The Junior Classics, Volume 5: Stories that never grow old
General
The Junior Classics, Volume 5: Stories that never grow old
Children's literature
At the noise of the fire I immediately advanced with my whole
army, which was now eight men, viz., myself, generalissimo;
Friday, my lieutenant-general; the captain and his two men, and
the three prisoners of war whom we had trusted with arms. We came
upon them, indeed, in the dark, so that they could not see our
number; and I made the man they had left in the boat, who was now
one of us, to call them by name, to try if I could bring them to a
parley, and so perhaps might reduce them to terms; which fell out
just as we desired, for indeed it was easy to think, as their
condition then was, they would be very willing to capitulate. So
he calls out as loud as he could to one of them, "Tom Smith! Tom
Smith!"
Tom Smith answered immediately, "Is that Robinson?" for it seems
he knew the voice. The other answered,
"Ay, ay; for God's sake, Tom Smith, throw down your arms and
yield, or you are all dead men this moment,"
"Who must we yield to? Where are they?" says Smith again.
"Here they are," says he, "here's our captain and fifty men with
him, have been hunting you these two hours; the boatswain is
killed; Will Fry is wounded, and I am a prisoner; and if you do
not yield you are all lost."
"Will they give us quarter, then?" says Tom Smith, "and we will
yield."
"I'll go and ask, if you promise to yield," said Robinson: so he
asked the captain, and the captain himself then calls out,
"You, Smith, you know my voice; if you lay down your arms
immediately and submit, you shall have your lives, all but Will
Atkins."
Upon this Will Atkins cried out, "For God's sake, captain, give me
quarter; what have I done? They have all been as bad as I," which,
by the way, was not true, for it seems this Will Atkins was the
first man that laid hold of the captain when they first mutinied,
and used him barbarously in tying his hands and giving him
injurious language. However, the captain told him he must lay down
his arms at discretion, and trust to the governor's mercy: by
which he meant me, for they all called me governor. In a word,
they all laid down their arms and begged their lives; and I sent
the man that had parleyed with them, and two more, who bound them
all; and then my great army of fifty men, which, with those three,
were in all but eight, came up and seized upon them, and upon
their boat; only that I kept myself and one more out of sight for
reasons of state.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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