Page 208 - Early English Adventurers in the Middle East_Neat

208 EARLY ENGLISH ADVENTURERS IN THE
EAST

on his return. The prow was encountered as anticipated
at a point at which it was completely at the Hollanders’
mercy. Betrayed and entrapped the intrepid Courthope
stood up in his tiny craft like a lion at bay. He returned
shot for shot until his “ piece being choked ” he could fire
no more. Still he maintained an undaunted mien until
a shot struck him full in the breast. Then without a
moment’s hesitation, as if he had fully thought out his
course of action, he jumped into the water and was seen no
more.
The history of the Empire has no finer example of courage
and lofty self-sacrifice than the two years’ struggle which
this splendid seaman maintained almost unaided from
without against the serried forces of Dutch power in the
East, Of him it may be said, as of an illustrious contem-
porary :—
“ He nothing common did, or mean,
Upon that memorable scene.”
The road of duty and of patriotism he saw clearly
before him and he followed it unerringly with a serene indif­
ference to all personal considerations. There was in him
much of the spirit which animated Gordon when he made
his glorious last stand in the lonely isolation of the Mahdi’s
capital. To Courthope, in a humbler way, belongs the
same crown of immortality which a grateful nation has
bestowed upon the Hero of Khartoum.