Unknown - "Pages for Laughing Eyes"

Sir Richard Henry Bonnycastle - "Canada and the Canadians"

L. de Hegermann Lindencrone - "In the Courts of Memory 1858 1875."

Various - "Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 21, 1893"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

Cord and Creese

J >> James de Mille >> Cord and Creese




This last room seemed to him as though it might have been the captain's.
That captain was Cigole, the very man who had flung him overboard. He
had unconsciously by so doing sent him to the scene of his early crime.
Was this visit to be all in vain? Thus far it seemed so. But might there
not yet be something beneath this sand which might satisfy him in his
search?

There still remained another room. Might there not be something there?

Brandon went back into the cabin and stood looking at the open doorway
of that other room.

He hesitated. Why? Perhaps it was the thought that here was his last
chance, that here his exploration must end, and if nothing came of it
then all this adventure would be in vain. Then the fantastic hopes and
fears which by turns had agitated him would prove to have been absurd,
and he, instead of being sent by Fate as the minister of vengeance,
would be only the commonplace victim of an everyday accident.

Perhaps it was some instinct within him that made known to his mind what
awaited him there. For now as he stood that old horror came upon him
full and strong. Weakness and excitement made his heart beat and his
ears ring. Now his fancy became wild, and he recalled with painful
vividness his father's words:

"In the crisis of your fate I will be near."

The horrors of the past night recurred. The air of the cabin was close
and suffocating. There seemed in that dark room before him some dread
Presence, he knew not what; some Being, who had uncovered this his abode
and enticed him here.

He found himself rapidly falling into that state in which he would not
have been able either to advance or retreat. One overmastering horror
seized him. Twice his spirit sought to overcome the faintness and
weakness of the flesh. Twice he stepped resolutely forward; but each
time he faltered and recoiled.

Here was no place for him to summon up his strength. He could bear it no
longer. He turned abruptly and rushed out from the damp, gloomy place
into the warm, bright sunshine and the free air of heaven.

The air was bright, the wind blew fresh. He drank in great draughts of
that delicious breeze, and the salt sea seemed to be inhaled at each
breath.

The sun shone brilliantly. The sea rolled afar and all around, and
sparkled before him under the sun's rays with that infinite laughter,
that [Greek: anaerithmon gelasma] of which Aeschylus spoke in his deep
love of the salt sea. Speaking parenthetically, it may be said that the
only ones from among articulate speaking men who have found fitting
epithets for the sea are the old Greek, the Scandinavian, and the
Englishman.

Brandon drew in new strength and life with every breath, till at last he
began to think once more of returning.

But even yet he feared that when he entered that cabin the spell would
be on him. The thought of attempting it was intolerable. Yet what was to
be done? To remain unsatisfied was equally intolerable. To go back to
his rock was not to be thought of.

But an effort must be made to get rid of this womanly fear; why should
he yield to this? Surely there were other thoughts which he might call
to his mind. There came over him the memory of that villain who had cast
him here, who now was exulting in his fancied success and bearing back
to his master the news. There came to him the thought of his father, and
his wrongs, and his woe. There came to his memory his father's dying
words summoning him to vengeance. There came to him the thought of those
who yet lived and suffered in England, at the mercy of a pitiless enemy.
Should he falter at a superstitious fancy, he--who, if he lived, had so
great a purpose?

All superstitious fancy faded away. The thirst for revenge, the sense of
intolerable wrong arose. Fear and horror died out utterly, destroyed by
Vengeance.

"The Presence, then, is my ally," he murmured. "I will go and face It."

And he walked resolutely, with a firm step, back into the cabin.

Yet even then it needed all the new-born resolution which he had
summoned up, and all the thought of his wrong, to sustain him as he
entered that inner room. Even then a sharp thrill passed through him,
and bodily weakness could only be sustained by the strong, resolute,
stubborn soul.

[Illustration: "THERE SEEMED A GHASTLY COMICALITY IN SUCH A THING AS
THIS," ETC.]

The room was about the size of the captain's. There was a table against
the side, which looked like a leaf which could hang down in case of
necessity. A trunk stood opposite the door, with the open lid projecting
upward out of a mass of sand. Upon the wall there hung the collar of a
coat and part of the shoulders, the rest having apparently fallen away
from decay. The color of the coat could still be distinguished; it was
red, and the epaulets showed that it had belonged to a British officer.

Brandon on entering took in all these details at a glance, and then his
eyes were drawn to the berth at the end of the room, where that Thing
lay whose presence he had felt and feared, and which he knew by an
internal conviction must be here.

There It awaited him, on the berth. Sand had covered it, like a
coverlet, up to the neck, while beyond that protruded the head. It was
turned toward him: a bony, skeleton head, whose hollow cavities seemed
not altogether vacancy but rather dark eyes which looked gloomily at
him--dark eyes fixed, motionless; which had been thus fixed through the
long years, watching wistfully for him, expecting his entrance through
that doorway. And this was the Being who had assisted him to the shore,
and who had thrown off the covering of sand with which he had concealed
himself, so as to bring him here before him. Brandon stood motionless,
mute. The face was turned toward him--that face which is at once human
and yet most frightful since it is the face of Death--the face of a
skeleton. The jaws had fallen apart, and that fearful grin which is
fixed on the fleshless face here seemed like an effort at a smile of
welcome.

The hair still clung to that head, and hung down over the fleshless
forehead, giving it more the appearance of Death in life, and lending a
new horror to that which already pervaded this Dweller in the Ship.

"The nightmare Life-in-Death was he,
That thicks men's blood with cold."

Brandon stood while his blood ran chill, and his breath came fast.

If that Form had suddenly thrown off its sandy coverlet and risen to his
feet, and advanced with extended hand to meet him, he would not have
been surprised, nor would he have been one whit more horror-stricken.

Brandon stood fixed. He could not move. He was like one in a nightmare.
His limbs seemed rigid. A spell was upon him. His eyes seemed to fasten
themselves on the hollow cavities of the Form before him. But under that
tremendous pressure he did not altogether sink. Slowly his spirit rose;
a thought of flight came, but it was instantly rejected. The next moment
he drew a long breath. "I'm an infernal fool and coward," he muttered.
He took three steps forward, and stood beside the Figure. He laid his
hand firmly upon the head; the hair fell off at his touch. "Poor devil,"
said he, "I'll bury your bones at any rate." The spell was broken, and
Brandon was himself again.

Once more Brandon walked out into the open air, but this time there was
not a vestige of horror left. He had encountered what he dreaded, and it
was now in his eyes only a mass of bones. Yet there was much to think
of, and the struggle which had raged within him had exhausted him.

The sea-breeze played about him and soon restored his strength. What
next to do was the question, and after some deliberation he decided at
once to remove the skeleton and bury it.

A flat board which had served as a shelf supplied him with an easy way
of turning up the sand. Occupation was pleasant, and in an hour or two
he had scooped out a place large enough for the purpose which he had in
view. He then went back into the inner cabin.

Taking his board he removed carefully the sand which had covered the
skeleton. The clothes came away with it. As he moved his board along it
struck something hard. He could not see in that dim light what it was,
so he reached down his hand and grasped it.

It was something which the fingers of the skeleton also encircled, for
his own hand as he grasped it touched those fingers. Drawing it forth he
perceived that it was a common junk bottle tightly corked.

There seemed a ghastly comicality in such a thing as this, that this
lately dreaded Being should be nothing more than a common skeleton, and
that he should be discovered in this bed of horror doing nothing more
dignified than clutching a junk bottle like a sleeping drunkard. Brandon
smiled faintly at the idea; and then thinking that, if the liquor were
good, it at least would be welcome to him in his present situation. He
walked out upon the deck, intending to open it and test its contents. So
he sat down, and, taking his knife, he pushed the cork in. Then he
smelled the supposed liquor to see what it might be. There was only a
musty odor. He looked in. The bottle appeared to be filled with paper.
Then the whole truth flashed upon his mind. He struck the bottle upon
the deck. It broke to atoms, and there lay a scroll of paper covered
with writing.

He seized it eagerly, and was about opening it to read what was written
when he noticed something else that also had fallen from the bottle.

It was a cord about two yards in length, made of the entrail of some
animal, and still as strong and as flexible as when it was first made.
He took it up carefully, wondering why such a thing as this should have
been so carefully sealed up and preserved when so many other things had
been neglected.

The cord, on a close examination, presented nothing very remarkable
except the fact that, though very thin, it appeared to have been not
twisted but plaited in a very peculiar manner out of many fine strands.
The intention had evidently been to give to it the utmost possible
strength together with the smallest size. Brandon had heard of cords
used by Malays and Hindus for assassination, and this seemed like the
description which he had read of them.

At one end of the cord was a piece of bronze about the size of a common
marble, to which the cord was attached by a most peculiar knot. The
bronze itself was intended to represent the head of some Hindu idol, the
grotesque ferocity of its features, and the hideous grimace of the mouth
being exactly like what one may see in the images of Mother Kali or
Bowhani.

At once the cord associated itself in his mind with the horrors which he
had heard of as having been perpetrated in the names of these frightful
deities, and it seemed now to be more than a common one. He carefully
wound it up, placed it in his pocket, and prepared to examine the
manuscript.

The sun was high in the heavens, the sea-breeze still blew freshly,
while Brandon, opening the manuscript, began to read.




CHAPTER VII.


MANUSCRIPT FOUND IN A BOTTLE.

"BRIG 'VISHNU,' ADRIFT IN THE CHINESE SEA.

"July 10, 1828.

"Whoever finds this let him know that I, Lionel Despard, Colonel of H.
M. 37th Regiment, have been the victim of a foul conspiracy performed
against me by the captain and crew of the brig _Vishnu_, and
especially by my servant, John Potts.

"Expecting at any time to perish, adrift helplessly, at the mercy of
winds and waves, I sit down now before I die, to write all the
circumstances of this affair. I will inclose the manuscript in a bottle
and fling it into the sea, trusting in God that he may cause it to be
borne to those who may be enabled to read my words, so that they may
know my fate and bring the guilty to justice. Whoever finds this let
him, if possible, have it sent to my friend, Ralph Brandon, of Brandon
Hall, Devonshire, England, who will do more than any other man to cause
justice to have its due.

"To further the ends of justice and to satisfy the desires of my
friends, I will write an account of the whole case.

"In the name of God, I declare that John Potts is guilty of my death. He
was my servant. I first found him in India under very remarkable
circumstances.

"It was in the year 1826. The Government was engaged in an effort to put
down bands of assassins by whom the most terrific atrocities had been
committed, and I was appointed to conduct the work in the district of
Agra.

"The Thuggee society is still a mystery, though its nature may yet be
revealed if they can only capture the chief [Footnote: The chief was
captured in 1830, and by his confession all the atrocious system of
Thuggee was revealed.] and make him confess. As yet it is not fully
known, and though I have heard much which I have reported to the
Government, yet I am slow to believe that any human beings can actually
practice what I have heard.

"The assassins whom I was pursuing eluded our pursuit with marvelous
agility and cunning, but one by one we captured them, and punished them
summarily. At last we surrounded a band of Thugs, and to our amazement
found among them a European and a small boy. At our attack the Hindus
made a desperate resistance, and killed themselves rather than fall into
our hands; but the European, leading forward the little boy, fell on his
knees and implored us to save him.

"I had heard that an Englishman had joined these wretches, and at first
thought that this was the man; so, desirous of capturing him, I ordered
my men whenever they found him to spare his life if possible. This man
was at once seized and brought before me.

"He had a piteous story to tell. He said that his name was John Potts,
that be belonged to Southampton, and had been in India a year. He had
come to Agra to look out for employ as a servant, and had been caught by
the Thugs. They offered to spare his life if he would join them.
According to him they always make this offer. If it had only been
himself that was concerned he said that he would have died a hundred
times rather than have accepted; but his little boy was with him, and to
save his life he consented, hoping that somehow or other he might
escape. They then received him with some horrible ceremonies, and marked
on his arm and on the arm of his son, on the inner part of the right
elbow, the name of Bowhani in Hindu characters. Potts showed me his arm
and that of his son in proof of this.

"He had been with them, according to his own account, about three
months, and his life had been one continuous horror. He had picked up
enough of their language to conjecture to some extent the nature of
their belief, which, he asserted, would be most important information
for the Government. The Thugs had treated him very kindly, for they
looked upon him as one of themselves, and they are all very humane and
affectionate to one another. His worst fear had been that they would
compel him to do murder; and he would have died, he declared, rather
than consent; but, fortunately, he was spared. The reason of this, he
said, was because they always do their murder by strangling, since the
shedding of blood is not acceptable to their divinity. He could not do
this, for it requires great dexterity. Almost all their strangling is
done by a thin, strong cord, curiously twisted, about six feet in
length, with a weight at one end, generally carved so as to represent
the face of Bowhani. This they throw with a peculiar jerk around the
neck of their victim. The weight swings the cord round and round, while
the strangler pulls the other end, and death is inevitable. His hands,
he said, were coarse and clumsy, unlike the delicate Hindu hands; and
so, although they forced him to practice incessantly, he could not
learn. He said nothing about the boy, but, from what I saw of that boy
afterward, I believe that nature created him especially to be a Thug,
and have no doubt that he learned then to wield the cord with as much
dexterity as the best strangler of them all.

"His association with them had shown him much of their ordinary habits
and some of their beliefs. I gathered from what he said that the basis
of the Thuggee society is the worship of Bowhani, a frightful demon,
whose highest joy is the sight of death or dead bodies. Those who are
her disciples must offer up human victims killed without the shedding of
blood, and the more he can kill the more of a saint he becomes. The
motive for this is never gain, for they rarely plunder, but purely
religious zeal. The reward is an immortality of bliss hereafter, which
Bowhani will secure them; a life like that of the Mohammedan Paradise,
where there are material joys to be possessed forever without satiety.
Destruction, which begins as a kind of duty, becomes also at last, and
naturally perhaps, an absorbing passion. As the hunter in pursuing his
prey is carried away by excitement and the enthusiasm of the chase, or,
in hunting the tiger, feels the delight of braving danger and displaying
courage, so here that same passion is felt to an extraordinary degree,
for it is men that must be pursued and destroyed. Here, in addition to
courage, the hunter of man must call into exercise cunning, foresight,
eloquence, intrigue. All this I afterward brought to the attention of
the Government with very good results.

"Potts declared that night and day he had been on the watch for a chance
to escape, but so infernal was the cunning of these wretches, and so
quick their senses, sharpened as they had been by long practice, that
success became hopeless. He had fallen into deep dejection, and
concluded that his only hope lay in the efforts of the Government to put
down these assassins. Our appearance had at last saved him.

"Neither I, nor any of my men, nor any Englishman who heard this story,
doubted for an instant the truth of every word. All the newspapers
mentioned with delight the fact that an Englishman and his son had been
rescued. Pity was felt for that father who, for his son's sake, had
consented to dwell amidst scenes of terror, and sympathy for the anguish
that he most have endured during that terrific captivity. A thrill of
horror passed through all our Anglo-Indian society at the revelation
which he made about Thuggee; and so great was the feeling in his favor
that a handsome subscription was made up for him by the officers at
Agra.

"For my part I believed in him most implicitly, and, as I saw him to be
unusually clever, I engaged him at once to be my servant. He staid with
me, and every month won more and more of my confidence. He had a good
head for business. Matters of considerable delicacy which I intrusted to
him were well performed, and at last I thought it the most fortunate
circumstance in my Indian life that I had found such a man.

"After about three years he expressed a wish to go to England for the
sake of his son. He thought India a bad place for a boy, and wished to
try and start in some business in his native land for his son's sake.

"That boy had always been my detestation--a crafty, stealthy, wily,
malicious little demon, who was a perfect Thug in his nature, without
any religious basis to his Thuggeeism. I pitied Potts for being the
father of such a son. I could not let the little devil live in my house;
his cruelty to animals which he delighted to torture, his thieving
propensities, and his infernal deceit, were all so intolerable. He was
not more than twelve, but he was older in iniquity than many a gray-
headed villain. To oblige Potts, whom I still trusted implicitly, I
wrote to my old friend Ralph Brandon, of Brandon Hall, Devonshire,
requesting him to do what he could for so deserving a man.

"Just about this time an event occurred which has brought me to this.

"My sweet wife had been ill for two years. I had obtained a faithful
nurse in the person of a Mrs. Compton, a poor creature, but gentle and
affectionate, for whom my dear love's sympathy had been excited. No one
could have been more faithful than Mrs. Compton, and I sent my darling
to the hill station at Assurabad in hopes that the cooler air might
reinvigorate her.

"She died. It is only a month or two since that frightful blow fell and
crushed me. To think of it overwhelms me--to write of it is impossible.

"I could think of nothing but to fly from my unendurable grief. I wished
to get away from India any where. Before the blow crushed me I hoped
that I might carry my darling to the Cape of Good Hope, and therefore I
remitted there a large sum; but after she left me I cared not where I
went, and finding that a vessel was going to Manilla I decided to go
there.

"It was Potts who found out this. I now know that he engaged the vessel,
put the crew on board, who were all creatures of his own, and took the
route to Manilla for the sake of carrying out his designs on me. To give
every thing a fair appearance the vessel was laden with stores and
things of that sort, for which there was a demand at Manilla. It was
with the most perfect indifference that I embarked. I cared not where I
went, and hoped that the novelty of the sea voyage might benefit me.

"The captain was an Italian named Cigole, a low-browed, evil-faced
villain. The mate was named Clark. There were three Lascars, who formed
the small crew. Potts came with me, and also an old servant of mine, a
Malay; whose life I had saved years before. His name was Uracao. It
struck me that the crew was a small one, but I thought the captain knew
his business better than I, and so I gave myself no concern.

"After we embarked Potts's manner changed very greatly. I remember this
now, though I did not notice it at the time, for I was almost in a kind
of stupor. He was particularly insolent to Uracao. I remember once
thinking indifferently that Potts would have to be reprimanded, or
kicked, or something of that sort, but was not capable of any action.

"Uracao had for years slept in front of my door when at home, and, when
traveling, in the same room. He always waked at the slightest noise. He
regarded his life as mine, and thought that he was bound to watch over
me till I died. Although this was often inconvenient, yet it would have
broken the affectionate fellow's heart if I had forbidden it, so it went
on. Potts made an effort to induce him to sleep forward among the
Lascars, but though Uracao had borne insolence from him without a
murmur, this proposal made his eyes kindle with a menacing fire which
silenced the other into fear.

"The passage was a quick one, and at last we were only a few days' sail
from Manilla. Now our quiet came to an end. One night I was awakened by
a tremendous struggle in my cabin. Starting up, I saw in the gloom two
figures struggling desperately. It was impossible to see who they were.
I sprang from the berth and felt for my pistols. They were gone.

"'What the devil is this?' I roared fiercely.

"No answer came; but the next moment there was a tremendous fall, and
one of the men clung to the other, whom he held downward. I sprang from
my berth. There were low voices out in the cabin.

"'You can't,' said one voice, which I recognized as Clark's. 'He has his
pistols.'

"'He hasn't,' said the voice of Cigole. 'Potts took them away. He's
unarmed.'

"'Who are you?' I cried, grasping the man who was holding the other
down.

"'Uracao,' said he. 'Get your pistols or you're lost!'

"'What the devil is the matter?' I cried, angrily, for I had not even
yet a suspicion.

"'Feel around your neck,' said he.

"Hastily I put my hand up. A thrill of terror passed through me. It was
the Thuggee cord.

"'Who is this?' I cried, grasping the man who had fallen.

"'Potts,' cried Uracao. 'Your pistols are under your berth. Quick! Potts
tried to strangle you. There's a plot. The Lascars are Thugs. I saw the
mark on their arms, the name of Bowhani in Hindu letters.'

"All the truth now seemed to flash across me. I leaped back to the berth
to look under it for my pistols. As I stooped there was a rush behind
me.

"'Help! Clark! Quick!' cried the voice of Potts. 'This devil's
strangling me!'

"At this a tumult arose round the two men. Uracao was dragged off. Potts
rose to his feet. At that moment I found my pistols. I could not
distinguish persons, but I ran the risk and fired. A sharp cry followed.
Somebody was wounded.

"'Damn him!' cried Potts, 'he's got the pistols.'

"The next moment they had all rushed out, dragging Uracao with them. The
door was drawn to violently with a bang and fastened on the outside.
They had captured the only man who could help me, and I was a prisoner
at the mercy of these miscreants.

"All the remainder of the night and until the following morning I heard
noises and trampling to and fro, but had no idea whatever of what was
going on. I felt indignation at the treachery of Potts, who, I now
perceived, had deceived me all along, but had no fear whatever of any
thing that might happen. Death was rather grateful than otherwise. Still
I determined to sell my life as dearly as possible, and, loading my
pistol once more, I waited for them to come. The only anxiety which I
felt was about my poor faithful Malay.

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