THE BARB OF AN ARROW.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9509, 5 April 1909, Page 4

THE BARB OF AN ARROW.

feASSAGES IN THE LIFE HISTORY V OP ANTONY PENTWICH, CONVICT. ■'*'■* JBy ROY BRIDGES.) No. IX. ' BLOODHOUNDS. [An. Rights Resebved.] From the phials of Time, the great Jfiealer, we sip the waters of forgetfulness. He who has suffered grievously, yet lived, shall find his load each wear the lighter, and though memory fendures and oppresses him with pictures of the dark and. evil past, the curtains of the mist deepen about them .with, the years. So of the days that I, Richard Stavely, passed within that new-born prison blouse upon Port Arthur I have, indeed, p. memory most bitter and most cruel ; *et let me take consolation that these fast comfortable years have spread feboufc the place for me a misty pall *s thick as a grey winter fog. Yet if to this hour I cry and quiver in my sleep, as under the sharp torture of the |ash and gnawing of the galling irons upon my limbs ; if, waking in the dark, 'I am yet agonised at the long stillness «s of the silent cell— grasp of the termors of that infant prison, all you who know it as a hideous thing, battening kipon the blood of wretched men, till it has grown into a charnel house, thelike whereof none other of these new jgngliish lands «an know. I have read, * have heard it said, Hhat this Port 'Arthur has met its aim and end; that being purposed, pc Sarah Island prison, for the worst class of convicts, it has brought Ixj their reform and punishment a system grinding per- , chance, but of certain justice. I fling hack this lie. I say .that unhappy men who have lain within its iron grasp liave numbered among them many wretches,' hardened, irreclaimable, but many more who under kindlier justice had come to penitence. I say that this' system, which Governor Arthur, the. just, the upright, the honourable, formulated to his servant Russell; which those officers, Mahon, Briggs R nd Gibbons, furthered; which Booth has brought to it* fulfilment^ has ground alike the lost 'and the repentant beneath its iron wheels, till the machine is rotten and decayed, and xhe whole land is with the blood oi murdered men— a crimson shame that BhaJl not be washed out till a wide, circle of years be rounded. A prison by the waters— stil\ Port Arthur stands and smiles, set beautifully about with green and a bright line of waters to mirror tenderly its walls. Thus it smiled upon that young November morning when the sloop, that bore us, Pentwich aud me, and half a dozen others, dropped anchoV near the shore. But the time when Governor Arthur had sent down Dr' Russell, assistant surgeon to the 63rd, to establish this convict prison, that he planned, was recent, so that when we poor chained wretches were pulled ashore we were not stricken, as now is every convict coming to Port Arthur, by the appalling oile of prison houses. The prison that we saw, indeed, was terrible to us; so had. been any prison. And this first place bore awful promise of the crop to spring up on that shore. I had had little knbwledge of Pentwich in the days since we were taken. We had been placed in separate ceils in Hobart Town, and only brought together when set aboard the sloop ; but then so straitly were we guarded by the soldiers that we had found, scant opportunity to speak, had we. cared. Indeed, /since that hour upon the rpa<J, he had scarce uttered word to any man. He had remained silent and stricken on his awakening from hie swoon, in which her passing left him; he never lifted up hie eyes ; no blow, no kick, no curse — and they were niany-^-could arouse him; but, like a mute, ho mov^ ed and gave no heed to any of his ftuarde, or yet to me. So when, with fettered limbs, we dragged our steps from the landing-place to the prison, K saw him ahead of, me, stepping }ike a sleep-walker, and in my evil plight I vet found thought and pity for my friend, but I despaired the more to see him so bereft of hope. / The gates were swung open >. in we were driven; the gates clashed after us. We were in a yard, shut in. with walls and prison building©, many yet incomplete. We were forced into a line, while word was given to the Commandant of our coming ;, and ;when it suited him, and we in our weakness were fit to sink down'wlfere we stood, he came, attended by his officers and a few warders. We listened dully to his brief caution that misbehaviour would bring us punishment sharp and severe. ■ We of our own eyes should hear witness on the morrow of what came upon the fractious prisoner. From the Commandant's presence, we were marched into the actual prison, and in a sort of hall lined up again, searched, made each man to strip, and put on a fresh regulation livery of coarse-yel-low stuff, shot with broad arrows, and then our leg-irons, which _had . been knocked off, were replaced with others, which, if lighter, were of tested strength. It was noon ere this task was completed; and- at the clanging of a bell they drove us into a great chamber of the penitentiary, where we were fed on a thin broth and bread. From that place" we came into, the corridor, and were thrust each man of ue into the silent cell which he must occupy for the first .days of his life within the prison. The warders in whose charge we had been, loaded us with many a foul oath, and kicks and blows. They were as their class. I have blamed the whole evil system, but let me yet »say 'that of the horrors that befouled Port Arthur no minor share lay with these wicked men. Many of ithcm had been convicte ; yet their own sufferings had not taught them mercy, but rather ' hardened all that was cruel and evil in them. Brutish themselves, they sought to embrute the stricken wretches who grovelled in their power. Judge .of them by Port Arthur's infamy. Thurst into my solitary ceil on this first day within Port Arthur, I might have been within my grave, for when the bolts shot home I could hear no' sound, but was hedged terribly about with a silence deep a* the darkness. There was no window; the walls shut out all sound, all light. At first, groping my way to the stone bench, f sought to sleep, but could not for terror of the darkness, and lay awake straining my ears to hear — if only the sound of the sentry tramping without, or the warder passing down tho corridor by my cell. The silence held me as in a ■pell, until, dreading I' should go mad,

I leaped to my feet, as fighting I knew not what, and clashed my chains for sound — clashed them till the air rang with their iron music; but from their weight I wearied soon of this, and in my weariness found sleep. Stiff iv every limb from my bed of stone, sick with hunger, I scarce lifted my head when the warders flung open the door of my cell next morning. The gleam of the lanterns dazzled me, and I lay blinking, and could not see them, but 'they roared out to me 'to jump up, and I made great haste to the door and forth into the corridor. The convicts were gathering there from their cells, and soon we tramped in single file into the prison yard. A drum was beating monotonously, and with fire-locks gleaming in the thin shafts of the rising sun that penetrated down into that gloomy court, the soldiers, smart, bright-buttoned, and pipe-clayed, turned out and drew up in the yard. The Commandant appeared immediately after," attended by the chief warder, and straightway we were lined up, a troop in yellow jackets, to watch the punishment of one of us. I dared turn my head when the warders' eyes were off me to search for Pentwich among the prisoners. I saw many lowering, evil faces. I saw many that were humble, and pale, and>white, and many that- yet were open and engaging. For all 7 that they bore upon them the inevitable stamp of the chained man, just as their yellow livery was shot with the broad arrow. At first I could not see my friend, .but presently I * was sur- ' prised to find that he stood two men off in the frpnt rank as I, and directly before the 1 triangles, which were fixed against the walls: He was very pale, X saw, and his chin well-nigh touched his breast.

While I stared four warders brought out the prisoner who was to be flogged. I turned my eyes on him on, whom all eyes were bent, some lusting to see him t suffer; some pitying; some- callous.' A 'well-set lad, whose imprisonment had been no lengthy one if a brown cheek and neck told true, but whose eyes were wild with terror, and whoso lips ujere pallid, and parting; and twitching for dread of his punishment. He hung_on their arms like a drunken man as they dragged him forward, and. would not move a step of his own accord — or, more likely., could not for. his terror; "Bring him up," ordered the Commandant.

They bore him swiftly to the bars, but, ! setting eyes on theny he let out a shriek and struggled so vigorously that ho flung them off cursing, despite the presence of the Commandant, but pitilessly they gripped him, and held him. Speedily they stripped the yellow jacket over his head, and/ forced him, naked to the waist, against the bars. Other warders ran up hastily and strapped the leather fastenings about his wrists and ankles ; ' and he struggled no more after that, • but hung triced up, awaiting the flagellator. Still he turned his head, and looked round on us so _?iteousiy that I turned sick, and clenched my hands till the nails pierced into my palm. A short, thick-set fellow stepped out., of the ranks of the- convicts, rolling up his sleeves above his elbows, and showing huge muscle-knotted arms, with red

hair growing thickly on them, as- if they ran with blood. His blubber lips grinned evilly; an evil leer was in his eye : an trril lust rioting over all his features, as drawing his fingers through the leaded thongs of the cat which' a warder handed him, he watched the prisoner's white back and shoulders, while waiting the Commandant's 1 order to commence the punishment.' ; The Commandant went up to the prisoner, and "addressed a few words to him.- ■■; I heard not a word, : so sick, was* I with the whole vile spectacle, aud in despair I looked on Pentwich.

He had awakened from his stupor. Hh) eyes were Slight, his cheek ablaze, his lips drawn in horror and pity. And then my sorrow for the lad changed swiftly to terror for Pentwich, lest he, rash, heedless of the inevitable result, upon himself, dare seek to interpose and bring the leaded lash on bis -own shoulders: He leaned forward slightly, but a warder, marching up and down the line, pushed him back savagely. At the fellow's roughness I saw to my joy a change come on him, | suddenly : his head sank on his breast again, and so, like a log, he stood, unheediuo-. "• . , ■ '"<'

. "Begin!" said the Commandant. . . I shut my eyes; I heard the lashes swish through the air; and the convict lad cry out. * "One!" counted a warder. Again that hiss of lashes through the air; so piteous a cry that I, perforce, opened' my eyes and looked upon the punishment. '' "Two!" - ,« '■ _ , I was ,§b close I saw the crimson ridges across his white flesh. The flagellator, grinning^ like "a fiend, Justing for blood, slashed furiously again ; but scarcely had. the leaded thongs fallen than the; blood leaped forth from the torn flesh' and ran redly down, whereat the lad burst out into agonised shrieks for mercy, and, taken with a deathly sickness, I went down and saw no •more. . ' • < . / • '. • In those days that we ; two passed within Port Arthur, of a surety we won redemption for our sins. We paid the price— paid it in the agony of the lash, the dragging of the irons, the maddening silence of the solitary cells. Inside that place where torture was the aim— I say it for all, the Governor's justice— we could not escape our share;: and, though our lot may have been, light to many, we cursed, and with good cause, the ill-will of the Governor, which had led him to cast us into such a . hell, rather than let us take our trial and swing.

The end came— the way of escape— for escape we did. Scarce any now'" can hope to break out of that prison-house ; but in those earlier days of Port Arthur! they trusted Sjather to the inhospitable bush to drive back any who escaped, though for caution they yet set their chain of dogs and lamps across the narrow Neck,, and posted their redcoats hard by. Within Tasman's Peninsula, though there was cover, there was not sustenance enough to keep body and soul together long, and the unhappy wretch' who dared abscond must needs be starved to death or give himself up into their hands again. ' Yet, in the scant chances of speech we had together Pentwich and I had agreed to risk all perils of famine in the bush if we found opportunity to get away v That opportunity came in the worst torture they- devised for us. For tfiree months we laboured in tha prison gangs about Port Arthur, building, fencing, 'clearing, digging, until they (thought it safe to put us. in the carrying gang. For this work our irons