Complete Works

men-of-war of the smaller kind were cruising off the north coast of Spain — as risky and disagreeable a station as can be well imagined.
    It looks as though that ship of his had had some special service to perform.  A careful explanation of all the circumstances was to be expected from our man, only, as I’ve said, some of his pages (good tough paper too) were missing: gone in covers for jampots or in wadding for the fowling-pieces of his irreverent posterity.  But it is to be seen clearly that communication with the shore and even the sending of messengers inland was part of her service, either to obtain intelligence from or to transmit orders or advice to patriotic Spaniards, guerilleros or secret juntas of the province.  Something of the sort.  All this can be only inferred from the preserved scraps of his conscientious writing.
    Next we come upon the panegyric of a very fine sailor, a member of the ship’s company, having the rating of the captain’s coxswain.  He was known on board as Cuba Tom; not because he was Cuban however; he was indeed the best type of a genuine British tar of that time, and a man-of-war’s man for years.  He came by the name on account of some wonderful adventures he had in that island in his young days, adventures which were the favourite subject of the yarns he was in the habit of spinning to his shipmates of an evening on the forecastle head.  He was intelligent, very strong, and of proved courage.  Incidentally we are told, so exact is our narrator, that Tom had the finest pigtail for thickness and length of any man in the Navy.  This appendage, much cared for and sheathed tightly in a porpoise skin, hung half way down his broad back to the great admiration of all beholders and to the great envy of some.
    Our young officer dwells on the manly qualities of Cuba Tom with something like affection.  This sort of relation between officer and man was not then very rare.  A youngster on joining the service was put under the charge of a trustworthy seaman, who slung his first hammock for him and often later on became a sort of humble friend to the junior officer.  The narrator on joining the sloop had found this man on board after some years of separation.  There is something touching in the warm pleasure he remembers and records at this meeting with the professional mentor of his boyhood.
    We discover then that, no Spaniard being forthcoming for the service, this worthy seaman with the unique pigtail and a very high character for courage and steadiness had been selected as messenger for one of these missions inland which have been mentioned.  His preparations were not elaborate.  One gloomy autumn morning the sloop ran close to a shallow cove where a landing could be made on that iron-bound shore.  A boat was lowered, and pulled in with Tom Corbin (Cuba Tom) perched in the bow, and our young man (Mr. Edgar Byrne was his name on this earth which knows him no more) sitting in the stern sheets.
    A few inhabitants of a hamlet, whose grey stone houses could be seen a hundred yards or so up a deep ravine, had come down to the shore and watched the approach of the boat.  The two Englishmen leaped ashore.  Either from dullness or astonishment the peasants gave no greeting, and only fell back in silence.
    Mr. Byrne had made up his mind to see Tom Corbin started fairly on his way.  He looked round at the heavy surprised faces.
    “There isn’t much to get out of them,” he said.  “Let us walk up to the village.  There will be a wine shop for sure where we may find somebody more promising to talk to and get some information from.”
    “Aye, aye, sir,” said Tom falling into step behind his officer.  “A bit of palaver as to courses and distances can do no harm; I crossed the broadest part of Cuba by the help of my tongue tho’ knowing far less Spanish than I do now.  As they say themselves it was ‘four words and no more’ with me, that time when I got left behind on shore by the Blanche, frigate.”
    He made light of what was before him, which was but a day’s journey into the mountains.  It is true that there was a full day’s journey before striking the mountain path, but that was nothing for a man who had crossed the island of Cuba on his two legs, and with no more than four words of the language to begin with.
    The officer and the man were walking now on a thick sodden bed of dead leaves, which the peasants thereabouts accumulate in the streets of their