CHAPTER I.

THE PIRATES.

The English did not think me of sufficient consequence to suspend me in an iron cage over the crocodile pool. This honor was reserved for the native shahs and rajahs.

I was transported, with scant ceremony, to Bombay, from which city I was shipped to sea, together with fifty other prisoners, who, like myself, had come to India to seek their fortunes, and whose chief crime was their nationality. They were natives of France, Holland, Germany and Spain, and the East India Company believed it had a right to arrest them and ship them in a body to New Caledonia.

Now, honorable gentlemen of the court, I beg you to tell me which was the pirate?--I, in the unseaworthy cutter, bound with chains to a Spaniard, perspiring over my oars, sailing to New Zealand instead of to New Caledonia, where the captain had been ordered to take us; having nothing to eat and drink but dried fish and stale water, the captain having again disobeyed orders, for the East India Company had shipped honest biscuit, smoked meat and brandy for the prisoner's food--which of us, I ask, was the pirate? the captain, who plundered the helpless prisoners in his power and broke the maritime laws--which, I ask, was the pirate; Captain Morder or I?

"I say Captain Morder was the pirate--" and the prince emphasized his reply by thumping the floor with his cane.

Many thanks, your highness; I wanted the question decided, for, against unauthorized force, self-defence is always justifiable. When we poor exiles became aware that our vessel was going farther and farther south, which we were able to judge from the stars; when, in consequence of the wretched food, the scurvy broke out among us; and when at last we also got a taste of the scourge, if we made any complaint, we conspired together to release ourselves from our chains; and to take possession of the cutter.

My hidalgo comrade was an expert in such matters. He showed us how to get rid of our manacles as easily as if they had been gloves or boots. It is a very pretty trick, but I don't think I could show you how it is done unless I received something in return--

"We don't want to learn the trick," interrupted the chair. "We have no use for it."

Well, after we had removed our fetters, we bound the sleeping crew, and, without shedding one drop of blood, made ourselves masters of the "Alcyona."

Now, honorable gentlemen of the court, I ask you: Can what we did be called mutiny? We were not the slaves of the East India Company; we were not prisoners of war; nor were we criminals. The captain had no right to chain us to the oars; we had done nothing to deserve deportation to a savage country.

On Captain Morder, however, rested most of the blame. He treated us free men like negro slaves; he gave us nothing to eat for a whole week but dried fish, though not all of us were papists; and to be more disagreeably contrary, he gave us smoked meat on Fridays because the majority of our crowd were Catholics.

"That rascally captain deserved to be hanged to the tallest mast on his ship!" exclaimed the justly indignant prince.

Yes, your highness, he did, but we didn't hang him, because we couldn't get hold of him. While we were securing the crew, he fled discreetly to the powder-room, and threatened to blow up the ship when we went to take him. We had to treat with him for terms. We assured him we did not want to injure him; we only wanted to leave his ship. To this he replied that we might go to the devil for all he cared.

Then followed a twenty-four hour truce, and our first business was--

"To eat your fill," interposed the chair.

Yes, your honor, to eat and drink all we wanted. Then we lowered the large boat, supplied it with mast and sails; loaded it with all the chests of biscuit, and casks of brandy it would hold, also a small cannon. Then we cut into bits the rigging of the cutter; threw overboard all the weapons we could find, in order that the captain could do us no injury in case he took it into his head to pursue us; took possession of his charts, compass, and telescope, and sailed away one beautiful moonlight night without saying goodbye to any one. How did Captain Morder reach home with the "Alcyona?" I really forget whether I ever heard.

There were fifty of us in the boat--five different nationalities. As I was the only one who could speak the five different languages, I was elected ship's patron, an office which differs from that of captain in that the latter commands every one on board a vessel, while the former carries out what his companions decide.

"I see plainly to what this subtle distinction will lead," dryly observed the chair. "Some one else will have to bear the blame for whatever misdeeds the 'ship's-patron' committed."

I am compelled to admire the honorable gentleman's keen perceptions, returned the prisoner in his most deferential manner. In this case, however, they are at fault; neither the ship's company nor its patron did anything which deserved yard-arm punishment.

Our intention, when we left the ship was to land in Florida, or the Philippines, and there found a new republic. But more than one unlooked-for hindrance prevented us from carrying out the plan. Hardly had the "Alcyona" disappeared from view, when a dead calm settled down on us; it was so still the sails hung in heavy folds from the yards; we could make progress, and that only very slowly, when we employed the oars.

The calm continued for two days, during which not a breath of air wrinkled the surface of the ocean.

"Didn't you say you had taken all the provisions on the ship?" inquired the chair.

"Yes, your honor, but 'all' was only the one-half of 'many,' and exactly the one-tenth of 'enough.' Even had there been 'many,' we had 'more' hungry mouths, and to take plus from minus is not permissable in Algorithm."

"And it can't be done," authoritatively interposed the prince. "You can't take eight from seven unless you borrow. From whom did you borrow, prisoner?"

"From a crab-fisher we met, your highness. During a calm, the large sea-crabs are more easily taken than at other times."

The honorable gentlemen of the court will have learned from natural history the peculiar characteristics of the sea-crab, which is of all living creatures--the human being not excepted--the most timorous. When a crab hears thunder or cannonading, he immediately flings off one of his huge claws, in order that he may escape more quickly.

Crab-fishers know this, and have made a compact with all warships, by which the latter have agreed to refrain from firing off cannon when in sight of a crabbing vessel. This is the reason all such vessels have a large red crab painted on their sails. The compact also obliges the fishers to deliver half of their catch to any warship they may meet on the high seas.

Consequently when we came in sight of the crabber we signalled for our share of his catch. We had eaten all our dried fish, and were on half-rations of biscuit.

"Oho!" called the fisher when he came near enough to distinguish the character of our craft. "How can you demand crabs of me? You aren't a warship."

"But we are hungry, and have a cannon on board. You know the result of a cannon-shot during a calm!"

This threat brought the argument to a conclusion; the crabber, according to seaman's custom, shared his catch with us.

"If," interposed the prince in a thoughtful manner; "If it was according to seaman's custom it cannot be termed 'piracy.'"

"No, certainly not!" ironically appended the chair. "It cannot be termed piracy--only an act of playfulness--a bit of frolic! But, let us hear what other pranks the band of fifty played with their cannon? I will spread the map here on the table, so that I may follow the course of your boat. I fancy I shall be able to tell from that whether you and your fellows comported yourselves as honest seamen or thievish pirates."

There was an almost imperceptible twitch of the prisoner's left eyelid when the mayor concluded his remark, and spread the map on the table in front of him.

In the neighborhood of the Marquesas Islands, honorable gentlemen, we fell in with a Spanish ship loaded with coffee. The captain, in response to our petition, supplied us with coffee, chocolate, and honey. This enabled us to continue our journey; we sailed toward the Aleutians, and met on our way a Russian merchantman, the owner of which took pity on us, and gave us several barrels of good brandy and salted fish.

When we were near the island of Yucatan our provisions again gave out, and we were compelled to borrow from an Italian trader some sago-palm, flour and several boxes of sultanas.

"What need had you of sultanas?" inquired the chair.

Sultanas are not women, your honor, but dried grapes, which are packed in boxes. When a man is starving he will eat anything! In the neighborhood of Barbados a Turkish vessel very kindly gave us a supply of pickled pork; and the captain of a Chinese junk we fell in with near the Canary Islands, was friendly enough to share his wine with us.

When off Madagascar, a Greek captain loaded our boat so generously with _rahut rakum_, it almost foundered under the weight; and when near Terre del Fuego we--

"Hold! stop!" screamed the chair thumping with both fists on the map. "If I wanted to make an accurate diagram of your course, I should have to tie a thread to the leg of a grasshopper and let him loose on a blank sheet of paper! A courier on horseback could not have made such twists and turns!"

"We did travel in a sort of zig-zag fashion," admitted the prisoner deprecatingly; "but, you see, none of us understood navigation. Besides, our charts were not accurate, and our compass full of whims."

"Must have been a feminine compass!" jocosely remarked his highness.

"To tell the truth, honorable gentlemen, I am not quite certain if the names I have given you are the ones properly belonging to the portions of the globe we visited. The excellent custom which obtains in all civilized regions, of posting the names of places at the street-corners, had not yet reached those remote corners. I can assure you, however, that we really met all the ships I have mentioned, as we were forced to beg our way over the limitless ocean."

"Beg your way!" sarcastically interrupted the chair. "It seems to me that fifty determined men, with small arms and a cannon, and a boat as swift as yours might have overtaken almost any other craft afloat."

"We did overtake a good many, your honor, and all of them very willingly shared their provisions with us when they saw we were in distress."

"Do you remember meeting a merchantman from Bremen?"

"Don't I? Don't I remember the generous gentleman! We met him near the Cape of Good Hope. That point of land hasn't got its name for nothing! It brought 'good hope' back to us! We were in tatters; the stormy weather; long voyage; and many hardships had reduced our frames to skeletons, our clothing to rags. When the brave man--blessed be his memory!--came up with us, and saw our nakedness, he took off his own coat and gave it to me--may heaven's blessings rest on him wherever he may be!"

"He tells quite a different story," responded the chair. "On his return home, he complained to the Hansa League that a boat load of pirates was sailing the high-seas, plundering, and levying contributions, from all vessels it met. He also related how the pirates had taken all his, as well as his crew's clothing. This must be true; for no Bremen trader has ever been known willingly to give coat of his to anyone. Bremen is not far away. We can summon the complainant--whose name, I believe, is Schulze--and let him tell his story here--"

"May I beg that your honor"--quickly interposed the prisoner--"will at the same time summon the witnesses who will testify for me? They are, the Spanish merchant Don Rodriguez di Saldayeni, from Badajos; the Russian captain, Bello Bratanow Zwonimir Tschinowink, from Kamtschatka; the Italian, Signor Sparafucile Odoards, from Palermo; the Turk, Ali Baba Ben Didimi Effendi, from Brusa; the Chinese mandarin, Chien-Tsen-Triping-Van, from Shanghai; the Greek, Heros Leonidas Karaiskakis, from Tricala; the--"

"Enough! enough!" roared the mayor clapping his hands to his ears. "I don't want to hear another name. Rather will I believe every word you say! You were sea-beggars, impoverished voyagers--anything but pirates! Will your highness permit us to erase also this indictment from the register?" The prince assenting, his honor added: "Now we will hear how the crime of cannibalism will be disposed of."

"I will first take the liberty to remind the honorable gentlemen of the court, that anthropophagy is not at all times considered a capital crime. The inhabitants of the Fiji Islands look upon it as the only proper method to dispose of a captured foe. The eating of human flesh is a part of the religious cult of the Mexicans; and during the Tartar invasion of Hungary, the people--as Rogerius proves--who had been robbed of the necessaries of life, were forced to eat each other. To such a condition of starvation we were also reduced, a fearful hurricane having compelled us, while on the Pacific ocean, to throw overboard all our stores in order to prevent the boat from sinking--"

"Now you are telling another story," thundered the chair. "You say you were on the Pacific ocean. If it is a _pacific_ ocean how is it possible that such a storm as you describe raged there? You shall be bound to the wheel, if you don't confess at once that hurricanes never rage on the Pacific Ocean."

Your honor is right--my memory served me ill--there are no such storms on the Pacific Ocean. But there are sharks. The voracious beasts surrounded our boat in such numbers that, in order to prevent them from eating us, we gave them all our provisions, hoping to fall in with a kind-hearted captain who would replenish our larder. But we didn't meet a single ship. For two whole weeks we managed to keep alive by eating our boots, and not until the last pair had been devoured, did we decide to resort to the "sailor's lunch," and cast lots which of us should be served up as such.

My name was drawn, and I made up my mind to die calmly--_pro bono publico_. But, when I began to remove my clothes, the Spaniard to whom I had been chained on the "Alcyona," and for whom I entertained the affection of a brother, stepped forward and said:

"You shall not die, brave rajah. You have a wife--nay, two of them, to whom your life is valuable. Here am I--your brother, who will consider it a privilege, an honor--as did the brave Curtius when he galloped into the abyss to save the republic--to fling myself into these hungry throats!"

With these words the noble fellow drew his sword, severed his head from his body and laid it before us.

"Did you eat any of him?"

"I was starving, your honor."

"That establishes your crime. The punishment for eating a body endowed with a human soul is death at the stake, you--"

"Hold," interposed the prince. "What portion of the Spaniard's body did you consume, prisoner?"

"His foot, your highness."

"Has the human foot a soul?"

"Why, certainly," answered the chair. "How frequently do we hear: 'His sense or his courage are in his knees'--sense and courage cannot exist without a soul. And, don't we say: 'Honest from his crown to his toes'--whereby we establish that even the toes possess a soul.'"

"These are merely phrases--maxims," returned the prince. "If the soul extends to the extremities, then the man who has a foot amputated loses a portion of his soul also; and it might happen, that one-quarter of a human soul would go to paradise, and the other three-quarters to hades--which it is absurd to suppose could be the case. To my thinking this is so important a question, that only the faculty of theology is capable of deciding it. Until those learned gentlemen have delivered an opinion on the subject, we cannot go on with this case. Therefore, the prisoner is remanded to his cell until such decision shall arrive."

A week was the time required by the learned faculty to discuss the questions: "Does the soul extend to the extremities of the human body?"

If not, just where does it terminate?

The decision was as follows:

"The soul extends to the knees--for this reason man is required to kneel when he prays. Consequently, that portion of the human frame below the knees is a soulless appendage."

"Then," decided the prince, when this decision was read to him, "the indictment for cannibalism may also be stricken from the register."