Part 35 (1/2)
The brig was quickly surrounded by boats bringing off vegetables, fruit, and fish, some of them containing those persevering personages ever present in foreign ports, washerwomen and washermen, their laudable object being to solicit the honour of cleansing the dirty linen of the officers and crew.
Jack hoped to find some amus.e.m.e.nt on sh.o.r.e. Before, however, ordering his gig to be got ready, he was engaged for some time, not in examining the beauties of the harbour, but in casting searching glances around to discover such rakish, wicked-looking craft as were likely to be engaged in the slave-trade. He marked several of suspicious appearance.
”We must have some of these fellows, Bevan,” he observed, ”keep a bright lookout on their movements; if we are off watch they will take the opportunity, depend on it, to slip out of the harbour; I have no doubt that the fellows cursed us in their hearts when they saw the little brig enter the harbour.”
Among the commercial cities of the western hemisphere, Havannah ranks next to New York; the harbour is the best in the West Indies, and is unequalled in beauty by any in the world. It is nearly three miles long, and a mile and a half in width. While completely sheltered from every wind by the surrounding heights, so great is the depth of water that the largest s.h.i.+ps can come close up to the quays.
The city stands on the western sh.o.r.e of the bay. The streets of the old part within the walls are narrow and far from clean, but those of the suburbs, which cover a much larger s.p.a.ce than the city itself, are broad and well laid out, many of them being handsome and tolerably free from dirt. Besides the two strong fortresses at the entrance, batteries run along both sh.o.r.es, while fortifications frown from all the surrounding heights.
The houses, which are in the Moorish style, have excessively thick walls, and are mostly of one storey. The windows, however, are unglazed, and, on account of the heat of the climate, always kept open.
The object of most interest in the city is the cathedral, not on account of its beauty, but because it contains the bones of Columbus, which were removed here from the church of Santa Domingo, in Hispaniola, at the end of the last century.
The chief attractions of the place are its paseos or public drives, of which it possesses three, two inside, and one outside the walls. Some of them are ornamented with statues of royal personages, more or less ugly, with rows of poplars on either side, and with fountains and gardens. Here, in the afternoon, the world of fas.h.i.+on resort, and they are thronged with young creoles in evening dress and round hats, employed in casting admiring glances at the fair dames, who drive slowly up and down the carriage-road in their wide and open volantes, their heads adorned as if for a ballroom, with natural flowers, and generally arrayed in costumes of all the colours of the rainbow.
Jack felt, at first, somewhat indignant as he observed the impudent glances, so he considered them, cast by the youths at the young ladies; but soon came to the conclusion that they had no objection to be so looked at, and would indeed have felt injured had they not received this style of homage from the opposite s.e.x. As he pa.s.sed through the streets, he could look with ease through the large open windows into the drawing-rooms of the houses, where in the evening, when not abroad, the ladies of the family are wont to a.s.semble; the older dames seated in rocking-chairs, the younger in front of the iron bars, by which alone ingress from without is prevented. Here they can see every one pa.s.sing and be seen in return.
The volante is as worthy of a description as the gondola of Venice. The dames of Cuba delight in it, for it is not only picturesque, but luxurious in the extreme. It is made to contain two sitters with comfort, but when a duenna is in attendance, she is seated on a middle seat between her charges. It has two enormous wheels, strong and thick; the body is supported on the axle-tree, and swings forward from it on springs; it is somewhat low down, and affords abundance of room for the feet, which are supported by a brightly polished metal bar, which runs across the footboard. It is most remarkable for the shafts, which are fourteen feet in length, the extreme ends resting on the saddle of the horse, who has thus entirely to support the whole weight of the vehicle; there is thus between the horse's tail and the carriage a s.p.a.ce of nearly seven feet. The postillion is generally a very heavy negro, who rides the unfortunate horse. Those used by people of fas.h.i.+on are drawn by two horses, one outside the shafts, on which the postillion sits. He is as remarkable an object as the vehicle itself. He wears a huge pair of footless boots, the top rising ten inches or so above his knees, so that they nearly touch his elbows, while, to the bottom are secured huge iron spurs, his breeches are white, and his jacket red, ornamented with gilt lace, while a broad-brimmed hat covering his woolly pate completes his costume. Still barbarous and awkward as the affair appears, it looks perfectly suitable to surrounding objects; the fair occupants seem also in their proper places, with their gaily-coloured costumes, and their dark hair fastened by a high comb, and ornamented generally with natural flowers. Jack did not consider their beauty so surpa.s.sing as he had been led to expect, while he thought the older dames perfectly hideous; but then the recollection of the lily and rose in the cheeks of his fair countrywomen was too recent to allow him to admire them as he might otherwise have done. He was highly amused at seeing in some of the dining-halls one of those silver ornamented vehicles placed at the farther end, its usual position when not in use.
As far as he could judge, the male portion of the population pa.s.sed their evenings in smoking cigars and playing billiards, when not engaged in dancing or listening to music. Every evening, before the captain-general's house in the Plaza, a military band played for an hour, when the men collected by hundreds, but a few ladies, however, appearing among them.
Gambling, in one form or another, appeared to be the occupation of all orders, encouraged considerably by the government, who had public lotteries, tickets and minute portions of tickets being daily vended in the streets.
Jack and his officers were overwhelmed with invitations, not only from English and Americans, but from Spaniards, some of whom, he was warned, might possibly have a motive in wis.h.i.+ng to make their stay on sh.o.r.e agreeable, they being owners, or in some way interested in the rakish-looking craft in the harbour, and on which it was his special duty to keep an eye.
Picturesque and attractive as Havannah is in many respects, Jack came to the opinion that it would undoubtedly become a much finer place were it in the hands of the English or Americans.
Once upon a time it did become a British possession. When in the year 1762 the Spaniards and English went to war, as soon as hostilities had broken out, the British government despatched a fleet under Sir George Poc.o.c.k, with an army of 1600 men, commanded by the Earl of Albemarle.
The fleet consisted of twenty-two sail of the line, four s.h.i.+ps of fifty guns, ten frigates, and seventeen small vessels. That so powerful a force was sent out, showed the belief of the English in the strength of the fortifications. The Spaniards, however, had but little stomach for the fight.
While the fleet threatened them on the sea side, the troops landed to the east and west of the city, and attacking it in the rear quickly made themselves masters of the renowned fortifications. On the return of peace, a few months afterwards, it was once more placed under the fearful mismanagement of the Spaniards, and now only awaits a favourable opportunity to be taken possession of by the Yankees.
Whatever may be said of Havannah, Jack found it a very pleasant place, but he took good care never to sleep on sh.o.r.e, or indeed at any time to remain longer away from his s.h.i.+p than possible. He made several excursions round the harbour, not so much to enjoy its beauties, as to examine the before-mentioned rakish-looking craft which lay moored to the quays, apparently for the purpose of taking in cargo; he could never, however, observe anything going forward on board them during the daytime. Needham had, however, several times in the evening, taken a pull in the dinghy among the vessels. He reported that there was some bustle on board one of them in particular, and that he could hear the sound of hammering going on within her.
”It is my idea, sir, that they are fitting up slave-decks. Depend on it, before long some of them will be trying to get out, if they have the chance, without our seeing them. I marked a craft called the _Venus_ which came in at sunset, when you were on sh.o.r.e, and if she is not the very schooner we chased, she is wonderfully like her. She is large, and to my mind faster than any of them; but if she can get whatever she wants, and her cargo s.h.i.+pped, we may be sure it won't be long before she tries to slip out unknown to us.”
Jack thought that Needham was probably right in his conjectures, but one thing was certain, that while the commander of the _Venus_ knew that he was watched and likely to be followed, he would not attempt to put to sea. Jack waited patiently. He knew that, at all events, he was of some service in thus locking up these traders in human flesh. If he could not catch them, he could, at all events, prevent them from doing harm. He had accepted several invitations, and had been seen at both English and Spaniards' houses; at one of the latter, he had met a Spaniard, Don Matteo, who spoke English well, and paid him great attention. On inquiry, he found that he was a slave-merchant, the owner of a number of vessels employed in making frequent trips to the coast of Africa and back.
Jack had hitherto refused his invitations, though his parties were among the most brilliant, and his daughters the most attractive of the black-eyed damsels of Cuba. Jack, however, as every British officer engaged in the suppression of the slave-trade ought to be, was wide awake; and when Don Matteo, notwithstanding his former refusals, again invited him and as many of his officers as he could bring, to attend a dance to be given at his house the following evening, he accepted the invitation, and promised to bring all that could be spared from the s.h.i.+p; on making inquiries he found, as he suspected, that the Don was the owner of the _Venus_.
”He goes by the name of Don Matteo at present, but he was long known on the coast of Africa by that of Pepe the pirate,” added his informant.
”Innumerable are the atrocities of which, there is not the slightest doubt, the fellow was guilty; but he managed to escape hanging, and having realised a large fortune, got whitewashed by the authorities, whom he still keeps in his pay, changed his name, and settled down in Havannah as a respectable merchant and s.h.i.+powner; though to avoid the risk of personal inconvenience, he no more goes to sea, as was his wont formerly. He has a fleet of a dozen vessels or more employed in the middle pa.s.sage. As he bribes the government officials, the captain of the port, and others, as well as the commanders of the Spanish s.h.i.+ps of war, his vessels find no difficulty in getting in and out of harbour, even though completely fitted for the slave-trade, and the latter frequently convoy them till they are free from the risk of capture by the English cruisers on this station. On the other side of the Atlantic, they have to look after themselves, but they get pretty correct information, and three in four escape capture, so that his adventures pay him handsomely. Having, as I said, grown honest, he deals at present exclusively in blacks, but he is known to have committed not a few acts of piracy in his younger days, and the deaths of two or three British officers, and the crews of several merchantmen, are placed to his account.”
”The scoundrel!” exclaimed Jack. ”I do not fancy partaking of his hospitality.”
”As you please, Mr Rogers; but I would advise you to put your feelings in your pocket,” was the answer. ”Remember that you do not go to the fellow's house for your own amus.e.m.e.nt, but for the good of the service in which you are engaged.”
”Yes, I see that you are right,” said Jack. ”I will do my best to catch one of his craft, at all events.”