Captain Gault; Being the Exceedingly Private Log of a Sea-Captain

by William Hope Hodgson

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Anthologies

310 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1918

About the author

William Hope Hodgson was an English author. He produced a large body of work, consisting of essays, short fiction, and novels, spanning several overlapping genres including horror, fantastic fiction, and science fiction. Early in his writing career he dedicated effort to poetry, although few of his poems were published during his lifetime. He also attracted some notice as a photographer and achieved some renown as a bodybuilder. Hodgson served with the British Army durng World War One. He died, at age 40, at Ypres, killed by German artillery fire.

Reviews

[Whistler's Mom · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the grand tradition of gentlemen crooks....

It's said that when E.W. Hornung created Raffles the Gentleman Thief in 1899, his brother-in-law (Arthur Conan Doyle) had a melt-down, claiming that it was immoral and unethical to have a career criminal as the hero. No idea what reaction Hornung had to Conan Doyle's outburst, but the reading public loved Raffles and Hornung was kept busy cranking out enough stories to meet the demand.

There were other early anti-heroes, my favorite being Arthur Morrison's wonderful Romney Pringle. Several of the Pringle stories appear in anthologies and the complete set is now available on Kindle.

Recently I enjoyed William Hope Hodgson's stories featuring Carnacki the Ghost-finder. I like most of the Carnacki stories, but there was one in the book that WASN'T a paranormal tale. That sent me searching through Hodgson's stories and I discovered Captain Gault, a charming villain who ranks with Raffles and Pringle.

The ten stories in this book were written between 1914 and 1916 and (sadly) soon forgotten. H.P. Lovecraft kept Hodgson's paranormal stories alive after Hodgson's early death, but I suspect he wasn't interested in the non-paranormal ones. Now e-publishing has made them available again.

Gault is a sea captain, helming both passenger and cargo ships in the Atlantic, although in "The Case of the Chinese Curio Dealer" he shows up in San Francisco. As the introduction says, we are given intriguing glimpses into Gault's past, although never a complete history. The only thing we know for sure is that his tastes are too expensive to be satisfied with the meagre salary of a sea captain.

His way of dealing with that problem is to smuggle expensive items past customs, both in England and in the U.S. Today, such items (and the passengers who want to avoid paying customs on them) would travel by air, but then the customs officials concentrated on ships and (especially) on Captain Gault. He was suspected of being a successful smuggler and they were determined to catch him at it.

Gault is a likable character - intelligent, witty, down-to-earth, and with a few weaknesses (charming young ladies being the most common) to make him human. He's proud of his talent and enjoys pitting his wits against the wily custom agents, especially since he always wins.

In fact, he can never resist the urge to let the agents know exactly how they were foiled, either over a good dinner (if they're congenial) or by letter (if they're stuff-shirts.) Readers who insist on "fair play" should avoid this one. Captain Gault isn't going to risk getting caught by sending singing telegrams. He plays them close to his vest and we must wait until he's safely in port with his swag to find out exactly how he pulled it off.

I think it's a fine group of stories and only wish there were more of them.

[Graham · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hodgson is, of course, best known today for his excellent work in the horror genre, particularly his Lovecraftian novella THE HOUSE ON THE BORDERLANDS and his short story collection CARNACKI, THE GHOST FINDER. However, he also turned his hand to other genres on occasion, notably the sea story, of which the collected Captain Gault stories are wryly humorous mini-adventures. All of the tales deal with Gault's efforts to smuggle various contraband into America and Britain. There are inevitable twists and double-crosses as characters appear to gain the upper hand before the truth is revealed. The stories are generally fresh and exciting and short enough to never outstay their welcome.

Two tales, MY LADY'S JEWELS and THE ADVENTURE OF THE GARTER, are wryly-described battles of the sexes. Two others, CONTRABAND OF WAR and THE GERMAN SPY, reveal the volatile international situation in the run-up to the First World War. Four of them (THE RED HERRING, THE DRUM OF SACCHARINE, THE PROBLEM OF THE PEARLS and FROM INFORMATION RECEIVED) are much of a muchness, short and snappy and similar to each other. THE DIAMOND SPY offers some great character work and humour among its pages. Best of the lot is THE CASE OF THE CURIO DEALER, an adventure story packed with danger and suspense, in which a man escapes from Chinese Triads by hiding within the wrappings of an ancient mummy.

You can't class these stories alongside Hodgson's work in the supernatural genre, but they're lively and funny enough. He's one of my favourite authors, so I have a tendency to snap up anything he writes.

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.85⭐

My Lady's Jewels • [Captain Gault] • (1916) 4⭐
The Diamond Spy • [Captain Gault] • (1914) 4⭐
The Case of the Curio Dealer • [Captain Gault] • (1914) 5⭐
The Red Herring • [Captain Gault] • (1914) 3.25⭐
The Drum of Saccharine • [Captain Gault] • (1914) 4⭐
The Problem of the Pearls • [Captain Gault] • (1915) 3.25⭐
From Information Received • [Captain Gault] • (1914) 3.25⭐
Contraband of War • [Captain Gault] • (1914) 3.25⭐
The German Spy • [Captain Gault] • (1915) 3.5⭐
The Adventure of the Garter • [Captain Gault] • (1916) 5⭐

Please note these following Captain Gault stories do not appear in this collection:

• The Captain Gault story Trading with the Enemy was first published in The London Magazine, October 1917 and later in the collection The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" and Other Nautical Adventures in 2003.

• The Captain Gault story The Painted Lady was first published in The London Magazine, November 1915 and later in the collection The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" and Other Nautical Adventures in 2003.

• The Captain Gault story The Plans of the Reefing Bi-Plane was first published in Terrors of the Sea in 1996.

[Gregory Moses · Rating 4 out of 5]

In addition to his novels The Boats of the Glenn Carrig and The Ghost Pirates, William Hope Hodgson wrote a fair number of non-supernatural nautical short stories. This collection, featuring the smuggler Captain Gault, is a fun, quick read. The stories average maybe fifteen pages, are written in a pleasant and easy-to-read style, and are mostly pretty formulaic--Gault is trying to smuggle something past customs, it briefly looks like things are going wrong, but in fact, Gault has a secret plan and everything is under control. There's no particular reason to root for Gault--he's a mercenary who rarely has any motivations other than money--but he's charming enough, most of the time, and the reader is unlikely to be morally outraged at the thought of someone not paying duty, so it all works pretty well.

There is one story featuring Chinese characters; it doesn't go full Fu Manchu, but readers may still have to grit their teeth for that one. There are two stories featuring women, and I can only say that I hope they were written tongue-in-cheek, and that Gault's views of women are not Hodgeson's.

[Stormcrow Hayes · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun but formulaic, these stories are in stark contrast to "The Boats of the 'Glen Carrig'" which I read last month. The latter are horror and these are humorous, though they both share a love of the sea.

I found most interesting the difficulties of getting anything past customs in this day and age which was quite intriguing. Also, the discussion of women's suffragette was cringe worthy (and hopefully only Capt. Gault's POV, but probably illuminating to how men thought at the time.

Final verdict, while not for everyone, these were fun almost pulpy tales lightly in the vein of a reverse Sherlock Holmes where the mystery isn't about being solved, but being revealed as to how he (Gault) got away with it.

[Slinkyboy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not all I was hoping for, but it had its moments.

"Faith dies hard with me; but it stays dead, when it does die."