Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands by Mary Seacole - Chapter 12

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter twelve of Wonderful Adventures of Missus Sea Coal in
Many Lands by Mary Sea Coal. This LibriVox recording is
in the public domain. Chapter twelve Summer was fairly advanced
before the British Hotel was anything like finished. Indeed, it
never was completed, and when we left the hill a

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year later, it still wanted shutters. But long before that
time spring Hill had gained a great reputation. Of course,
I have nothing to do with what occurred in the camp,
although I could not help hearing a great deal about it.
Mismanagement and privation there might have been, But my business
was to make things right in my sphere, and whatever

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confusion and disorder existed elsewhere, comfort and order were always
to be found at spring Hill. When there was no
sun elsewhere, some few gleams, so its grateful visitors said,
always seemed to have stayed behind to cheer the weary
soldiers that gathered in the British Hotel. And perhaps, as

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my kind friend Punch said, after all these things had
become pleasant memories of the past. The cold without gave
a zest, no doubt to the welcome warmth within, but
her smile, good old soul lent heat to the coal
and power to the Pannikin let me in a few
words describe the British Hotel. It was acknowledged by all

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to be the most complete thing there. It cost no
less than eight hundred pounds. The buildings and yards took
up at least an acre of ground, and were as
perfect as we could make them. The hotel and store
house consisted of a long iron room with counters, closets
and shelves. Above it was another low room used by

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us for storing our goods, and above this floated a
large union jack. Attached to this building was a little kitchen,
not unlike a ship's caboose, all stoves and shelves. In
addition the iron house were too wooden houses with sleeping
apartments for myself and mister Day, out houses for our servants,

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a canteen for the soldiery, and a large enclosed yard
for our stock, full of stables, low huts and sties. Everything,
although rough and unpolished, was comfortable and warm, and there
was a completeness about the whole which won general admiration.
The reader may judge of the manner in which we
had stocked the interior of our store from the remark

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often repeated by the officers that you might get everything
at Mother Secual's from an anchor down to a needle.
In addition, we had for our transport service four carts
and as many horses and mules as could be kept
from the thieves. To reckon on being in possession of
these at any future time was impossible. We have more

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than once seen a fair stud stabled at night time,
and on the following morning been compelled to borrow cattle
from the land transport camp to fetch our things up
from Balaklava. But it must not be supposed that my
domestic difficulties came to an end with the completion of
the hotel. True, I was in a better position to
bear the Crimean cold and rain, But my other foes

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were as busy as ever they had been on the
beach at balac Lava. Thieves biped and quadruped human and
animal troubled me more than ever, and perhaps the most
difficult to deal with were the least dangerous, the Crimean rats,
for instance, who had the appetites of London aldermen and
were as little dainty as hungry schoolboys. Whether they had

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left Sebastopol, guided by the instinct which leads their kindred
in other parts of the world to forsake sinking ships,
or because the garrison rations offended their palates, or whether
they had patriotically emigrated to make war against the English larders.
I do not pretend to guess, but whatever was their motive,
it drew them in great abundance to spring Hill. They

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occasionally did as damage in a single night, to the
tune of two or three pounds, wasting what they could
not devour. You could keep nothing sacred from their strong teeth.
When hard pressed, they more than once attacked the live sheep,
and at last they went so far as to nibble
one of our black cooks, Francis, who slept among the
flower barrels. On the following morning he came to me,

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his eyes rolling angrily and his white teeth gleaming, to
show me a mangled finger which they had bitten, and
ask me to dress it. He made a great fuss,
and a few mornings later he came in a violent
passion this time and gave me instant notice to quit
my service. Although we were paying him two pounds a
week with board and rations. This time the rats, had,

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it appeared, been bolder and attacked his head in a
spot where its natural armor the wall was thinnest. And
the silly fellow had a notion that the souls of
the slain Russian soldiers had entered the bodies of the
rats and made vengeful war upon their late enemies. Driven
such an extremity, I made up my mind to scour

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the camp in search of a cat, and after a
long day's hunt, I came to the conclusion that the
tale of Whittington was by no means an improbable one.
In fact, had a brisk young fellow with a cat
of even ordinary skill in its profession made their appearance
at spring Hill, I would gladly have put them in
the way of laying the foundation at least of a fortune.

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At last I found a benefactor in the guard's camp,
in Colonel d of the cold Streams, who kindly promised
me a great pet, well known in the camp, and
perhaps by some who may read these pages, by the
name of Pinkie. Pinkie was then helping a brother officer
to clear his hut, but on the following day a
guardsman brought the noble fellow down. He lived in Clover

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for a few days, but he had an English catlike
attachment for his old house, and despite the abundance of game,
Pinky soon stole away to his old master's quarters three
miles off. More than once the men brought him back
to me, but the attractions of spring Hill were never
strong enough to detain him long with me. From the

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human thieves that surrounded spring Hill. I had to stand
as sharp as siege as the Russians had in that
poor city, against which we heard the guns thundering daily.
While the most cunning and desperate sorties were often made
upon the most exposed parts of my defenses, and sometimes
with success, scores of the keenest eyes and hundreds of

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the sharpest fingers in the world were always ready to
take advantage of the least oversight. I had to keep
two boys whose chief occupation was to watch the officers
horses tied up to the door posts of the British Hotel.
Before I adopted this safeguard, more than one officer would
leave his horse for a few minutes and on his

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return find it gone to the neighborhood of the Naval Brigade,
or the horse fair at Camillese my old friends, the dwarves,
soon found me out at spring Hill, and the wiry,
light fingered, fighting loving gentry spent much of their leisure there.
Those confounded trousers of theirs offered conveniences of stowage room,
which they made rare use of. Nothing was too small,

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and few things too unwieldy to ride in them. Like
the pockets of clown in a pantomime. They could accommodate
a well grown baby or a pound of sausages equally well.
I have a firm conviction that they stuffed turkeys, geese
and fowls into them, and I positively know that my
only respectable teapot traveled off in the same conveyance. While

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I detected one little fellow who had tied them down
tight at his ankles, stowing away some pounds of tea
and coffee mixed. Some officers who were present cut the cords, and,
holding up the little scamp by the neck, shook his
trousers empty amid shouts of laughter. Our live stock, from
the horses and mules down to the geese and fowls,

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suffered terribly, although we kept a sharp look out by
day and paid a man five shillings a night. As watchmen,
our losses were very great. During the time we were
in the crimea. We lost over a score of horses,
four mules, eighty goats, many sheep, pigs and poultry. By
thieving alone, we missed in a single night forty goats

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and seven sheep. And on mister Day's going to headquarters
with intelligence of the disaster, they told him that Lord
Raglan had recently received forty sheep from Asia, all of
which had disappeared in the same manner. The geese, turkeys
and fowls vanished by scores. We found out afterwards that
the watchmen paid to guard the sheep used to kill

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a few occasionally. As he represented them to have died
a natural death during the night, he got permission to
bury them, instead of which he sold them. King Frost
claimed his share of our stock too, and on one
December night of the winter of eighteen fifty five killed
no less than forty sheep. It is all very well

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to smile at these things now, but at the time
there were heartrending enough and helped if they did not
cause the ruin which eventually overtook the firm of Sekull
and Day the determination and zeal which besiegers and besieged
showed with respect to a poor pig which was quietly
and unconsciously fattening in its sty A worthy of record.

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Fresh pork in the spring of eighteen fifty five was
certainly one of those luxuries not easily obtainable in that
part of the crimea to which the British Army was confined.
And when it became known that Mother Secull had purchased
a promising young porker from one of the ships in Balaklava,
and that brave woman she had formed the courageous resolution

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of fattening it for her favorites, the excitement among the
frequenters of spring Hill was very great. I could laugh
heartily now when I think of the amount of persuasion
and courting I stood out for before I bound myself
how its four legs were to be disposed of. I
learnt more at that time of the trials and privileges

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of authority than I am ever likely to experience again.
Upon my word, I think if the poor thing had
possessed as many legs as my editor tells me, somebody
called the Hydra, with whom my readers are perhaps more
familiar than I am had heads. I should have found
candidates for them. As it was. The contest for those
I had to bestow was very keen, and the lucky

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individuals who were favored by me looked after their interests
most carefully. One of them, to render mistake or misunderstanding impossible,
entered my promise. In my day book. The reader will
perhaps smile at the following important memorandum in the Gallant
Officer's writing memorandum that Missus Secual did this day, in

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the presence of Major A and Lieutenant W, promised Captain H. R.
A a leg of the pig. Now it was well
known that many greedy eyes and fingers were directed towards
the plump fellow, and considerable interest was manifested in the
result of the struggle Missus Secual versus Thievery. I think

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they had some confidence in me, and that I was
the favorite. But there was a large field against me,
which found its backers also, and many a bette was
laughingly laid on the ultimate fate of the unconscious porker.
I baffled many a knavish trick to gain possession of
the fine fellow, but after all I lost him in

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the middle of the day, when I thought the boldest
rogues would not have run the risk. The shouts and
laughter of some officers who were riding down from the
front first informed me of my lass up. They rode
calling out, mother, secull, old, lady, quick, the pig's gone.
I rushed out, injured woman that I was, and saw

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it all at a glance, but that my straw wide awake,
was in the way. I could have torn my hair
in my vexation. I rushed to the stye, found the
nest warm, and with prompt decision prepared for speedy pursuit back.
I came to the horseman, calling out off with you,
my sons. They can't have got very far away, yet,

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do your best to save my bacon. Delighted with the fun,
the horsemen dispersed, laughing and shouting, stole away, hark away,
while I ran indoors, turned out all my available bodyguard
and started in pursuit. Also not half a mile off,
we soon saw a horseman wave his cap and starting

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off into a run. Came to a little hollow where
the poor panting animal and two Greek thieves had been
run down. The provost Marshal took the latter in hand willingly,
and Piggy was brought home in triumph. But those who
had pork expectancies hearing of the adventure, grew so seriously
alarmed at the narrow escape that they petitioned me to

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run so desperate a hazard no longer, and the poor
thing was killed on the following day and distributed according
to promise. A certain portion was reserved for sausages, which
fried with mashed potatoes, were quite the rage at the
British hotel for some days. Sat pork was also sent
to headquarters with an account of the dangers we ran

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from thieves. It drew the following kind acknowledgment from General
b Headquarters. My dear missus Secual, I am very much
obliged to you, indeed for your pork. I have spoken
to Colonel p As to the police of your neighborhood,
and you will see what arrangement can be made for
the general protection of that line of road. When the

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high road is finished, you will be better off. Let
me know at the time of any depredations that are committed,
and we will try and protect you. I am faithfully
yours m l B. For The truth was. Although I
can laugh at my fears now, I was often most
horribly frightened at spring and there was cause for it too.

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My washerwoman, who with her family lived not half a
mile from us, was with me one day and carried
off some things for the wash. On the following morning,
I was horrified to learn that she, her father, husband,
and children in all seven had been most foully murdered
during the night. Only one of the whole family recovered

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from her wounds and lived to tell the tale. It
created a great sensation at the time and caused me
to pass many a sleepless night, for the murderers were
never discovered. Whilst I am upon the subject of crimean thievery,
I may as well exhaust it. Without paying any regard
to the chronological order of my reminiscences. I have before

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mentioned what I suffered from the French. One day I
caught one of our allies in my kitchen, robbing me
in the most ungrateful manner. He had met with an
accident near spring Hill. I believe he belonged to a
French regiment leant to assist the English in road making,
and had been doctored by me and now I found
him filling his pockets before taking French leave of us.

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My black man Frances pulled from his pockets a yet
warm fowl and other provisions. We kicked him off the premises,
and he found refuge with some men of the Army
Works Corps, who pitied him and gave him shelter. He
woke them in the middle of the night, laying hands
rather clumsily on everything that was removable, and in the
morning they brought him to me to ask what they

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should do with him. Unluckily for him, a French officer
of rank happened to be in the store, who, on
hearing our tail, packed him off to his regiment. I
gathered from the expression of the officer's face and the
dread legible upon the culprits, that it might be some
considerable time before his itch for breaking the eighth Commandment

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could again be indulged. In the trouble I underwent, respecting
a useful black mare for which mister Day had given
thirty guineas, and which carried me beautifully, was immense. Before
it had been many weeks in our store. It was gone,
whither I failed to discover. Keeping my eyes wide open. However,

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I saw Angelina, so I christened her, coming quietly down
the hill carrying an elderly naval officer. I was ready
to receive the unconscious couple, and soon made my claim good.
Of course, the officer was not to blame. He had
bought it of a soldier, who in his turn had
purchased the animal of a messmate, who of course had

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obtained it from another, and so on. But eventually it
returned to its old quarters, where it only remained about
a fortnight. I grew tired of looking for Angelina and
had given her up when one day she turned up
in capital condition, in the possession of a French officer
of Chausseur. But nothing I could say to the Frenchman

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would induce him to take the view of the matter
I wished, but had no right to enforce. He had
bought the horse at ca Amish and intended to keep it.
We grew hot at last, and our dispute drew out
so large an audience that the Frenchman took alarm and
tried to make off. I held on to Angelina for
a little while, but at last the mare broke away

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from me. As Tamoshant as Maggie did from the witches.
I don't mean that she left me even her tail,
and vanished in a cloud of dust. It was the
last I ever saw of Angelina. More than once the
crimean thievery reduced us to woeful straits to a Greek.
Returning to Constantinople, we intrusted after the murderer of our

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washerwoman two trunks containing things for the wash, which she
was to bring back as soon as possible. But neither
upon Greek trunks nor their contents did we ever set
eyes again. It was a serious lass. The best part
of our tablecloths and other domestic linen, all my clothes
except two suits, and all of mister Day's linen vanished

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and had to be replaced as best we could by
fresh purchases from Camierche and CADIICOI. Perhaps the most ridiculous
shift I was ever put to by the crimean thieves
happened when we rose one morning and found the greater
part of our stud missing. I had, in the course
of the day urgent occasion to ride over to the
French camp on the Chenia. The only animal available for

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my transport was an old gray mare who had contracted
some equine disease of which I do not know the name,
but which gave her considerable resemblance to a dog suffering
from the mange. Now go to the French camp. I
must to borrow a horse was impossible, and something must
be done with the gray. Suddenly one of those happy

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thoughts which sometimes help us over our greatest difficulties entered
into my scheming brains. Could I not conceal the poor
mare's worst blemishes? Her color was gray? Would not a
thick coating of flour from my dreadger make all right?
There was no time to be lost. The remedy was
administered successfully, and off I started. But alas the wind

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was high and swept the skirts of my riding habits
so determinedly against the side of the poor beast, that
before long its false coat was transferred to the dark cloth,
and my innocent ruse exposed. The French are proverbially and
really a polite and considerate nation. But I never heard
more hearty peals of laughter from any sides than those

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which conveyed to me the horrible assurance that my scheme
had unhappily failed. End of Chapter twelve.