Tom Finch's Monkey

We were cruising off Callao on the Pacific station when it all happened, and I daresay there are a good many others who will recollect all about it as well as myself. But to explain the matter properly I must go back a little in my dates; for, instead of Callao at the commencement of my yarn, you must read Calabar. You see, I was in the Porpoise at the time, a small old-fashioned, paddle-wheel steamer that had been ordered across from the West Coast of Africa by “my lords” of the Admiralty to reinforce our squadron in South American waters on account of a war breaking out between Chili and Peru. Being a “sub” on board of her, and consequently subject to the authorities that be, when the Porpoise was obliged to abandon the fragrant mangrove swamps at the mouth of the Congo river, where we had been enjoying ourselves for over a twelvemonth amidst the delights of a deadly miasma that brought on perpetual low fever, and as constant a consumption of quinine and bottled beer to counteract its effects, I was of course forced to accompany her across the Atlantic and round the Horn to her allotted destination.