Public-domain ebook
by Charles William De la Poer Beresford
Language: en8,050 downloads on Project Gutenberg
Subjects
In: Biographies·History - British·History - Warfare
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #50508.
The work is a sprawling memoir by Admiral Lord Charles William De la Puer Beresford, a 19th‑century British naval officer, and it opens with a series of vivid, anecdotal sketches of the people who served him aboard the HMS Galatea. He begins by recounting the arrival of Tom Fat, a Chinese boy taken on as a “faithful servant” in Kowloon, and proceeds to describe the boy’s clever forgery of cheques, his eventual arrest, and the Admiral’s reluctant intervention. The narrative then shifts to other exotic encounters, an enslaved negro named Punch rescued on Mauritius, a leisurely stay in Tahiti, and a crash‑laden visit to the Sandwich Islands, each episode framed as a self‑selected vignette rather than a continuous plot.
The voice is unmistakably Victorian, marked by the Admiral’s self‑assured, sometimes paternalistic tone and a penchant for detailed, often humorous observation of foreign lands and peoples. The prose reflects the period’s imperial outlook, mixing travelogue, personal reflection, and occasional moralizing. Readers who enjoy unvarnished first‑person accounts of naval life, colonial encounters, and the idiosyncrasies of a high‑ranking officer’s worldview will find this memoir rewarding, while those seeking a tightly plotted narrative may prefer a different genre.
Continued ) II. MY TWO FAITHFUL SERVANTS They came to me first in the Galatea , so that their story may fitly be related in this place. Tom Fat the China boy came to me at Kowloon. He was brought to me by his uncle, who desired to dispose of his nephew, for a consideration. The consideration was £5. Lest I should be accused of Chinese slavery—and anything is possible in these days—I should explain that the fiver was not the price of Tom Fat, but was in the nature of a delicate compliment paid to his uncle. Tom was a free boy; he was entered in the ship's books as my servant, at so much wages per month. Not that he valued his wages particularly; he had wider views. He was an invaluable servant, clever, orderly, indefatigable and devoted. I attired him in gorgeous silks, and he bore my crest with perfect unassuming dignity. …
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