The Tiger of Mysore | Page 7

voyage a pleasant one for you.'
"So you see, we shall start favourably, Dick; for the captain can do a great deal towards adding to the comfort of a passenger. When it is known, by the purser and steward, that a lady is under the special care of the captain, it ensures her a larger share of civility, and special attentions, than she might otherwise obtain."
As soon as they went on board, indeed, the captain came up to them.
"Good morning, Mrs. Holland," he said. "You have done quite right to come on board early. It gives you a chance of being attended to, before the stewards are being called for by twenty people at once."
He beckoned to a midshipman.
"Mr. Hart, please tell the purser I wish to speak to him.
"So this is your son, Mrs. Holland? A fine, straight-looking young fellow. Are you going to put him in the Service? You have a strong claim, you know, which I am sure the Board would acknowledge."
"Do you know, Captain, it is a matter that I have hardly thought of--in fact, I have, for years, been so determined to go out and try and obtain some news of my husband, as soon as Dick was old enough to journey about as my protector, that I have not thought, as I ought to have done, what profession he should follow. However, he is only fifteen yet, and there will be time enough when he gets back."
"If he is to go into the service, the sooner the better, ma'am--one can hardly begin too young. However, I don't say there are not plenty of good sailors, afloat, who did not enter until a couple of years older than he is--there is no strict rule as to age.
"Only fifteen, is he? I should have taken him for at least a year older. However, if you like, Mrs. Holland, I will put him in the way of learning a good deal, during the voyage. He might as well be doing that as loafing about the deck all day."
"Much better, Captain. I am very much obliged to you, and I am sure that he will be, too."
"I should like it immensely, Captain," Dick exclaimed.
At this moment, the purser came up.
"Mr. Stevenson," the captain said, "this is Mrs. Holland. She is the wife of my old friend, John Holland--we were midshipmen together on board the Ganges. He commanded the Hooghley, which was lost, you know, five or six years ago, somewhere near Calicut. There were two or three survivors, and he was one of them, and it seems that he was taken up the country; so Mrs. Holland is going out to endeavour to ascertain whether he may not be still alive, though perhaps detained by one of those native princes.
"Please do everything you can to make her comfortable, and tell the head steward that it is my particular wish she shall be well attended to. Who is she berthed with?"
The purser took the passenger list from his pocket.
"She is with Mrs. Colonel Williamson, and the wife of Commissioner Larkins."
The captain gave a grunt of dissatisfaction. The purser went on.
"There is a small cabin vacant, Captain. Two ladies who were to have it--a mother and daughter--have, I hear this morning, been unexpectedly detained, owing to the sudden illness of one of them. Their heavy baggage is all in the hold, and must go on, and they will follow in the next ship. Shall I put Mrs. Holland in there?"
"Certainly. This is most fortunate.
"I don't think that you would have been comfortable, with the other two, Mrs. Holland. I don't know the colonel's wife, but Mrs. Larkins has travelled with us before, and I had quite enough of her on that voyage."
"Thank you very much, Captain. It will indeed be a comfort to have a cabin to myself."
Dick found that he was berthed with two young cadets, whose names, he learned from the cards fastened over the bunks, were Latham and Fellows.
Half an hour after the arrival of the Hollands on board, the passengers began to pour in rapidly, and the deck of the Madras was soon crowded with them, their friends, and their luggage. Below, all was bustle and confusion. Men shouted angrily to stewards; women, laden with parcels, blocked the gangway, and appealed helplessly to every one for information and aid; sailors carried down trunks and portmanteaus; and Mrs. Holland, when she emerged from her cabin, having stowed away her belongings and made things tidy, congratulated herself on having been the first on board, and so had not only avoided all this confusion, but obtained a separate cabin, which she might not otherwise have been able to do, as the captain would have been too busy to devote any special attention to her.
After having handed her over to the