HOW I DID NOT JOIN THE GARIBALDINI.

Tuapeka Times, Volume I, Issue 32, 19 September 1868, Page 5

HOW I DID NOT JOIN THE GARIBALDINI.

(tfSfrWEN EXPBES-SLY FOE THE TffAPEKA TIMES.)

It £3 now nine years since the name of Garibaldi became a household word all over the earth ; in a less space of time, it is said, we change the substance of our bodies, and assuredly we greatly alter oui minds. To Mr. Jack, the respectable; agriculturist of the present day, the Quixotism of the " excursionist " appears rather absurd ; but to the Jacob Jack of that period groaning under the pedagogues' bir«hen rule the idea had the attraction, which romance and adventure always have to youthful and enthusiastic minds. I was residing, at the time of the daring invasion of Sicily, in a small town in the north of Scotland ; and my day-dreams were soon filled with pleasant visions of the " Great General and Dictator, Jack : his doughty exploits." Strange to say, the parental authority did not seem inclined to allow me to follow out a path so certain to lead to fortune, perchance to empire itself. Such blindness was not to be endured. I cut stick and hooked it. After the approved custom of all heroes of romance, I had a tender parting, where vows of eternal constancy were exchanged with the Dulcinea of my young affections, whose very name I can hardly at the present moment recall.' My travelling equipment, if not sumptuous, was warlike ; an old pistol minus the lock, a clasp knife, wanting only half the blade, three percussion caps, a rifle bullet, and a bow and arrows forming, as I thought, an armament sufficient to equip a regiment. With the sinews of war I was not so well provided, a couple of pounds in shillings and a sixpence, and a bag of. coppers, the fruits of long and careful saving, being hardly enough to carry a person from John O'Groat's to Rome. However, I started, and for a fortnight tramped steadily on, sheltered at night in the hut of some peasant, without any diminution of my little treasure. I reached Edinburgh all safe, and took steam to London, where I arrived in tolerable health and excellent spirits. If any of my readers recollect their first visit to the modern .Babel, they may have some idea of my feelings of bewilderment and helpless misery. My first visit was to the recruiting office, where, as a matter of course, my pretentious were received with- ridicule. Here was a downfall to all my hopes ; and worse follovyed when a day or two after my money came to an end, and I was turned ont homeless and friendless on the streets of London. Well might De Quincey call Oxford-street " the stoney-hearted," for it is with a shudder that I recall the feelings with which i blushed along its length, vainly endeavoring to look business-like, ;iud painfully conscious of my failure. I went down to the docks, for, thought I, if the world has no need of youthful Bonapartes it may require a sucking Nelson. Ship after ship did I board, l»ut not even 'a loblolly- boy was wanted. As I stood disconsolatily gazing on the water, a hale-looking old man saluted me with a hearty " What cheer, mate ? " I was too miserable to conceal my plight, and the warm-hearted fellow, scarcely waiting to hear out my tale, dragged me to a public house, where I was regaled with bread and cheese and porter. Not content ' with this, he took me to his humble lodging, and with the spirit of Eastern hospitality bathed my hot and dusty feet. In the morning he gave me ninepence, half his available capital, and bade me good bye, never again to be encountered by me, though when I possessed the means of rewarding his benevolence I often sought for him, nor ever to be forgotten while my heart beats with a single kindly emotion. That night T slept on a seat in the enclosure, James's Park. L hid as " bedfellow," a young Irishman, who had come to London in search of a rather mythical rich relation. He was as completely stumped as myself ; and we entered into a committee of ways and means to discuss the momentous question, " how to raise the wind." A lucky hit at last struck my companion in misfortune, who asked me if I could whistle. I told him I could. " Ach, then, I'm the boy to dance. Won't we jisfc give an- intertainment that'll astonish the wake nerves of the cockneys ! " No batter prospact appearing, wj started f ,o work in a quiet West End streafc (ATberfc-streat, Hyde Park, I think), and my companion capared away with all the reckless jollity of a true Hibernian, while I sat on a door step, whistling " Money Musk," awfully ashamed, and doing my bast to look quite unconcerned with the exhibition. Seven or eight coppers rewarded our first attempt ; Wind our further efforts were so successful that at night we divided over nine shillings. I lost si^ht of my Irish friend, and in a few days I was in as bad a plight as ever. I was walking along, iMiiiinsj at the pastry cooks' doors, and scarcely daring to trust my honesty far enough to look at the tempting viands displayed in their windows, when I heard a voice pronounce my name, and turning round, saw an old fri.?nd of my father. The rest may be ea3ily guessed ; suffice ifc to say that my return home was not quite so trininphant an affair as I had anticipated, and that the result of my first interview with my schoolmaster prevented me Bitting down with any degree of comfort for the next six weeks. I have travelled much and suffered much syice then, but never in the whole course of my existence can I forget the terrible time when I was a wanderer on the streets of London.