Walter Besant

I t was some time in the month of March, A.D. 1686, that we landed in Providence. The settlement—from which the Spaniards had now nothing to fear—then consisted (it is now, I learn, much larger) of no more than one hundred and fifty people in all, the men being all sailors, and ready to carry on again the old trade of privateer or pirate, as you please to call it, when they should be strong enough to buy or hire a ship and to equip her.

We stayed on the island for two years and a quarter, or thereabouts. It is one of an archipelago, for the most part, I believe, desert. The settlement was, as I have said, but a small one, living in scattered houses; there were plenty of these to spare (which had belonged to the former settlement), if one only took the trouble to clear away the creeping plants and cut down the trees which had grown up round them since the Spaniards came and destroyed the colony. Such a house, built of wood, with a shingle roof, we found convenient for us; and after we had cleared the ground round it and repaired it, we lived in it. Some of the people helped us to a porker or two and some chickens. They also gave us some salt beef and maize to start with. That we had little money (only what was left over from the sale of Alice's ring) made no difference to us here, because no one had any at all, and at this time there was neither buying nor selling on the island—a happy condition of things which will not, I take it, last long. So great is the fertility of the ground here, and such is the abundance which prevails, that we very shortly found ourselves provided with all that we wanted to make life pleasant. Work there was for us, but easy and pleasant work—such as weeding our patches of vegetables and fruit in the early mornings; or going to fish; or planting maize; or attending to our pigs, poultry, and turkeys; and for the rest of the time, sitting in the shade conversing. It is none too hot in this place, though one would not in the summer walk abroad at noon; nor is it ever too cold. All the fruits which flourish under the tropics grow here, with those also which belong to the temperate zone. Here are splendid forests, where you can cut the mahogany-tree, and build your house, if you please, of that lovely wood. Here we ourselves grew, for our own use, maize, tobacco, coffee, cocoa, plantains, pines, potatoes, and many other fruits and vegetables.

Barnaby soon grew tired of this quiet life, and went on board a schooner bound for New England, promising that we should hear from him. After two years we did receive a letter from him, as you shall immediately learn. When he was gone we carried on a quiet and peaceful life. Books, paper, and pen there were none upon this island. Nor were there any clothes, so that the raggedness of our attire (we were dressed in the sailors' clothes our friends the privateers gave us) became incredible. I made some kind of guitar on which we played, and in the evening we would have very good playing and singing together of such pieces and songs as we could remember. I made verses, too, for amusement, and Alice learned them. We found our brother-settlers a rough but honest folk, to whom we taught many arts: how to procure sea-salt, how to make wine from pineapples, how to cure the tobacco-leaf—things which greatly added to their comfort; and, seeing that there was no church on the island, we every Sabbath held a meeting for prayer and exhortation.

Seeing, then, that we had all that man could desire, with perfect freedom from anxiety, our liberty, a delightful climate, plenty to eat and drink—ay, and of the very best—and that at home there was nothing for us but prison again, and to be sent back to the place whence we had escaped, we ought, every one will acknowledge, to have felt the greatest contentment and gratitude for this sure and quiet refuge. We did not. The only contented members of our household were John Nuthall and the woman Deb, who cheerfully cultivated the garden and fed the poultry and the pigs (for we had now everything around us that is wanted to make life pleasant). Yet we were not contented. I could read the signs of impatience in the face whose changes I had studied for so long. Other women would have shown their discontent in ill-temper and a shrewish tongue; Alice showed hers in silence, sitting apart, and communing with herself. I daresay I also showed my discontent; for I confess that I now began to long vehemently for books. Consider, it was more than two years since I had seen a book! There were no books at all on the island of Providence—not one book, except a Bible or two, and, perhaps, a Book of Common Prayer. I longed, therefore, for the smell of leather bindings, the sight of books on shelves, and the holy company of the wise and the ingenious. No one, again, could look upon Robin without perceiving that he was afflicted with a constant yearning for that which he could not have. What that was I understood very well, although he never opened his mind unto me.

Now I confess that at this time I was grievously tormented with the thought that, Alice's marriage having been no true marriage—because, first, she was betrayed and deceived; and, next, she had left her husband at the very church porch—there was no reason in the world why she should not disregard that ceremony altogether, and contract a marriage after her own heart. I turned this over in my mind a long while; and, indeed, I am still of the opinion that there would have been nothing sinful in such an act. But the law of the country would not so regard it. That is quite true. If, therefore, I had advised these unhappy lovers in such a sense they would have been compelled to live for the rest of their lives on this island, and their offspring would have been illegitimate. So that, though the letter of the law caused a most cruel in justice—summum jus summa injuria—it was better that it should be obeyed. In the end, it was a most happy circumstance that it was so obeyed.

I have presently to relate the means by which this injustice was removed. As for my own share in it, I shall neither exaggerate nor shall I extenuate it. I shall not defend it. I will simply set it down, and leave judgment to a higher Court than the opinion of those who read these pages. I must, however, acknowledge that, partly in Barbadoes and partly in Providence, I learned from the negresses, who possess many secrets and have a wonderful knowledge of plants and their powers, the simple remedies with which they treat fevers, agues, rheumatisms, and other common disorders. I say simple, because they will, with a single cup of liquor boiled with certain leaves, or with a pinch of some potent powder gotten from a plant, effect a speedier cure than our longest prescriptions, even though they contain more than fifty different ingredients. Had I possessed this knowledge, for example, while we lay in Exeter Jail, not one prisoner (except the old and feeble) should have died of the fever. This said, you will understand presently what it was I did.

It was, then, about the month of March, in the year 1688, that a ship, laden with wine, and bound from New York to Jamaica, put in at the port of Providence. Her captain carried a letter for me, and this was the first news of the world that came to us since our flight.

The letter was from Barnaby. It was short, because Barnaby had never practised the art of letter-writing; but it was pertinent. First, he told us that he had made the acquaintance at Boston (I mean the little town Boston of New England) of his cousins, whom he found to be substantial merchants (so that here, at least, the man George Penne lied not), and zealous upholders of the Independent way of thinking; that these cousins had given him a hearty welcome for the sake of his father; that he had learned from them, first, that the Monmouth business was long since concluded, and, so great was the public indignation against the cruelties of the Bloody Assize, that no one would again be molested on that account, not even those who had been sent abroad should they venture to return. He also said—but this we understood not—that it was thought things would before long improve.

'And now,' he concluded, 'my cousins, finding that I am well skilled and have already navigated a ship with credit, have made me captain of their own vessel, the Pilgrim, which sails every year to Bristol and back again. She will be despatched in the month of August or September. Come, therefore, by the first ship which will set you ashore either at New York or at Boston, and I will give you all a passage home. Afterwards, if you find not a welcome there, you may come back with me. Here a physician may find practice, Robin may find a farm, and sister will be safe from B. B.'

At this proposal we pricked up our ears, as you may very well believe. Finally we resolved to agree to it, promising each other to protect Alice from her husband, and to go back to Boston with Barnaby if we found no reason to stay in England. But the woman Deb, though she wept at leaving her mistress, would not go back to the place where her past wickedness might be remembered, and John Nuthall was also unwilling, for the same reason, to return; and, as this honest couple had now a kindness for each other, I advised them to marry and remain where they were. There was on the island no minister of religion, nor any magistrate or form of government whatever (yet all were honest); therefore I ventured to hear their vows of fidelity, and prayed with them while I joined their hands—a form of marriage, to my mind, as binding and as sacred as any wanting the assistance of a priest. So we handed over to them all our property (which was already as much theirs as ours), and left them in that sunny and delightful place. If the man was a repentant thief, the woman was a repentant magdalen, and so they were well matched. I hope and believe that, being well resolved for the future, they will lead a godly and virtuous life, and will be blessed with children who will never learn the reason why their parents left their native country.

There is little trade at Providence, but many vessels touch at the port, because it lies between the English possessions in America and those in the West Indies. They put in for water, for fruit, and sometimes, if they are short-handed, for men, most of them in the place being sailors. Therefore we had not to wait long before a vessel put in, bound from Jamaica to New York. We bargained with the captain for a passage, agreeing that he should find us provisions and wine, and that we would pay him (by means of Barnaby) on our reaching Boston (which is but a short distance from New York). Strange to say, though we had been discontented with our lot, when we sailed away Alice fell to weeping. We had murmured, and our murmuring was heard. We should now be permitted to live out what was left to us of life in England, and we should die and be buried among our own folk. Yet there are times when I remember the sweet and tranquil life we led in the island of Providence, its soft and sunny air, the cool sea-breeze, the shade of its orange groves, and the fruits which grew in such abundance to our hands.