Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader | Page 8

How's your beak, Dick, my boy?"
"None the better for your askin'," replied the surly mariner, who was tenderly stroking the injured member of his face with the fingers of both hands.
"Come, Dick, it is none the worse of being inquired after," said Henry, laughing. "But 'tis as well to let the fellow go. He knows best how to cure his wound, by the application of a few simples; and by thus making off has relieved us of the trouble and responsibility of trying our hands at civilized doctoring. Besides, John Bumpus (if that's your name,--though I do think your father might have found you a better), your long legs would never have brought you within a mile of the savage."
"Young man," retorted Jo, gravely, "I'd have you to know that the family of the Bumpuses is an old and a honorable one. They comed over with the Conkerer to Ireland, where they picked up a deal o' their good manners, after which they settled at last on their own estates in Yorkshire. Though they have comed down in the world, and the last of the Bumpuses--that's me--is takin' a pleasure-trip round the world before the mast, I won't stand by and hear my name made game of, d'ye see: and I'd have ye to know, further, my buck, that the Bumpuses has a pecooliar gift for fightin'; and although you are a strappin' young feller, you'd better not cause me for to prove that you're conkerable."
Having delivered himself of this oration, the last of the Bumpuses frowned portentously on the youth who had dared to risk his anger, and turning with a bland smile to surly Dick, asked him "if his beak was any better now."
"There seems to be bad news in the letter, I think," observed Henry, as Captain Gascoyne perused the epistle with evident signs of displeasure.
"Bad enough in these times of war, boy," replied the other, folding the note and placing it in a pouch inside the breast of his flannel shirt. "It seems that that pestiferous British frigate, the Talisman, lies at anchor in the bay on the other side of the island."
"Nothing in that to cause uneasiness to an honest trader," said Henry, leading the way up the steep path by which he had descended from the mountain region of the interior.
"That speech only shows your ignorance of the usages of ships-of-war. Know you not that the nature of the trade in which I am engaged requires me to be strong-handed, and that the opinion of a commander in the British navy as to how many hands are sufficient for the navigation of a trading-schooner does not accord with mine?--a difference of opinion which may possibly result in his relieving me of a few of my best men when I can ill afford to spare them. And, by the way," said Gascoyne, pausing as they gained the brow of an eminence that commanded a view of the rich woodland on one side and the sea on the other, "I had better take precautions against such a mischance. Here, Dick" (taking the man aside and whispering to him), "go back to the schooner, my lad, and tell the mate to send ten of the best hands ashore with provisions and arms. Let them squat where they choose on land, only let them see to it that they keep well out of sight and hearing until I want them. And now, Master Henry, lead the way; John Bumpus and I will follow at your heel like a couple of faithful dogs."
The scene through which young Henry Stuart now led his seafaring companions was of that rich, varied, and beautiful character which is strikingly characteristic of those islands of the Pacific which owe their origin to volcanic agency. Unlike the low coral islets, this island presented every variety of the boldest mountain scenery, and yet, like them, it displayed all the gorgeous beauty of a rich tropical vegetation. In some places the ground had been cracked and riven into great fissures and uncouth caverns of the wildest description, by volcanoes apparently long since extinct. In others the landscape presented the soft beauty of undulating, grove-like scenery, in which, amid a profusion of bright green herbage, there rose conspicuous the tall stems and waving plumes of the cocoanut palm; the superb and umbrageous ko-a, with its laurel-green leaves and sweet blossoms; the kukui, or candlenut tree; the fragrant sandal-wood, and a variety of other trees and shrubs for which there are no English names.
Hundreds of green paroquets with blue heads and red breasts, turtle-doves, wood-pigeons, and other birds enlivened the groves with sound, if not with melody, and the various lakelets and pools were alive with wild ducks and water-hens.
The route by which the party traveled led them first