heads to have a shot at us. From our battery we often amused ourselves
by sending a shell from one of the big Lancaster guns down at the
ships in the harbor. But I never dreamed that I was likely to be a
cockshy myself."
The usual duel was going on between the batteries, and the puffs of
white smoke rose from the dark line of trenches and drifted up
unbroken across the deep blue of the still wintry sky.
But happily the passage of the flotilla of boats attracted no
attention, and they soon arrived at the shore close to the work known
as Battery No. 4.
Here they were landed. Those who could not walk were lifted into
carts, of which some hundreds stood ranged alongside. The rest fell in
on foot, and the procession started. The boys, to their satisfaction,
found that the officer who had given them the coats was in charge of a
portion of the train, and as they started he stopped to speak a word
or two to them, to which they replied in the most intelligible manner
they could by offering him a cigar, which a flash of pleasure in his
face at once showed to be a welcome present.
It took some time to get the long convoy in motion, for it consisted
of some 700 or 800 carts and about 5,000 sick and wounded, of whom
fully three-fourths were unable to walk. It mounted to the plateau
north of the harbor, wound along near the great north fort, and then
across undulating land parallel with the sea. They stopped for the
night on the Katcha, where the allied army had turned off for their
flank march to the southern side.
The boys during the march were allowed to walk as they liked, but two
soldiers with loaded muskets kept near them. They discussed the
chances of trying to make their escape, but agreed that although they
might be able to slip away from the convoy, the probability of their
making their way through the Russian troops to their own lines at
Balaklava or Sebastopol was so slight that the attempt would be almost
madness. Their figures would be everywhere conspicuous on the snow,
their footsteps, could be followed, they had no food, and were
ignorant of the language and country. Altogether they determined to
abandon any idea of escaping for the present.
There were but a dozen soldiers with the convoy, the officers being
medical men in charge of the wounded. A halt was made in a sheltered
spot near the river, and close to the village of Mamaschia, which was
entirely deserted by its inhabitants.
The worst cases of sickness were carried into the houses, and the rest
prepared to make themselves as comfortable as they could in or under
the wagons. Stores of forage were piled by the village for the use of
the convoys going up and down, and the drivers speedily spread a
portion of this before their beasts.
The guard and such men as were able to get about went off among the
orchards that surrounded the village, to cut fuel. The boys' special
guard remained by them. When the doctor whom they regarded as their
friend came up to them, he brought with him another officer as
interpreter, who said in broken French,--
"Voulez-vous donner votre parole pas essayez echapper?"
Jack was as ignorant of French as of Russian, but Dick knew a little.
He turned to Jack and translated the question.
"Tell him we will give our words not to try and escape during the
march, or till we tell him to the contrary." This was almost beyond
Dick.
"Nous donnons notre parole pour le present," he said, "pour la marche,
vous comprenez. Si nous changons notre--I wonder what mind is," he
grumbled to himself--"intention, nous vous dirons."
This was intelligible, although not good French, and their friend,
having shaken hands with them as if to seal the bargain, told the
soldiers that they need no longer keep a watch on the prisoners, and
then beckoned them to accompany him. The boys had, at starting, placed
their bundles upon a cart to which they had kept close during the
march. Putting these on their shoulders, they accompanied their friend
to a cart which was drawn up three or four feet from the wall of a
house. They set to work at once, and with the aid of some sticks and
blankets, of which there was a good supply in the wagon, made a roof
covering the space between it and the house, hung others at the end
and side, and had soon a snug tent erected.
One of the soldiers brought a large truss of straw, and another a
bundle of firewood. The blanket at the end of the tent sheltered from
the wind, was drawn aside, and a great fire speedily blazed up at the
entrance. The straw was shaken out to form a soft seat, just inside
the tent. All three produced their pipes and lit them, while the
doctor's servant prepared over the fire a sort of soup with the
rations. This turned out to be by no means bad, and when after it the
boys produced one of their bottles of brandy and three cigars, the
Russian doctor patted them on the back, and evidently told them that
they were first-rate fellows.
For half-an-hour he smoked his cigar and sipped his tin of brandy and
water, then, explaining by signs that he must go and look after his
wounded, left them.
The boys chatted for another half-hour, and then stowing their brandy
carefully away, they shook up the straw into a big bed, and, wrapping
themselves in their sheepskins, were soon soundly asleep; but it was
long after midnight before the doctor returned from his heavy work of
dressing wounds and administering medicine, and stretched himself on
the straw beside them.
CHAPTER XII.
PRISONERS ON PAROLE
Day after day the convoy made its way northward without any incident
of importance happening. The midshipmen were glad to find that,
thanks to their sheepskin cloaks and pointed hoods, they passed
through the towns without attracting any attention whatever.
The convoy lessened in length as it proceeded. The animals broke down
in great numbers and died by the road, under the task of dragging the
heavy wagons through the deep snow.
At a town of some size, where they halted for two days, relief was
afforded by the wheels being taken off the wagons, and rough runners
affixed, the wheels being placed on the carts, as that they could be
put on again in case of a thaw.
Famine, however, did more that fatigue in destroying the animals; for
although good exertions had been made to form depots of forage along
the roads, these were exhausted faster than they could be collected by
the enormous trains, which, laden with provisions and warlike stores,
were making their way to Sebastopol from the interior of Russia. There
was no lack of food for the men, for ample stores of black bread were
carried, and a supply of meat was always obtainable at the end of the
day's journey by the carcase of some bullock which had fallen and then
been shot during the day's march.
But though the train diminished in length, its occupants diminished
even more rapidly. Every morning, before starting, a burying party
were busy interring the bodies of those who had died during the
previous day's march or in the night.
When the halt was made at a village, the papa or priest of the place
performed a funeral mass; when, as was more common, they encamped in
the open, the grave was filled in, a rough cross was erected over it,
and the convoy proceeded on its march.
The midshipmen found the journey dreary and uninteresting in the
extreme.
After leaving the Crimea the country became a dead flat; which,
though bright in summer, with a wide expanse of waving grain, was
inexpressibly mournful and monotonous as it lay under its wide
covering of snow. Here and there, far across the plain, could be seen
the low, flat-roofed huts of a Russian village, or the massively-built
abode of some rich landed proprietor.
Scarce a tree broke the monotony of the wide plain, and the creaking
of the carts and the shouts of the drivers seemed strangely loud as
they rose in the dense silence of the plain.
From the first day of starting, the midshipmen set themselves to learn
something of the language. The idea was Jack's and he pointed out to
Hawtry, who was rather disinclined to take the trouble, that it would
in the first place give them something to think about, and be an
amusement on the line of march; in the second, it would render their
captivity less dull, and, lastly, it would facilitate their escape if
they should determine to make the attempt.
As they walked, therefore, alongside their friend the doctor, they
asked him the names of every object around them, and soon learned the
Russian words for all common objects. The verbs were more difficult,
but thanks occasionally to the doctor (who spoke French) joining them
at their encampment at night, they soon learned the sentences most
commonly in use.
As they had nothing else to do or to think about, their progress was
rapid, and by the end of a month they were able to make themselves
understood in conversations upon simple matters.
They had been much disappointed, when, upon leaving the Crimea, the
convoy had kept on north instead of turning west; for they had hoped
that Odessa would have been their place of captivity.
It was a large and flourishing town, with a considerable foreign
population, and, being on the sea, might have offered them
opportunities for escape. The Russians, however, had fears that the
allied fleets might make an attack upon the place, and for this
reason, such few prisoners as fell into their hands were sent inland.
The journeys each day averaged from twelve to fifteen miles, twelve,
however, being the more ordinary distance. The sky was generally clear
and bright, for when the morning was rough and the snow fell, the
convoy remained in its halting-place.
The cold was by no means excessive during the day, and although the
snow was deep and heavy, there was no difficulty in keeping up with
the convoy, as the pace of the bullocks was little over a mile and a
half an hour. At night they were snug enough, for the doctor had
adapted an empty wagon as their sleeping-place, and this, with a deep
bed of straw at the bottom, blankets hung at the sides and others laid
over the top, constituted as comfortable a shelter as could be
desired.
At last, after a month's travelling, the doctor pointed to a town
rising over the plain, and signified that this was their
halting-place.
It was a town of some seven or eight thousand inhabitants, and the
mosque-like domes of the churches shining, brightly in the sun, and
the green-painted roofs and bright colors of many of the houses, gave
it a gay and cheerful appearance.
The convoy made its way through the streets to large barracks, now
converted into a hospital. When the sick had been taken into the
wards, the doctor proceeded with the midshipmen to the residence of
the governor.
The boys had laid aside the sheepskin cloaks which had proved so
invaluable during their journey, and as they walked through the
streets, in their midshipman's uniform, attracted a good deal of
attention.
They were at once shown in to the governor, an officer of some
five-and-thirty years old, with a fierce and disagreeable expression
of countenance. He was a member of a high Russian family; but as a
punishment for various breaches of discipline, arising from his
quarrelsome disposition and misconduct, he had been appointed governor
to this little town, instead of going with his regiment to the front.
Saluting him, the doctor delivered to him an order for the safe
guardianship of the two English officers.
"Ah," he said, as he perused the document, and glanced at the
midshipmen, "if these are British officers, I can scarcely understand
the trouble they are giving us. They are mere boys. I thought their
uniform was red. The soldiers who were brought here a month ago were
all in red."
"These are young naval officers," the doctor said. "I understand that
some of the sailors are serving on shore, and these were captured, I
am told, when out with a party of their men cutting fuel."
"A wonderful capture, truly," the governor said sneeringly. "Two boys
scarce out of the nursery."
"It cost us some men," the doctor said calmly, "for I hear from the
officer who brought them in that we lost altogether fifteen men, and
the sailors would all have got away had it not been that one of these
young officers was shot in the leg and the other stood by him, and
shot several men with his revolver before he was captured."
"A perfect St. George," the commandant sneered. "Well, sir, your duty
is done, and I will see to them. Are they on parole?"
"They gave me their parole not to try to escape during the journey,
and have expressed their willingness to renew it."
"It matters little one way or the other," the governor said. "Unless
they could fly, they could not make their way through the country.
There, sir, that will do."
The doctor bowed, shook hands with the boys, and without a word went
out, touching his lips with his fingers to them as he turned his back
to the governor, a movement which the lads understood at once as a
hint that it would be as well to say nothing which might show that
they had any knowledge of Russian.
The governor rang a hand-bell, and a sergeant entered. The governor
wrote a few words on a piece of paper.
"Take these prisoners to Count Preskoff's," he said, "and deliver this
order to him."
The sergeant motioned the lads to follow him. With a bow to the
governor, which he passed unacknowledged, they followed the soldier.
"A disagreeable brute, that," Jack said. "A little work in the
trenches would do him good, and take some of his cockiness out of him.
That was a good idea of the doctor, not saying good-bye in Russian. I
don't suppose we shall run against that fellow again, but it we did,
he might make it so disagreeable that we might be driven to show him a
clean pair of heels."
