Transcribed from the 1894 Chapman and Hall “Christmas Stories”edition , email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
It was in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and forty-four,that I, Gill Davis to command, His Mark, having then the honour to bea private in the Royal Marines, stood a-leaning over the bulwarks ofthe armed sloop Christopher Columbus, in the South American waters offthe Mosquito shore.
My lady remarks to me, before I go any further, that there is nosuch christian-name as Gill, and that her confident opinion is, thatthe name given to me in the baptism wherein I was made, &c., wasGilbert. She is certain to be right, but I never heard of it. I was a foundling child, picked up somewhere or another, and I alwaysunderstood my christian-name to be Gill. It is true that I wascalled Gills when employed at Snorridge Bottom betwixt Chatham and Maidstoneto frighten birds; but that had nothing to do with the Baptism whereinI was made, &c., and wherein a number of things were promised forme by somebody, who let me alone ever afterwards as to performing anyof them, and who, I consider, must have been the Beadle. Suchname of Gills was entirely owing to my cheeks, or gills, which at thattime of my life were of a raspy description.
My lady stops me again, before I go any further, by laughing exactlyin her old way and waving the feather of her pen at me. That actionon her part, calls to my mind as I look at her hand with the rings onit—Well! I won’t! To be sure it will come in,in its own place. But it’s always strange to me, noticingthe quiet hand, and noticing it (as I have done, you know, so many times)a-fondling children and grandchildren asleep, to think that when bloodand honour were up—there! I won’t! not at present!—Scratchit out.
She won’t scratch it out, and quite honourable; because wehave made an understanding that everything is to be taken down, andthat nothing that is once taken down shall be scratched out. Ihave the great misfortune not to be able to read and write, and I amspeaking my true and faithful account of those Adventures, and my ladyis writing it, word for word.
I say, there I was, a-leaning over the bulwarks of the sloop ChristopherColumbus in the South American waters off the Mosquito shore: a subjectof his Gracious Majesty King George of England, and a private in theRoyal Marines.
In those climates, you don’t want to do much. I was doingnothing. I was thinking of the shepherd (my father, I wonder?)on the hillsides by Snorridge Bottom, with a long staff, and with arough white coat in all weathers all the year round, who used to letme lie in a corner of his hut by night, and who used to let me go aboutwith him and his sheep by day when I could get nothing else to do, andwho used to give me so little of his victuals and so much of his staff,that I ran away from him—which was what he wanted all along, Iexpect—to be knocked about the world in preference to SnorridgeBottom. I had been knocked about the world for nine-and-twentyyears in all, when I stood looking along those bright blue South AmericanWaters. Looking after the shepherd, I may say. Watchinghim in a half-waking dream, with my eyes half-shut, as he, and his flockof sheep, and his two dogs, seemed to move away from the ship’sside, far away over the blue water, and go right down into the sky.
“It’s rising out of the water, steady,” a voicesaid close to me. I had been thinking on so, that it like wokeme with a start, though it was no stranger voice than the voice of HarryCharker, my own comrade.
“What’s rising out of the water, steady?” I askedmy comrade.
“What?” says he. “The Island.”
“O! The Island!” says I,