not a “ship,” speaking technically, but a “barque;” in other words, a ship with her mizen-mast rigged unlike the other two, or without a “square” topsail. In this, and a few other points, lies the difference between a barque and a ship – though the former is also usually smaller.
The Pandora was large enough for a barque, – carried a full suit of sail, even to flying-jibs, topgallant studding-sails, and royals; and was one of the fastest sailors I have ever known. For her size, however, and the amount of merchandise she carried, I could not help fancying that she had too large a crew. Not over half of them seemed to be employed, even while wearing ship – and I was convinced that half of them could have done the work. I had been told often – for I used to make inquiry about such matters – that a crew of from ten or twenty hands was sufficient for a vessel of her size; what then could the Pandora want with twice that number? I counted them over and over. There were forty of them all told, including the worthies of the quarter-deck and Snowball in the caboose!
The circumstance made an impression upon me – somewhat undefined it is true – but day by day, as I observed the reckless and disgusting behaviour of both officers and men, and overheard some strange conversations, suspicions of a most painful character formed themselves in my mind and I began to dread that I had got into the company of real ruffians indeed.
These suspicions were at length confirmed, and to the fullest extent.
For several days after setting sail the hatches had been down and covered with tarpaulings. The weather had continued breezy, and as there was little occasion to go below they had been kept thus, though now and again a half-hatch had been lifted as something was required from the lower deck or the hold. I myself had not been sent below on any errand, and had never seen the cargo, though I had been told that it consisted chiefly of brandy, and we were going with it to the Cape of Good Hope.
After a while, however, when the weather became fine, or rather when we had sailed into a southern latitude where it is nearly always fine, the tarpaulings were taken off, the hatches – both main and fore – were thrown open, and all who wished passed down to the “’tween decks” at their pleasure.
Curiosity, as much as aught else, took me below; and I there saw what not only confirmed my suspicions but filled me with disgust and horror. The cargo, which was all down in the hold, and none of it on the lower deck, certainly appeared – what it had been represented – a cargo of brandy; for there were the great puncheons, scores of them, in the hold. Besides these there were some boxes of merchandise, a quantity of bar iron, and a large pile of bags which appeared to contain salt.
All this I saw without any uneasiness. It was not these that produced within me the feeling of disgust and horror. It was a pile of manufactured iron that lay upon the lower deck; iron wrought into villainous shapes and hideous forms, that, notwithstanding my inexperience, I at once recognised as shackles, manacles and fetters! What wanted the Pandora with these?
But the secret was now out. I needed to employ conjectures no longer. The carpenter was at work upon some strong pieces of oak timber, which he was shaping into the fashion of a grating, I perceived that it was intended for the hatchway.
I needed no more light. I had read of the horror of the “middle passage.” I recognised the intention of the carpenter’s job. I no longer doubted that the Pandora was a slaver!
Chapter Nine
Yes – beyond a doubt I was on board a slave-ship – one regularly fitted up for the inhuman traffic – manned for it. I might also say armed – for although there were no cannon, I observed a large number of muskets, cutlasses, and pistols, that had been brought upon the deck from some secret hiding-place, and distributed to the men to be cleaned and put in order. From all this it was plain that the Pandora was bent upon some desperate enterprise, and although she might not sustain a combat with the smallest vessel of war, she was determined that no mere boat’s crew should capture and rob her of her human freight. But it was to her sails more than to her armour that the Pandora trusted for success; and, indeed, built and rigged as she was, few ships of war could have overhauled her in open water, and with a fair wind.
I say that I no longer doubted of her true character. Indeed the people on board no longer made a secret of it. On the contrary, they appeared to glory in the occupation, regarding it in the light of achievement and enterprise. Over their cups they sang songs in which the “bold slaver” and his “jolly crew” were made to play the heroic, and many a coarse jest was uttered relating to the “black-skinned cargo.”
We had now passed to the southward of Gibraltar Straits, and were sailing in a track where there would be less likelihood of falling in with English men-of-war. The cruisers, whose sole business it is to look after the slave-trade, would be found much farther south, and along the coasts where slaves are usually shipped; and as there was no fear of meeting with them for some days to come, the Pandora’s crew had little else to do than enjoy themselves. A constant carousal, therefore, was kept up, and drinking, singing, dancing, and “skylarking” were practised from morning to night.
You may be surprised to know that a ship so evidently fitted out for slave-traffic could have thus openly and directly sailed out of a British port. But it is to be remembered that the period of which I am writing was many years ago; although so far as that goes, it would be no anachronism to lay the scene of my narrative in the year 1857. Many a slave-ship has sailed from British ports in this very year, and with all our boasted efforts to check the slave-trade it will be found that as large a proportion of British subjects are at present engaged in this nefarious traffic as of any other nation.
The attempt to put down the African slave-trade has been neither more or less than a gigantic sham. Not one of the governments who have engaged in this scheme of philanthropy have had more than a lukewarm interest in the matter, and the puny efforts they have made have been more for the purpose of pacifying a few clamorous philanthropists, than with a real design to stop the horrid traffic. For one slave-ship that is captured at least twenty pass free, landing their emaciated thousands upon the shores of the western world. Nay – worse than ever – the tyrant who, with railroad speed, is demoralising the millions of France, lends his ill-gotten power to re-establish this barter of human souls, and the slave-trade will ere long flourish as luxuriantly as ever.
It would have been an easy matter for Great Britain long since to have crushed out every vestige of the slave-trade, even without adding one item to her expenditure. What can be more absurd than the payment of 300,000 pounds to Portuguese slave-merchants to induce them to abandon the traffic in slaves? Why it is a positive premium upon crime – an indemnity for giving up the trade of pillage and murder! I say nothing would have been easier than for England to have put an end to the very existence of this horror years ago. It would only have required her to have acted with more earnestness, and a little more energy – to have declared that a slave-dealer was a pirate, and to have dealt with him accordingly – that is, hanged him and his crew, when taken, from the yard-arm of their ship – and there was not a nation in the world that would have dared to raise voice against such a course. Indeed it is a perfect absurdity to hang a pirate and let a slaver escape: for if it be admitted
