To the claws of a score or more of the elder baron’s fowls I tied a kind of fuzee of my own invention, so inflammable that the slightest friction would cause it to burst into flame, and then I turned them loose in the fields and garden adjoining the family hall.
They had been cooped up all the Summer, and were overjoyed at the prospect of a good, comfortable scratching time ’mid the dry leaves and stubble of the open fields.
The gamekeepers by this time had succeeded in arousing the hounds somewhat from their stupor, when the cry of “fire! fire!” went up. The hunting party hastily dismounted and joined the servants in the mad rush for buckets of water.
I was sitting calmly in my apartment, with Bulger by my side, when the alarm was raised.
The elder baron at first was inclined to think that although my workmanship was plainly visible in the fabrics of mischief, which consisted in overfeeding the hounds and summoning the ten doctors to the manor house on a wild goose chase, yet the breaking out of the fire in the neighboring gardens and fields was really something with which I had nothing to do. The return of a venerable old Dominick rooster, which had been either too feeble or too lazy to explode the fuzees attached to his claws, settled the matter, however.
The elder baron’s mind was now clear as to who had conceived the crime in which his poor fowls had so unwittingly become the accomplices.
That night Bulger and I went to bed with light hearts.
The elder baron had at last consented to let us set out on our first journey in quest of strange adventures among the curious people of far-away lands.
THE FOWLS THAT WOULDN’T SCRATCH, AND SO BETRAYED ME.
CHAPTER V.
Preparations for my first voyage. The elder Baron selects the port from which I am to sail. Description of port No Man’s Port. How I escaped its quicksands, Whirlpool and Thor’s Hammer. Becalmed on the Southern Seas, I rescue my ship in a wonderful way. Land ho! Something about a beautiful Island. I leave my ship and start for the interior. How I fell in with some most extraordinary beings. Description of them. They leave me to go and request permission of their chief to present me at his court. How I thought myself attacked by a band of gigantic beings. My strange mistake. They prove to be the same beings I had met the day before. What had caused the transformation. The land of the Wind Eaters. I am conducted to the court of Ztwish-Ztwish. More about the curious people. The Chief’s affection for me. The bursting of the babies. Go-Whizz becomes my enemy. I grow thin. Queen Phew-yoo wants me to marry Princess Pouf-fâh. To regain my flesh I teach the Wind Eaters to catch fish. Terrible accident resulting from a fire I had kindled. Go-Whizz demands my death. Ztwish-Ztwish refuses. The furious brawler tries to slay the Chief and is himself slain, by Ztwish-Ztwish. To avoid the marriage with Pouf-fâh, I send Bulger back to the ship, and then escape in the night. Too weak to bear the fatigue, I am overtaken. Enmeshed in the nets of the Wind Eaters and nearly beaten to death. Bulger rescues me. The relief party from my ship come up with me. I reach the coast, and after a short rest, sail for home.
BULGER HELPS ME WITH MY PACKING.
I threw myself now heart and soul into the task of making ready for my first voyage.
Bulger was not slow to understand what all the hurry-skurry meant.
He was delighted at the prospect of a trip to distant lands where life had less monotony about it. By the hour he would sit and watch me at my labors and, from time to time, to please him, I pointed out articles lying here and there about the room and bade him fetch them, which he invariably did, with many manifestations of pleasure at being permitted to help his little master.
In fact, everybody lent a hand most kindly, so that, to my great satisfaction, I was left more time for the study of navigation.
My poor mother, the gracious baroness, would not permit anyone else to mark my clothing. With her own slender, white fingers she worked the crest and initials of my wardrobe.
There was a matter which I turned over in my thoughts for several days, to wit: What national garb I should adopt.
After long and mature deliberation I resolved to attire myself in Oriental dress. I did so for several reasons. It had been a favorite garb of mine.
Its picturesque grace appealed to my love of the beautiful, while on the other hand, its ease and lightness made it very agreeable to one of extreme suppleness of limb and elasticity of step. While the old manor house was being literally turned topsy-turvy and everybody, from cook to chambermaid, set by the ears, the elder baron was by no means idle. He took good care, among other things, that I was well provided with wholesome reading matter, and brought me several books of maxims, precepts, reflections, thoughts and studies, which he requested me to thrust into the empty corners of my chests, “for,” said he, and that, too, with a great show of reason, “thou wilt have many idle hours on thy hands in calm weather. It behooves thee to feed thy mind lest its wonderful development be checked and thou become as an ordinary child, with no thoughts above games and picture books.” My poor mother, the gracious baroness, added to this stock of good literature by presenting me with a small volume entitled: “The Straight Road to Good Health; or, Everybody His Own Doctor.” As to my medicine chest, I gave that my personal supervision, for I was always skilled in the art of reading all kinds of symptoms and was gifted with the rare faculty of knowing almost instinctively what remedy to give for a certain ailment, without first experimenting upon the patient by trying one thing after another, as is the custom with most people who pretend to heal sickness.
TRUE PORTRAITS OF BULGER AND ME; I AS I APPEARED IN MY ORIENTAL DRESS.
Everything was going well now, and I was in the best of spirits, when the elder baron came to me with a proposal which, for some reason, I can hardly tell why, displeased me, although it would seem that it ought to have had the opposite effect. He proposed to precede me, by a week or ten days, to the North Sea, in some port of which I intended to purchase and fit out a swift, staunch vessel, purchase the vessel himself, give his personal attention to fitting her out and shipping a crew of picked men.
What could I do?
If I refused his offer, it would have been tantamount to a confession of distrust on my part.
Can he have in mind any project to thwart my scheme?
O, perish the thought!
But I must confess that I did not accept his proffered services without serious misgivings.
This sudden anxiety on the part of the elder baron to hurry my departure, after having opposed it so long and so vigorously, made me a little uneasy in my mind.
Before setting out for the North Sea to purchase a ship for me, the elder baron entered my apartment, and spoke as follows:
“Pardon me, little baron, for interrupting thy labors, for I perceive that thou art deep in the study of navigation.”
“Speak, Baron,” said I, looking up, with a mischievous smile, “that right belongs to thee.”
“I have a last request to make,” he continued, in his usual calm manner, “nor is it a matter of very great importance. Rather is it a whim, more than aught else. Thou knowest from my lips, and from the perusal of our family chronicles, that we were in ancient time very large land owners on the coast of the North Sea. We controlled several ports, were extensively engaged in trade, sending out at least a score of ships in a twelvemonth. One of the ports of our domain was a famous one, famous for the