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Updated: May 17, 2025
At last I went into what I concluded to be the master's cabin, and in a tin case, under his pillow, I found them. I took them to Mr Gale, who glanced over them. "The Dolphin, the vessel is called," he observed. "Ah, and here's a name I think I remember, Walter Stenning, master. Why, Poplar, is not that the name of the young man we picked up at sea a few voyages back to the West Indies?"
The captain, who was a kind-hearted man, did his best to raise his spirits; and promised him that if we fell in with a homeward-bound ship he would endeavour to put him on board. As it happened, we did not speak any vessel till we reached the West Indies; so we had to carry Walter Stenning with us.
The whole incident took place, it seemed, in a few seconds. Once more he was on the deck, and there could be no doubt of it, with no other than Walter Stenning in his arms! The poor fellow breathed, but the dangers he had gone through, and the sudden restoration to safety, had overcome him, and he lay almost unconscious on the deck.
After the lessons we had received, also, we were not likely to be taken by surprise, the mode in which the pirates of those days usually attempted to capture their prey. Mrs Stenning used frequently to come on board, to superintend the outfit of the ship, and to hasten the workmen; and thus everybody working with a will, and with an important object in view, she was soon ready for sea.
It was not with the best possible grace that the two masters got up to take their leave; and yet Captain Stenning well knew that he was completely in the power of the commander of the sloop-of-war, and that there was no law to prevent him from being sent to do duty before the mast on board of her.
The appearance of Walter Stenning on board the rover was a subject of constant conversation among us. There could be no doubt, then, that he had been carried on board the rover, and that his life had been preserved. This would be a satisfaction to his friends, though a melancholy one, as his ultimate fate must still be uncertain.
But among the men he chose was poor Bill Jackson, who has a wife and small family at Halifax, and who only came the voyage from his love for Captain Stenning, and was going to give up the sea and live on shore with his wife's relations up the country.
We found that she was His Britannic Majesty's sloop-of-war Syren, of eighteen guns; and the captain directed us to lay by him till the morning, when he would send on board to hear all the particulars of what had occurred. Meantime I had been sent to sit by Captain Stenning, to be ready to attend to him when he awoke. When he did so, I called Captain Gale to him.
Before committing the heads to the deep, we examined their features, and it was the opinion of all on board, who had known Walter Stenning, that none of them bore any resemblance to him; so that if the young man, who had for so long been on board the Rainbow, was the same person who lately commanded this unfortunate vessel, his fate was still uncertain.
He was ready enough even to promise to assist in finding poor Captain Stenning, provided he could be paid for it he preferred labouring in a laudable object with pay, to labouring in an object which was not laudable, if no more money was to be made in one way than in another; but he had no desire to labour in anything without pay.
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