The Cannibal Islands

By William Andrew Mudie

William Brown is born in 1825 and grows up in the harsh
jute mills of Dundee Scotland. Later, he is brought to
the attention of Queen Victoria and is dispatched to the
tropical islands of the Feejees to bring light to the
heathen and infamous giant cannibal Chief, Ratu Seru Cakobau

1817, Feejee sees the birth of Ratu Seru Cakobau, heir to
the i

• Language: English
• Publisher: Foh Fum PTY LTD
• Release date: Jul 14, 2015
• ISBN: 9780977527076

Book preview

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About the Author

Born and educated in London, Andrew qualified as a civil engineer and has worked and travelled throughout the world gaining a wealth of experience. His journey has been the source of inspiration, unearthing ancient origins to some of the greatest fables, the stories from which Andrew creates some of his historic novels. Married to Lynne, Andrew now lives in Queensland, Australia and can be found on the web at www.fohfum.com

Also by

Andrew Mudie

The Rain Tree

The Magwitch Fortunes

London Bus on the Q.T.

The Felonry of Queensland

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Acknowledgements

The Royal Archives of Windsor Castle

The Great Chiefs of the Fiji Islands

The Archives of the City of Dundee

The Archives of the Fiji Islands

The Archives of the Royal Bank of Scotland

The London Missionary Society

The Wesleyan Missionary Society

The Fiji Museum

The Dundee Museum

The Dundee University

The London University

The Oxford University

The University of the South Pacific

Launceston Planetarium, Tasmania

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Fact

1.    The Cannibal Islands was the satanic name given to the Fiji Islands because of the horrors witnessed by early seafarers in the 1800s.

2.    William Brown was from Dundee, Scotland, and served the London Missionary Society in Fiji from 1855 to 1892. He was not ordained.

3.    The Great Chief, Ratu Epenisa Seru Cakobau, was infamously known as the King of the Cannibal Islands.

4.    Ratu Epenisa Seru Cakobau seeded the Fiji Islands to Queen Victoria in 1872 in return for settlement of the American debt.

5.    Before joining the British Empire the Fiji Islands were known as the Feejees and their inhabitants Feejaans.

6.    The Camperdown Jute Works in Dundee, Scotland, was the largest jute factory in the world employing some 5500 workers by 1850.

7.    Dundee, Scotland became the jute centre of the world in the 1800s.

8.    Queen Victoria acquired Balmoral Castle for Prince Albert in 1848.

9.    Balmoral Castle renovations in 1853 included the placing of a bottle containing coins of the realm beneath the commemoration stone.

10.  Calcutta, West Bengal was the capital of British India, the source of raw jute and today is the cultural centre of India.

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Cast of Principal Characters

These are real people, all of whom are recorded in the annals of history books and in museums of Great Britain and of the Fiji Islands.

William Brown

Child jute worker, Dundee City missionary 1849-1854. Missionary to Feejee 1854-1892.

Ratu Seru Cakobau

Great Chief, Vunivalu and Paramount Chief of Bau, Tui Viti, King of Feejee and infamous King of the Cannibal Islands 1817-1883.

HM Queen Victoria

The Royal House of Windsor.

Born 1819, Queen 1837, Died 1901.

John Brown

Highland Gillie to Her Majesty, Queen Victoria

Ratu Tanoa Visawaqa

Father of Ratu Epenisa Seru Cakobau

Paddy Connol

Irishman, castaway in Feejee in 1822. Nicknamed ‘Berry’ by the Feejaans.

J. Humphrey Danford

London Cockney, castaway in Feejee in 1826. Nicknamed ‘Harry-the-Jew’ by the Feejaans.

David Whippy

United States of American Consul to Feejee 1845

Richard Nichols

Principal of the Matting and Hemp Trading Company, Ock Street, Abingdon, Berkshire

James Cox

Senior partner of Cox Brothers, later, Camperdown Jute Works, Dundee

Toganivalu

Chief spokesperson on the Chiefly Island of Bau.

Adi Samanunu

Principal wife and ultimately only Christian wife to the Great Chief — Ratu Epenisa Seru Cakobau

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Prologue

‘They wrapped his body in big green pandanus leaves, all except his head. Then, still trussed in the bamboo frame, the four Feejaans picked him up. He was still alive. He screamed and kicked.

They dumped him on top of the red-hot stones. His head jammed between two scorching rocks. His ears shrivelled in thirty seconds and his lid-less eyes turned opaque. Like a fish in a frying pan.

The screaming and kicking stopped minutes later. I could smell his skin and curly-hair burning from here.

‘Paceli took over two-and-a-half-hours to cook.’

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Part 1

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1

Dundee, Scotland        1825

Janet Brown felt warm. Outside the small tennamant building on Loons road, Glenesk, the recent snow sparkled with a frosted surface. As yet, not much pain had made itself evident. Janet had a job to do and to be completed. Probably her last she was sure. The body could only take so much and she had given so much already.

‘Concentrate on something else,’ she told herself.

Ice stars had crystallized on the inside of the bedroom window, ever growing. Appearing and disappearing with steaming heat invading the bedroom every time hot water was hauled up from the kitchen. Outside of her window there was silence for once. A still quiet brought about by the bitter and bone-marrow freezing cold that belonged to Scotland alone. It was a cold that had the habit of arresting the activities of the wrag-cloaked wretches out scrounging for wood or ale, all forced to huddle around a grated fire, barely heating the chimney. Half-starved wretches that called the damp, rat-infested hovels, home.

‘Concentrate,’ she said to herself again. The pain in her belly grew stronger and more demanding than before. She watched the crystals with undistracted wonder at how something so beautiful, fragile and forever changing could possibly settle and form in such a place of abject poverty, where death and personal loss were constant companions and went hand-in-hand with hopelessness and futility.

‘Concentrate,’ she had to keep reminding herself. Focus on good things. Eradicate unhappiness. There had been good times, times when she was a wee lass, so young and so long ago, with not a care in the world. She remembered racing through the cobbled streets of Dundee to wait for her daddy as he returned home from the flax-mill. How she would hurl herself into his exhausted arms and he would spin her round and hug her close to his chest, the ever-present, familiar, and musty smell of flax still clinging to his shirt and jacket.

‘Concentrate, close out negative and unwanted comments,’ she thought, concerned about the job that had to be done now and forgetting the ever-increasing excruciating pain.

‘Ride it, bend with it and embrace it. Don’t fight it. You’ll never win. Think on the new life that was struggling and ripping its way into this frozen room. Why was the wee thing in such a hurry to get here, surely its life would not be much better than the one she had had?’ Yet she knew the arrival of this new soul was going to be different from her others. She felt it in her heart, this wee laddie, for she knew it to be a wee laddie and she knew he would be special. He would do something important with his life. It was written in the stars. Don’t ask her how she knew, she just knew, perhaps he would be lucky enough to find what he was looking for, she wished that for him. Yes this would be her last child, of that she was certain, she was so tired but the job was yet uncompleted.

A soft rain began to fall, washing away the ice-crystals and the small window took on the shape of dark holes. Shapes like cheerless eyes being plucked out by a carrion crow.

‘What a shame,’ she thought, the frost and flakes had amazed her with their wondrous shapes and sizes that she had hardly ever noticed in previous winters gone by and now there was nothing but a long darkness outside.

‘She’s no gonni make it if the bairn dusna get a move on,’ murmured a voice close by.

‘Oh yes,’ she thought as one final spear-stabbing pain tore through her failing insides. ‘Both of us will and by God my son will live his life, dream his dreams, and make them come true. Travel his road and meet whatever man or beast decides to challenge him.’ She prayed he would always keep an open heart and spirit. Most of all, her son was to be true and believe in himself and in the good Lord.

‘It’s a wee laddie, would yi look at that mop o’ red hair stuck tae his heed. Never seen that ’afore. Look at his eyes, they fare take in the situation, looks as if he’s been here afore. Is he no a bonny baby? Disna look like any o’ them, too small, doot he’ll make it tae this mornin,’ said the voice.

‘William will make it,’ she thought to herself, ‘and then you all better just sit back and watch. He’ll do things that you could only read about. He’ll make things happen in this world that you could only dream about. This one would be different and right a few wrongs.’

Her thoughts faded. Suddenly she felt very calm, then even peaceful. It was going to be all right. The room slowly darkened and she felt herself withdrawing from her surroundings. Fear came then left swiftly. She looked down on the wee bundle the midwife had given her. Yes, his bright blue-green eyes were looking straight up into hers.

‘William,’ she whispered, ‘I will always love you. A hard life awaits and I know you will grasp it. I’ll never be far away, but always watching, take extra care my little boy. God bless.’

She rolled her head across the stained pillow and kissed the tiny head that still watched without so much as a cry. It was as if William already knew his hardships and destiny had begun. Her job was now complete. In her subconscious, she felt her life’s work had been achieved. But now she was so tired yet so happy and contented as she slipped away into a dreamy sleep.

Then she heard the footsteps, long forgotten, first on the cobbled street then turning into the house, crunching on the frosted chuckies. ‘And how’s ma wee fleur o’ the forest the day?’ She heard Samual Brown in the twilight distance. There it was again, that familiar smell, the legacy, that musty-sweet smell of flax.

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2

London

‘A pukka of jute, four-hundred pounds in weight for us to experiment with,’ said Richard Nichols, the Principal of the Matting and Hemp Trading Company located in Ock Street, Abingdon. ‘And about eight weeks to come up with a production technique before Captain Henshaw sails back to Calcutta, West Bengal on his next trip?’ Richard probed again. He reached into the boat’s storage bay behind and stroked the innocuous bundle of faded straw-like dried plant material.

‘That’s about the size of it, Mister Richard,’ responded Clem the boatman. ‘Apparently there is plenty more where that came from, sir.’

‘We’ve been trading with hemp-based goods for decades, particularly hessian, sacking and clothing. It’s all grown along the banks of the Hooghly River, a tributary of the holy Gangees river, but as far as I know, it is only processed by hand in Calcutta,’ continued Richard.

He tugged at a few more strands and slid them out from under the coarse manually-platted string restraining the shaggy bundle of raw jute. ‘Industrial revolution and mass production here in Abingdon, that’s a tall order,’ Richard muttered, his breath steaming in the cold air as he tugged a few more strands from the pukka.

‘I’m told it’s all in the letter,’ said Clem, sniffing back the glistening drop forming at the end of his pink nose. Wiping away the swelling drip with the back of his already moist glove, Clem withdrew a crumpled letter from the inner pocket of his well-worn overcoat.

The dismal, gaoling-grey February sky held the morning sun captive and the dank mists continued to rise from the murky waters of the river Ock. The pair hunched together in the delivery boat as it rubbed gently against her private moorings outside the Half Moon tavern in East St. Helen Street Abingdon.

Sitting opposite Clem, Richard grasped the letter. He shivered. ‘I’m getting cold Clem. I’ll read this letter over a glass of ale. Let’s get the lads down to off-load this stuff while we repair to the tavern. I’d like to prepare a brief reply for Captain Henshaw today. You’ll have to wait for the letter.’

‘Ale and lunch seems a fair trade,’ said the unshaven Clem. ‘Yours was the last delivery for the day, so time’s me own.’ Clem sniffed, then jerked his head back just in time to retrieve another growing nose jewel. ‘Gor blimey, guv, right parky ta’day ain’t it?’ he grumbled clapping his gloved hands together whilst his sniffing became continuous in the freezing air.

The portly red-faced publican was warmly clad down to his thick, fur-lined, leather boots. His chunky reinforced soles crunched heavily over the recently scattered coal cinders on the icy walkway into the Inn. Laden with firewood from the log store, the publican trudged back to the saloon and dumped the iced logs in the alcove to the left of the dull fire.

Aggressively, he drove his right foot into the top of the partially burnt elm log. An eruption of sparks and embers resulted, chasing each other up the chimney of the inglenook fireplace, making way for more logs to be loaded. His work was rewarded with a burst of fresh flame dramatically lighting the two frozen faces now seated in the tattered armchairs adjacent to the fire.

The instant heat and light accompanied by the inner warmth of the local ale served to raise his awareness. Richard rubbed his warming hands together and then reached into the inner pocket of his Harris Tweed jacket for the crumpled letter. Opening it, Richard found two more envelopes, the first, white-grey in colour, was from Captain Phillip Henshaw and the second, an outwardly ornate envelope bearing the name of the East India Company.

Fondling the ornate envelope and then placing it on the small Georgian oak table, Richard opened the white-grey envelope first and read:

Dear Richard,

I have the honour to present to you a 400lb pukka of raw jute, the purpose for which being to develop an industrialised process of mass production.

Our Principals, the East India Company, ask that when you have had time to consider appropriate action, indeed a solution, we meet personally so that I may convey your views and advice to Edmund Boot, the gentleman from whom we will take new instructions on arrival in West Bengal, India.

As we sail again in seven weeks, may I suggest we meet shortly after Easter, possibly in the Prospect of Whitby at Wapping in the East End of London? Since you are most likely to travel down by the River Thames, the venue should be convenient and I may reserve rooms and indeed entertainment for you and your colleagues.

May I look forward to our meeting?

Your obedient servant

Phillip Henshaw – Ship’s Captain

Richard sat back, raised his tankard and drank as if it were his last. Exhaling, he wiped his whetted lips with the back of his hand and reached for the ornate envelope embossed with the seal of the East India Company, opened it and viewed the contents which read:

Sir,

I write to introduce to you a material that we believe has great potential. To realise this potential, however, I would ask that you locate a company with the ability to mechanise the mass production of the finished goods to a standard acceptable to the markets of His Majesty, King William IV throughout Great Britain and the Empire.

The 400lbs. pukka (the Indian name for a bale) of raw jute, now in your possession, is typical of that grown and harvested here, of which there is an abundant, and indeed an unlimited supply. For centuries, as you are probably already aware, it has been woven by hand to produce clothing, sacks to hold spices, matting for floors, string and indeed rope. The finished material is so strong, that even the elephant is unable to break the thicker, hand-woven rope when dragging trees from the forests of West Bengal to the Hooghly River.

I shall be pleased to receive your comments by the return of Captain Henshaw.

Yours truly,

Edmond Boot.

For and on behalf of the East India Company.

‘What say them letters, Mister Richard?’ chortled Clem having warmed up and feeling the better for having consumed two pints of strong English ale, a baked potato and half a roasted chicken.

‘Interesting, very interesting and something that needs thinking about,’ replied Richard. ‘I’ll draft a reply so that you can get away and be back at East India dock before midnight. I want my reply delivered to Captain Henshaw first thing in the morning,’ said Richard, struggling up from the soft armchair and walking over to the bar to obtain writing materials.

By Wednesday the pale sun, although low in the sky, was shining and its warm rays streamed in through the office windows of the Matting and Hemp Trading Company, Abingdon. The well-appointed room glowed with excitement whilst Richard Nichols examined the possibilities with his two senior clerks. Ceylon tea was poured by the young, newly employed waitress, who, fascinated by the snippets of conversation floating in the air, managed to over pour the delicately presented tea cup, much to the amusement of the meeting as they developed their plan.

‘Dundee, Scotland, is another possibility,’ said the more senior of the two clerks. ‘They’ve been weavers for as long as anyone can remember. They have the manpower and the looms for the flax, wool and linen. Maybe they can do something with this stuff.’

‘The bottom line,’ interjected Richard Nichols, ‘is that my gut tells me that jute needs to be spun automatically. The other point is why were we asked in the first place?’

‘Mister Nichols, I imagine they asked us because we are active in the London market place, particularly with the Abingdon carpet industry,’ suggested the senior clerk.

‘Very true and remember, this company has been trading the imported hand-made finished product for decades,’ agreed Richard, delighted at the input the clerk was giving. ‘However, to be truthful, I can’t see any way that we could carry out manufacturing trials in Abingdon?’

‘Maybe I could go ahead and send the sample to Dundee?’ continued the senior clerk, eager to find a solution.

‘Yes, quite so, quite so,’ said Richard assuming control once more. ‘Apparently there is a certain James Cox who has just become principal and now runs the Camperdown Linen Works in Lochee, a suburb of Dundee. The other important connection is the Earl of Camperdown and indeed, I believe some of their financial support comes from the Dundee Banking Company, who are also headquartered in Dundee so development money should not be a problem,’ he concluded as the young waitress returned to remove the tea service.

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3

Dundee

‘How heavy do you think it is?’ asked Cox, pulling at a couple of strands of raw jute sticking out of the bundle. Doesn’t say but it has just arrived from Abingdon,’ advised the chief store’s manager, ‘and here is the accompanying letter addressed to your good-sel, Mister Cox.’ The manager handed the buff envelope to James Cox.

‘Not sure but too heavy for one person to lift by hand. Shall I tell the driver to take the cart round to the over-head gantry?’ suggested the store’s manager.

‘Good idea,’ said Cox. Attempting to hide his fascination and excitement, Cox disappeared back into the office complex to read the letter.

Following the early retirement of his father the previous year, James Cox, still in his early twenties, had assumed principal and senior partner of the Camperdown Linen Works. He walked briskly back along the passage way within the complex to his executive office, en route, passing the engineering office.

Clutching the door-jamb and poking his head round the open door, Cox identified the man he needed. ‘Bruce, I need to see you. Something has just arrived which looks extremely interesting. Follow me please.’ Immediately receiving respectful attention, the chief engineer, Bruce McDonald, stood and followed the principal back to his office.

Seated in his large high-backed leather chair, Cox indicated the visitor’s chair opposite. McDonald settled himself and looked expectantly across the imposing maroon-coloured leather-inlaid desk. Sweeping the numerous loose papers to one side, Cox opened the buff envelope and extracted the letter, which read:

Dear Mr. Cox,

We have been approached by the East India Company to locate a company with the ability to develop a mass production process for raw Jute. That is, converting the short raw fibre strands into a continuous strand from which the mass production of finished goods, to a standard acceptable to the markets of His Majesty throughout Great Britain and the Empire, can be achieved.

The pukka (the Indian name for bale) of raw jute now in your possession, is typical of that grown in Calcutta, West Bengal, of which there is an abundant and indeed an unlimited supply. The current manufacturing process in Calcutta is manual. It’s currently a cottage industry. Generally, the Indians produce sacks to hold spices, matting for floors, string and indeed rope so strong that even the elephant is unable to break the thicker hand-woven rope when dragging trees from the forests of West Bengal to the Hooghly River.

Mr. Cox, may I respectfully advise that this is an initial inquiry to ascertain your interest and future desires, such that I am able to provide a qualified response to the East India Company when the messenger sails again for the Bay of Bengal shortly after Easter.

May I have the pleasure of receiving your valuable comments in due course?

Yours truly,

Richard Nichols

Matting and Hemp Trading Company

Ock Street, Abingdon, Berkshire.

Having previously placed the few strands of the jute fibre on the leather inlay of the desk, Cox lent forward, picked up one strand and stretched it between both hands.

‘This is the stuff, Bruce, an unlimited supply they say. What do you think?’ said Cox, looking intently at his chief design engineer expecting a solution for mass production. McDonald leant forward and, resting his arm on the desk, picked up a strand. Rubbing the sample between thumb and forefinger, he put it to his ear. Hardly discernible, the sample gave a muffled creak when rolled and squeezed. McDonald raised his eyes and looked from behind light-framed wire-glasses at Cox.

‘Em, very dry, Mister Cox, very dry. First we have to find out the breaking strength of a strand.’ Silence fell in the room as both men pondered the problem.

‘How long? When? How quickly can you get a result?’ quizzed Cox impatiently swivelling his eyes across at the small ivory and brass-mounted calendar on the side of his desk.

‘I’ll need a couple of weeks before I can give a fair assessment, Mister Cox,’ replied McDonald, his eyes dropping back down to take another serious look at the sample. ‘This stuff is very dry and therefore probably brittle, we’ll need to soften it before the bobbins and looms take hold.’ Cox abruptly stood up, eager to send a swift and positive reply to Richard Nichols.

‘Come, Bruce, let’s take a look outside. Stores should have got the pukka into the works by now,’ he said, beckoning with a twist of his head. McDonald scrambled to his feet and followed. ‘I want you to get a small team together to do the testing,’ instructed Cox as they arrived in the works.

The harvested straw-like square pukka sat on the gravel entrance to the works ‘It’s very coarse, sir,’ said McDonald, bending down to examine the material.

‘No muck, no money,’ said Cox mentally accepting the enormity of the project.

‘I want some kind of answer before Easter,’ said Cox abruptly. ‘And don’t forget, I want the names of your research team on my desk first thing in the morning. Engineering’s your forte, Bruce; and I suggest you get some of our loud, bold-eyed girls involved, they have the feel and energy, but make sure they’re the sober ones, we don’t want them roaring drunk over the excitement,’ said Cox silently optimistic.

Six inches of snow had fallen during the night blanketing everything beneath. Yet at this hour it felt strangely warm and silent. ‘Two hours before the sun comes up,’ thought McDonald. He trudged alone up Lochee Road, totally consumed in plans for the jute and the presentation he would make later that morning.

The muffled crunch of new snow under foot brought cosy comfort and highlighted the beauty of the trees and rooftops. Wax and whale-oil lights glittered from most houses as the Camperdown weavers prepared for the day shift, the night shift yet to finish. Newly emitted coal smoke hung, polluting the crisp and fresh air, yesterday’s air scrubbed clean by the fallen snow. A dog barked, the sound muffled by the glittering frozen blanket.

‘Nobody around yet, thank heavens I’m early,’ mused Bruce McDonald as he arrived at the main gate and went straight to production. He selected his team. Two women from the nightshift just finishing and two women from the day shift due to start within the hour. Norman Burniston, the chief production engineer couldn’t believe his ears, let alone his eyes. Robert McKenzie, the chief maintenance engineer with a flare for keeping the plant running, couldn’t wait to get working on the project.

‘Never been given a job that canna be done,’ said McKenzie, his mouth twisting into a knowing half-smile at the worried look on McDonald’s face. ‘You do the design and I’ll make it work.’ McKenzie boasted confidently, crushing the burning ember between thumb and fore-finger of his hand-rolled cigarette before entering the store.

Finishing the gruelling nightshift, the women quickly washed in cold water and were the last to arrive in McDonald’s office. Janet Brown who had fully recovered from William’s birth were already seated at the hastily convened double trestle-table with Burniston and McKenzie. In the middle of the three-foot wide trestle-table McDonald had stretched out half-a-dozen strands of the fibrous jute. Most strands being longer than the double trestle-table hung over each end of the table and dropped silently to the floor. Lit by whale-oil lamps and warmed by the open coal fires burning cheerfully in cast-iron fireplaces on each end wall, the room buzzed with excitement. The team of six chattered nervously, stopping abruptly as McDonald, clutching his cane, strode into the room.

‘This stuff is called jute,’ he announced authoritatively, tapping the silver-capped end of his cane on the strands of jute. ‘It is grown on the banks of the Hooghly River, a tributary of the Holy River Ganges in Calcutta, West Bengal. It takes three to four months to grow to full height. Four harvests a year; and it is harvested by hand using machetes. The harvested jute is green and after cutting it is laid out to dry in the sun. After the jute has dried, the Indians hand-weave it into sacking and clothing and rope; you have already seen it in its hand-woven state, probably in its finished state down at the Broomielaw docks when they are off-loading the cargo ships.’ McDonald paused to take a sip of milky-sweet Ceylon tea the tea-girl had just placed in front of him.

‘We received this raw sample yesterday, probably took another six months to be shipped to London from Calcutta and another week for Abingdon to think of us and another week by stage-coach to Dundee. The gaffer wants us to come up with a way of mechanically processing it,’ concluded McDonald, nonchalantly walking round to the other side of the trestle-table. Janet Brown, the most experienced weaver in the team, reached out and touched the fibres. Sitting next to her, McKenzie finally spoke for the first time since the meeting began.

‘It’s a bit like straw,’ he said, ‘but a lot stronger.’ Janet reached out for a single strand, raising it to her mouth, bit down on it as if trying to eat dry grass.

‘You girls will try to eat anything,’ said McKenzie sarcastically.

‘Okay that’s enough,’ cautioned McDonald, tapping once again on the table with his cane. He removed his spectacles and huffed on them as a prelude to the next announcement. ‘Here’s what I propose we do. Robert, tonight, can you, Elspeth and Agnes, attempt to spin a sample onto a normal flax bobbin?’ McKenzie nodded in acceptance whilst also reaching out to feel the fibre.

‘I think we just rig up a semi hand-feed to manage the first sample, joining manually as we go, but it would help to have a glue to apply at the splicing points,’ proposed Burniston thinking in terms of production control.

‘Good point,’ agreed McDonald, ‘but before we get to the technicalities, you two girls, unless you have any questions, duck off home and get some rest, but be back here early, well before the nightshift starts. Robert will also be working the nightshift with you, won’t you, Robert?’ said McDonald, smiling across the trestle-table. Elspeth winked at Agnes as they happily excused themselves from the meeting.

‘Today, I want Janet and Edna to lay out the jute, splice each joint and fix with animal glue so the continuous strands are one-hundred yards long at a minimum and ready for spinning,’ continued McDonald. ‘And have at least two, twenty pound bunches ready for Elspeth and Agnes to work on tonight. Any questions?’

‘Okay by me,’ confirmed McKenzie. ‘But preparation and glue drying will take time.’

‘I’ve thought about that,’ responded McDonald, ‘Robert, I have sketched out two simple designs, the first is a mechanism which will stabilise the gluing process so that each joint is the same structure and secondly, the actual spinning process. The objective is to test the material to find its weakness and from there to develop a process which can be maintained at a constant speed with continuous jute strands. Now, would you like to take a look at a pukka?’

‘What the hell’s a pukka?’ challenged Janet, her questioning face developing into a frown.

‘Another good question. Follow me.’ McDonald stalked from the room enjoying the intrigue.

Having re-assembled and gathered around the pukka, McDonald continued. ‘This is what they call a pukka of jute. The way I see it is today and, before the night shift and attempt at spinning, we need to break this up into easy-to-handle bunches of say twenty pounds weight each. Don’t break any strands, the longer they are the fewer joints we have to make. The whole pukka is about four hundred pounds weight, so we should have about twenty samples to practice on.’ McDonald lent forward, ran his hand over the pukka and then sat down gently on it. Steadily he looked up at his audience.

‘Robert, you’re in charge and Janet, give special attention to the freedom of each strand. Don’t allow them to get wet. That animal glue is water soluble as you know. Lay them out in straight lines on the floor of the shop, well away from existing activity and the entrance. When you make the splices, be careful of surplus glue. I don’t want them jamming up or getting stuck together when we start the spin. And remember, minimum lengths are to be over one-hundred yards. Longer if that is the way the joined strand works out. Straighten any kinks or crushed jute formed while in transit in the pukka. The strands must be laid out as straight as you can make them.’

‘Aye, Mister McDonald,’ acknowledged Janet. ‘May I?’ Janet pulled a small knife from the side of her apron and slashed at the hand-twisted strand of jute retaining the pukka. McDonald had already stood and began to walk back into the office to find Cox. ‘Careful, don’t cut the jute in the pukka!’

‘Good morning, Mister Cox,’ said McDonald greeting Cox on his arrival at the office.

‘Beautiful when it first snows,’ observed Cox looking out into the courtyard. ‘So what plans have you made, Bruce?’

‘Forty-eight hours, sir.’ McDonald smiled, confident of success. ‘I have selected a small team and given instructions already this morning. Robert McKenzie, Janet Brown and Edna Calder are already busy preparing the jute and Elspeth and Agnes will work the night shift and attempt the first spin. Would you like to take a look?’

‘Let them get a start first. Maybe I’ll take a look mid-morning tomorrow. I’ll let you know when?’ replied Cox, preferring to leave the detail and frustration of the development to his chief engineer. Snowflakes were falling again as Cox and McDonald walked confidently back to the executive office.

By nightfall, which came about 3.30pm in Dundee, two bunches of jute strands lay neatly together out on the workshop floor. The joints glistened with animal glue and had been assisted to dry using coals placed four inches away from the side of each joint in the strand. Two labourers were used to fan the coals to red-heat and push the choking coal smoke towards the massive timber door of the shop.

McKenzie had produced a bulky wooden reel which would turn on a solid steel axle cradled between twin V ended vertical steel posts. The posts had been driven into the ground to a depth of some two feet and rammed home. A wooden friction brake had been made up to create tension between the single wooden reel so that the jute strand was dragged across onto the spinning bobbin. The bobbin end of the strand was wedged into the bobbin and held by an enormous split pin. The speed of the bobbin would determine the coefficient of drag achieved by the braking mechanism on the opposing reel.

The over-head belt system powered by a massive paddle wheel at the side of the shop drove the spinning and weaving machines. In turn, the belt system was driven by the flow of water diverted from the river that flowed down from the higher ground above the plant.

During the night, Robert, Elspeth and Agnes had isolated one of the flax-spinning machines and loaded it with empty bobbins ready to receive the first twenty pound batch of extended jute strands. It was just before midnight when the first trial commenced.

Elspeth manned the manual clutch to the spinning machine whilst Agnes stood guard to lower or raise the tension on the reel.

‘Ready,’ announced Elspeth.

‘Ready,’ acknowledged Agnes. Robert over-saw the belt system watching for bigger failure and belt slippage. Elspeth pulled the clutch leaver and the bobbin began to turn. At first the slack was taken up. Elspeth moved the leaver to the second notch and the bobbin sped up, noticeably beginning to spin, the jute dutifully wound onto the bobbin. The spread-arm that travelled up and down the bobbin to evenly spread the jute began to travel. Elspeth moved the clutch to the third notch. The Bobbin began to rattle as tension raised and lowered by the intermittent braking on the side of the reel. The strand started to jerk, bouncing up and down. Then with a final jerk, the strand of jute snapped just as Elspeth selected the fifth notch. But it snapped in the middle of the strand and not at the joint as had been expected. They had witnessed their first failure.

‘When you feed the jute onto the bobbin,’ said Cox, ‘then what happens?’

‘The fibre is much thicker and naturally far coarser than the flax, but after the machine modification I have suggested, I am hoping that we will be able to weave the strand in much the same way as the flax,’ replied McDonald. ‘Let’s see how we get on tonight.’ McDonald was conscious that this was the second night. Suddenly forty-eight hours appeared hopelessly optimistic.

Late afternoon the snow was still falling but stopped just as the night shift started. During the day shift, Janet and Edna assisted by McKenzie had separating more jute and had glued it together again in matching sets. Nearly half of jute had been prepared by the time McKenzie returned from dinner. Elspeth and Edna were waiting and McKenzie began setting up the bobbins. Earlier that day Mc Donald and McKenzie had made the decision to use three bobbins. One bobbin at low speed, then a medium speed bobbin and the last bobbin as fast as the flax process. The jute strands, threading their way over, then under, then over triple horizontal rollers. The strands would be lined up to the bobbins by steel spikes protruding from the roller nearest to the bobbins. For the initial test, the feeder control was to be manual, still with tension applied by a friction brake.

Two o’clock in the morning came and went. Snow had given way to rain and outside the soot-blackening slush lay heaped.

‘Not so easy,’ sighed McKenzie, reaching for his mug of broth whilst briefing