"Perhaps. At anyrate if you carry the letter, and bring back an answer or not, you can act as an ambassador."
"With pleasure," I cried, delighted to think I was again to be restored to British protection, and to see English faces. "I will accompany you at once."
I made some few--very few--changes in my appearance, which was a bit remarkable for an English youth, or "man." My stubbly hair, my thick wadded costume,--_a la Chinois_,--for your Chinaman pads his garments until his bulk, in winter, vies with Mr. Daniel Lambert, of pious memory. Thus, something like a clean scarecrow, crossed with the Fat Boy in _Pickwick_, I accompanied my deliverers.
As we quitted my quarters, I said as pleasantly as possible--
"Tell me the mistake I made when you came in?"
They smiled at the recollection, and the sailor-boy said, nodding at me--
"It was all right, really. You only said, Hurrah for the Emperor! and" (here he choked)--"and called out for the '_Japan Mail Steam Company_.' That's all."
I laughed aloud at the connection. What I intended to say I have now no idea, and my Japanese friends never enlightened me.
This was my last attempt at Asiatic languages--on service.
EXPLANATIONS--ON BOARD THE _NANIWA_ AGAIN--THE BLOCKADE OF WEI-HAI-WEI--ON SERVICE
During our journey to Talien Bay, which had become the Japanese naval base after the demolition of Port Arthur, I put a number of questions to Tomi and to the military officer, his brother, whom I now learned was attached to the army staff. Several of these inquiries had reference to the movements of the army and navy, but some questions were personal to myself. At last my kind friends threw off their official reserve, and cheered my heart with the prospect of release.
I began by asking how the young lieutenant had found me out, and why, having sent me adrift, he had thought of seeking me again. I told my adventures briefly.
"I am sure you did it for the best," I concluded, "but all the same your plans nearly cost me my life."
"We had no choice, I am sorry to say. The report that you were a Chinese spy had been so insisted upon that even Japanese discipline wavered on board. When you confessed to knowledge of Chinese, the plan of sending you as a scout with the interpreter was adopted, and I gave you all the assistance I could."