The Voyages of Captain Scott | Page 2

John
Edward Scott, father of the Captain Scott who was born at Oatlands on
June 6, 1868. About the same date, or perhaps a little earlier, it was
decided that the boy should go into the Navy like so many of his
for-bears.
I have been asked to write a few pages about those early days of Scott
at Oatlands, so that the boys who read this book may have some slight
acquaintance with the boy who became Captain Scott; and they may be
relieved to learn (as it holds out some chance for themselves) that the
man who did so many heroic things does not make his first appearance
as a hero. He enters history aged six, blue-eyed, long-haired,
inexpressibly slight and in velveteen, being held out at arm's length by
a servant and dripping horribly, like a half-drowned kitten. This is the
earliest recollection of him of a sister, who was too young to join in a
children's party on that fatal day. But Con, as he was always called, had
intimated to her that from a window she would be able to see him
taking a noble lead in the festivities in the garden, and she looked; and
that is what she saw. He had been showing his guests how superbly he
could jump the leat, and had fallen into it.
Leat is a Devonshire term for a running stream, and a branch of the leat
ran through the Oatlands garden while there was another branch, more
venturesome, at the bottom of the fields. These were the waters first
ploughed by Scott, and he invented many ways of being in them
accidentally, it being forbidden to enter them of intent. Thus he taught
his sisters and brother a new version of the oldest probably of all
pastimes, the game of 'Touch.' You had to touch 'across the leat,' and,
with a little good fortune, one of you went in. Once you were wet, it did
not so much matter though you got wetter.
An easy way of getting to the leat at the foot of the fields was to walk
there, but by the time he was eight Scott scorned the easy ways. He
invented parents who sternly forbade all approach to this dangerous
waterway; he turned them into enemies of his country and of himself
(he was now an admiral), and led parties of gallant tars to the stream by
ways hitherto unthought of. At foot of the avenue was an oak tree
which hung over the road, and thus by dropping from this tree you got

into open country. The tree was (at this time) of an enormous size, with
sufficient room to conceal a navy, and the navy consisted mainly of the
sisters and the young brother. All had to be ready at any moment to
leap from the tree and join issue with the enemy on the leat. In the
fields there was also a mighty ocean, called by dull grown-ups 'the
pond,' and here Scott's battleship lay moored. It seems for some time to
have been an English vessel, but by and by he was impelled, as all boys
are, to blow something up, and he could think of nothing more splendid
for his purpose than the battleship. Thus did it become promptly a ship
of the enemy doing serious damage to the trade of those parts, and the
valiant Con took to walking about with lips pursed, brows frowning as
he cogitated how to remove the Terror of Devon. You may picture the
sisters and brother trotting by his side and looking anxiously, into his
set face. At last he decided to blow the accursed thing up with
gunpowder. His crew cheered, and then waited to be sent to the local
shop for a pennyworth of gunpowder. But Con made his own
gunpowder, none of the faithful were ever told how, and on a great day
the train was laid. Con applied the match and ordered all to stand back.
A deafening explosion was expected, but a mere puff of flame was all
that came; the Terror of Devon, which to the unimaginative was only a
painted plank, still rode the waters. With many boys this would be the
end of the story, but not with Con. He again retired to the making of
gunpowder, and did not desist from his endeavors until he had blown
that plank sky-high.
His first knife is a great event in the life of a boy: it is probably the first
memory of many of them, and they are nearly always given it on
condition that they keep it shut. So it was with Con, and a few minutes
after he had sworn that he would not open it he was begging for
permission to use