Tarzan of the Apes | Page 2

There were mothers and brothers and sisters, and aunts and cousins to
express various opinions on the subject, but as to what they severally
advised history is silent.
We know only that on a bright May morning in 1888, John, Lord
Greystoke, and Lady Alice sailed from Dover on their way to Africa.
A month later they arrived at Freetown where they chartered a small
sailing vessel, the Fuwalda, which was to bear them to their final

destination.
And here John, Lord Greystoke, and Lady Alice, his wife, vanished
from the eyes and from the knowledge of men.
Two months after they weighed anchor and cleared from the port of
Freetown a half dozen British war vessels were scouring the south
Atlantic for trace of them or their little vessel, and it was almost
immediately that the wreckage was found upon the shores of St. Helena
which convinced the world that the Fuwalda had gone down with all on
board, and hence the search was stopped ere it had scarce begun;
though hope lingered in longing hearts for many years.
The Fuwalda, a barkentine of about one hundred tons, was a vessel of
the type often seen in coastwise trade in the far southern Atlantic, their
crews composed of the offscourings of the sea--unhanged murderers
and cutthroats of every race and every nation.
The Fuwalda was no exception to the rule. Her officers were swarthy
bullies, hating and hated by their crew. The captain, while a competent
seaman, was a brute in his treatment of his men. He knew, or at least he
used, but two arguments in his dealings with them--a belaying pin and
a revolver--nor is it likely that the motley aggregation he signed would
have understood aught else.
So it was that from the second day out from Freetown John Clayton
and his young wife witnessed scenes upon the deck of the Fuwalda
such as they had believed were never enacted outside the covers of
printed stories of the sea.
It was on the morning of the second day that the first link was forged in
what was destined to form a chain of circumstances ending in a life for
one then unborn such as has never been paralleled in the history of
man.
Two sailors were washing down the decks of the Fuwalda, the first
mate was on duty, and the captain had stopped to speak with John
Clayton and Lady Alice.

The men were working backwards toward the little party who were
facing away from the sailors. Closer and closer they came, until one of
them was directly behind the captain. In another moment he would
have passed by and this strange narrative would never have been
recorded.
But just that instant the officer turned to leave Lord and Lady
Greystoke, and, as he did so, tripped against the sailor and sprawled
headlong upon the deck, overturning the water- pail so that he was
drenched in its dirty contents.
For an instant the scene was ludicrous; but only for an instant. With a
volley of awful oaths, his face suffused with the scarlet of mortification
and rage, the captain regained his feet, and with a terrific blow felled
the sailor to the deck.
The man was small and rather old, so that the brutality of the act was
thus accentuated. The other seaman, however, was neither old nor
small--a huge bear of a man, with fierce black mustachios, and a great
bull neck set between massive shoulders.
As he saw his mate go down he crouched, and, with a low snarl, sprang
upon the captain crushing him to his knees with a single mighty blow.
From scarlet the officer's face went white, for this was mutiny; and
mutiny he had met and subdued before in his brutal career. Without
waiting to rise he whipped a revolver from his pocket, firing point
blank at the great mountain of muscle towering before him; but, quick
as he was, John Clayton was almost as quick, so that the bullet which
was intended for the sailor's heart lodged in the sailor's leg instead, for
Lord Greystoke had struck down the captain's arm as he had seen the
weapon flash in the sun.
Words passed between Clayton and the captain, the former making it
plain that he was disgusted with the brutality displayed toward the crew,
nor would he countenance anything further of the kind while he and
Lady Greystoke remained passengers.

The captain was on the point of making an angry reply, but, thinking
better of it, turned on his heel and black and scowling, strode aft.
He did not care to antagonize an English official, for the Queen's
mighty arm wielded a punitive instrument which he could appreciate,
and which he feared--England's far-reaching navy.
The two sailors picked themselves up, the