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Updated: July 31, 2024
Even on the day of your arrival, Signor Deodati, when Geronimo met me in the dock-yard on the bank of the Scheldt, he begged me to inquire for an English vessel which would leave on that or the next day, and secretly to engage his passage on board. You may well know that I combated this foolish project, and I left him only when he promised me to abandon the idea."
That was the first and last time I ever did my lessons afloat, or rather on the mud. The object my parents had in sending me across the harbour to school was that I might receive an efficient training to enable me to pass the Dock-yard Civil Service examination which, by the way, is locally considered the highest distinction a boy can attain, providing he be qualified to pass the examiner.
The importance of blocking such an expedition becomes yet more evident should it at any time be divided between two or more ports, a condition which may easily arise when the facilities of a single dock-yard are insufficient to fit out so many ships in the time allowed, or when, as in the present war, allied powers furnish separate contingents.
He told me that he had no doubt we should be good friends, that I had better go to the dock-yard, and inquire for the landing-place, and for the Eos' cutter, which was waiting there for stores. That I was to make myself known to the officer of the boat, who would give me two or three hands to convey my luggage down to it, and that I had better ship myself as soon as I could.
"Why need we go so soon to the dock-yard?" asked the old cavalier. "Many days may yet pass before the Il Salvatore appears in the Scheldt. Do not fear, Mary, that the Signor Deodati will take us by surprise. Don Pezoa, the agent of the king of Portugal, has given orders that I shall be notified as soon as the galley we are awaiting is signaled in the river, at noon."
It is a fine, flourishing city, with a dock-yard, where many of the ships of the American navy are built. I saw little of it, for soon after the Neptune had dropped her anchor I was conveyed with the other prisoners on shore to jail. The Americans are as fond, fortunately, of the go-ahead system in law as they are in everything else.
They bade adieu as the carriage drove out of the gate of the dock-yard. Simon Turchi followed it with his eyes, immovable as a statue, until the sound of the rolling wheels was lost in the distance. Then he convulsively crossed his arms and dropped his head, as though the certainty of a terrible misfortune had overwhelmed him.
She was lashed to the hulk; and the Yarmouth, an old receiving ship, was lying on the opposite side, quite close to her, and both within a few yards of the Dock-yard jetty.
Before I rose in the morning, my young friend informed me that, in the course of the forenoon, I should have an opportunity of seeing the royal family, as they were going to inspect the dock-yard, and on that account the gates were kept closed, that they might not be annoyed by the crowd, which would otherwise have impeded their progress.
Moreover, Mr Vanslyperken had orders to draw from the dock-yard three large boats for the debarkation of the said troops; but the boats were not quite ready, one required a new gunnel, another three planks in the bottom, and the third having her stern out, it required all the carpenters in the yard to finish it by the next morning.
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