Delphi Works of Ford Madox Ford (Illustrated) (291 page)

He paused for a minute, and then said —

“Go now, one of you, to that old man that sitteth at the doorway. To my sorrow he hath no English, for he will sail with me upon this voyage, and I have but three words of High Dutch and none at all of Low. Go, then, to that old Dutchman, and tell him that he shall get himself to my chamber. In my chamber he shall find a little model of this ship, the
Half Moon,
that shall carry me and maybe one of you. That model is too weighty for such an old man to bear. But tell him to bring me hither the model of her little consort, the
Good Hope;
he shall bring it with its sprit-sail half-reefed, with a Dutch pennant a-trail from a staff at its stern, and with the water kegs filled and stowed, and the mariner’s compass aboard as if it would make a little voyage out of consort-ship. If you can do that I think you may be of profit to me as an interpreter.” He spoke to Lang of Bideford, “Can you do that thing?”

Lang put his finger beneath his hat to scratch his head.

“Why, I will try,” he said. And he betook him towards the door where an old Dutchman with a flat cap was gazing gloomily at the floor.

Hudson looked at Edward Colman.

“From your smile I perceive that you can do this thing,” he said.

“It was said that I was born smiling,” Edward Colman answered. “But I can do this thing, and talk in Low Dutch of most things about a ship.”

“Your smile I like,” Hudson said, “for it argues a contented mind. And of all things upon the sea the most to be feared is discontent, for there have been few pilots but have had to contend with mutinies from Christopher Columbus’s day till Devlin’s. That ragged man whom first I sent away did mutiny against Devlin; I know his name well, so I was short with him.”

He looked aside and saw the mutineer’s cloak edge that showed from beside the pillar, where he sat smoking his pipe and drinking.

“Will he foment a meeting here?” he asked impatiently, but he added, “Why, this is a public room for guests,” and fell to
gazing
thoughtfully at his stout and heavy feet.

Young Lang of Bideford came back, still scratching his head.

“I can make nowt on’t,” he said. “I can speak all your Dutch of merchandise, but not this of shipping.”

Hudson spoke to Edward Colman, “Go you!” he said.

The old Dutchman at the door, where he sat upon a bench, with very large red hands, and ears and red eyelids, was very angry. He spat at the sand on the floor and muttered. He had high boots painted yellow, little black trousers and a narrow jerkin of blue worked on the breast with a pentagon in white wool, to avert spells and witchcraft. His little beard, white and crisp, stood out like a brush all round his face.

“What sort of man is this?” he asked the floor. “A heathen English pilot that sends madmen to me to ask for toys.”

“Old man, a good day,” Edward Colman said in Dutch. The old man turned his questions from the floor to his interlocutor.

“What voyage shall this be?” he said. “Assuredly where we turn the ship’s nose corpses shall lie at the bottom of the sea, and no ship may sail over corpses. Ill-omen’d! Ill-omen’d!”

“Venerable senior,” Edward Colman smiled, “the navigator is not mad. He asked for no toys, but he desires the model of the pinnace from his room, with a little sprit-sai! half-reefed and your Dutch pennant a-trail from its staff at the stern, and the water kegs filled and stowed, and the mariner’s compass aboard and all made ready for a little voyage apart.”

The old Dutchman stood upon his legs.

“That boy asked for toys for this English navigator to play with,” he asseverated.

“Oh, belike,” Edward Colman answered, “the boy, knowing no better word, spoke of toys when he should have said models.”

“Young sir,” the old man answered, and the blue eyes between the red lids were full of an obstinate misgiving, “it is a very ill-omen when the first word that a shipmate or captain sends you upon a voyage are mad words.” He thrust his hands deep into his pockets and gazed at the floor. “If I were not still poor after thirty voyages never would I go with this mad Englishman, for ‘mad words, mad witches, mad weather,’ the proverb says. And this man’s first words are mad.”

“Pray you begone upon mine errand,” Edward Colman answered.

The old Dutchman turned slowly upon his heel, and then stayed to utter —

“This will be an evil voyage. I counsel you, go not with us if such your purpose is, for I am very certain that you or I shall not come back again, but we shall die by devil’s craft or hags of the sea.’’

“Pray you begone upon mine errand,” Edward Colman repeated. The old man reluctantly pushed the door open and, shaking his white head, disappeared.

When he returned he had in his huge red hand the little pretty model of the
Half Moon’s
consort, and he still shook his head.

“Tell this mad and doomed navigator,” he said, “that I can find no Dutch pennant to trail at the stern. And that, too, is an ill-omen. I counsel you not to go upon this voyage. I like not this man, he is too fat to be a sailor and he whistles when he speaks.”

When Edward Colman told Hudson that the old man could not find the pennant, Hudson looked negligently at the little boat, and then asked quickly —

“Tell me this: Why, if you know no navigation, you are conversant with the terms of shipping?”

“Because,” Edward Colman answered, “I am a builder of ships, and am come here to see how fly-boats are builded.”

“And how have you the Dutch tongue?”

“Because I am wedded to a Dutch maid after many years’ courting.”

“And why will you sail with me?”

“Sir,” Edward Colman answered, “I am not very certain that I shall sail with you; but if I do so sail it is because you shall voyage in a fly-boat, and I am minded to build fly-boats, and I would fain see how fly-boats are fitted for such seas as you shall sail in.”

“Well,” Hudson said, “the
Half Moon
is a very good fly-boat. You may see much that you are desirous to see.”

“Moreover,” Edward Colman said, “it is good for my health that I make a voyage of some six or seven months.”

Hudson smote his thigh.

“Mother,” he said to his wife, “look upon this young man and say if he is such a one as I may trust.” And, without waiting for her protests, he went on, “If you be not a Papist I will not ask after your health and its reasons. But I was very certain, when first I glanced upon you, that you were not one of those that sought navigation or great journeys because you were avid of gallant adventures.”

Edward Colman answered, “I am no Papist and have done no murder, and it is true that I am not avid of adventure, but seek merely knowledge how I may advance my trade in shipping from a little harbour that is much choked up.”

“Why, I am very glad that you are none of these adventure-popinjays,” Hudson said. “The world is too full of such youths. I could have a hundred for snapping my fingers in Bristol market-place.” The good Master Hudson began, indeed, to think that he had found such a man as he sought.

He was in truth jealous, maybe, to wish to have neither adventurers nor navigators to vie with him. He loved to command men he could bid do this and that without questioning or comprehending the why or wherefore. For he feared, above all things, mutinies of men who thought they knew more than he; and, upon this voyage above all others, with Dutchmen for a crew whom he opined to be both obstinate and proud, he was anxious to find a man that could not only interpret his orders to the crew, but one that was not likely to join league with them to depose him. This Edward Colman could not do since, if he knew nothing of navigation, he could neither guide the ship nor step into a pilot’s shoes. He appeared, too, to be of a generous and a contented disposition in ordinary. To assure himself of this he plied Edward Colman with many and hard questions for a long while.

Edward Colman, on the other hand, saw before him a man, great in his way and, as such, to be honoured, but heavy, opinionative and overbearing. To the questions that Hudson had a right to ask he returned ready answers, for he had nothing that could make him ashamed. The voyage was not just such a one as he had wished to make, but the season was late; if he travelled down to Bordeaux or to Marseilles or to any other foreign port, that sent adventurers forth to the New World, he might come there only after ships had all sailed.

He put his objections frankly and coolly to Hudson.

‘‘I see not,” he said, “very well how it shall profit me to go with you. For, on the one hand, if you find not the Passage I shall be in no wise advanced, and, if you do find it, on the other, you must keep the secret of where it lies and so my ships might not go thither.”

Hudson’s eagerness to take Edward Colman grew with this measure of opposition.

“Now,” he said, “you shall go with me. As like as not you shall not have your pardon, then you may become a Dutchman and so profit by my finding of the Passage.”

“Why,” Edward Colman said, “I like well enough the thought of becoming a Dutchman to be of the people of my wife, whom I do love well. That would consort well with my likings if I may not go back to mine own country. But I hope I shall; then what shall it profit me if you do find this Passage for only Dutchmen?”

Hudson was angry; he pulled his beard and looked at his wife.

“Dame,” he said, “may I trust this man?”

Mrs. Hudson looked up from her knitting, and, “He appeareth with an honourable face and bearing,” she said. “But I wish ye would ask not me, for ye quarrel always, afterward, with my advice.”

“
Basta!
” Hudson called out, “you are a very ill pair to drive in my cart. Shall I be the greatest man alive and be so bargained with?” He recovered his humour, however, and dropped his voice. “Edward Colman,” he said, “this is the day neither of private adventuring nor of merchanting. I tell you this is the day of taking up great tracts of land and filling them with settlers. The old days are past when a man might take a little ship and rob six galleons between July and Michaelmas. This is a new age.”

“Sir,” Edward Colman answered, “I know it well, and am minded to send out settlers if it appeareth that profitable lands may be found. But how shall your Passage help me to that? If I come there it is like to be but snow and ice.”

“Aye,” Hudson said, and he dropped his voice still further, “but there is this: you have heard speak of my friend Captain John Smith, that for Sir Walter Raleigh did conduct and pilot a colony to the land called Virginia? Captain John Smith is to me as my brother, he and I having played as children at the same school and talked of the same voyages.”

“I have heard tell of him among the sailors at Rye,” Colman said.

“Well, then,” quoth Hudson, whilst his wife glanced up at his back as if she were not sure that he was wise to reveal his secret intentions, “this is my plan: this Captain Smith hath had converse, as well you know, very intimate with the Indian savages of that land, and, one and all, they tell of a great isthmus of water running across their land far to the northward of that colony of Virginia. And this is my offer: if you will deposit here in safe hands enough gold to pay unto this my wife forty pounds a year until my second boy, that is now fourteen, be come to man’s estate, if you will deposit this sum to be paid to my wife in case I die and come back no more, but to be paid back again to you if I return sound and well, this I will do for you: I will take you upon this adventure to serve me as my interpreter, to feed you very well, as you shall eat with me in my cabin, to sail for the North-West Passage amongst the ice of the North at first; but then, when early winter comes, to sail down along the western mainland, southward as far as the 40th parallel, ascending all inlets and rivers to find this strait whereof the Indians speak.” He paused to draw his breath, and then, perceiving that Colman was attentive and made calculations, he continued, “So you may see the coasts of this land, descending at places to mark the soils and dispositions of places most fitting to bear settlements. And, when you shall find such a place as seems good to you, I will give you a chart with its bearings marked that your expedition again may find it. So you shall find what shall profit you.”