pointing to the gently heaving parcel--'is no more than a poll-parrot of the common green, or West African, species, too loquacious for its own good.' He undid the baize, snipped the band confining the parrot's wings, and set the bird upon its feet. The parrot instantly cried. 'A bas Buonaparte. Salaud, salaud, salaud,' in a metallic, indignant voice, climbed on to the back of his chair, and began to preen its ruffled feathers. 'The cloth bag, on the other hand, contains some of the finest coffee I have ever tasted; it grows to great advantage upon the island.'
Breakfast appeared, and when they were alone again Jack said, 'So you did not spend all your time ashore bird's nesting, I collect. Would it be proper to tell me anything about the rest of your journey?'
'Oh, that,' said Stephen, setting his egg sideways upon a butter-dish to see it at a better angle. 'Yes, yes: it was a straightforward piece of routine, perfectly simple, as I told you. Fruitful, however. I shall not tell you about my interlocutor--far better to know nothing in these cases--apart from saying that I take him to be a wholly reliable source, exceptionable only in his prolonged retention of this indiscreet fowl, a fault of which he was himself most sensible. Nor shall I trouble you with the political aspect: but I have a clear notion of the military side. I believe it to be a true statement of the position, and am not without hope that it will give you pleasure. In the first place, our accession of strength is as yet unknown: in the second, the two most recently captured Indiamen, the Europe and the Streatham, are in St Paul's road, on the other side of the island, together with their captor, the frigate Caroline, whose inward parts are alleged to require some attention that will keep her there for perhaps a fortnight. In fact her captain, a most amiable young man called Feretier, is attached to the wife of the Governor, General Desbrusleys, a passionate gentleman who is at odds with Captain Saint-Michiel, the commandant of St Paul's, and with most of the other officers on La Reunion. At present he is at Saint- Denis: his forces amount to something over three thousand men, including the militia; but they are stationed at various points, twenty and even thirty miles apart over difficult mountain country; and although St Paul's is strongly defended by batteries and fortifications mounting, let us see, nine and eight is seventeen--I write seven and I retain one; five and five is ten, and with the one that I retained, eleven--mounting a hundred and seventeen guns, you may consider it practicable, in spite of the difficulty of landing on these shores, to which you have so frequently adverted. This rude sketch shows the approximate location of the batteries. This the disposition of the troops. You will forgive me for labouring the obvious when I say, that if you do decide to act, then celerity is everything. 'Lose not a minute', as you would put it.'
'Lord, Stephen, how happy you make me,' said Jack, taking the paper and comparing it with his chart of St Paul's dstead and the shore. 'Yes, yes: I see. A crossing fire, of course. Forty-two-pounders, I dare say; and well served, no doubt. There is no possibility of cutthing the Indiamen or the frigate out, none at all, without we take the batteries. And that we cannot do with our Marines and seamen: but three or four hundred soldiers from Rodriguez would just tip the scale, I do believe. We could not hold the place, of course, but we might take the ships--there is a fair chance that we take the ships.' He stared at the paper and at his chart. 'Yes: a tough nut, to be sure; but if only I can persuade the soldiers on Rodriguez to move at once, and if only we can get our men ashore, I believe we can crack it. St Paul's is on the leeward side, where the surf is not so wicked unless the wind lies in the west . . . but I quite take your point about losing no time, Stephen . . . 'He ran out of the cabin, and a few moments later Stephen, turning the egg over in his hands, heard the Raisonable begin to speak as she bore up for Rodriguez, spreading sail after sail: the masts complained, the taut rigging sang with a greater urgency, the sound of the water racing along her side mounted to a diffused roar; the complex orchestra of cordage, wood under stress, moving sea and wind, all-pervading sound, exalting to the sea borne ear--a sound that never slackened day or night while the squadron made good its five hundred miles with the strong, steady south-east wind just abaft the beam.
Rodriguez: the low dome of the island lay clear on the starboard bow at dawn on Thursday, a greenish dome, its skyline stuck with palm-trees, in a green lagoon; all round the immense surrounding reef the white of breakers, and beyond it the intense blue of the open sea, uninterrupted for five thousand miles to windward. A man-of-war bird passed a few feet overhead, its long forked tall opening and closing as it glided through the swirling currents about the forestaysail and the jibs, but neither Jack nor Stephen moved their steady gaze from the land. On a flat tongue of land with a large house upon it and some huts, neat rows of tents could already be seen: no great number of them, but enough to shelter the three or four hundred soldiers that might make the descent on La Reunion a possibility, if only their commanding officer could be induced to stir. Jack had seen combined operations by the score, few of them a pleasant memory; and the likelihood of miserable jealousies between army and navy, the divided command, to say nothing of divided councils, were clear in his mind. He was superior to Lieutenant- Colonel Keating in rank, but that gave him a mere precedence, no right to issue orders: it would have to be a true, willing cooperation or nothing. He must rely upon his powers of exposition: and as though an unremitting glare might carry conviction, he kept the glass trained on the house, moving it only occasionally to glance at the gap in the surf that showed the narrow passage into the lagoon.
Stephen's mind was largely taken up with the same considerations; yet part of it was also aware, vividly aware, that the island gliding towards him was the home of an enormous land tortoise, not perhaps quite so vast as Testudo aubreii, discovered and named by himself on a comparable island in this same ocean, but even so one of the wonders of the world; and, more important still, that until recently it had been the home, the only home, of the solitaire, a bird in some ways resembling the dodo, equally extinct alas, but still less known to science, even in fragmentary remains. He turned over a number of approaches to this subject, none wholly satisfactory, given Jack's gross insensibility to all science without an immediate application: for Captain Aubrey, as for the rest of brute creation, there were only two kinds of birds, the edible and the inedible. Even after prolonged meditation, during which the squadron reduced sail for the first time in fifty-two hours, he could produce no more than a timid
'Were we compelled to stay a short while 'that passed unnoticed, for as he spoke Jack raised his speaking- trumpet and hailed the Nereide, saying 'Lead in, if you please, Captain Corbett. And preserve us from evil.'
'Amen,' said a forecastleman automatically, glancing at the Commodore with horror as soon as the word was out of his mouth.
'. . . perhaps I might be allowed a party,' continued Stephen, 'a very small party, consisting only of ambulant cases . . . ' He would have added 'to look for bones', if the Commodore's eager determined expression had not convinced him that he might as well have pleaded with the ship's figurehead.
The barge splashed down into the calm waters of the lagoon, its crew stretched out as they were bid, and this same eager determined expression advanced with long strides up the coral beach to meet Colonel Keating. They exchanged salutes, shook hands, and the soldier said, 'You will not remember me, sir, but I was at a dinner given in your honour at Calcutta after your magnificent defence of the China fleet.'
'Certainly I remember you, sir,' said Jack, who had indeed some recollection of this tall, lean figure--a longnosed, capable face that raised his hopes, 'and am very happy to see you again.'
The Colonel looked pleased, and as he led Jack through a double hedge of his men, Englishmen of the 56th Foot on the one side, turbaned sepoys of the 2nd regiment of Bombay Infantry on the other, he observed, 'How delighted we were to see you coming in. We have been so cruelly bored on this dismal rock, these last few months--reduced to tortoise-races--nothing to look forward to except the arrival of the main body next year-- nothing to shoot except guinea-fowl.' Jack instantly seized upon the opening and said, 'If we are of the same mind, Colonel, I believe I can do away with your boredom. I can offer you something better than guinea-fowl to shoot at.'
