By Steve Law

A small ad in the morning paper in Cape Town said the skipper of the Solitaire, about to sail for South America, was looking for people to pay for berths on their yacht. "That fits perfectly," I thought. I'd just crossed overland from Europe and gotten to the end of the continent, and on top of that my brother had written me that he was going to be working in Rio de Janeiro for six months. There were seven of us sailing: the three brothers who built the yacht (Ian, Anthony, and Allan), Ian's wife Netta, and Bev and Esther.

We were 17 days at sea, pitching and tossing. Water backed up the motor exhaust, and we had to stop and fix the problem. There were no fresh-water showers, no landscape, just one rolling hill of water after another. Then we sighted light patches on the horizon: St. Helena's cloud cover. Hours later we were confronted by the imposing cliffs of the northeast coast, and by early afternoon we were pulling into the harbor, such as it was. Allan lost no time in getting island women aboard for drinks; I met up with a hospitable local family and started hitchhiking around to the sights.

St. Helena, once you get past the cliffs, is a pretty island. The houses along the main street are in the Georgian style, but the town is small and cradled in a valley of semi-arid vegetation. Each garden had plenty of flowers in bloom, though it was the start of the cold season. Hibiscus was common. Farther upland, there were meadows and copses of flax, scented by plantings of eucalyptus and cedar. There were plenty of fruits and vegetables, though goods from the rest of the world were scarce. There were no televisions on the island, for example, because there was no signal to receive them in the days before satellite dishes.

There was no airport, nor even an airstrip. It had been several months since a steamer called. We were hundreds of miles from the nearest land. These were probably the most isolated people I had ever met.

Napoleon had been exiled here at Longwood, 'up the hill' from Jamestown, the port. I soon made my way there. In spite of walking part way, I was two and a half hours early, and I stopped in at a pub and nursed a beer until the residence opened. The caretaker of Napoleon's house has practiced his little tour of the house until it's polished like a fun-house mirror.

Most tour guides embellish the romantic or grotesque elements of the history of the place, but the six years of history in this house have more than anyone could invent. First, the nervous Governor Sir Hudson Lowe had imposed a multitude of anti-escape measures. Then, it's generally believed that the butler, Cipriani, was poisoned in 1818, though his body was never found when an autopsy was ordered. With Cipriani gone, there was no effective guard over Napoleon's food and drink. Two important retainers, Emmanuel de Las Cases and Gourgaud, could no longer tolerate the backbiting and intrigue of the others and left for France. Meanwhile a slow, methodical poisoning of Napoleon was taking place.

Napoleon and his guests continued to resent and resist Governor Lowe, who no doubt believed the ex-Emperor had friends who would stop at nothing to rescue him. As 1818 wore on, Napoleon began to undergo treatment for symptoms which modern research indicates were caused by arsenic. In these rooms remained the tightening circle: Dr. Antommarchi, his Corsican physician, treated him for stomach trouble; Generals Henri Bertrand and Tristan Montholon remained. Montholon's wife grew desperately depressed and left for France with their daughter Napoleonne. For almost three years Napoleon continued to rot painfully away from within. Finally, in 1821 he died; in 1840 his bones were returned to France.

After showing me the scenes where this unhappy history played out, the caretaker presented the French consul who lives there, M Gilbert Martineau. This has to be the hardest hardship post on the ladder, but this man actually enjoyed his job!

"Here I can write," he explained in French. "It's lovely; I have all the materials I need, and I complete about one book each year, always histories relative to the Napoleonic era. More than that: although I am free to write, I never have to deliver a lecture. I never understood how a creative mind like a writer's can bear to say the same thing every night for thirty nights. The only drawback is receptions at the Governor's, and they are few."

My next ride took me to Plantation House, the governor's mansion. There I got to meet Jonathan, the island's Oldest Inhabitant and probably its second most famous after the Emperor. I even have a coin from the island showing his picture. I was told that he'd be somewhere about the grounds, probably in the paddock. Soon I found him in the shade of a hedge. I think he was asleep. I prodded him in the leg, then stopped in consideration of his extreme age. His shell was four feet across, at least.

Next day Bev and I shopped for groceries. There wasn't a single store labeled as such on the island, so we went to the post office and asked who grows food. Tuku Young, up the valley, had a bountiful garden. He had a grove of banana trees at the lower end of his narrow property, then a pumpkin patch and a stream. Higher up we found prickly pears and Farmer Young's grizzled and bent old laborer wearing a formerly mustard-colored jacket and bare feet. He cut and peeled us prickly pear fruit and picked some chilies and brought back a basket of guavas. He led us up a jungle trail to the terrace of lettuce. He barely had to stoop to chop the lettuce heads. The buckets we had brought from Mrs. Benjamin's -- they were recycled margarine buckets -- soon filled up; in went a dozen bananas, in went a mango. The whole lot, buckets included, cost less than a pound.

We stayed on a week, making minor repairs on the yacht that never seemed to end and enjoying the hospitality of the Saints (as Saint Helenians are known). The week turned to two before we finally left for Ascension Island, carrying mail and vegetables. All told, it was two months from Cape Town to Salvador, Brazil. On the dock at Salvador, I walked through the door to a new continent.