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Title: The Wind-Jammers
Author: Hains, T. Jenkins (Thornton Jenkins)
Language: English
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THE WIND-JAMMERS
Works of
T. Jenkins Hains
[Illustration]
The Windjammers $1.50
The Black Barque 1.50
The Voyage of the Arrow 1.50
[Illustration]
L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
New England Building
BOSTON, MASS.
[Illustration: “CLAWING OFF THE CAPE.”
Copyright by S. S. McClure Co.]
THE
WIND-JAMMERS
By T. JENKINS HAINS
Author of “The Voyage of the Arrow,” “The Black Barque,”
“The Strife of the Sea,” etc.
[Illustration: colophon]
BOSTON
L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1894, 1898, 1899, by T. JENKINS HAINS
Copyright, 1897, by FRANK A. MUNSEY
Sixth Impression, March, 1906.
COLONIAL PRESS
PRINTED BY C. H. SIMONDS & CO.
BOSTON, U. S. A.
TO
GENERAL P. C. HAINS
UNITED STATES ARMY
A STERN CRITIC AND
MY OLDEST FRIEND
_CONTENTS_
PAGE
THE EXECUTIVE OF THE RANDOLPH 9
TIMBER NOGGINS 28
OFF THE HORN: A TALE OF THE SOUTHERN OCEAN 38
THE BLACK CREW OF COOPER’S HOLE 52
JOHNNIE 71
THE TREASURE OF TINIAN REEF 84
THE LE MAIRE LIGHT 110
THE BACKSLIDERS 124
CAPTAIN CRAVEN’S COURAGE 146
THE DEATH OF HUATICARA 161
A BLUNDER 181
TO CLIPPERTON REEF 196
THE TRANSMIGRATION OF AMOS JONES 227
MURPHY OF THE CONEMAUGH 235
MY PIRATE 244
THE CURSE OF WOMAN 264
_THE EXECUTIVE OF THE RANDOLPH_
I was a few months over sixteen when my father set me to work in the
ship-yard. My task consisted in carrying water for the men to drink and
distributing among them armfuls of bolts and trunnels.
In this way I became acquainted with the different men employed upon the
various parts of the vast hull for the ship of war that was being set
up, and I knew their peculiarities and some of their affairs.
My father was working with several other men, one day, on the dead-wood
aft, when an unfinished butt flew out from its fastenings and struck a
man named Simms, injuring him so badly that he was laid off. As the
building dragged very slowly, other men were put on and my father had a
new assistant.
This new man was about thirty years of age and rather good-looking. He
had no beard or mustache, and his sensitive mouth wore a grave
expression, as if he were much given to deep thought.
It was his eyes, however, that appeared to me most remarkable. They
seldom met mine when he took his water from me, and when they did I
always had the impression that I had seen only the whites of them in
their corners.
Only once did he look straight at me, and that was when I was a trifle
slow about bringing him a bolt. Then he gazed at me for fully a quarter
of a minute, and I was so frightened by his fierce look that I almost
dropped the bolt from my hand.
At other times he smiled so pleasantly, and said so many flattering
things to everybody, that the other workmen took a strong liking to him.
He always had the latest war news, and solemnly bade the men thank
Providence for each success that attended General Washington’s army.
My father finally invited him to our house one Sunday, and he appeared
there all dressed and powdered like any gentleman of wealth and
position, much to my father’s disgust and to my sister Peggy’s
astonishment.
He saw our looks, and explained that he was more careful of his
appearance on the Lord’s day, inasmuch as he had held clerical orders,
and that the only reason he took up the work at the ship-yard was
because he felt that he could serve the Lord better by helping to build
defences for the suffering country than by talking.
His manner to both Peggy and my mother was such, that had they been of
the blood royal, he could hardly have treated them with more deference
and respect.
The way he took to Peggy was remarkable, and he spent much time, after
this first visit, in her company talking of church affairs, with which
he appeared to be quite familiar. My mother and father did not object to
this, for they were religious people, and their dislike for the young
man’s effeminacy soon gave place to admiration for his zeal in these
elevating matters.
The only person frequenting our house who did not take greatly to Mr.
Robinson was George Rhett, our young Episcopal clergyman, who was very
attentive to Peggy. He thought Mr. Robinson’s conversation more
fascinating than instructive.
One day, late in the winter, three rough-looking men appeared in the
yard and asked for work. They were put on the gang under my father. The
leader of these men was a perfect giant in size, and had a head as big
and bald as the butt of a twelve-pounder. He also had a face and manner
of peculiar fierceness.
I happened to be near him one day when my father gave him an order,
which he roughly answered with a great oath. Instantly Mr. Robinson
turned about and, holding up his hands, raised his face to heaven and
bade him ask forgiveness for using such language.
The deep tones of his voice startled me at first with their intenseness,
but the great ruffian laughed. Then he suddenly caught Mr. Robinson’s
eye, and a change came upon him.
He quietly asked my father’s forgiveness and apologized for swearing;
then he resumed work with an agility that reminded me I must not stand
about gaping.
Mr. Robinson, however, was not satisfied with what he had accomplished.
He went to the foreman and, after a little argument, persuaded him to
discharge the three new men, much to the big bald-headed ruffian’s
apparent disgust.
This fellow and his comrades left the yard with some show of feeling
against Mr. Robinson, and went directly to our young pastor, Mr. Rhett,
with their grievance. They showed him letters telling of their good
character, signed by several prominent officers in the army at the
North, and explained that they wished to work, and could do so to some
advantage on a part of the hull where Mr. Robinson would not be annoyed
by their presence.
When Mr. Rhett heard it was Mr. Robinson who had had the men discharged
his indignation ran high, and he went about telling such a tale of
persecution that even my mild-mannered sister Peggy was ready to take up
matters in their behalf.
Mr. Rhett went to the foreman and had the men put back on the work, and
was loud in his praise of them.
They really were the best men for heavy work in the yard, and when, a
few days later, they asked to have several of their friends employed,
Mr. Rhett was quite willing to recommend them. As he was very popular in
the community, his word was of so much value that they were immediately
turned to with their comrades.
Mr. Robinson took no further notice of the matter, but about a week
before the launching Peggy came to me and, with many pretty blushes,
told me I was about to have a new brother. My father and mother had
consented to the marriage and every one was as happy as could be. That
is, every one except Mr. Rhett.
The wedding took place the day of the launching of the ship, and Peggy
was a proud girl as she stood there on the forward deck and watched a
beautiful woman break a bottle of wine over the vessel’s bows. Then a
cannon-shot boomed out and the name “Randolph” was cheered again and
again. It was a memorable day in our family, and my father came home in
such a state my poor mother instantly sent me for the doctor.
Of course, after this event of the launching, all talk was of the war
and of what part the frigate--named after the Hon. Peyton Randolph, of
Virginia--would take in it.
It was not long before the ship had her guns aboard and the riggers were
through with her. Then Captain Biddle began looking for volunteers to
help man her.
Seamen were not plentiful, but as a man-of-war must have men to man her
battery, landsmen are as good as any other class for this work after
they have had a little training.
I begged hard to join, and as I had now been out of employment nearly
two months, while the frigate was fitting out, and as I also had a
hearty appetite, my poor father and mother at last consented. This,
provided that I could be regularly shipped, and so have some chance of
promotion.
I was very happy and excited the morning my father took me on board and
asked Captain Biddle for his favor, and when I found I was really to go
to sea in that splendid ship I fairly danced with joy.
I was a heavy, active boy, and soon learned to handle a musket, cutlass,
or boarding-pike in a satisfactory manner.
The best men for this sort of thing, however, were those recommended by
Mr. Rhett. There were over twenty men aboard in this party, and they had
enlisted for the full term of the cruise. It was astonishing to see how
that bald ruffian would perk himself up when handling a musket or
cutlass.
Finally the day came for sailing, and a great crowd collected to bid us
farewell. I saw my parents early in the day, and then Peggy and her
husband came to bid me an affectionate good-by, my poor sister weeping
upon my shoulder and hugging me again and again.
Three hundred and five men stood upon the frigate’s deck and manned the
yards, to answer the shouts from the shore with three ringing cheers. A
gun boomed the parting salute, our yards were braced sharp on the
backstays to the southerly breeze, and we stood rapidly out to sea.
When the bar was crossed and the long, easy roll of the ocean was felt,
I began to get a little homesick. I forgot the grand thoughts I had
indulged in but an hour before.
I struggled against this peculiar feeling for some time, and then a
particularly heavy rolling sea taking the frigate squarely on the beam,
I leaned over the side, and cared not whether I was alive or dead.
My paroxysms must have attracted some attention, for I heard several men
laugh. I turned quickly, and at that moment a hand was laid heavily upon
my shoulder, and Mr. Robinson stood before me. He flashed a look at the
grinning men and they turned away.
Then he raised that thin, piping voice of his into a deep, sonorous
tone, and, lifting his face skyward, bade me have faith in the Lord. I
had actually begun to think I was dying, for the qualms were most
severe; so the grave face and solemn manner of my brother-in-law were
very welcome to me in spite of my utter astonishment at seeing him
aboard.
I thanked him for his kindness, and gained much strength from his words,
and then, without further remark, I lay down beside a broadside gun and
tried to lose consciousness.
All that night and the next day I suffered agony, but I found myself
able to attend to some duties, and asked Mr. Robinson why and how he
came to be on board. These questions he answered abruptly, but gave me
to understand that it was my sister’s wish that he should serve his
country as a sailor.
In a few days I was entirely well, and I was put to work as a
powder-boy, to help pass ammunition from the magazine to the guns.
The gun crews were drilled and the pieces fired to test their accuracy
and exercise the men. Then we were ready for any enemy of our size and
rating. Even greater, for that matter; for while we only rated as a
thirty-six-gun frigate, Captain Biddle was an officer of such high
spirit and courage that he would have willingly engaged a ship of the
line had one appeared.
Robinson was made captain of an after broadside gun crew, for in spite
of his knowledge of religious matters he was every inch a sailor, and
knew more of nautical affairs--including the handling of naval
guns--than any man on the ship, except, perhaps, Captain Biddle himself.
Four of the men recommended by Mr. Rhett were in his gun’s crew, and
they were the stoutest and most grim-looking ruffians when working
stripped to the waist that ever stood behind the breech of a
twenty-four-pounder. When they drilled, they would practise running in
their gun and whirling it around on the deck, and then send the tackles
about in a most confusing manner.
Finally the officer of the deck had to interfere, and give Robinson to
understand that gymnastic exercises were out of place on the gun-deck.
In spite of this he was highly esteemed by Captain Biddle, and when his
men yelled at each discharge he was not reprimanded.
We were off Charleston one evening, cruising to the eastward under easy
canvas, and waiting for a prize to heave in sight. Several British
vessels were known to be bound for the colonies, loaded with arms and
supplies for the enemy’s troops, and it would be a godsend to catch up
with one, as there were not half enough muskets ashore to equip the
volunteers in the Carolinas.
It was noticed by some on board that, while the majority of the men and
all the officers appeared anxious for a meeting with the foe, there was
a peculiar apathy shown among a part of the crew. These were the men
whom Mr. Rhett had helped to get work, and they appeared quiet and
listless, taking no interest in the sails we raised above the horizon
and maintaining a manner of sullen effrontery to all who did not share
their intimacy.
It was first supposed that the new life and discipline did not appeal
favorably to them, but as they made no complaint little thought was
given to the matter. Robinson kept away from this crowd except at drill
times, and then he did much to exhort them not to be so profane.
Several times I noticed groups of men, who were not on watch, having a
large sprinkling of these fellows among them standing about, talking in
a manner that could hardly be said to speak well of the discipline
aboard the ship.
The sun had gone down but little over half an hour, dyeing the light
clouds in the west a fiery red, when the man on the lookout in the
foretop hailed the deck.
“Sail dead ahead, sir!” he bawled.
In half a second all eyes were turned in that direction. Instantly
royals were sheeted home, while the outer jibs, topmast, and
topgallant-staysails were run up, making the frigate heel to leeward
under the pressure.
Men were sent to quarters, the magazines opened, the guns loaded and
run out, and everything was ready for action.
We had little time to wait to find out what the vessel was ahead, for
her captain was evidently as anxious to meet us as we were to meet him,
and he stood for us with every stitch of canvas drawing alow and aloft.
It grew quite dark, but we could still see the stranger, and by the
heavy topsails and well-trimmed yards it was easy to see that the vessel
was a man-of-war.
In about half an hour we came abreast, and not more than fifty fathoms
distant, but somehow the Randolph was sent to leeward, giving the
stranger the weather-gage. Then we had no difficulty in recognizing the
frigate Yarmouth, sixty-four guns, commanded by Captain Vincent of his
majesty’s navy.
As we were new and unknown, the British ensign had been run up to
deceive the enemy, Captain Biddle hoping to get in close and deliver a
crippling broadside before the Yarmouth was aware of our intentions, but
I am not certain whether it was seen or not in the darkness.
Every man was at his post, standing silent and motionless in the dim
light of the battle-lanterns, and every gun on the starboard broadside
was kept trained on the British frigate.
We drew directly abreast, and a hoarse voice hailed us through the
gloom.
“Fire!” came the order clear and distinct from the quarter-deck, and
our answer to the hail was the deep rolling thunder of twenty heavy
guns, fired almost simultaneously.
Then, as we ran clear of the cloud from our guns, the Yarmouth appeared
to burst into a spitting line of flame, and the shot from her answering
broadside crashed among us while she disappeared in a storm of smoke.
The scene on our spar-deck was frightful. Men struck by the flying shot
or splinters were hurled and pitched about and fell in mangled groups
upon the sanded planks.
Then the order came to wear ship, and we paid off rapidly to the
northward, to bring our port broadside to bear upon the enemy as she
crossed our wake, coming after us in full chase.
We were new and light, and probably able to go two knots to her one, if
no accident happened to our sailing gear. Our rigging had not been
seriously cut and our spars were sound, so it is hard to tell just how
the action would have ended had the fight continued as it commenced.
But there were other matters at hand far more dangerous to us than his
majesty’s sixty-four-gun frigate Yarmouth.
As I passed a powder charge to the after starboard gun, I turned and
looked across the deck at Robinson and his crew.
Instead of running his gun out and laying it towards the enemy, he and
his men quickly shifted the tackles and, slewing it around, trained it
down the port broadside through the line of gun crews. As he did so,
some thirty men--among whom I recognized the big bald ruffian and his
comrades of the ship-yard--rushed down the starboard side, and came aft,
yelling and swearing and with their cutlasses swinging in their hands.
They took their places around and behind Robinson’s gun, while one man
stepped out and coolly rammed a bag of musket-balls down the muzzle.
“What are you doing?” roared the officer of the deck from the break of
the poop.
“Watch me,” said Robinson, quietly; and with that he let off the heavy
gun, double charged, along the deck.
The discharge swept the gangway clear of living men, the poor, surprised
fellows going down in groups like grass before a scythe-blade. Then,
with a roaring yell, the ruffians left the spar-deck to the gun crews
and rushed aft in a body, with Robinson and the bald-headed giant at
their front.
It was all so sudden no one realized what was taking place. The ship was
off before the wind, racing along to the northward through the gloom.
The lanterns of the port battery were smashed or blown out, and the
shrieks and groans of the wounded men added to the confusion and terror
of the scene. Those men left alive and unhurt on the port side were
tailing on to the waring braces.
The officers forward bawled and swore at the bewildered sailors, trying
to get them to realize their position, and while they did so the
villains were taking the quarter-deck.
It was a short, desperate fight aft, but they had laid their plans so
well that every officer was taken off his guard and cut down before even
preparing to make a defence. Then the ruffians were masters of the
quarter-deck.
I saw the Yarmouth on the port quarter. She loomed dimly through the
gloom nearly a mile away, and as I looked I saw the intermittent flashes
of her bow-chasers and heard the regular firing.
A shot from one of her long twenty-fours tore past me, and killed a man
who was just starting aft to join in the affray on the poop. I thought
for an instant that they might know on the Yarmouth what was taking
place on board the Randolph, but afterwards I found they knew nothing.
In a few moments the men forward began to see what had happened aft, and
they just recovered themselves as Robinson and his crew finished off the
last man and were running the ship away to the northward without a
thought of engaging the enemy.
So far the villains had been successful, and with another turn of good
luck would be masters of a large frigate, fully equipped and provisioned
for a long cruise.
Robinson could then have become a wealthy pirate in the West Indian and
South American waters, and retired from the sea in a year or two without
much danger of being caught, for his vessel was larger and faster than
any he would be likely to meet. From the capes of Virginia to the river
Plate no vessel of this size had cruised for years, and he would have
had a good chance to make a clean sweep before anything caught up with
him.
But this turn of luck for him did not occur. When he had finished his
deadly work aft and started his men forward, our men rallied, and, led
on by the under officers left alive, began to make a stand.
Robinson rushed his men on in a style worthy of a better cause. And the
way that great bald ruffian went into our poor fellows was astounding.
They charged up the port gangway in a close body and engaged with pike
and cutlass, forcing those before them who were not cut down, until they
reached the mainmast. Robinson appeared like a fiend. He roared and
yelled to his men to press on, and slashed right and left with amazing
power.
The great bald ruffian, who now appeared as his right-hand man, kept
close to him, and they went along that deck leaving a bloody path to
mark their course.
They cut down and killed or wounded every man who had the hardihood to
dispute their way. I saw Robinson strike a gunner a blow that stretched
him dead with his skull cleft to the ears, and then, instantly
recovering his weapon, he drove it clear through the body of the man
next to him.
One officer alone stood before the rush. I do not remember his name, but
he commanded the forward battery.
He engaged Robinson for an instant and smote him sorely with his
weapon, for, although I could not see the stroke in the gloom, I heard
the villain cry out fiercely as if in pain. The next instant the bald
man struck the officer to the deck and pressed on harder than ever.
This officer evidently understood the situation to be more desperate
than it really was, for, as the crowd of ruffians passed over him, he
arose with difficulty and staggered to the hatchway which led to the
magazine. I guessed his purpose the instant he disappeared, and I saw
him no more.
The fight went on forward for some minute longer, and I was driven to
the forecastle by a fierce scoundrel who bore down on me with a reeking
cutlass. Then a sudden rally of our men turned my enemy and their rush
was brought to an end.
As we were five to one in point of numbers, it now began to look as if
we would soon make way against the assault. Some of our men got around
in their rear, and we began to close in on them with something like a
chance of winning the fight, but it was never fought out.
I saw the big bald man strike furiously at a man near me, and swing his
weapon around so fiercely that not one of our men dared get within its
reach, although they brought up stubbornly just beyond it. Then Robinson
dashed in to where I stood with my loaded musket. I fired blindly and
then saw his blade flash up, and I felt my end had come.
At that instant the whole ship shivered and burst into a mass of flame.
I felt myself hurled into the air as the deck disappeared under me, and
the next moment I found myself in the water.
I looked around me on all sides and saw nothing but the waves that
stretched away into the surrounding gloom. I was uninjured and swam
easily, thinking that my end must be near, and that I could only prolong
my existence by half an hour’s hard struggle.
I was much dazed, but remembered the Yarmouth, and looked about for some
sign of her.
Finally I made out a dark object over a mile away, and soon I recognized
her standing directly for me. This gave me hope for a short time, and I
struck out strongly, thinking it might be possible to gain her if she
remained in the vicinity of the blown-up frigate.
I was a good swimmer, and made some headway until I butted hard into a
floating object I failed to see in the darkness and nearly stove in my
skull. I reached wildly upward, and my hands clutched the combings of a
hatchway.
Then I recovered myself and drew my tired body clear of the sea. I had a
float that would keep me from sinking as long as I had strength to stay
upon it.
The Yarmouth bore down on me, and I cried out. She altered her course a
point or two, but did not stop, and in a moment she was gliding away
into the darkness, leaving me alone on the hatchway.
I could hear the rush of the water under her bluff bows, and the cries
of the men on deck calling out orders. Then she faded away into the
night.
In a little while I heard a cry from the dark water near me, and soon I
made out a man’s head close to the hatch. I called to him, and reached
out and pulled him up on the float, for he was too weak to help himself.
He raised his face as it came close to mine, and I recognized my
brother-in-law, Mr. Robinson.
He was very feeble, and I soon saw that he was badly hurt, but he said
not a word and lay there on his back, quietly gazing up at the stars.
I could see his features with that look of profound thought expressed
upon them as in the days we worked in the ship-yard together.
My only feeling towards him was one of awe. No idea of killing him
entered my head, though I could easily have disposed of him in his
present weak state, so there I sat gazing at him, and he took no more
notice of me than if I was part of the floating hatchway.
In a little while I made out another dark object in the water near us,
and presently a voice hailed me. I answered, and soon afterwards a piece
of spar supporting three men came alongside the hatch.
They were all Robinson’s followers. Taking some of the rigging that
trailed from the spar, they lashed it to the hatch, and the two pieces
together made a serviceable raft.
Then all drew themselves clear of the water and lay prone on the float
to rest.
It was an awful night we spent on that bit of wood washed by the waves,
but when morning dawned the breeze fell away entirely, so the sea no
longer broke over us.
The sun rose and shone hot on a glassy ocean, and not a sail was in
sight.
There is little use in describing the four days of suffering spent on
that float. Robinson was horribly burned and badly cut by a blow from a
cutlass. His left arm was shattered from the shot I fired at him, and he
was otherwise used up from the minor blows he had received in his fierce
rush. But he lived long enough to prevent his ruffian crew from killing
me. I was bound by a solemn oath to say nothing of the affair as I had
seen it, so that if we were the sole survivors--which we were not
certain of being at that time--there could be no evidence to implicate
my shipmates.
Robinson must have known that he was fatally hurt, and that is the
reason he made them spare my life. Whatever I told would not harm him;
and, besides, I really think he turned to the memory of my sister during
those last hours.
He died very shortly after the Yarmouth picked us up, and the British
officers and men buried him with some ceremony; especially respectful
were they when they were told that he was our executive officer.
There was some truth in this grim falsehood, although not of the kind
suspected.
He was sewn carefully in canvas the day after we were rescued, and had a
twelve-pound shot lashed to his feet. The burial service was read by
the ship’s chaplain in much the same tone I had heard Robinson quote
from the Scriptures in my father’s house.
All the officers uncovered as he was dropped over the side, and the
silence that followed the splash of his body into the sea was the most
impressive I have ever observed to fall on so large a body of men.
Had they known the truth about this villain, it is doubtful if they
would have shown him so much honor and respect; but then the truth is
often hard to secure, and also often undesirable when attained.
Peggy mourned her husband a year or more, but after her boy began to
occupy her attention she brightened up and married Mr. Rhett, who was
ever faithful to her.
I kept my oath because I took it. The three surviving ruffians had
joined the British navy and no retribution could be meted out to them;
and as for my sister, she always held her husband’s memory sacred, and
only harm could come to her and her son through knowledge of the truth
about him.
Captain Vincent of the Yarmouth may have thought it strange a frigate
like the Randolph should have met such a sudden end, but it was always
understood that she must have blown up from the effects of the shot from
his bow-chasers. Some of these did hull her, and it was the most
reasonable way to understand the matter.
Now, when all are gone, there can be no harm in telling what I know of
that affair.
_TIMBER NOGGINS_
Mr. Ropesend, the senior member of the firm of Snatchblock, Tackle &
Co., sat in his office and drew forth his pocket-knife. Upon the desk
before him lay a small wooden box which contained a patent taffrail log.
After some deliberation he opened his knife and began to pry off the lid
of the box, whistling softly as he did so. In doing this he awakened a
strange-looking animal which lay at his feet. But the animal, which Mr.
Ropesend called a “daschund,” after raising its long body upon four
twisted and double-jointed legs until its belly barely cleared the
floor, appeared overcome by the effort and flopped down again with its
head towards its master and its hind legs trailing out behind on the
floor.
Mr. Ropesend carefully removed the lid of the box and with considerable
anxiety removed the instrument. Then he laid it carefully upon the
table, while Gaff, his pet, looked lazily up with one eye, and then, not
caring for logs, slowly closed it again.
Presently Mr. Ropesend appeared to have developed an idea. He rang the
bell. A boy appeared almost instantly at the door leading into the main
office.
“Tell Mr. Tackle to step here a moment, please,” said Mr. Ropesend in a
soothing tone.
The boy vanished, and in a few minutes a man with red whiskers trimmed
“dishonestly”--with bare chin--made his appearance.
“Good-morning, Mr. Tackle; here’s the patent log for Captain Green. What
do you think of it?”
“H’m. Yes. H’m-m. I see. I don’t know as I’m any particular judge of
logs, although I’ve been in this shipping house for twenty years. But it
appears to me to be a very fine instrument. Very fine indeed, sir. Sort
of screw-propeller that end affair, ain’t it?”
“That’s it, of course,” said Mr. Ropesend in a tone bordering on
contemptuous; “sort of a fin-screw with long pitch. It says in order to
regulate it you simply have to adjust the timber noggins. I should
suppose a man who has been in a shipping house as long as you have would
know all about a plain taffrail log and be able to regulate it so as to
use it, if necessary.”
“Ah, yes, I see,” said Mr. Tackle instantly, without appearing to hear
the last part of the senior’s remarks. “Eggzackly. Regulated by timber
noggins, of course. I didn’t notice it, but any one might know it
couldn’t be regulated without timber noggins. Let me see it closer. That
new cord gave it a strange look.”
“I’m glad you like it and understand all about it,” said Mr. Ropesend in
a tone of decision, “for I’m very busy, and you can just take it into
your office and explain it to Captain Green when he comes for it. He
will be here presently.”
So saying the senior quickly replaced the instrument in the box and had
it in the astonished Tackle’s hands before he could get out an H’m-m.
Then he commenced writing rapidly upon some important-looking papers
before him, giving Mr. Tackle to understand that the incident had
closed.
Mr. Tackle flushed, hesitated a moment, and then quickly retired into
the outer office, and Mr. Ropesend, having rid himself of the log,
smiled grimly to Gaff, turned half-way around in his chair, proceeded to
light a cigar and puff the smoke at the dog’s face.
This provoked the animal to such an extent that he growled, snarled, and
grew quite savage, much to Mr. Ropesend’s delight.
The dog finally grew frantic, and had just risen from the floor to find
more congenial quarters, when the door opened suddenly and Captain Green
stepped into the room with a hoarse roar of “Good-morning, Mr. Ropesend;
I’ve come for that patent log.”
This sudden entrance of the loud-voiced skipper was too much for Gaff’s
nerves, and he no sooner found himself attacked in the rear than he made
a sudden turn, and grabbed the first thing that came within his reach.
This happened to be the calf of Captain Green’s left leg, which he held
on to in a manner that showed he had a healthy appetite.
“Let go, you son of a sea cook!” bawled the skipper. “Let go, or I’ll
stamp the burgoo out o’ you.”
“Let go, Gaff; that’s a good doggie,” said Mr. Ropesend in his mildest
tone. “Let go, Gaff; you’ll hurt your teeth, doggie.”
“Let go, you son of a pirate!” roared the skipper. “Let go, or I’ll
smash you!”
“Good heavens, Captain Green, you forget yourself. What, strike a poor
dumb brute!” cried Mr. Ropesend. And he arose from his chair as if to
ward oft a threatened blow.
Gaff at this juncture looked up, and apparently realized the energy
stored within the skipper’s raised boot. He let go and waddled under his
master’s desk, his long belly touching the ground amidships, as his legs
were too short to raise it clear. From this safe retreat he sent forth
peculiar sounds which were evidently intended by nature to terrify the
enemy.
“Wouldn’t strike him, hey!” roared the skipper, rubbing his leg. “Well,
maybe I wouldn’t, I don’t think. By Gorry, Mr. Ropesend, that’s a
long-geared critter. I didn’t know but what he was a sort o’ walking
snake or sea-sarpint. I felt as if a shark had me. It’s a good thing I
had on these sea-boots.”
“Calm yourself. Calm yourself, captain,” said the senior. “Did he hurt
you?”
“No, confound him, not to speak of. It’s a fine watch-dog he is when he
bites his friends like this.--I came for that log you spoke of the other
day.”
“Oh, yes,” said Mr. Ropesend; “I’ve just given it to Mr. Tackle to give
to you. He will explain it to you,--how it works and all that. Right in
the front office,--yes, that door. Good-morning.” And the skipper went
out cursing softly.
In the front office he met the boy with the box containing the log and a
note from Mr. Tackle delivering the same to him, in which he excused
himself from explaining the management of the instrument by the fact
that he was called out suddenly. The note concluded, however, with the
remark that “the instrument was quite easy to regulate by means of the
timber noggins, and that he anticipated no difficulty with it.”
The captain took the box and carried it on board his ship, and locked it
in the cabin. He was going to sea the next morning, and, as he had a
good deal to attend to, he couldn’t stop to investigate further.
When the ship had crossed the bar, the next afternoon, and backed her
main-yards in order to put the pilot off, the mate brought out the box
containing the log, and proposed to put the instrument over the
taffrail. The third mate happened to be standing near and noticed him.
The third mate’s name was Joseph, but being a very young man, and very
bright, having a fine grammar-school education, he was familiarly called
Joe by his superiors for fear that the handle of “Mister” to his name
might trim him too much by the head. Joe despised his superiors with all
the scornful feeling that a highly educated sailor has for the more
ignorant officers above him, and it required more than ordinary tact on
his part to keep from getting into trouble.
“Why, the skipper don’t know enough to be mate of a liner,” said he to
the steward one day in a burst of confidence. “As for Gantline, he don’t
know nothing. You just wait and see if I don’t get a shove up before we
make another voyage around the Cape.”
He had waited, but Joseph was still in his old berth this voyage.
It was natural he should be a little more scornful than ever now, and as
he watched the mate clumsily handling the patent log a strong desire to
revenge himself for slighted genius came upon him.
When the ship’s yards were squared again the skipper took up the log and
examined it.
“I suppose you know how to regulate the machine, Mr. Gantline,” said he,
addressing the mate.
“Can’t say as I do. I never seen one like this before.”
“Why, blast you, all you’ve got to do is to twist them timber noggins
till it goes right, and that does the whole business. Then you let her
go.”
“Where’s any timber noggins hereabouts?” asked the mate.
“Why, on the tail of the log; see?” and the skipper took up the
trailing-screw.
“Ah, yes, I see; but how about this clock machine that goes on the rail.
Don’t seem to open exactly.”
The skipper took up this part and examined it carefully.
“That’s all right. It don’t open; you just keep on letting her twist,
and add on to where you start from or subtract from where you are.”
“I see,” said the mate, and without further ado he dropped the
trailing-screw overboard.
The third mate saw all this, and he determined to investigate the
instrument during his watch that night.
When he went forward he stopped at the carpenter’s room.
“Chips,” said he, addressing his chum, “we’ve got a new log on board and
the skipper and mate don’t know how to use it. Now, I’ll bet you they
will have to get me to show them, and if I do, I’ll make them shove me
up the next voyage. Why, I tell you, putting a good instrument like that
in the hands of such men is like casting pearls before--before--Captain
Green and Gantline. You just wait and see.”
That night there was very little wind, but the third mate wound the log
up for about fifty miles more than the ship travelled.
“We don’t need any more sights for a while,” said the skipper the next
morning. “Mr. Snatchblock said that the log was dead accurate, so we’ll
let her run. Must have blown pretty stiff during the mid-watch, Mr.
Gantline, eh?” he continued, as he looked at what the log registered.
“No, I can’t say as it did,” said the mate, scratching his head
thoughtfully as he looked at the night’s run.
“’Pears to me as if we made an all-fired long run of it.”
“Well, I guess you were a little off your first night out. You’ll be
sober in a day or so,” said the skipper, with a grin.
The next day it was dead calm and foggy, but in spite of this the log
registered a good fifty-mile run, and, as the ship was to put into
Norfolk to complete her cargo, she was headed more to the southward.
“I haven’t any faith in that log, captain,” said Mr. Gantline; “it don’t
seem as if we were off shore enough to head the way we do.”
“Well, haul it in and let’s look at it,” said the skipper.
The third mate was standing close by and helped haul in the line.
“Captain,” said he, as the screw came over the rail, “this log is not
set right; and if we’ve been running by it, we are too close in to the
beach.”
“Eh! what’s that? Too close in are we? How do you know the log ain’t all
right?”
“Why, it’s just a matter of calculation of angles,” replied the third
mate. “These fins that Mr. Tackle calls timber noggins are set at the
wrong angle. You see the sine of the angle, at which this blade meets
the water, must be in the same proportion to the cosine of the angle to
which it is bent as its tangent is to its secant, see?”
“H’m-m, yes, I see,” growled the skipper; “but why didn’t you mention it
before, if you knew it all this time, instead of waiting until we got
way in here? Why didn’t you tell Mr. Gantline?” His voice rising with
his anger. “Why didn’t you tell Mr. Gantline this when you knew he’d
never seen a log like this before? What do you suppose you are here for,
anyhow?” he fairly roared. “Go forward, sir; I won’t have such a man for
a mate on my ship.”
“Mr. Gantline,” he said, after Joe had gone, “get the lead-line and make
a few casts, sir, by yourself,--by yourself, sir,--and then come and
tell me how much water we’ve got under us.”
The mate, without any unnecessary disturbance, got out the lead, and, as
it was calm and the vessel had no motion, he had no difficulty in making
a deep-sea sounding. He was also materially aided by the startling
effect of the lead, when he hove it over the side with fifty fathoms of
coiled line to follow it. To his great amazement the line suddenly
ceased running out after the five-fathom mark had passed over, and it
became necessary to heave the remaining forty-five fathoms of coiled
line after it, in order not to transmit this startling fact to any one
that might be looking on. Then, with a great deal of exertion, he
laboriously hauled the forty-five fathoms in again, and then called to
Joe to haul in and coil down the rest, and then put the lead away. After
this he went quickly aft to the skipper and whispered something in his
ear that sounded to the man at the wheel like “Shoal--Barnegat.” The man
at the wheel might have been mistaken, and it is only fair to presume
that he was, but in a very short time the ship was headed due east
again.
As night came on, a slight breeze came through the fog and the ship
gathered headway. The captain, who had been walking fore and aft on the
quarter in his shirt-sleeves, mopping great beads of perspiration from
his forehead, now seemed to be aware of the chilliness of the air and
forthwith went below.
The ship made a very quick voyage around Cape Horn, and a year later,
when she returned, Mr. Ropesend met Captain Green in his office the
morning he arrived.
“How did you like the patent log, captain?” said Mr. Ropesend.
“Mr. Ropesend,” said the captain, in a deep voice that made Gaff look up
and recognize his old friend,--“Mr. Ropesend, I don’t believe in these
new-fangled logs what’s regulated by timber noggins, no more’n I do in
these worthless third mates that’s only good for teaching school.”
_OFF THE HORN: A TALE OF THE SOUTHERN OCEAN_
The average man knows as little of the region where the backbone of the
American continent disappears beneath the ocean as he does of the heart
of Africa. The mighty chain of mountains that raise their peaks miles
above the surrounding country at the equator sink gradually until only a
single cone-shaped hump--the last vertebra--raises itself above the sea
in latitude 55° 50’ south. This is the desolate and uninhabited end of
the southern continent, commonly known as Cape Horn, and no man gets any
nearer to it than he can help. Past it flows the deep ocean stream known
as the Pacific Antarctic Drift, and over it whirl fierce hurricanes in
almost uninterrupted succession.
To the southward and westward rise the jagged rocks of the Ramirez, but
these do not break in any manner the force of the high, rolling sea
which sweeps down from the Pacific. There is but little life on any of
these tussock-covered peaks, and they offer no shelter, save to the
white albatross and the wingless penguin.
It is past this dreaded cape, in a region of almost continual storm and
with a rapidly shifting needle, the navigator of the sailing vessel has
to drive his way. The Straits of Magellan offer no passage to the
handler of square canvas, and the furious, whirling current of the Le
Maire is usually avoided, as when navigated it only saves a few miles of
westing. The floating ice is always a dreaded menace, for with the
spume-drift flying before a freezing gale and surrounded by the gloom of
the high latitude in winter, it is difficult to distinguish an object
fifty fathoms ahead of a ship’s cut-water.
Rough, hard men were the “wind-jammers” as they were called, who earned
a right to live by driving overloaded ships around this cape, from 50°
south latitude on one side to 50° south latitude on the other. With the
yards “jammed” hard on the backstays, they would take advantage of every
slant in the wind, until at last it would swing fair, and then away they
would go, running off for the other side of the world with every rag the
vessel would stand tugging away at clew and earring, sending her along
ten or twelve knots an hour towards the latitude of the trade-wind.
Men of iron nerve, used to suffering and hardship, they were, for they
had to stand by for a call to shorten sail at any hour of the day or
night. Their food consisted of salt-junk and hardtack, with roasted
wheat boiled for coffee, and a taste of sugar to sweeten it. Beans and
salt pork were the only other articles to vary the monotonous and
unhealthful diet. As for lime-juice, it existed only in the imagination
of the shipping commissioner who signed-on the men.
* * * * *
The Silver Sea was manned and officered by a set of men who had been
longer in the trade around the Cape than any others of the deep-water
fleet. She crossed the 50th parallel on the morning of June 20, and not
being certain of her exact longitude, Captain Enoch Moss headed her a
trifle to the eastwards to clear Staten Land. The second day afterwards
land was looked for, the first to be seen in eighty days out of New
York.
Enoch Moss was said to be a hard man among hard men. His second mate was
a man named Garnett, a fellow who had been so smashed, shot, and stove
up, in the innumerable fracases in which he had taken part, that to an
unnautical eye he appeared an almost helpless old man. His twisted
bow-legs, set wide apart, gave him a peculiar lurching motion when he
walked, and suggested the idea that he was continually trying to right
himself into equilibrium upon the moving world beneath his feet.
A large, red-headed Irishman, with a freckled, hairless face, named
O’Toole, was the first officer on board. It was his watch on deck, and
he stood, quadrant in hand, calling off time sights to the skipper, who
sat below checking up his reckoning.
Garnett sat on the main-hatch and smoked, waiting and resting, for he
seldom turned in during his day watches below. A man sat in the maintop,
and, as O’Toole took his last sight, hailed the deck.
“Land ho!” he bawled. “Little for’ard o’ the beam!” And he pointed to
the ragged peaks of Staten Land showing dimly through the haze to the
westward. It was very close reckoning after all, and O’Toole was well
pleased as he bawled the news down the companion-way to the skipper.
Then he turned to Garnett, who had come on the poop.
“’Tis a pity, Garnett, yer eddication was so misplaced ye don’t know a
hog-yoke from a dead-eye, fer ye miss all the cream av navigation.”
Garnett removed his cap and mopped the dent in the top of his bald
cranium.
“You an’ your hog-yoke be hanged. If I used up as much canvas as you the
company would be in debt to the sail-makers. I mayn’t be able to take
sights like you, but blast me if I would lift a face like yourn to
heaven. No, stave me if I wouldn’t be afraid of giving offence. I mayn’t
have much of a show hereafter, but I wouldn’t like to lose the little I
have.”
“Git out, ye owld pirit! And say, Garnett, ye know this is the first
land sighted, so ye better get your man ready to go ashore. The owld man
swore he’d put him ashore on the first rock sighted, for sez he, ‘I
don’t want no more cutting fracases aboard this ship.’”
The man referred to was a tall, dark-haired Spaniard, who had already
indulged in four fights on board in which his sheath-knife had played a
prominent part. Having been put in double irons he had worked himself
loose, so the captain, not wishing to be short-handed with wounded men
off the Cape, had decided to hold court in the after cabin before
marooning the man, as he had sworn to do when the ruffian had broken
loose and again attacked a former opponent. The news of sighting the
land brought him on deck while the mates were talking, and he made known
his course in the matter a few moments after O’Toole had ceased
speaking.
“You can bring the fellow aft, Mr. Garnett,” said he. “And twelve men of
your watch can have a say in the matter before I put him ashore.”
Garnett left the poop and went forward and told his watch what was
wanted, and they in turn told the man, Gretto Gonzales, whom they held
tightly bound for further orders.
“Eet iz no fair! Yo no hablo Engleeze!” cried the ruffian, who began to
understand his position.
“Colorado maduro, florifino perfecto,” replied Garnett, gravely,
remembering what Spanish he had read on the covers of various
cigar-boxes. “If you don’t savey English, I’m all solid with your
bloomin’ Spanish. So bear a hand, bullies, and bring the convict aft.”
His victim, a mortally wounded man lying in a bunk, and two others badly
cut in the onslaughts Gonzales had begun the first day at sea, smiled
hopefully. Davis, the principal object of his attacks, cursed him
quietly, although his lungs had been pierced twice by the Spaniard’s
knife. The two other men, Americans, who had taken his part in the
affrays and suffered in consequence, also swore heartily, and
sarcastically wished Gonzales a pleasant sojourn on the Tierra del
Fuego.
Although the ship carried no passengers, Enoch Moss had thought fit to
provide a stewardess. This woman was well known to many deep-water
skippers, and at one time had possessed extreme beauty. Her early
history no one knew, but since she had taken to the sea she had
endeavored to make up for this deficiency by creating enough for several
women.
Plump and rosy she was still, and much thought of by all with whom she
sailed. Many a poor sailor had reason to thank Moll, as she was called,
for the tidbits she brought forward from the cabin mess, for often a few
meals of good food did much to save a man from the horrible scurvy which
for years has been the curse of the deep-water fleet.
Whatever faults the woman had, she also had good qualities in abundance.
It was a strange scene there in the cabin when Gonzales was brought
before the captain. The twelve sailors shuffled about uneasily as they
stood against the cabin bulkhead, while Enoch Moss sat at the head of
the table with his charts and instruments before him. On one side stood
the condemned man, who was to be tried again, so that the skipper’s oath
to maroon him would be more than a sudden condemnation. It would have
the backing of twelve honest sailors in case of further developments.
That the twelve honest sailors would agree with the captain was evident
by the respectful attitude in which they stood, and the uneasy and
fearful glances they cast at him across the cabin table. O’Toole stood
in the cabin door, and behind him, looking over his shoulder, stood
Moll.
Enoch Moss looked up at the man before him and spoke in his deep, hoarse
voice.
“You have fought four times since you’ve been aboard,” said he; “the
last time you broke out your irons and nearly killed Davis, and I
promised to maroon you. I’ll do it before night.” Then he turned to the
men. “We have tried to keep this fellow in irons and he breaks out. He
has cut three of you. Do you agree with me that it is best to put him
ashore before further trouble, or not?”
“Yes, sir, put him on the beach,” came a hoarse answer from the men that
made O’Toole smile.
“Got anything to say before you go?” asked the skipper.
The poor fellow looked across to the door in the bulkhead. His eyes met
those of Moll, and he gazed longingly at her a moment while a look of
peculiar tenderness spread over his coarse, fierce face. Then he looked
at a seam in the cabin floor for an instant and appeared to be thinking.
“Well, speak up,” growled Enoch Moss.
“Yo no hablo Americano. Yo no understand. No, I say nothin’; yes, I say
thank you.” And he looked the skipper squarely in the face.
“You can take him forward,” said Enoch Moss.
As they filed out again into the cold and wet, Moll watched them, and
after they had gone the skipper called her.
“Do you know Gonzales or Davis?” said he.
“Never saw either of them before they came aboard this ship,” she
answered in a steady voice.
The captain looked long and searchingly at the woman before him. She met
his gaze fairly for the space of a minute; then her lip trembled
slightly.
“That will do. You may go,” said he, and his voice had a peculiar
sadness that few people had ever heard.
O’Toole’s step sounded on the deck overhead, and, as the stewardess went
forward into the main cabin, the mate’s voice sounded down the
companion-way. “It’s hauled to the north’ard, sir. Shall I let her come
as high as sou’-sou’west, sir?”
Enoch Moss sat silent at the table. He was thinking of a Spanish crest
he had seen tattooed on the white arm of the stewardess. It belonged to
her “family,” she had told him, and was tattooed there when she was a
child of sixteen.
“Yes, let her head up to the southwest, and call me when we get in close
enough to lower a boat,” he replied.
Before dark they were as close in as they dared to go, much closer than
one skipper out of ten would take his ship, even in calm weather. Then a
boat was lowered and Gonzales was put into it with enough to eat to last
him a month. Garnett and two sailors jumped in, and all was ready.
The skipper stood at the break of the poop, and beside him stood
O’Toole.
“Ye better not cast th’ raskil adrift till ye get ashore,” said the
mate, “for by th’ faith av th’ howly saints, ’twill be himself that will
be for coming aboard an’ laving ye to hunt a route from th’ Cape.”
“Trust me to see the pirit landed safely,” replied Garnett. “I’ve
handled _men_ before.”
A female head appeared at the door of the forward cabin just beneath the
skipper’s feet. He looked down at it unnoticed for a moment. Then he
spoke in a low voice, moving away from O’Toole, so he could not hear,--
“Would you like to go with him?”
Moll started as if shot. Then she looked up at the captain with a face
pale and drawn into a ghastly smile. She gave a hard laugh, and walked
out on the main-deck and looked at the boat as the oars fell across. The
condemned man looked up, and his eyes met hers, but she rested her arms
on the bulwarks and gazed steadily at him over the top-gallant-rail
until he went slowly out of sight.
Two hours later Garnett and the men returned with the empty boat.
The ship was headed away to the southwest, and the struggle to turn the
corner began with one man less in the port-watch.
In the dog-watch Garnett met O’Toole on the main-deck.
“We landed him right enough,” he said, “for we just put him ashore, and
then only cast off his hands, so we could get into the boat afore he
could walk. But what seemed almighty queer was his asking me to give the
skipper’s stewardess that ring. Do you suppose they was ever married or
knowed each other afore?”
“I don’t suppose nothin’, Garnett; but you better give her the ring.
Davis is a good enough man, but one man don’t try to kill another, so
strong, for nothin.’ Better give her the ring--and you want to git that
chafing-gear on the fore-royal-backstay a little higher up; it’s cuttin’
through against the yard.”
The following night at two bells the wind began to come in puffs, and in
less than half an hour afterwards it was snorting away in true Cape Horn
style.
It was Garnett’s watch on deck at midnight, and as he came on the poop
he saw there was to be some discomfort. Each rope of the standing and
running rigging, shroud and backstay, downhaul and clew-line, was piping
away with a lively note, and the deep, smothered, booming roar overhead
told how the ship stood to it and that the canvas was holding. The three
lower storm-topsails and the main spencer were all the sails set, and
for a while the ship stood up to it in good shape. At ten minutes past
three in the morning she shipped a sea that smothered her. With a rush
and thundering shock a hundred tons of water washed over her. The ship
was knocked off into the trough of the sea, and hove down on her beam
ends. The water poured down her hatch openings in immense volumes; the
main-hatch, being a “booby,” was smashed; and all hands were called to
save ship.
O’Toole and his watch managed to get the mizzen-trysail on her while
Garnett got the clew of the foretop-sail on the yard without bursting
it. Then the vessel gradually headed up again to the enormous sea.
The ship sagged off to leeward all the next day and was driven far below
the latitude of the Cape; then, as she gradually cleared the storm belt,
the wind slacked and top-gallant-sails were put on her to drive her back
again.
Five times did she get to the westward of the Cape, only to be driven
back again by gales of peculiar violence. She lost three sets of
topsails, two staysails, a mizzen-trysail, besides a dozen or more
pieces of lighter canvas, before the first day of August.
Part of this day she was in company with the large ship Shenandoah, but
as the wind was light she drew away, for in that high rolling sea it is
very dangerous for one ship to get close to another, as a sudden calm
might bring them in contact, which would prove fatal to one or both.
The night was bitter cold. The canvas rolled on the yards was as hard as
iron, and that which was set was as stiff to handle as sheet tin. Old
Dan, the quartermaster, and Sadg Bilkidg, the African sailor, were at
the wheel; the quartermaster swathed in a scarf and muffled up to the
chin, with his long, hooked nose sticking forward, looked as watchful
as--and not unlike--the great albatross that soared silently in the
wake.
A giant sea began rolling in from the southwest and the wind followed
suddenly. The foretop-sail went out of the bolt-ropes, and, as the ship
was to the westward of Tierra del Fuego and the wind blowing her almost
dead on it, she was hove-to with great difficulty. After a terrible
night the wind hauled a little. Not much, but enough to throw her head a
couple of points and let the sea come over her.
A huge mass of water fell on deck and washed a man, named Johnson,
overboard. He was one of Davis’s friends, and had been cut by Gonzales.
He remained within ten fathoms of the plunging ship for fully five
minutes, but nothing could be done for him.
Three days passed before the gale eased and swung to the southward, and
the high land of Tierra del Fuego was then in plain sight under the lee.
The man Davis was dead, and he was dropped overboard as soon as the gale
slacked enough to permit walking on the main-deck. Sail was made, in
spite of the heavy sea, and the ship headed away to the northward, at
last, with a crew almost dead from exposure. Everything was put on
forward, starting at a reefed foresail, until finally on the second day
she was tearing along under a maintop-gallant-sail.
The well was then sounded, and it was found she was making water so fast
that the pumps could just keep her afloat. Six days after this she came
logging into Valparaiso with her decks almost awash. A tug came
alongside and relieved a crew of men who looked more like a set of
swollen corpses than anything else. Men with arms blue and puffed to
bursting from the steady work at the pump-brakes, their jaws set and
faces seamed and lined with the strain, dropped where they stood beside
the welling pump-lead upon the deck.
They had weathered the Cape and saved the ship with her cargo of
railroad iron, for they had stood to it, and steam took the place of
brawn just as the water began lapping around the hatch combings. O’Toole
approached Garnett as they started to turn in for a rest after the
fracas.
“There’s a curse aboard us, Garnett. Come here!” said the mate. He led
the way into the cabin, and pointed to the open door of the stewardess’s
room.
“It’s a good thing to be a woman,” growled Garnett. “Just think of a man
being able to turn in and sleep peaceful-like that way, hey? Stave me,
but I’d like to turn in for a week and sleep like that,” and he looked
at the quiet form in the bunk.
“Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t a good thing to be a woman,” said O’Toole,
quietly. “Faith, it may be a good thing to be woman, but as for me, I’ll
take me place as a man, an’ no begrudgin’. Moll is dead, man,--been dead
for two days gone. The owld man ain’t said nothin’, for he wanted to
bring her ashore, dacent an’ quiet like. She bruk into th’
medicin’-chist off th’ Straits.”
Garnett removed his cap, and wiped the dent in the top of his bald head.
“Ye don’t say!” he said, slowly. Then he was silent a moment while they
both looked into the room. Garnett put up his handkerchief and rubbed
his head again.
“It was so, then, hey?” he said. “An’ Davis was the man what broke ’em
up. Too bad, too bad!”
“By th’ look av th’ matter, it must ha’ been. Yes, ’pon me whurd, for a
fact, it must ha’ been.”
The captain’s step sounded in the after-cabin, and the mates went
forward to their bunks.
_THE BLACK CREW OF COOPER’S HOLE_
To the southward of Cape Horn, a hundred leagues distant across the
Antarctic Ocean, lie the South Orkneys. Sailors seldom see these strange
islands more than once. Those who do see them are not always glad of it
afterwards, for they usually have done so with storm topsails straining
away at the clews and the deep roar of a hurricane making chaos of sound
on the ship’s deck. Then those on watch have seen the drift break away
to leeward for a few moments, and there, rising like some huge, dark
monster from the wild southern ocean, the iron-hard cliffs appear to
warn the Cape Horner that his time has come. If they are a lucky crew
and go clear, they may live to tell of those black rocks rising to meet
the leaden sky. If they are too close to wear ship and make a slant for
it, then there is certain to be an overdue vessel at some port, and they
go to join the crews of missing ships. The South Orkney ledges tell no
tales, for a ship striking upon them with the lift of the Cape Horn sea
will grind up like a grain of coffee in a mill.
In the largest of these grim rocks is a gigantic cleft with walls rising
a sheer hundred fathoms on either side. The cleft is only a few fathoms
across, and lets into the rocky wall until suddenly it opens again into
a large, quiet, land-locked harbor. This is the Great Hole of the
Orkneys. On all sides of this extinct volcanic crater rise the walls,
showing marks of eruptions in past ages, and a lead-line dropped at any
point in the water of the hole will show no bottom at a hundred fathoms.
Since the days of Drake and Frobisher the hole has been visited at long
intervals, but it is safe to say that not more than six white men have
visited it since Cook’s Antarctic voyage. To get in and out of the
passage safely requires a knowledge of the currents of the locality, and
the heavy sea that bursts into a churning caldron of roaring white
smother on each side of the entrance would make the most daring sailor
hesitate before sending even a whale-boat through those grinding ledges
into the dark passage beyond.
To the eastward of the Horn, all along the coast of Tierra del Fuego,
the fur seals are plentiful. At the Falklands many men of the colony
hunt them for their pelts. The schooners formerly used in this trade
were small vessels, ranging from sixty to a hundred tons, and the crews
were usually a mixture of English and native.
After working along the southern shore of Tierra del Fuego they often
went as far north as the forty-fifth parallel. They then used to
rendezvous at the coaling station in the Straits of Magellan, sell out
their catch, and afterwards, with enough supplies to carry them home,
they would clear for the Falklands or the West Coast.
A rough, savage lot were these sealing crews, but they were well
equipped with rifles of the best make and unlimited numbers of
cartridges. Sometimes they carried a whale-gun forward and took chances
with it at the great fin-backs for a few tons of bone. These cannon
threw a heavy exploding harpoon which both killed and secured the whale
if struck in a vital part.
The largest schooner of the Falkland fleet, the Lord Hawke, was lying
off the coaling station, one day, sending ashore her pelts for shipment
to Liverpool. Her skipper, John Nelson, was keeping tally of the load
upon a piece of board with the bullet end of a long rifle cartridge. Two
other vessels were anchored in the channel, already discharged, and
their crews were either getting ready to put to sea or lounging about
the station. John Nelson suddenly looked up from his tally and saw a
strange figure standing outlined against the sky upon a jagged spur of
rock about half a mile distant on the other side of the Strait. The
natives to the southward of the Strait are very fierce and dangerous, so
Nelson swore at a sailor passing a hide and bade him “avast.” Then he
took up his glass and examined the figure closely.
It appeared to be that of a white man clothed in skins, carrying either
a staff or gun, upon which he leaned.
“There are no men from the schooner ashore over there; hey, Watkins?”
said Nelson.
“Naw,” said his mate, looking at the solitary figure. “It’s one of those
cannibals from the s’uth’ard.”
“Pass me a rifle,” said the skipper.
The mate did so, and Nelson slipped in the cartridge he had been using
for a pencil.
“Now stand by and see the critter jump,” said he, and his crew of six
Fuegians stopped shifting hides and waited.
John Nelson was an Englishman of steady nerves, but he rested his rifle
carefully against the topmost backstay and drew the sights fine upon the
man on the rock.
It was a useless act of brutality, but John Nelson was a fierce butcher,
and the killing of countless seals had hardened him. A man who kills a
helpless seal when the poor creature raises its eyes with an imploring
half-human appeal for mercy will develop into a vicious butcher if he
does it often.
The picture on the schooner’s deck was not very pleasant. Nelson, with
his hard, bronzed face pressed to the rifle-stock, and his gleaming eye
looking along the sights at the object four hundred fathoms distant. It
was a long shot, but the cold gray twilight of the Antarctic spring-time
made the mark loom strangely distinct against the lowering evening sky.
There was a sharp report and all hands looked at the figure. Nelson
lowered his rifle and peered through the spurt of smoke. The man on the
rock gave a spring to one side, then he waved his hand at the schooner
and disappeared.
“Bloody good shot, that,” said John Nelson, handing Watkins the rifle.
“That’s one for the crew of the Golden Arrow. I guess that fellow won’t
care so much about eating sailors as he did when those poor devils went
ashore to the s’uth’ard last year.”
“Think you hit him, for sure?” asked the mate.
“Didn’t you see him jump?”
“Oh, yes,” said Watkins. “Here, Sam, go ahead with the skins. Take that
pelt--damn!” As he spoke the faint crack of a rifle sounded and Nelson
saw his mate clutch his leg.
“Nipped you, by thunder! Now where in the name of Davy Jones did that
fellow get a gun? Blow me, but things are coming to a pretty pass when a
vessel can’t unload in this blooming Strait without somebody getting
shot. I’d lay ten to one it was that Dago the Silver Sea marooned last
year.”
Watkins was not badly hurt, however, and after the cut in his leg was
tied up he sat about the deck and cursed at the way the British
government allowed its stations to be open to the attacks of savages.
The station was not well fortified, but the few men there had had little
trouble, and the block-house of wood and stone was found to be
sufficient shelter. There was little for the natives to steal save coal,
so they were left alone. When a few straggling Fuegians crossed the
Strait, as they sometimes did, they were peaceful enough, and only
traded in skins and rum. Fire-arms they never used and did not care for.
After the last boat-load of hides was sent ashore from the Hawke, the
crew went below and began to trim the vessel’s stores for getting under
way. They would start for the Falklands at daylight.
It was late when the lookout was set and all hands off watch had turned
in.
Nelson and his mate, Watkins, were sleeping in the cabin to starboard
while the harpooner and a half-breed hunter occupied the port bunks. The
fire burned low in the small stove and the cabin was dark.
About three in the morning several canoes shot out from the southern
shore of the Strait and headed rapidly towards the Lord Hawke. It was
getting light in the east and the man on the lookout could make out the
grim monument of Admiral Drake’s, where that truculent commander had
once swung off a mutineer into eternity. The man on the lookout struck
off six bells and then went below to get a pipe of tobacco.
When he came on deck, five minutes later, he was astonished to meet
twenty gigantic Patagonians clad in skins, who were being led towards
the hatchway by a dark-faced, heavy built Spaniard.
“_Hace bien tiempo quel a manana_,” observed the leader, nodding and
smiling pleasantly.
“What the----”
But before he could finish, a savage struck him a blow on the head with
a club, and that ended his interest in things of this world. He was
quickly knifed and dropped overboard. Then the Spaniard led the way aft.
Nelson and his comrades awoke to find a couple of black giants bending
over each of them. Before they could offer any resistance the knives
and clubs of the black crew had put an end to any possible discussion.
There was an outcry, but even the skipper’s single fierce yell was not
heard by the men on the other vessels. The leader grasped Nelson by the
throat while four natives held his arms and legs.
“You shot at me yesterday,” said the Spaniard.
“I didn’t know you were a white man. Who are you?” gasped Nelson, in a
strangling whisper.
“Gretto Gonzales.”
“The man whose wife was stewardess on the Silver Sea--you were marooned
for killing the man who ran off with her?”
“How you hear?”
“Saw it in last year’s newspaper--let go of my throat---- Ah!”
It was all over, and the crew of the sealing schooner were dropped
overboard. The men at the station were astonished to find the Lord Hawke
standing out to sea so early in the morning without settling for the
trade at the company’s store. A few weeks later the crews of the other
Falkland schooners were more astonished to find that the Lord Hawke had
not returned to the islands. At the end of two months John Nelson and
his crew were given up for lost, for the Hawke was seen no more in the
sealing fleet. Gretto Gonzales, the Spaniard, held her head straight for
the South Orkneys and ran her through the entrance of the Great Hole.
Once safe inside, he built huts of stone for his stores, and then stood
to sea again to meet the Cape Horn fleet.
As he had by some means--previous to the taking of the Hawke--heard of
the death of Davis from the wounds he had given him in the fight on the
Silver Sea, he was afraid to set foot in one of the Strait stations.
Captain Enoch Moss had marooned him two years ago for his savage conduct
aboard his ship, and since then he had become a chief among the fierce
eastern natives. These savages were large and active, and unlike the
hopeless Fuegians of Smith’s Channel. His life, like theirs, was wild
and restless, but it was unbearable for its monotony, so he had picked
his crew and determined on this wild plan of piracy. His thoughts also
appear to have been often with his wife, whom he believed to be alive,
for many of his actions point that this was his chief motive in holding
up the vessels of the Cape Horn fleet.
The first vessel he sighted was the Norwegian bark Erik, and he boarded
her in his whale-boat during a calm. She was reported as missing.
The next vessel was the large ship James Burk, of San Francisco. He
fought her, and followed her for nearly ten days, and finally took her
abreast of the Ramirez after having shot half her crew from his own
deck. She was also added to the list of missing ships and no one in the
civilized world was the wiser.
For over a year and a half Gonzales held up vessels of all kinds, and
not a soul escaped to tell a tale. How many ships, still overdue, were
taken by him no one will ever know, but it is safe to say they were
many. His storehouses at the Orkneys were filled with enough material to
supply a colony.
After taking enough supplies to last him for years, Gonzales ceased to
attack vessels. This was proved in the case of the Sentinel, whose
skipper reported a fast, black sealing schooner, without a name, manned
by a crew of Patagonians, having spoken him in south latitude 50°, west
longitude 96° 35’. The skipper of the sealing vessel came aboard and
asked the captain of the Sentinel to sell him Remington 45-90 cartridges
for sealing. After this he asked to see all the passengers, and insisted
on talking for some time to the stewardess. Then he left in his boat,
calling out a farewell in Spanish.
The English ship Porpoise, a few months later, reported the same strange
sealer off Juan Fernandez. He came aboard with a dozen of his giant
crew, and asked for rifle cartridges. He also held a long conversation
about the different vessels in the Cape Horn trade, and asked many
questions in regard to their skippers and after guards.
“I haf a wife; she runs away on ship,--I look for her,” said he to the
captain of the Porpoise.
“Hope you will find her,” said the Englishman, with a sneering grin and
a glance at the Spaniard’s strange dress.
“You seem amused,” said Gonzales.
“I am,” replied the skipper, laughing.
“Then see I don’t kill you,” said Gonzales, and he left without another
word.
The sealing schooner was within fifty fathoms of the ship, and after
Gonzales went back aboard the captain watched him. As he looked, he saw
the Spaniard raise a gun to his shoulder and the smoke spurt forth. At
the same instant a bullet tore its way through the taffrail, within an
inch of his waist.
“Sink him, if his wife hasn’t driven him mad,” cried the captain, as he
dived below.
Five other vessels reported meeting this strange sealer before the year
was out, and each told of a somewhat similar experience in regard to the
stranger’s inquiries. As sealers seldom speak deep-water ships, this was
thought strange, and when Enoch Moss, of the Yankee clipper Silver Sea,
read the latest account at Havre, he called his first mate, Mr. O’Toole,
into the after cabin.
“Have you read the _Marine Journal_?” said he, looking up at the big
red-headed Irishman.
“No, sir; how is it now?”
“Read that, and tell me what you make of it.”
O’Toole looked hard at the page for some moments, and then replied,--
“’Pon me whurd, for a fact, it’s him, Gonzales, th’ very man we marooned
off th’ Cape for knifin’ Davis. Now, what in th’ name av th’ saints is
he doin’ aboard a sealer with a native crew? He don’t know poor Moll is
dead, for sure, but he’s heard av th’ man he knifed.”
“Maybe he will visit us to the s’uth’ard,” said Enoch Moss.
“In that case, ’twill be as well to have a few rifles aboard, for a
fact. Shall I see to it?”
“Yes; we clear to-morrow at noon.”
And O’Toole went forward.
At the main-hatch he met Garnett, the second mate, and he asked,--
“D’ye mind Gonzales? Th’ same as ye put off on th’ rocks av Hermite
Isle?”
“The Dago who killed Davis for his wife’s sake?”
“Th’ same.”
“Well, I reckon I do, but what of him? He won’t turn up as long as
there’s danger of swinging.”
“He’s sealin’ to th’ s’uth’ard av th’ Cape, an’ speakin’ vessels what
carry stewardesses. He shot at th’ skipper av th’ Porpoise for no more
than a joke.”
“Stave me! You don’t mean it. He’s looking for Moll, then. Suppose he
meets us?”
“’Pon me whurd, I feel sorry for ye if he does, Garnett. Ye are an owld
villain, an’ ye haven’t much chance if he sees ye. Now, for a fact,
ye’ll be in a bad way.” And O’Toole grinned hopefully.
“Bah!” said Garnett, and he went on with his work.
Ten weeks later the Silver Sea raised Cape St. John, and stood away for
the Horn under top-gallant-sails. It was mid-summer, and Christmas day
was daylight twenty hours out of the twenty-four. There was little
difficulty in seeing anything that might rise above the horizon. It came
on to blow very hard from the northwest during the day, and the ship,
being quite deep, was snugged down to her single lower maintop-sail. She
lay to on the starboard tack, and made heavy weather of the high,
rolling sea.
“’Tis a bad spell for th’ ‘wind-jammers,’” said O’Toole, as he stood
under the lee of the mizzen, where he had just come to relieve Garnett.
“Divil av a thing have we sighted but a blooming owld penguin this
blessed week.”
“It’s a most ornery live sea rolling,” said Garnett, removing his
sou’wester, and mopping the dent in the top of his bald head. “I wonder
how that Dago would like to board us to-day?”
“He was good enough sailor; but, say, Garnett, what d’ye make av that
white t’ the west’ard? ’Pon me whurd, for a fact, ’tis a small vessel
comin’ afore it.”
Garnett looked to windward. There, coming out of the thick haze of the
flying drift, appeared a small black schooner running before the storm,
with nothing but a small trysail on the foremast. She rode the giant
seas like an albatross, and bore down on the Silver Sea at a tremendous
pace. Several figures appeared upon her dripping deck, and several more
appeared aft at her helm. The white foam dripped from her black sides at
each roll, and was flung far to either side of her shearing bows,
leaving a broad, white road on the following sea to mark her wake.
From the time O’Toole first saw her outlined against the blue
steel-colored sky through the flying spray and spume drift to that when
she came abreast the Silver Sea was but a few minutes. But it was long
enough for Garnett to call the skipper, who came on deck and examined
her through his glass.
“Gonzales and his black crew, by all that’s holy,” said Enoch Moss,
quietly.
“’Pon me whurd it is, an’ he’s going to kape us company. Look!” said
O’Toole.
As he spoke, the little vessel began to broach to on the weather-beam.
As she bore up in the trough, a tremendous comber struck her and laid
her flat on her beam ends, so that for several minutes she was quite out
of sight in the smother. Then her masts were seen to rise again out of
that storm-torn sea, and she was taking the weight of it forward of her
starboard beam. It was an interesting sight to see that little craft
rise like a live thing and throw her dripping forefoot high in the air
until her keel was visible clear back to her foremast. Great splashes of
snowy white foam, dripping from her black sides, were blown into long
streamers by the gale, and everything alow and aloft glistened with salt
water. Then she would descend with a wild plunge and bury herself almost
out of sight in the sea, only to rise again in a perfect storm of flying
spray. She was heading well and making good weather of it, half a mile
off the Silver Sea’s weather-quarter.
Enoch Moss watched her through his glass.
“It’s Gonzales, and he has a gun. I reckon he will signal us,” said he.
“No,” he continued; “he has raised it and put it down again. Sink him; I
believe he has fired at us.”
There was no report heard above the deep booming roar of the gale, but
instantly after the skipper spoke a small hole appeared in the
maintop-sail. The hole grew in size every moment as the pressure of the
gale tore the parting canvas. Then, with a loud crack, the sail split
from head to foot and began to thrash to ribbons from the yard.
“Stave me, but he has the range of us all right,” said Garnett, and the
next instant he was plunging forward bawling for the watch to lay aft
and secure the remains of the storm-topsail.
“Shall we put the spencer on her?” bawled O’Toole to the skipper, who
had sprung to the wheel.
“No use,” roared Enoch Moss. “Trim the yards sharp and let her hold on
the best she can. If she pays off put a tarpaulin in the mizzen.”
The Silver Sea did hold her head up to the sea without any canvas, for
she was very deep, and she sagged off to leeward less than the Hawke.
Enoch Moss went below and came on deck again with a Winchester rifle.
Then he seated himself comfortably near the wheel and fired cartridge
after cartridge at the trysail of the schooner. After half an hour’s
sport there was nothing to indicate that his shots had taken effect, so
he desisted. All Christmas day the vessels were within sight of each
other and towards evening the wind began to slack up.
Gonzales was first to take advantage of the lull. He put a close-reefed
mainsail on his little vessel, and, with a bonneted jib hoisted high
above the sea-washed forecastle, he sent the Hawke reaching through it
like mad.
He came close under the Silver Sea’s lee-quarter, and fired his
whale-gun slap into the ship’s cabin. The shell burst and scattered the
skipper’s charts all over the deck and set fire to the bulkhead. Then
began the most novel fight that ever occurred on deep water.
Enoch Moss, O’Toole, and Garnett kept up a rapid fire with their rifles
upon the schooner’s deck, but, although the range was not great, the
motion of the plunging vessels made it almost impossible to hit even a
good-sized mark. Gonzales, in turn, fired his whale-gun as long as he
was close enough to use it, and he made the splinters fly from the
deck-house and cabin. Then he and his fellows took to their sealing
rifles and kept up a hot fire until the Hawke passed ahead out of range.
Three times did the Spaniard go to windward and run down on the heavily
loaded ship, while all hands worked to get canvas on her. Finally, when
the Silver Sea hoisted topsails, fore and aft, she began to drive ahead
at a reasonable rate, but with dangerous force, into the heavy sea. Even
then Gonzales could outpoint her, and had no difficulty in keeping
within easy rifle range. From there he kept up a slow but steady fire
upon everything that had the appearance of life on the Silver Sea’s
deck.
Late in the evening it was still quite light, and he drew closer. A huge
Patagonian was seen upon the schooner’s forecastle, firing slowly and
carefully. Soon after this a sailor was struck and badly injured. The
faint crack of the sealing rifle continued to sound at regular
intervals, and Enoch Moss began to get desperate. He stood behind the
mizzen, watching the Hawke following him as a dog follows a boar.
“This can’t keep up forever,” he said to O’Toole. “He’ll wear us out
before we make port. I reckon we might as well stand away for the
Falklands.”
“’Tis no use; I can’t hit him,” said O’Toole, jamming his rifle into the
furled spanker. “Th’ men are all scared half mad, an’ if it falls calm
he’ll board us certain; ’pon me whurd he will.”
“We must chance it, then,” said Enoch Moss. “Hoist away the fore-and
main-t’gallant-sails. We’ll run for it.”
In ten minutes the Silver Sea was standing away to the eastward, with
half a gale on her quarter. She hoisted sail after sail, until she drove
along fully twelve knots an hour, leaving a wide, white wake into which
Gonzales squared away. But he could not overhaul her. He shook out his
reefs and hoisted a foresail, burying his little vessel’s head in a wild
smother of foam.
Enoch Moss stood aft looking at him, and, as his ship flew along with
top-gallant-masts bending like whips, his spirits rose.
“He’ll spring something yet, if he holds on,” he cried to O’Toole and
Garnett, who stood near.
“’Pon me whurd he will,” said the mate.
“Look!” bawled Garnett.
As he spoke, a huge sea, following in the Spaniard’s wake, began its
combing rush. It struck the little schooner full upon her
weather-quarter, and rolled over her stern, swinging her broadside to.
As it did so the mainsail caught the weight of the flying crest, and the
mast went over the side. The next instant it carried the foremast with
it. Then the Hawke lay a complete and helpless wreck upon the high,
rolling seas of the Horn.
“We’ve got him,” bawled Enoch Moss, springing upon the poop. “Fore-and
main-t’gallant-sails, quick!” And the mates dashed forward, bawling for
all hands to secure the canvas. Jennings and Bilkidg stood at the wheel,
and steadied the heavy ship as she came on the wind, and the way she
tore along gave them all they could do.
Everything held, and they were soon several miles to windward of the
Lord Hawke. Then Enoch Moss wore ship, and stood for the schooner close
hauled. There was still a stiff gale blowing, and the heavy ship tore
her way through the high sea with a lurch and tremble that bade fair to
take her topmasts out of her. But Enoch Moss held on.
“Point her head for him,” he bawled to the men at the wheel. “Hold her
tight and hit him fair; we’ll smash him under this time.”
Garnett stood on the forecastle-head and watched the Spaniard giving
directions to the helmsmen by waving his hands. He saw a dozen or more
natives launch their whale-boat and try to clear the schooner just as
the Silver Sea came rushing down upon them, with a roaring waste of
snowy surge under her forefoot, fifty fathoms distant.
Gonzales stood on the schooner’s deck, rifle in hand, and he fired at
Enoch Moss as the Silver Sea towered over his doomed vessel. The next
instant the heavy ship rose on the sea, and, with her great sloping
cut-water storming through it at ten knots an hour, swooped downwards.
There was a heavy jar that almost knocked Garnett overboard, but Enoch
Moss, gripping his arm where the rifle-shot had passed through, rushed
to the side and peered over in time to see the forward half of the Lord
Hawke sink from view. The native crew barely got clear, and, as the
Silver Sea passed on, they and their boat were the only objects left
floating in her wake.
“Now for the rest,” roared the skipper, smarting from his wound. “Stand
by to wear ship.”
“We’ll never touch them,” said O’Toole. “They’ve picked up Gonzales and
are heading dead to windward, rowing six oars double banked.”
The Silver Sea bore up again to the northward, but the black crew of the
Hawke were then a good mile in the wind’s eye, pulling with giant
strokes. She wore again after jamming for an hour, but when she crossed
their wake the whale-boat was a tiny speck in the distance.
“’Tis a long row home they’ll have,” said O’Toole, looking after them.
“I hope the old man won’t ship any more pretty stewardesses,” growled
Garnett.
“’Pon me whurd, I don’t belave he will.”
“Let her head her course, west-nor’west,” said Enoch Moss, and he went
below holding his bandaged arm.
The last they saw of Gonzales and his crew was the tiny speck appearing
and disappearing upon the high rolling seas of the Pacific Antarctic
Drift.
_JOHNNIE_
At eight bells, after the dog-watch, I went aft to relieve Gantline, and
found him talking to the skipper. It isn’t good ship etiquette to
interrupt a superior officer, so I went to leeward along the poop and
gained the wheel. There I waited until the discussion ended.
Gantline was somewhat excited at a remark made by the “old man,” and was
holding forth in explanation.
“No, sir,” said he; “let the boys come aboard for’ard--through the
hawse-pipe, as the saying is--not in the cabin. It’s the little devils
who run away and ship that make the sailors. They take to a slush-pot or
tar-bucket as if there was honor in getting afoul of them. All the
stinks of the fo’castle, all the hard knocks, bad grub, and every mean
thing that happens in a sailor’s life--and Lord knows there are lots of
them--are all taken as part of that big thing--agoing to sea. I know you
want your boys to sign on, regular like. You say it protects them. Maybe
it does. But I say, give me the little rascals who are full of the song
of the thing. Yes, sir, you may laugh, but that’s it. They go into the
thing different, and hard knocks ain’t going to hurt them much.
“You know a man has to be rough on deep water. No matter how easy he is,
sometimes he gets a hard crew, and he must know how to handle them when
the time comes.”
“But how about that case we were speaking of?” said the skipper; “there
was the investigation, and some of the men gave Jensen a pretty rough
name, considering he’s a dead man. They didn’t lay any particular blame
on you.”
Gantline was somewhat disturbed in mind, and he forthwith went to
leeward and spat a stream of tobacco juice into the sea. Then he came
back wiping his mouth on the back of his great, horny hand, his face
wearing a thoughtful look.
“You see, this is the way the thing was,” said he, stopping and throwing
one leg upon the rail near where the skipper sat.
“That little fellow came aboard while we were lying at the dock in the
East River. He was a dirty, ragged little rascal. I saw him sneak over
the rail and dodge behind the deck-house. When I collared him he began
crying, and asked me not to let the ‘cops’ get him. He begged so hard
and seemed so thin a little shaver I couldn’t see him run in, so I let
him down in the forepeak, and he hid behind some empty harness-casks. We
were going out the next day, and I intended to see him ashore all right
in the morning, and as it was past six bells then I went uptown to have
a last look about.
“Two watchmen stopped me and asked if I had seen a boy come aboard, and
when I asked what they wanted him for they were short enough.
“No, I ain’t much but a deep-water mate, but most men are civil enough
to me.”
Captain Green smiled, but said nothing.
“A mate ain’t supposed to know much,” continued Gantline, not liking the
smile, “but I didn’t have to stand on my head to take the sun the first
time I crossed the line,” and he looked meaningly at the skipper, who
smoked in silence.
“So when those fellows talked short and big, I just told them to hurry
up to the place they were sure to fetch up in some day and went on
uptown. You know what a sailor is, so you know how he spends his last
night on the beach.
“I got aboard in the morning and was feeling pretty blue. After sticking
my head in a pail of water I came on deck just as we got the word to
clear. In a few minutes we were towing out, and I never thought of that
little shaver until the next day. Then Mr. Jensen dragged him aft to the
‘old man’ by the scruff of his poor little neck.
“Crojack was feeling blue then, and he didn’t want any boys aboard, so
he told the mate to flog him and turn him to with his watch.
“The poor little fellow begged hard not to get the rope’s end, but the
mate wouldn’t listen.
“I can’t say I was against lamming him, for I felt he had taken
advantage of me.
“Jensen went too far, though, and we came near having a set-to over the
child before we were off soundings. Johnnie was cast loose and he fell
down on deck. Then old Williams, the bos’n, took him into the
fo’castle. After that Jensen took him in hand pretty regular.
“‘In my day,’ said he, ‘boys were taught something, and there weren’t no
dudes. And the only way to get knowledge into a boy’s hide is to lam it
in with a rope’s end. It stays there then.’ So he would lecture Johnnie
on the wicked ways of the world, and after the poor little fellow would
listen to the rigmarole and gibble gabble he would take him under the
t’gallant fo’castle and lam him beyond all reason, just so he wouldn’t
forget a word he told him.”
“That’s what the men said,” broke in Zack Green. “He was a ruffian to
the little fellow and a d----d coward, and meaner than the wrath of
Davy Jones. It’s all because he wasn’t signed on regular.”
Gantline was silent for a time, and then continued:
“He grew fat and strong and in a couple of months could go aloft with
the men. He feared nothing but Jensen, and the men used to call out for
fun, ‘Here comes the mate, Johnnie,’ just to hear him curse.
“Curse? Lord love ye, he could beat anything I ever heard. Why, I’ve
seen the mate go for’ard to see what the men were laughing at, when it
was just Johnnie calling Jensen names to them.”
“Shows how the coward was ruining him,” broke in the skipper.
“Well, he did have a queer way of training him,” went on Gantline. “He
would ask him questions about navigation, too, and then lam him
afterwards. One I remember.
“‘Johnnie,’ said he, ‘if this hooker should be driven clear to the Pole
and steered away nor’west, how would she steer to get back, considering
she had left something there she wanted to go back for, for instance.’
“‘Steer away nor’west, sir? Get back, sir? Why, just the opposite
direction, southeast’
“‘Now, how in the name of Davy Jones can a vessel get to the Pole
steering southeast, hey?’ he would yell. ‘What’s the matter with you?
I’ll give you till the watch is called to answer, and if you don’t, I’ll
peel you fore an’ aft.’”
“A cowardly, ignorant fool, sure enough,” said the skipper.
Gantline bit off a fresh chew of tobacco and stowed it carefully in his
cheek.
“Still,” he went on, slowly, “when the weather got cold he saw the poor
boy shivering one day, and he went aft and bought him a new set of
slops, good and warm. He must have paid half a month’s wage for them,
for the old man never gave things away off the Horn. You may say it
wasn’t much, but he did it, anyway.
“It was July when we got off the Cape. You know how it is in that month.
Cold, dark, stormy weather, with the giant nor’west sea rolling down
from the Pacific. We had been knocking about now, too, for three weeks
and were down below 61° south, so it was hard enough. The cold was
terrible. Nearly all of us were badly frozen. There wasn’t any floating
ice, but the log-line broke from the weight of ice frozen to it as it
dipped and rose with the ship.
“It was dark nearly all the time and so gloomy, even when it wasn’t
blowing hard; all hands were used up. Jensen kept Johnnie warmed up just
the same, and I guess he thought it helped him.
“One day it got still. The wind died away entirely, and the
maintop-sail--the only rag we had on her--began to jerk fore and aft,
slatting loud as the ship rolled her channels under in a great live sea
that came rolling down on us from the north’ard.
“It was so dark at six bells in the afternoon the forms of the men
loomed strange like through the gloom as they walked fore and aft in the
gangways. It was my watch on deck; but there was nothing to do, so I sat
on the step to windward on the poop and smoked to keep warm.
“The mate came on deck after a little while to take a look around, and
he called Johnnie to coil down some running rigging at the mizzen.
“‘The bloody glass has fallen an inch since eight bells,” said he,
coming to where I sat.
“‘It is sort of bad looking,’ said I, ‘and I don’t quite like the quick
run of this sea,--seems to go faster than ever, as if something was
behind it.’ And as I spoke the old hooker rammed her nose clear to her
knight-heads into a living hill. It rolled under us silently, and the
slatting of the topsail and rush of water in the channels were the only
sounds it made. The voices of the men jarred on my ears, strange like.
“All of a sudden a long, hoarse cry broke from the gloom and silence to
windward.
“‘What’s that?’ asked Johnnie, and he dropped the rope.
“‘That’s the Cape Horn devil,’ said the bos’n, grinning; ‘every time he
winks his eye he gives er yell, an’ wice wersa; see?’
“‘Cape Horn thunder,’ growled Jensen; ‘you an’ me will disagree
somewhat, Williams, if you try an’ scare the boy like that. Jump, blast
you, and lay up on that foreyard an’ see if there ain’t some serving
wanted on that weather lift. Git!’
“‘Cape Horn h----,” he went on to Johnnie. ‘That ain’t nothing but a
bleeding old penguin, and may the devil take his infernal soul.’
“Johnnie didn’t know any more than he did before he spoke, so he kept
looking out of the clew of his eye to windward while he worked. The mate
was strange and queer when he heard that cry. I don’t know what it was,
but it sounded like some one calling out of that great blackness. Jensen
went below, and when he came on deck I smelled rum on his breath.
“Soon the cry was repeated, and I must say it did have a depressing
effect.
“‘Sure sign of westerly wind,’ said Jensen, as he lit his pipe and
walked fore and aft. ‘Better make all snug for’ard there, for, by
hookey, it looks as if we were goin’ to have a fracas.’
“I went for’ard and saw all snug and then came aft again. The old man
had come on deck, and I could see on his face the glow of his pipe as he
drew it. He was standing close to the rail and looking hard to the
north’ard.
“‘I don’t believe a barometer is any good in these here latitudes,’ I
heard Jensen say to him. ‘I’ve seen the glass way below the centre of a
West India hurricane an’ no more wind than now for days on end.’
“It wasn’t five minutes afterwards that I felt a puff, and the topsail
came aback with a crack. The old man was on the break of the poop in a
second, bawling, ‘All hands wear ship; hard up the wheel!’
“The men jumped for the braces, but it was nearly ten minutes before we
got way on her. The wind came slowly. By the time she paid off it had
increased, and came harder and harder at every puff, so before we had
her braced around on the port-tack it was snorting away in true Cape
Horn style. Soon we were switching into it at a great rate, and the big
sea that took us fair on the port-bow made a nasty mess on the
main-deck, while the maintop-sail with the sheet slacked off, to spill
some of the wind out of it, bellied out like some huge monster in the
gloom overhead.
“There was nothing more to do, so when the watch was changed I turned
in, and after wedging myself into my bunk I fell asleep.
“It seemed as though I had hardly closed my eyes before there was a
sharp banging at my door. I turned out, and opening it found Johnnie
standing in the for’ard cabin with the water dripping from his shining
oil-skins and blowing his fingers to try and get them warm.
“‘Eight bells, sir,’ said he, ‘an’ the mate wants you, sir.’
“‘All right; how is it now?’ I said.
“‘Bad night, sir, and plenty of water on deck.’
“I buttoned on my sou’wester and followed Johnnie to the cabin door. It
was on the lee side, so there was no trouble getting out.
“As I stepped on deck I saw that the gale had increased in force, and
the dull booming roar overhead told that the old ship was standing up to
it manfully.
“She was plunging and switching into a giant sea, and every now and then
a huge mass of water fell on deck with a tremendous crash and roared off
to leeward through the water-ways.
“We kept clear of the main-deck and joined the rest of the watch on the
poop, where some of them had stayed to keep clear of the water.
“As my eyes were almost blinded at first from the flying drift, I
couldn’t make out anything, but soon they got accustomed to the darkness
and water, and I looked about me.
“The maintop-sail was still holding with the foot rope stretching and
bending until it was almost on the yard, but the sheet, being slacked
off, eased it, while the way the wind roared out from under the foot of
the sail told plainly of the pressure.
“To leeward, on the main-deck, the foam showed ghastly white, and it
was evident that the waist was full of ice-cold water. I soon made out
the forms of the rest of the watch huddled behind the for’ard house,
swinging their arms to keep their hands warm. The old man stood on the
break of the poop holding on to the pin-rail and beside him stood the
mate, both watching the maintop-sail as it surged and strained at the
clews.
“I saw in a moment that if the sail went there would be nothing to do
but run for it, as it was all two men at the wheel could do to hold her
up to it as it was.
“While I was looking at the sail I heard a loud crack like a gun and saw
the lee-clew part from the yard-arm. It was gone to ribbons in a second,
but the weather-clew still held.
“‘Goose-wing it!’ roared the old man, and Jensen bawled for all hands to
lay out on that yard.
“The men for’ard saw what had happened even if they didn’t hear the
mate. Just as they started aft to the main-rigging a tremendous sea
rolled right over the weather-rail. The for’ard house saved the men, but
they were up to their waists in cold water and held back.
“‘Lay out on that yard!’ bawled Jensen, and we fought our way along the
weather-rail to the backstays. ‘Lay out there!’ and his voice rose to a
screech, for it was duff or dog’s belly, as the saying is, and it meant
life or death for all hands.
“In the gloom I saw a slight form spring into the ratlines and go aloft
hand over hand. Then the men followed, while Jensen was bawling, ‘Come
down, you devil’s limb! come down, or I’ll skin you!’
“But Johnnie was leading the way over the futtock-shrouds, so I grabbed
the ratlines and went up with the rest.”
Here Gantline stopped for a moment and expectorated violently down the
weather-side most unsailorly.
“And didn’t that coward Jensen go along, or was he too scared?” asked
Captain Green.
Gantline wiped his mouth and continued, slowly, “He may or may not have
been scared. He went aft. Johnnie gained the yard first with Williams
close behind him, and they started out to leeward with the watch
following.
“The yard-arm was jumping and springing under the shock of flying
canvas, and it was all a good sailor could do to hold on. The men soon
passed a line under the sail and got it on the yard amidships, while
Johnnie, knife in hand, cut away the flying canvas from the bolt-rope to
leeward.
“It was bitter work on that yard-arm in that freezing gale, and it took
a long time to get the sail ‘goose-winged,’--that is, with the bunt on
the yard and the weather-clew drawing,--and when we got through my hands
were so nearly frozen I could hardly hold on to a rope.
“The mate was on the poop, and we had just finished lashing the sail,
when I felt the vessel take a tremendous heave to windward.
“‘Hold hard!’ I yelled, for I knew what was coming. With a great heave
she rolled to leeward, and above the roar I heard the smothering rush of
water as the sea went over her.
“From the darkness to leeward I heard a sharp cry, and, looking to where
I had last seen Johnnie, I saw he was gone.
“I grasped the topsail clew-line and slid down to the deck. Making my
way aft somehow, I found the old man and one of the men at the wheel
holding on to a rope that trailed taut over the lee-quarter, while the
old man was bawling for some one to lay aft and help pull it in.
“I grabbed hold and we hauled it in together. A dark lump came over the
side and I grabbed hold of it and pulled it aboard. It was all that was
left of Jensen. He had seen Johnnie go, and had gone after him with the
line around his waist.
“The old man said nothing, but took his shoulders and I took his feet
and we carried him below. He was as dead as could be. A sea had hove him
under the ship’s counter as she squatted, and the top of his head was
stove flat.
“The old man didn’t say much, but I could see by the light of the lamp
there was more water in his eyes than that of the flying drift.
“The next day the carpenter sewed the mate up in canvas, along with some
sheet-lead. The old man read the service in spite of the gale, and then
he raised his hand.
“The men of the mate’s watch tilted the plank he was laying on, and the
white bundle went to leeward with a heavy plunge.
“Just at that minute the long, hoarse cry of a penguin broke on our ears
from the darkness to the s’uth’ard. That was all.”
Zach Green sat smoking, but said nothing. Gantline turned and noticed
me. Then he spat his quid overboard, and, giving me the course for my
watch, went slowly forward.
_THE TREASURE OF TINIAN REEF_
The tropical sun shone fiercely on the beach of coral sand. The
tall-trunked cocoanuts, with their bunchy, long-leaved tops, rustled
softly in the trade-wind on the shore, and stood like bold sentinels, or
a picket-line, for the serried ranks of thick jungle growth on the land
behind them. The long, heavy roll of the Pacific heaved itself up, as if
in defiance, as it rolled towards the land, mounting higher and higher
upon itself, until the blue wall wavered an instant, then fell with a
mighty roar into a waste of sparkling foam as it rolled over the
barrier-reef and rushed towards the beach beyond.
Sometimes the seas would come in quick couples, and the deep thundering
jar of their falling bodies could be heard clear back to Sunharon, where
Sangaan lived in the pride of his manhood and a grass-thatched palace.
Northward from the reef, well off shore, lay a small schooner, rolling
deep in the swell. Her mainsail was hauled flat aft, and she lay hove
to, while a small white speck in the sea between her and the shore,
growing rapidly larger every moment, told plainly to the curious native
sitting on the beach in the shadow of a palm that a boat was soon to
make a landing.
But Warto was not uneasy. He had seen boats land there before, and had
once helped to carry some of the men ashore, where a large fire had been
built and knives sharpened; but that was long ago, long before Mr.
Easyman had come there and taught him how to take care of his soul as
well as his huge brown body.
Still, memory made his eyes bright, and he involuntarily clutched a
short spear with his right hand as he sat and watched the small boat
near the surf.
“Steady your bow oar!” roared a deep-voiced, bow-legged man who stood at
the steering oar. Then he removed his cap and wiped a dent in the top of
his bald head, while he gazed steadfastly at a floating mass in the
water. “By the Holy Smoke, Gantline! but that’s some o’ that whale
slush, or bust my eyes!”
Gantline, pulling stroke oar, turned quickly in his seat at this and
gazed in the direction the boat was heading, where a small object
floated like a lump of tallow on the smooth water. His gray eyes grew
suddenly bright as he brought the object in range of his vision, but he
assumed a careless air as he answered Garnett.
“Nothing but a piece of whale-blubber,” he muttered, as he drew his oar
inboard. “Some of those niggers been trying out on the beach; and, by
thunder! if that ain’t one squatting there under that big palm right
ahead.”
“Get out your boat-hook,” roared Garnett to the man at the bow oar,
“and make a pass at it; for, by the Pope! it looks to me like a lump of
amber-grease.”
They were very close to the line of lifting water, closer, in fact, than
Garnett supposed; but he was so intent on capturing the floating prize
that he did not realize his danger.
The man forward reached for the floating mass with his boat-hook and
drew it alongside, but it took the united efforts of himself and the man
next him to lift the spongy, slippery lump into the boat.
There it was, a good hundred pounds of ambergris, worth fifty dollars a
pound anywhere on the West Coast.
Garnett removed his cap and mopped the top of his bald head, while his
eyes remained fixed upon the prize. “By the Holy Smoke, Gantline! you
see what comes o’ being in charge of a party. I came mighty near letting
you go ashore with the boat by yourself, and then I’d been out a few
thousand; but never mind, I’ll give you a pound o’ the stuff, anyways.”
Gantline gave a loud grunt of disgust. “Seems to me half and half would
sound better among old messmates like us. By thunder! if I had picked it
up you would have had your share fast enough.”
Garnett smiled broadly and replaced his cap on his head.
“It’s a pity that the devilish desire to prosper should come atween two
old shipmates like us two; but I remember the time, onct, when the
terbacker gave out on the Moose, and you never so much as offered me a
quid off your plug, even when you knowed I was suffering. Besides, it
not only wouldn’t do to divy up from a physical stand-point, but it’s
’gainst all morals and religion. What d’ye suppose old Easyman, ashore
there, would say if I gave up my rights? The Bible says, ‘He that have
got, shall have; and he that haven’t got, shall have that which he ain’t
taken from him,’ which goes to show that by all rights and religion I
should take away that pound I promised you.”
Gantline muttered something that Garnett couldn’t hear, and then resumed
his oar.
During all this time the boat had been drifting towards the beach, but
the wind had caused her to swing nearly broadside on while all hands
were busy with the prize. Suddenly Gantline looked seaward, and gave a
quick exclamation that brought Garnett to his senses and the steering
oar with a jump.
“Back port! Give way starboard, for God’s sake!” roared the mate, as he
swung all his weight on the steering oar to slew the boat head-on; but
it was too late. A great blue sea rose just outside of them, with its
inshore slope growing steeper and steeper, until it was almost
perpendicular. Then, curling clear and green, it fell over them, and in
an instant boat and men disappeared in the white smother.
“’Ternal bliss! ’ternal bliss!” lisped Warto, sweetly, as he sat
scraping his great toe-nail with a piece of shell. Then he glanced
sharply up and down the beach to see if anybody was looking who might
tell the missionary, and, grasping his spear firmly, dropped his grass
cloth and made for the surf.
The first thing that attracted his attention was a shining bald head
which glistened brightly in the sunshine, and he made his way swiftly
towards it.
“Get onto the divil av a naygur makin’ for us,” said a sailor. “Faith,
an’ if me eyes ain’t entirely full of salt, I do believe the black
haythen has a harpoon along with him. Now, bless me----”
This last remark was caused by the actions of Garnett, who was swimming
a little in advance of the rest, turning his head every now and then to
watch for the following breakers. The mate had an oar under each arm and
was using the boat-hook for a paddle, when he was aware of a black head,
with shining eyes and grinning teeth, close aboard him.
There was something suspicious in the manner the savage swam, for, while
he often held one hand clear of the water, Garnett noticed that the
other was always below the surface.
“Git out the way, ye murdering shark, or I’ll hook ye higher than
Haman!” roared Garnett, as he flourished his boat-hook and glared
fiercely at the islander. “None o’ your cannibal tricks on me;” and with
that he made a pass with his weapon so quick that Warto came near ending
his career as a beach-comber then and there.
As it was, he ducked his head just in time, and then, completely cowed
by this show of resistance from what he supposed were helpless men, made
for the beach.
Before Garnett made the land quite a crowd had collected, for the
fleeing savage had spread the news in a few moments, and then hastened
back to see if anything was to be gained from the new arrivals.
These came ashore in due course of time on whatever flotsam that
happened within their reach, Gantline astride of a keg which bore the
missionary’s name in large black letters, painted on the ends, while the
two sailors clung tenaciously to the sides of the capsized boat.
Soon the majestic form of Sangaan was seen approaching, accompanied by a
crowd of servants and the Reverend Father Easyman himself.
At an order from their chief, several stout fellows plunged into the
surf and assisted in getting Gantline and the men safely ashore; but
Garnett flourished his boat-hook when they approached him, and glared at
them so savagely that they soon let him alone and turned their attention
to securing whatever stuff still floated in the broken water.
When Garnett could stand, he turned and cast his eye along the white
line of rolling surge in search of his prize, but failing to see it, he
walked slowly ashore, looking intently from right to left.
Gantline and the men were already surrounded by the crowd of natives,
and the missionary was alternately shaking their hands and offering up
thanks for their safe deliverance from the perils of the sea. At a wave
of the good man’s hand, two strapping fellows picked up his keg and made
off in the direction of the mission, but the rest of the supplies, that
still floated, were piled in a heap upon the sand as fast as the men
could rescue them from the water.
“By the Holy Smoke! Mr. Easyman,” grunted Garnett, with a string of
oaths, “but you’re making a fine lot o’ these naygers when they swim out
and try to murder a man as soon as he gets into trouble. There was----”
“Ah, me!” gasped the missionary, lifting his hands and raising his eyes;
“so it is the violent one I see again,--the man of fierce speech. A warm
welcome to you, friend; for it has been a long time since you and Father
Tellman’s pig left the Marquesas suddenly on the same day. A mere
coincidence, however! a mere coincidence!” and he shot a vengeful look
at the mate, who smiled and spat a stream of tobacco and salt water upon
the sand.
“What is the invoice of goods that you have landed so disastrously. I
had thought you were a right good sailor, though I reckoned you a poor
Christian. Give me the bill and I’ll check off what I owe your captain
for. Ah, my friend, it gives me great unease to hear you use such
strange and unholy words, especially before my great friend, Chief
Sangaan, the greatest chief in the Archipelago, and also the greatest
ras----”
“’Tis Garnett, sure enough,” he continued to himself, as that sailor,
having handed him the list of goods, hurried off down the beach, where
Gantline stood with his eyes fixed on an object in the surf.
“Blast his eyes! if he don’t remember me when I was on the Pigeon,” said
Garnett, as he reached Gantline. “You remember that foolishness I told
you about concerning a pretty wench he had at the mission--ewe lamb, he
called her--and that infernal pig I pulled out of his friend’s pen the
day we sailed. Dernation! the beast was so tough I can taste it yet.”
“There’s a saying in the Holy Book that stolen fruits is sweetest,”
answered Gantline, with a grin; “which goes to show the onreliability of
misplacing these quotations. Which, the same, you seem to be doing in
regard to that lump of whale stuff. It seems to me that I might enter
into a dispute with you in regard to the ownership of it; for, if I see
straight, there it is just inside the first line of breakers, and
belongs to the man who can abide the longest for its sake.”
“Now, by the eyes of that sky-pilot, if you are bent on quarrelling and
intent on mutiny, it won’t take long for me to show you who is running
this affair,” said Garnett, as he glared at Gantline and began to make a
few preparations necessary for establishing his authority.
“We’re on the beach; and, Lord love ye, Garnett, I’ll make a fair
showing if you start for me. Afloat I’ll obey orders, but ashore you’ve
got to prove what’s what before I believe it.”
So saying, Gantline plunged into the surf and made his way rapidly
towards the floating mass, which represented, in value, his profits of a
dozen voyages.
“This is too infernal bad,” muttered Garnett to himself, as several
natives started out to help Gantline. “Here I’ll have to fight Gantline
or lose half of that lump o’ grease; but he brings it on himself, for
it’s mutiny.”
He grasped the boat-hook which he still carried, and waited patiently
until the lump was brought ashore. Then he approached the second mate,
who had had the prize carried above high-water mark, where he stood
astride of it.
The natives saw that something was wrong between the white men, although
they knew nothing of the dispute or the value of the fetid prize, so
they began to crowd around them in the hope of viewing and enjoying the
hostilities in which they had no desire to take part.
“’Tis no use, Garnett; you are too old a dog to make headway against me,
even with that hook, though there was a time when you might have held on
to some purpose.”
“I have had a clip or two in my time,” answered Garnett; “but we’ll see.
No matter if you do get to windward of me, Easyman and the chief will
hold you for mutiny till the skipper gets you. So stand away to leeward
of that lump or I’ll be for boarding ye.”
“Stand off!” bawled Gantline; “if I fire this chunk of coral into that
dent in your forepeak there’ll be trouble.”
“Ah, brothers! ah, brothers! what is this strife about? and what is that
lump on the sand?” asked a voice on the outside of the group. The
natives instantly stood aside, and the Reverend Father Easyman stood
before the quarrelling mates. “Oh, ho! it is my friend of the godless
tongue; and pray, my friend, what is it he desires to take from you? for
I reckon him a covetous man,” said the missionary, looking at Garnett,
but addressing Gantline.
“It’s just a find of grease,” answered Gantline, “and, as I went into
the surf after it, I want to divide it with Garnett here, who says it’s
his because he saw it first.”
“Lump of grease! Now, bless me, my friend, it has a most unholy odor for
grease. ’Tis a poor beef that gives forth such tallow; but let me
examine it closer, for there is no need to guard it, as Sangaan there
will have no disputes about the ownership of property on his most
civilized island.”
“Sangaan be hanged!” grunted Garnett; “the stuff’s mine, and I’ll have
it if I have to bring the schooner in and fire on the village with our
twelve-pounder. Who’s Sangaan, that he must meddle with the affairs of
an American citizen, hey? After a while I suppose I’ll have to be asking
permission from every chief in the Archipelago to carry the stuff we
just brought ashore for you. Have your niggers clear our boat and give
me the bill, for it’s time we were aboard again.”
“Not so fast, friend Garnett,” said the missionary; “your boat is stove,
and it will take a man a half a day to repair it, and as you haven’t
enough spare hands aboard your vessel to man another, you will have to
stay ashore with me this evening. Perhaps I may find a nice tender shote
and entertain you according to your taste,” and he glanced sharply at
the sailor. “As for this find, as you call it, it seems to me that I
have heard of the stuff before, and that it has some value; so I will
have it carried up to the village and stored safely. In the mean time we
can discuss its ownership and also examine certain articles billed to me
at our leisure; for although your captain is an honest trader and a true
Christian man, yet one of his last year’s kegs did contain a most
unsavory mixture, and gave rise to the impression that his vessel’s hold
contained much liquid tar in a free state. As for Sangaan, it will be
well for you to show him some deference, for, although a good chief and
a devout man, he has little love for sailors, as you may remember if you
have not forgotten that affair of the Petrel. He is coming this way now
with his men, so have a care.”
Garnett saw there was nothing to do but as the missionary said. The boat
was injured so as to be unsafe for a long pull through the heavy surf,
and it would have to be repaired before launching again.
Gantline had the fetid mass which he was guarding so closely put into an
empty keg, and several natives carried it off to the mission as Sangaan
walked up.
The chief evidently remembered the mate, for he advanced smiling and
held out his hand, saying, in good English, “How do you do? Had a bad
time in surf, so come up to the mission and we’ll have a good time.”
Garnett shook his hand, and then, the missionary joining them, they
walked towards the mission house together. They proceeded in silence,
Garnett eyeing the chief suspiciously and trying to remember if he had
ever committed any deviltries which Sangaan might still feel sore about.
The missionary kept Gantline and the two sailors in view, but appeared
to be lost in deep thought. A close observer, however, might have
noticed an unholy twinkle in his eye when he glanced at the natives who
were carrying the keg of ambergris towards his home.
As for Sangaan, he suddenly seemed to remember some of Garnett’s former
trips through the Archipelago, and asked very abruptly, “How’s Mr.
’Toole?” And at the memory of O’Toole’s affairs with the natives Garnett
snapped out, “He’s dead.” Whereupon the chief laughed so heartily that
Garnett’s suspicions were aroused again, and he remained silent.
“And Captain Crojack, how is he? He used to do good trade with the
people to the southward.”
“Oh, he’s still alive,” answered Garnett, somewhat reassured. “He’s in
the China trade now.”
“And ’Toole, his mate,--I think you must lie----”
“He is dead, I tell you,” answered the mate quickly, for it was evident
that the chief still wished to hear some news of him. “That’s a fine
big mission house, by the---- Beg your pardon, but it is just the same;
and, by thunder, it’s the best on the islands.”
“Be not so violent, friend Garnett,” said the missionary. “It is a good
house, and, by the blessing of Providence, we have striven successfully
to keep it in good repair against the fierce typhoon and the hot sun.”
“It’s good and large,” said Sangaan, with pride; “and you and your men
may sleep upstairs. The room is wide and cool.”
Garnett grunted out thanks for the chief’s hospitality, but remarked
that if the boat could be fixed in time he would rather go aboard the
ship. All he wished for was the loan of a few tools and a piece of wood,
and he thought the boat could be fixed fast enough. These the missionary
lent him; so, after going over the list of goods and testing some of the
contents of the kegs and packages, he and Gantline, accompanied by the
two sailors, went back to the beach and began work on the boat.
They were soon surrounded by a curious crowd of natives, who squatted
around them in a circle and looked on, regardless of the hot sunshine,
while the mates and men toiled bravely at their task.
The boat was so badly stove, however, that it was dark before they were
half through repairing her; so, when Father Easyman came down on the
beach and told them that they would find something to eat at the
mission, all hands knocked off and started for it.
Garnett and Gantline had been arguing about the possession of their find
of the morning, but had not come to blows; for the mate knew that it
would rest with the skipper as to who would have the largest share of
it, and that nothing could be settled until they got aboard ship. There
was little use, either, in getting the missionary mixed up in the
matter, for he would be likely to press the weight of his judgment
against him if called upon to help decide the case.
The mission house was a large frame building, built of boards brought
ashore from a vessel, and had a sloping thatch roof. It was two stories
high, however, the upper one serving as a loft for storing supplies
belonging to the missionary. It was now nearly empty; a large, cool
room, with a slight opening all around it under the overhanging eaves of
the thatch.
In this loft Garnett and his men were left to pass the night, after
having partaken of a good meal at the expense of their host, who lived
several hundred yards farther back in the village, in a modest little
cottage close to the larger abode of Sangaan.
The good chief had offered them shelter under his roof, but as he had a
numerous company in his household, and the weather being warm, the mates
had expressed a keen desire to sleep alone with their men. The keg
containing their prize was also stored away with them for the night, and
soon silence settled upon the peaceful village of Sunharon.
The gentle rustle of the trade-wind soothed the ears of the tired men
and they slept soundly on.
“By the Holy Smoke! what’s up?” exclaimed Garnett, as he sprang up from
the tarpaulin on which he and the men were lying.
There was a tremendous uproar in the room beneath, and the voice of
Sangaan could be heard singing lustily. It was a little past midnight,
but the chieftain’s voice was thick and husky, and it was evident that
he intended celebrating the arrival of the supplies.
Garnett had carefully withdrawn the charges from the brace of huge
muzzle-loading pistols he had carried ashore with him, and had managed
to get a handful or two of dry powder from the missionary, so he was
prepared to defend any attack upon his treasure.
He awaited developments, but as no one appeared on the ladder which led
to the loft, he crawled to the opening and looked below.
About twoscore of natives, with Sangaan in their midst, were crowding
around a keg which Garnett recognized as one of his own wares, and a
smile broke upon his grizzled features.
Gantline had come to his side, and they gazed down upon the mob.
In a moment Sangaan saw their faces and waved his hands, “Come down!
come down!” he cried in a thick voice, and the whole assembly took up
the cry, laughing and shouting.
“Come, drink health!” bawled Sangaan, as he staggered towards the
ladder.
“No, sirree!” roared Garnett. “What! you expect me to come down and
drink with a lot o’ niggers like them. No, sirree, not by a darned
sight.”
“Go t’ell, then!” bawled Sangaan, and he walked to the keg for another
drink, flourishing an empty cocoanut shell as he went.
It was well that the natives could not understand Garnett’s remarks, or
there might have been trouble, but, instead of paying any attention
whatever to the white men, they shouted, laughed, and sang in the
highest good humor.
“Gad, Lord love ye, but what heads you’ll have in the morning,” muttered
Gantline, with a grin. “’Tis nearly half Norway tar the devils are
pouring into their skins. However, I suppose it’s best, after all, for
if ’twas the real stuff, like what we gave the missionary, they would
set fire to half the village before morning and probably murder us.”
“By thunder, I’m about tired of the racket as it is,” said Garnett;
“let’s see, if we can’t get a move on them anyhow,” and he poked one of
his pistols down the opening. “Yell together, Gantline.”
“Hooray! Let ’er go slow!” they roared as Garnett fired. “Hooray!” and
he banged away with the other, filling the place with smoke and smashing
the lantern on the table beneath him.
“Load her up, Gantline,” and he passed one of the pistols to the second
mate. There was wild scrambling for the door in the room beneath, but
before the frightened natives could get clear the mates had fired again,
yelling all the time like madmen, while the two sailors hove everything
they could get their hands on down upon the struggling crowd. In a few
moments Sangaan had retreated, but, as he carried the keg of rum along
with him, he doubtless thought it was not worth while to go back again.
The shouting gradually died away in the distance, and only a faint hum
from the direction of Sangaan’s abode told that the celebrating natives
were still in high good humor.
“After all, Gantline,” said Garnett, “now that these barkers are dry and
in good condition, we might decide who’s to be owner of that keg, if we
only had a little more light,” and he began to reload one of the
pistols.
“You’re the most bloody-minded devil I ever sailed with,” growled
Gantline; “but I’ll just go you this time, for there’s light enough for
me to see to bore a hole in that stove-in figure-head of yours. Here,
give me a bullet and powder and take your place over there by that
barrel of rice, and let Jim here give the word.”
“If it’s murder ye’re up to, I’ll be for calling the missionary,” cried
the sailor. “Faith, an’ who iver heard ave fi’tin’ a jewel in sich a
dark hole. As fer me, I won’t witness it,” and he started for the
ladder, closely followed by his shipmate.
“Go, and be hanged,” growled Garnett; “but mark ye, this is a fair fight
and don’t you go trying to make the missionary believe different, for I
never struck a sailor or mate under me that couldn’t have a chance to
strike back. I don’t belong to that kind o’ crowd.”
“Take your place and stop your jaw tackle; if you don’t hurry they’ll be
back with a crowd before we begin,” said Gantline, as the sailors
disappeared down the ladder and started off. “We ought to have stopped
them.”
“Darnation! but it’s dark. Where are you now?” asked Garnett from his
position.
“Ready. Fire!” bawled Gantline, and his pistol lit up the darkness.
Bang went Garnett’s, and then there was a dead silence.
“Garnett,” growled Gantline.
“Blast you! what is it?”
“Did you get a clip?”
“No, you infernal fool; but you came within an inch of my ear, and I
fired before I put the ball in my pistol. You owe me a shot.”
“It’ll be a hard debt to collect, mate, for I’ll be stove endways before
we try that again. Here comes Easyman with the men now.”
As he spoke there was a rush of feet, and the two sailors, followed by
the missionary and a crowd of half-sober natives, burst into the room
below.
“Hello aloft, there!” sung out a sailor.
“What’s the matter?” asked Garnett, quietly, from the opening above.
“Have you done him any harm?” asked the missionary, in a voice that
showed him to be a man of action when necessary.
“No,” answered Gantline; “there’s nothing happened.”
A lantern flashed in the room, and in a moment Father Easyman was upon
the ladder.
In another moment he was in the loft, and the sailors with a crowd of
natives followed.
“Now,” said the missionary, “hand over those pistols, or I will have to
assert my authority, even as the good King David did of old. I know you,
Garnett, a fierce and unholy man, but you have enough sins on your soul
now, so don’t force me to set these men upon you.”
“By thunder!” growled the mate, “it’s to protect ourselves we’ve been
forced to fire, to scare that drunken Sangaan out of the room below.
It’s a pretty mess he’s been making in a decent mission house, coming
here drinking that tar--I mean rum, and waking us out of peaceful
sleep.”
“Fact, he woke us up with his yelling,” said Gantline, “and we fired
down below just to scare the crowd away.”
“But what is this the men say about you two fighting?” asked the
missionary.
“Oh, they were as badly frightened as the niggers. Hey, Jim, ain’t that
so?” said Garnett, and he gave the sailor so fierce a look that the
fellow stammered out, “Faith, an’ it must ’a’ been so; it was so dark we
couldn’t see nothing at all.”
“Well, come with me, anyway,” said the missionary. “It won’t do for
Sangaan to take it into his head to come back here if he gets drunk. He
is easy enough to manage sober, but you remember the Petrel affair.”
“Sangaan be blowed,” grunted Garnett. “I can take care of any crowd o’
niggers that ever saw a mission, but if you insist on our cruising with
a sky-pilot, why, we’re agreeable. Come on, Gantline.”
They followed the good man down the ladder and up the village street to
his house. When they were in the starlight the mates noticed that
several of the natives who had followed the men back carried short
spears, and one or two had long knives in the belts of their grass
cloths. When they saw this they began to realize that perhaps the
missionary was right after all, and it was just as well that they
changed their sleeping quarters for the remainder of the night.
The next morning they patched the stove-in plank on the boat’s bottom,
and after getting all the gear into her, including the keg into which
they had put their treasure the day before, they ran her out into the
surf and started off. Several natives helped them until they were beyond
the first line of breakers, but Garnett was in a bad humor and accepted
this favor on their part in very bad grace.
When the men and Gantline put good way on the craft with their oars, the
mate swore a great oath and rapped the nearest native, holding to the
gunwale, a sharp blow across the head with his boat-hook and bade them
get ashore. This fellow gave a yell which was taken up by the crowd on
the beach, and instantly several rushed into the surf carrying short
spears.
“Give way, bullies,” grunted Garnett, “or the heathen will be aboard of
us.” And the men bent to their oars with a hearty good will.
As it was, several managed to get within throwing distance, and a spear
passed between the mate’s bow-legs and landed in the bottom of the boat.
He instantly picked it up and threw it with such wonderful aim at a
native that it cut a scratch in the fellow’s shoulder. This had the
effect of stopping the most ambitious of the crowd, and they contented
themselves with yelling and brandishing their weapons.
“Steady, bullies,” said Garnett, as they neared the outer line of
combing water; “if we miss it this time there’ll be trouble.”
The old mate balanced himself carefully on his bow-legs and grasped the
steering oar firmly as they neared the place where the sea fell over the
outer barrier.
They went ahead slowly until there came a comparatively smooth spell,
then they went for the open water as hard as they could.
As they reached almost clear, a heavy sea rose before them with its
crest growing sharper and sharper every moment. Garnett, with set jaw
and straining muscles, held her true, and with a “Give way, bullies,”
hissed between his teeth, the boat’s head rose almost perpendicular for
an instant on the side of the moving wall. Then with a smothering roar
it broke under and over her and she fell with a crash into the smooth
sea beyond.
“Drive her!” he roared, as the half-swamped craft lay almost motionless;
and Gantline, bracing his feet, gave three gigantic strokes and his oar
snapped short off at the rowlock.
“Drive her through!” he roared again, as one of the men turned with a
scared look at the sea ahead. “Drive her or I’ll drive this boat-hook
through you!” and he made a motion towards the bottom of the boat. The
two remaining oars bent and strained under the pressure, and in another
instant they rose on a smooth crest and went clear, while the sea fell
but two fathoms astern.
“Lord love ye, Garnett, but that was a close shave,” panted Gantline;
“give us the bailer and let me get some of this water out of her. It’s
astonishing how those seas deceive one, for from here it looks as smooth
on the reef as the top of Easyman’s head. It’s evident that you
calculate to go out of the island trade on the profits of this voyage.
They would have handled us rough enough had we been stove down on the
reef again.”
Garnett muttered something, as he glared astern at the crowd on the
beach, and passed Gantline the bailer from the after-locker.
He then headed the boat for the schooner, which had been working in all
the morning, and now lay hove-to about a mile distant.
In a little while they were on board and Captain Foregaff was handed
the receipts of his trade, which he carried below and deposited in a
strong box; making a note afterwards, in a small book, of the percentage
due his mates. Then he came on deck, and as the boat was dropped astern
he drew away his head-sheets and stood to the eastward.
On going forward he noticed the keg they had brought back with them and
instantly demanded to know its contents.
“It’s a find o’ grease,” said Garnett, as he picked it up and carried it
aft, where he deposited it carefully in the cockpit.
“Find o’ what?” asked Foregaff, as he and Gantline followed hard in his
wake.
“Find o’ whale grease,” said the mate. “It’s the stuff that sells so
high in the States. I found it in the surf, and Gantline here has been
trying to prove half of it his because he was along with me.”
“Well, where, in the name o’ Davy Jones, do I come in on this deal?”
bawled Foregaff. “Ain’t we running this business on shares, I want’er
know?”
“So far as concerns trade, you’re right; but d’ye mean to say that what
I find ain’t my own?” said the mate in a menacing tone.
“Trade be blowed! Gantline and I come in on this, share an’ share alike.
Knock in the head o’ the keg an’ let’s have a look at it.” And the
skipper’s eyes gleamed with anticipation.
Gantline reached an iron belaying-pin and quickly knocked in the top of
the keg and tore off the pieces.
“You see, it’s ill-smellin’ stuff,” grunted Garnett, “and its value is
according to its smell.” He bent over the keg and peered into it. “It’s
pretty hard,” he continued, “when a man’s been through all the danger
and trouble o’ getting a prize to have to divy up with them that ain’t
in the contract----”
“Gord A’mighty! Hard down the wheel there! Spring your luff!” he roared,
as he sprang to his feet. “Pig grease! s’help me, the scoundrel’s robbed
us!”
The men rushed to the sheets as the schooner came up on the wind and
headed for the island again, while Gantline and Foregaff bent over the
open keg.
“’Tis as good lard as ever fried doughnut,” said the skipper, as he
stuck his finger into the mass and then drew it through his lips, while
Gantline glared at it as though it was the ghost of Father Tellman’s
pig.
“Clear away the gun for’ard, and get----”
“Hello, what’s the matter?” asked the skipper, as Garnett was getting
ready for action.
“Why, we can’t get ashore there again. They well-nigh murdered us as it
was,” said the mate.
“Well, what good can we do with that gun, then? It won’t throw a ball
across the surf, let alone to the village. You must have been up to some
deviltry ashore.” And the skipper eyed the mates suspiciously.
“Devil be hanged! We were as soft as you please, but they were for
mischief from the time we rolled over in the surf. I guess, perhaps,
you’d better go ashore, though, for old Easyman don’t like me.”
“Not by the holy Pope,” said the skipper, with a grin. “You don’t catch
me on that beach for all the whale grease afloat, or ashore either, for
that matter. If that’s the game, we might as well stand off again.”
“Let’s at least have a try at that sky-pilot’s house,” growled Garnett.
“Give me a couple of charges and I’ll see what I can do, anyhow.”
“As for that, go ahead; but no good’ll come of it,” muttered the
skipper.
Garnett was on the forecastle in a few minutes with several cartridges
for the old twelve-pounder.
The schooner was rapidly nearing the surf, and Foregaff could see the
natives with great distinctness through his glass.
When she was as near as was safe to navigate, she yawed and Garnett
fired.
The shot struck the crest of a comber, in spite of all he could do to
elevate the gun, and ricochetted on to the sand, where a native picked
it up and danced a peculiarly aggressive dance while he held it aloft in
his hand.
The flag on the mission dipped gracefully three times while Garnett
loaded for a second shot.
“If I only had a shell I’d make those niggers see something,” he
muttered, as he rammed home the charge.
“Fire!” And the gun banged again.
The flag dipped again in the breeze, and several natives, joining hands,
danced wildly to and fro.
“Keep her off!” bawled the skipper, with a broad smile on his face.
“Done by a nigger chief,” he muttered to himself. “I want’er know, I
want’er know.”
_THE LE MAIRE LIGHT_
It had been calm all day, and the dull light of the overcast sky made
the sea have that peculiar black tint seen in this latitude. It rolled
silently with the swell, like a heaving world of oily ink, and, although
we were almost midway between the Falklands and the Straits of Magellan,
Captain Green determined to try a deep-sea sounding. This proved barren
of result with a hundred-fathom line on end.
The silent calm continued, and the weird, lonesome cry of a penguin
greeted our ears for the first time on the voyage.
Late in the afternoon a light breeze sprang up from the westward. As the
ship gathered headway, a school of Antarctic porpoises came plunging and
jumping after her. The toggle-iron was brought out, and the carpenter
tried his luck at harpooning one on the jump. After lacerating the backs
of several he gave it up and turned the iron over to Gantline, with the
hope that he might do better.
The old mate took the iron in his right hand and balanced it carefully.
Then he took several short coils of line in his left hand, and, bracing
himself firmly on the backstays just forward of the cathead, waited for
a “throw.” Almost instantly a big fellow came jumping and plunging
towards the vessel, swerving from side to side with lightning-like
rapidity. He passed under the bowsprit end so quickly that Gantline’s
half-raised arm was hardly rigid before it was too late to throw.
Suddenly back he came like a flash across the ship’s cut-water. There
was a sharp “swish,” and the line was trailing taut through the
snatch-block with three men heaving on it as hard as they could. It was
done so quickly that it seemed less than a second from the time the
animal flashed past to when he hung transfixed a few feet above the sea
beneath the bowsprit end.
Chips, who had harpooned many a porpoise in the low latitudes, was
filled with admiration, and instantly lent a hand to get the striped
fellow on deck.
I went aft, for it was my watch on deck, and we expected to sight land
before darkness compelled us to stand off to the eastward. At five
o’clock a man stationed in the mizzen-top sung out that he could see
something on the weather-beam to the westward, and soon by the aid of
the glass we made out the high, grim cliffs of Staten Land looming
indistinctly through the haze on the horizon. The first land sighted for
seventy days.
The ship’s head was again pointed well up to the wind to try and turn
the “last corner” of the world,--Cape Horn.
Captain Zack Green stood looking at the land a long time, and then
remarked,--
“I would have gone through the Straits ten years ago, but I don’t want
to get in there any more.”
“What!” I asked, “would you take a vessel as heavy as we are through the
Straits of Magellan?”
“Straits of thunder!” he replied. “Who said anything about going through
the Straits of Magellan with a deep loaded clipper ship? Man alive!
That’s the way of it. Whenever anybody talks of going through the
Straits, every eternal idiot thinks it the Magellan, when he ought to
know no sailing ship ever goes through Smith’s Channel. Strait of Le
Maire, man, between Staten Land and Tierra del Fuego. It would have
saved us thirty miles westing, and thirty miles may be worth thirty days
when you are to the s’uth’ard.”
I admitted that what he said was true, but as people knew very little of
this part of the world, they usually associated the word “Straits” down
here with the Magellan.
“Well,” said he, “they ought to know better, for nothing but small
sailing craft and steamers could go through there without standing a
good chance of running foul of the rocks. It’s the Le Maire Strait I was
thinking of; but even that is dangerous, for there is no light there any
more, and the current swirls and cuts through like a tide-race. I’ve
been going to the eastward since they had trouble with the light and
can’t get any one to stay and tend it.”
“What’s the matter?” I asked; “is it too lonely?”
“No,” he answered, slowly, “it isn’t that altogether, though I reckon
it’s lonely enough with nothing but the swirling tide on one side and
barren rocks and tussac on the other. I was ashore there once and saw
the fellows who ran the light, before they died, and the head man told
me some queer things. It’s a bad place for the falling sickness, too,
and that’s against it, but the mystery of the light-keepers was enough
to scare a man.
“I knew old Tom Jackson, the skipper of the relief boat, and he asked me
to go over to the light with him. It’s only a day’s run from the
Falklands, and, as I was laid up with a topmast gone, I went.
“We had a whaling steamer to go over in. A vessel about one hundred
tons, with an infernal sort of cannon mounted for’ard which threw a
bomb-harpoon big enough to stave the side of a frigate.
“On the way over Jackson told me how hard it was to get any one to stay
at the light, and how he came across the two men who were now keepers.
“Two men had drifted ashore near the settlement lashed to the thwarts of
a half-sunken whale-boat. They were all but dead and unable to speak.
Finally, after careful nursing, one began to show some life, and he
raved about a lost ship and the Cooper’s Hole.
“You see, over there in the South Orkneys there is a hole through the
cliffs about a hundred feet wide, with the rocks rising straight up
hundreds of feet on both sides. Inside this narrow passage, which is
like an open door, is the great hole, miles around inside, with water
enough for all the vessels afloat to lie in without fouling.
“This fellow raved about driving a ship through the hole during a storm.
He talked of revenge, and would laugh when he raved about the captain of
the ship.
“When these men were well again they told a straight story about the
loss of the ship Indian. As near as they could make out, they had been
fifteen days in that open boat, which they clung to when the vessel
foundered off the Horn. They had nothing saved but the rags they came
ashore in, so they were glad enough to take Jackson’s offer of two
hundred pounds a year to tend the Le Maire light.
“We arrived off the light the next afternoon. There was no place to land
except on the rocks, where the heave of the swell made it dangerous. It
was dead calm this evening, so we got ashore all right. As we climbed
the rocks towards the light the fellows there came out of the small
house to meet us.
“The head keeper walked in front, and he was the queerest-looking
critter that ever wore breeches. His hair was half a fathom long and the
color of rope yarn, and his eye was as green and watery as a
cuttlefish’s. The other fellow was somewhat younger, but he seemed taken
up with the idea that his feet were the only things in nature worth
looking at, so I paid little attention to him.
“The older fellow with long hair grunted something to Jackson and held
out his hand, which the skipper shook heartily.
“‘Well,’ he roared, ‘how’s things on the rocks? Damme if I don’t wish I
was a light-keeper myself, so’s I could sit around and admire the sun
rise and set.’
“‘I wish to blazes you was,’ grunted the long-haired heathen; ‘as for
me, I’m about tired of this here job, and you might as well tell the
governor that if he gives me the whole East Falkland I wouldn’t stay
here through another winter.’
“‘That’s just the way with a man soon as he gets a soft job. Never
satisfied. Now, here’s my friend Green just waiting to step into your
shoes the minute you think two hundred pounds a year is too infernal
much for a gent like you to live on.’
“The old fellow looked hard at me with his fishy eyes, but said nothing.
“‘No,’ went on Jackson, ‘you wouldn’t be satisfied with ten thousand.
What’s the matter, anyhow? Have you seen the bird lately?’
“At this the fellow glanced around quickly and took in every point of
the compass, but he didn’t answer.
“Finally he mumbled, ‘To-night’s the night.’ Then he turned to me and
asked, ‘Be you going to stay ashore to-night?’
“‘No,’ I answered, ‘not if we can get back on board.’
“Then the fellow turned and led the way to the light and Jackson and I
followed after him.
“The light-house was built of heavy timber, brought ashore from a
vessel, and the lantern was one of those small lenses like what you see
in the rivers of the States. It had a small platform around it, guarded
by an iron hand-rail, which, I should judge, was about fifty feet above
the rocks. Outside the lens was the ordinary glass covering, making a
small room about the lantern, and outside of all was a heavy wire
netting to keep birds from driving through the light during a storm.
“There were some repairs needed, and the lampist had to go back on board
the steamer for some tools. He had hardly started before the dull haze
settled over the dark water, and in half an hour you couldn’t see ten
fathoms in any direction.
“‘By thunder! Green, we are in for a night of it, sure,’ said Jackson to
me. ‘There’ll be no chance of that boat coming back while this lasts.’
“‘Let her go,’ I replied; ‘I’d just as soon spend a night in the lantern
as in that infernal hooker soaked in sour oil and jammed full of
bedbugs. I don’t know but what I’d rather like the change.’
“‘Like it or not, here we are, so we might as well take a look around
before dark.’
“We hadn’t gone more than half a mile through the gigantic tussac-grass
when I felt a peculiar sensation at my heart. The next moment I was
lying flat on my back and Jackson was doing all he could to bring me to.
I had the falling sickness, and I realized what the governor meant by
the order that no person should be allowed to travel alone on the
Falklands.
“In a little while I grew better, and with Jackson’s help managed to get
back to the light, faint and weak.
“That old long-haired fellow was there waiting for us, and he expressed
about as much surprise and feeling at my mishap as if I had been an old
penguin come ashore to die. However, after I had a glass of spirits and
eaten some of the truck he had cooked for supper, I felt better. Then
the old fellow went into the lantern and lit up for the night. He then
came back and joined us in the house, where we sat talking.
“‘It’s the first quarter o’ the moon an’ third day,’ said he, coming in
and sitting down at the table and lighting his pipe from the sperm-oil
lamp.
“‘I never made any remarks to the contrary,’ said Jackson.
“‘It’s this night, sure, and the Strait will be crowded before morning;
then he’ll be here.’
“‘Who?’ I asked.
“Old man Jackson laughed. ‘That’s his friend the bird,’ he said, looking
towards me. ‘He has a visitor every now and then, you see, so it isn’t
so blooming lonesome here after all.’
“The keeper looked hard at me with his fishy eyes, and then continued.
“‘He has been here twice before,’ he said.
“‘Well, suppose he has,’ snapped Jackson.
“‘If you can get another man, get him. I don’t want to be here when he
comes again.’
“I looked at Jackson and saw his face contracted into a frown. ‘It’s
some sailor’s joke,’ said he. ‘Nobody but a fool would send a message
tied to the leg of an albatross.’
“‘It’s a joke I don’t like, an’ I’d like you to take us away.’
“‘Well, joke or no joke, you’ll have to stay until I get some one to
take your place,’ and Jackson filled his pipe and smoked vigorously.
“I must have been dozing in my chair, for it was quite late and the fire
in the stove almost out, when I was aroused by a peculiar sound.
“I noticed Jackson start up from the table and then stand rigid in the
centre of the room.
“There was a deep moaning coming from the water that sounded like wind
rushing through the rigging of a ship. Then I heard cries of men and the
tumbling rush of water, as if a vessel were tearing through it like mad.
Jackson sprang to the door and was outside in an instant. I followed,
but the old keeper sat quietly smoking.
“Outside, the light from the tower shone like a huge eye through the
gloom, and as the fog was thick, it lit up the calm sea only a few
fathoms beyond the ledge. This made the blackness beyond all the more
intense.
“‘That vessel will be on the rocks if they don’t look sharp,’ said
Jackson. ‘Ship ahoy!’ he bawled in his deep base voice, but the sound
died away in the vast stillness about us.
“‘There’s no wind,’ said I; ‘but I distinctly heard the rattle of blocks
and snaps of slatting canvas as she came about.’
“We stood there staring into the night, and were aware of the presence
of the old keeper, who had joined us. Suddenly we heard the rushing
sound again, and it seemed as if a mighty wind was blowing through the
Strait. There were faint cries as if at a great distance. Then the noise
of waring braces coupled with the sharp snapping of slatting canvas.
“Jackson looked at me, and there was a strange look in his eyes.
“‘They’ll pass through all night,’ said the old keeper, ‘and in the
morning there won’t be a sail in sight, calm or storm.’
“We stood in the fog for half an hour listening to the noises in the
Strait, while the glare from the light made the mist-drifts form into
gigantic shapes which came and melted again into the darkness. Once
again Jackson went to the water’s edge and bawled into the blackness.
The long-haired keeper smiled at his attempts, and his eyes had a
strange glow in them like the phosphor flares in water of the tropics.
“‘The devil take this infernal place!’ said Jackson. ‘I never heard of
so many vessels passing through here in a whole season. The whole Cape
Horn fleet are standing to the s’uth’ard to-night.’
“I felt a little creepy up the back as we went into the house. Jackson
made up the fire, while I lay in a bunk.
“‘It’s been so since the light went out last winter; but it was the
fault of the oil, not me,’ said the old keeper.
“‘Why didn’t you stay awake and look to it?’ asked Jackson.
“‘It was a terrible night, and I got wet. I sat by the stove and fell
asleep, and when I woke up it was daylight, and the light was out. That
bird was there on the platform.’
“Jackson talked to the old fellow sharply, but I finally fell asleep. He
aroused me at daylight, and I went outside.
“The sun was shining brightly, and the light air had drifted the fog
back across the Strait to the ragged shore of Tierra del Fuego, where it
hung like a huge gray pall, darkening underneath. To the northward lay
the steamer, but besides her there was not a floating thing visible.
“The younger keeper, with the hang-dog look, started up the tower to put
out the light, and I followed, taking the telescope to have a look
around. We had just reached the platform when there waddled out from
behind the lantern the most gigantic albatross I ever saw. The creature
gave a hoarse squawk and stretched its wings slowly outward as if about
to rise. But instead of going it stood motionless, while the keeper gave
a gasp and nearly fell over the rail, his face showing the wildest
terror.
“‘That’s him,’ he whispered.
“And I must say I felt startled at seeing a bird four fathoms across the
wings. I stood looking at the creature a moment, and was aware of
something dangling from its leg. Then I went slowly towards it. It stood
still while I bent down and unfastened the piece of canvas hanging to
its leg, but it kept its great black eye fixed on me; then it snapped
its heavy hooked beak savagely, and I started backward.
“The creature dropped gracefully over the edge of the platform, and,
falling in a great circular sweep, rose again and held its way down the
Strait. I watched it with the telescope until it disappeared in the
distance, and then swept the horizon for signs of a sail. There was
nothing in sight, and the sea was like oil as far as the eye could
reach. I put down the glass and examined the piece of rag. It was
nothing but a bit of tarred canvas, with nothing on it to tell where it
came from. The keeper asked to see it, and he could make no more of it
than I could. Then we went down, and as we approached the house the old
keeper came out of the door and looked around in the air above him. I
held out the piece of canvas and he gave a start.
“‘He was there, then?’ he asked.
“‘If you mean that all-fired big albatross, yes,’ I answered. ‘But why
the devil are you so scared of him?’
“The old fellow didn’t answer, but stood looking at the piece of canvas,
saying, ‘Only one left. This is the third time.’
“‘Only one fool!’ I cried. ‘How, by Davy, can you read anything on that
bit of canvas when it’s as blank as a fog-bank?’
“‘And you are that fool,’ he replied, in a low tone, so smoothly that I
damned him fore and aft for every kind of idiot I could think of.
“‘Let him alone,’ said Jackson, hearing the rumpus. ‘All these outlying
keepers are as crazy as mollyhawks. It’s some joke, or some fellow’s
trying to get the place.’
“In a little while we went aboard the steamer and started for the
Falklands.
“I was still there three weeks later, when two small sealing schooners
came in and unloaded their pelts. The men aboard them told a strange
tale of a wreck in the great hole of the Orkneys. They had gone into the
crater after seals and had found a large ship driven into a cleft in the
rocky wall. Her bow was clear of the water, but her stern was fathoms
deep in it, so they couldn’t tell her name. On their way up they had
gone to the westward and come through the Le Maire. They had hunted for
two days off the rocks and reported the light out both nights.
“Jackson started off in a day or so to see what was the matter, and he
took a goose-gun for that albatross. When he reached the light there
wasn’t a sign of those keepers. Everything was in its place and the
house was open, but there was nothing to tell how the fellows left.
“In a little while he noticed the head of an albatross peering over the
platform of the light, and he tried to get a sight at it. But the
critter seemed to know better than to show itself.
“He finally started up the ladder and gained the platform. There were
the two keepers, stark and stiff, one of them holding an oil-can in his
dead grip. The sight gave him such a turn that when the giant bird gave
a squawk and started off he missed it clean, although it wasn’t three
fathoms from the muzzle of his gun. He yelled to the men below to come
up, but by the time they got there the whole top was afire from the
spilled oil catching at the flash, or burning wad, from his gun.
“There was no way to put the fire out, so they had the satisfaction of
climbing down and watching the tower burn before their eyes.
“It’s hard to say just how those keepers died. It may have been the
falling sickness, or it may have been natives that killed them. As for
me, I’ve believed there was something unnatural about the whole affair,
for I’ve never heard of an albatross landing on a light before. There
was some talk about fear of mutiny aboard the Indian by her owners, but
there was no ground for it. Those fellows probably told a straight
story. There was a boat picked up to the northward of the Strait some
time afterwards, but there was no name on it, and the only man in it was
dead. He had several ugly knife wounds, but it proved nothing.
“There’s room to the eastward of the island for me. You had better watch
those fore-and mizzen-t’gallant-sails,--it looks as if we may get a
touch of the Cape before morning.”
I went forward and started some men aft to the mizzen. We were about to
begin the struggle “around the corner.” The deepening gloom of the
winter evening increased, and the distant flares and flashes from the
Land of Fire gave ominous thoughts of the future in store for us.
_THE BACKSLIDERS_
“Wal, I swow!” exclaimed Captain Breeze, as he came to the break of the
poop the morning after the Northern Light had dropped down the bay to
await the tide before putting to sea. The object that had called forth
this remark was the figure of a very pretty and strongly built woman,
dressed in a close-fitting brown dress with a white apron, standing at
the galley door waiting to receive the breakfast things from the
“doctor,” who was busy with the morning meal inside.
It was quite early and the mates were forward getting the men to the
windlass. The tug was alongside waiting to take the tow as soon as the
anchor came to the cat-head. The passengers were still below in their
bunks and the skipper had only just turned out. He was bound out on a
long voyage to the West Coast, and both he and his mates had enjoyed a
more than usually convivial time the evening before. This accounted for
the skipper not having seen his stewardess until the next morning, for
she had come aboard quietly and had gone unperceived to her state-room
in the forward cabin. He had asked for a good stewardess this voyage,
for he had several female passengers. The company had evidently tried to
accommodate him, for this girl certainly looked everything that was good
and nothing bad. He stood gazing at her in amazement. Stewardesses on
deep-water ships were not of this breed. Forward, the men manned the
brakes, and a lusty young fellow looking aft from the clew of his eye
caught a glimpse of the vision at the galley door and broke forth, all
hands joining in the chorus,--
“A Bully sailed from Bristol town,
Singing yo, ho, ho, oh, blow a man down;
A Bully sailed, and made a tack,
Hooray for the Yankee Jack,
Waiting with his yard aback,
Soo-aye! Hooray! Oh, knock a man down.”
The rising sun shone upon the white topsails hanging in the buntlines
and glittered upon the brass binnacle and companion-rail. In the bright
light the hair of the young woman at the galley door looked like
burnished copper or a deep red gold. The curve of her rosy cheek was
perfect, and every now and then the skipper caught a glimpse of red lips
and a gleam of white teeth.
“Wal, I swow!” he exclaimed again.
“Anchor’s short, sir!” came the hoarse cry of Mr. Enlis from the head of
the top-gallant-forecastle.
“Sink me if that ain’t the all-aroundest, fore an’ aft, alow an’ aloft,
three skysail-yard, close-sailin’ little clipper I----”
“Anchor’s short, sir!” came Garnett’s bawl from the capstan.
“----I ever see,” continued the skipper, completely deaf and lost to
everything else.
“Stand by to take the line!” roared Mr. Enlis to the tow-boat.
He was a cool, collected, and extremely profane mate, and he saw in an
instant that if the tug did not get the ship’s head she would swing
around with the sea-breeze and be standing up the harbor with the tide.
As it was, she kept paying off so long that the natural sailorly
instinct, alive in every true deep-water navigator as to a sudden change
of bearings, asserted itself in the skipper and brought him out of his
dream with a start. His vision faded, and in its place he saw his vessel
swinging towards Staten Island, her topsails filling partly as they
hung.
“What’s the matter for’ard?” he roared. “Wake up, you----,” and he let
drive a volley of oaths which for descriptive power stood far and away
above any of that extensive collection of words found in the English
dictionary. Had Mr. Garnett been of a literary turn of mind he might
have noted them down for future reference, but he apparently did not
appreciate their depth and power, for he caught them up carelessly as
they came and flung them into the faces of the crew with no concern
whatever.
No one was affected much by this outburst, but after the skipper had
taken pains to explain that his mates and crew were all sons of female
dogs, and that they had inherited a hundred other bad things besides low
descent from their ancestors, he subsided a little and another voice was
heard from the main-deck.
“That’s right, old man; don’t mind me. Cuss them out, I shan’t pay any
attention. I’ll get used to your tune, even if I don’t to your words,”
cried the pretty girl from the galley door, smiling up at him.
Jimmy Breeze looked down upon the main-deck from the break of the poop.
Then he scratched his head, first on one side and then on the other.
Never before in the twenty years he had followed deep water had he ever
heard of a stewardess addressing a captain like this. Had she been old
and ugly a belaying-pin would have found itself flying through the air
in the direction of her head. But this beautiful, gentle young girl!
It was too much for the skipper, so he turned slowly upon his heel and
walked aft with the air of a much disturbed man, muttering incoherently
to himself.
At three bells in the morning the female passengers had their breakfast
served in the saloon. The skipper happened to be in his room adjoining
and could hear the praise bestowed upon his stewardess by Mrs. O’Hara,
the Misses O’Hara, and Mrs. McCloud.
“A perfect jewel,” affirmed the latter, while “Carrie” was forward
getting her tea. “I really don’t think we could make a voyage without
her.”
“And so beautiful and good,” said the Misses O’Hara.
“Faith, tu be sure, she’s a rale saint av a gurl,” added Mrs. O’Hara,
just as she appeared with the tea things. “An’, Carrie, me gurl, d’ye
like th’ sea that ye follow it alone, so to spake?” she continued,
addressing the stewardess.
“Yes, indeed, ma’am. But it’s not alone I am entirely, for surely the
captain is the finest I ever saw, and they told me he was a father to
his crew. He’s a man after my own heart.”
“Humph!” growled Jimmy Breeze in the solitude of his state-room. He
thought his stewardess was not only very pretty, but an extremely
discerning young woman. It was, however, this very perfection in
appearance and deportment that caused trouble this morning, for when
“Bill,” the cabin boy, passed the stewardess in the alley-way he was
quite overcome by the vision of loveliness. He had some of the dinner
things for the officers’ mess, and when he turned suddenly at the door,
a heavy lurch of the vessel sent him against the coamings. This had the
effect of throwing the things scattering to leeward about the feet of
Mr. Enlis.
“You holy son of Belial!” roared the mate. And he continued to curse him
loudly until Mr. Garnett came up.
“Whang him!” grunted the second officer, shortly. “Whang the lights out
of him, the burgoo-eating, lazy,” etc.
Mr. Enlis had seized the unfortunate “Bill” by the slack of his coat and
had yanked him to the mast to “whang” him, when the form of the
stewardess appeared at the door of the forward cabin.
The mate laid on one good whang, when he was interrupted by the remark,
“Soak it to him; don’t mind me, I’ll get used to hearing him pipe.” And
the pretty girl smiled pleasantly.
“Ye had better go below, missie, for there’s a-going to be a little
hee-hawing for’ards. Come back again soon,” said Garnett, with a leer.
“Not exactly, while the fun lasts,” answered Miss Carrie.
But, somehow, the mate could not curse loud enough to keep his temper up
before the young girl, and he ended matters by giving Bill a kick that
sent him to leeward, where he landed in the mess-kit. Then the mate
touched his forelock to Miss Carrie and went forward muttering something
about there being no discipline aboard a boat with wimmen folks around.
Garnett balanced himself upon his short bow-legs to the heave of the
ship, which was now well off shore, and took his cap in his hand while
he mopped a deep, greasy dent in the top of his bald head. Then he took
out a vial of peppermint salts and sniffed loudly at it, looking out of
the clew of his eye at the stewardess. “Holy smoke an’ blazes, but she’s
a craft to sail with! To think of a tender-hearted young gurl like that
wanting to see a man whanged.” And he went forward like a man in a
dream.
Each time during the following days when the oaths flew thick and fast
from poop or forecastle, Miss Carrie appeared upon the scene and cheered
on the contestants. It was simply uncanny to see the fresh young girl
telling the skipper or mates to “go ahead and cuss them out,” or “don’t
mind me, boys, I’ll get used to it.” They could not go on while the
young girl stood by. Once Enlis continued to use foul language before
her, but two or three groans and hisses made his face flush for the very
shame of it. He threatened to kill every man who uttered a sound, and
seized a belaying-pin to carry out his design, but a laugh from the
galley door drove him into a frenzy, and he sent the pin flying at the
girl’s head. He was instantly reported to the skipper for his brutal
conduct and had the satisfaction of being knocked down by that truculent
commander, barely escaping forward with his life.
“He’s a real captain,” said Miss Carrie to the O’Haras, whenever she
thought the skipper was in his state-room and could hear. She was a very
pretty girl, and what she said was seldom lost entirely.
Day after day life grew quieter on board the Northern Light. There was
no help for it. And while life grew quieter, so likewise did Jimmy
Breeze, the skipper. He was just “losing his tone,” as Mr. McCloud
expressed it. He sometimes burst forth at odd moments, but the presence
of his stewardess usually ended the flare into deep mutterings.
One morning he came on the poop and joined his passengers.
“There’s no use denyin’ it,” he said, “cussin’s wrong, and that young
gurl shan’t be exposed to it no more. She’s a-tryin’ not to mind the
rough words; but, sink me, any one can tell how they effects her, young
and innercent as she is. Things is goin’ much better this v’yage, and
blast me if I allows any d--d swab to shoot off his bazoo in my hearing.
No, sir; if there’s any cussin’ to be done, I’ll do it. Yes, sir, I’ll
do it; and I’ll whang the lights out of any d--d junk-eating son of a
sea-cook aboard here I catches,--an’ I don’t make no exceptions for
passengers.”
Here he glared at Mr. O’Hara, but that gentleman appeared absorbed in
the weather-leach of the main-top-sail.
“An’ I don’t make no exceptions for passengers,” repeated the skipper,
still glaring at the small and inoffensive O’Hara, who stared vacantly
aloft. Then the skipper went aft to the wheel and noted the ship’s
course.
Within another week after this speech of Captain Breeze’s a change had
come over the ship’s company almost equal to that which had physically
come over Mr. Garnett, whose long, flowing jet-black mustaches had now
given place to a natural growth of stubbly, grizzly beard and whiskers.
But of course the change of ships’ morals did not cause as much comment
after the skipper had repeated his remarks in regard to swearing to the
mates. Mr. Garnett’s private affairs were always of a nature that caused
inquisitive and evil-disposed persons much interest, whereas the ship’s
company interested no one, unless it was the stewardess.
As there was war on the West Coast of South America between Chile and
Peru, the Northern Light carried her specie in the captain’s safe, as
drafts and exchanges were difficult to negotiate. Captain Breeze was a
careful and determined skipper and he had the confidence of the owners.
He was a bachelor, but he debauched in moderation,--that is, in
moderation for a deep-water sailor. Therefore it was something over ten
thousand dollars in negotiable form that he carried in the small steel
safe lashed to the deck beside his capacious bunk.
On the days he opened his “slop-chest” to sell nigger-head tobacco which
cost him seven cents a pound for ninety, and shoes which cost him thirty
cents a pair for two dollars and a half, he took pride in opening the
steel doors and displaying his wealth to the stupid gaze of the men. The
men were not forced to pay the prices he asked for his stores, but it
was a case of monopoly. They could go without tobacco or shoes for all
he cared. When they had done so for a short time they usually accepted
matters as they were and signed on for both at any price he had the
hardihood to demand. Oil-skins and sou’westers usually took a whole
month’s pay, but that was no affair of his. If the men wished to go wet
they could do so. He had no fear that they would attempt to crack his
safe or steal his stores, for behind the safe and within easy reach of
his strong hand stood his Winchester rifle loaded full of cartridges.
Mr. McCloud and Mr. O’Hara often had the pleasure of viewing the ship’s
wealth, for there were occasions when the skipper’s temper was
sufficiently mellow to allow them in his room that they might marvel at
his power. He seldom failed to impress them. When the Northern Light had
crossed the line he had impressed them into such a state of high respect
for himself, and had subdued their own spirits so far, that he actually
began to make their acquaintance. He would now hold conversation with
them, but always in a tone of immeasurable and hopeless superiority.
During this period the moral tone of the crew had likewise risen
accordingly.
Garnett marvelled greatly during his watch below, and at night when on
deck he could be seen walking to and fro in the light of the tropic
moon, mopping the dent in his bald head and sniffing hard at his little
vial. The change was dreadful to the old sailor’s nerves.
Mr. Enlis went about his duties silently, muttering strange sounds when
things went wrong. The skipper’s promise to “whang the lights out” of
any one caught swearing had had its effect.
One warm morning, after breakfast, the skipper invited McCloud and
O’Hara below to try some beer. This feeling of good fellowship, starting
as it did under impressive surroundings, developed into one of real
confidence within a very short time. Mr. O’Hara had pronounced the hot,
flat beer the best he had ever tasted, and McCloud had affirmed without
an oath that he told nothing but the truth.
“Th’ only wan av all th’ saints that cud come within a mile av it,” said
O’Hara, “is that paragin av goodness and all the virtues, me own old
woman, Molly. She kin make beer.”
“Ah, the blessings of a good lassie!” said McCloud, holding his mug at
arm’s length. “Captain, ye have me pity, fra I weel ken ye need it,
being as ye are a puir lonely sailor-man. I drink to ye, sir, with much
feeling----”
“An’ hope as ye will not be always be sich,” interrupted O’Hara.
Jimmy Breeze sat silent and sullen upon his safe, glaring at his
passengers over the rim of his mug each time he raised it to his lips.
At the end of the sixth measure he dashed the mug upon the deck and
swore loudly for nearly a minute, and his guests were wondering what had
happened.
“I’ll not be any d--d sich any longer!” he roared. “I’ve stood it long
enough, s’help me.”
O’Hara put down his mug and edged towards the cabin door, and McCloud
was in the act of following his example when Breeze sprang forward and
locked it, putting the key in his pocket.
“Sit down, you swabs, and give me your advice. You can’t leave here till
you do; so take your time and lay me a straight course.”
“What’s--what’s the matter?” gasped O’Hara.
The skipper seated himself on top of his safe.
“It’s like this,” he said. “Here I’m bound for the West Coast in cargo
and passengers, likely to be at sea four months or more, and here I am
bound to get married even if I have to run the bleeding hooker clear
back to Rio to have it done.”
“Whew!” said McCloud.
“Whew!” said O’Hara.
“What I wants is advice. Shall I lay a course back to the Brazils and
cross the hawse of some shaved-headed priest, or put into the river
Plate and have her own kind of sky-pilot do the job? She lays she won’t
have no shave-head splice her, and it’s a good three weeks’ run to the
river, to say nothing of the danger of the Pompero this time o’ year.
Ain’t there any way to make her ’bout ship an’ head her on the right
tack, or have I got to be slanting about this d--d ocean until I get to
be an old man?”
“What wud ye loike us to do?” asked O’Hara.
“Do!” roared Breeze. “If I knew, do you suppose I’d ask you? I’d make
you do it so infernal quick you----”
“Or whang yer lights out, ye insolent man,” said McCloud, turning upon
him.
“Well, well, I’m no priest,” said the repentant O’Hara.
“No more ye ken, Mickey, me boy; na is it the likes o’ you as will be o’
service in this case. Now, ye know, Mickey, I knows law, and I always
have told ye the skipper of a vessel is a law to himself. Ain’t that be
the truth, sir?” he asked, turning to the captain.
Captain Breeze nodded.
“That being the case, I know a skipper can marry people, perform
religious worship, and do all manner o’ things aboard ships off
soundings, as the saying is.”
The skipper nodded encouragingly from the safe.
“That being the case,” says I, “there’s no reason or being or state as
can keep him fra marrying this minute if--if he wants to.”
“I know that all right,” said Breeze; “but who’s to marry me?”
“I don’t happen to be able to guess the leddie’s name,” said McCloud.
“D--n the lady! Who’s to marry me? That’s what I want to know,” roared
the skipper.
“Why, the leddie will marry you, and you will marry the leddie to
yourself, I presume. We are both married, O’Hara and me.”
The skipper sat glaring at his passengers, while he repeatedly damned
the lady, the priests, the passengers, and all else connected with the
affair.
“You infernal cross-checkered sea-lawyer, how can I marry myself? How
can I marry myself and the girl too? Answer me that, sir,” and he glared
at McCloud.
“Sure, ’tis aisy enough, a little bit av a thing loike that, sur,” said
O’Hara. “Mac is right, an’ he has the lure strong an’ fast in his books
foreninst th’ state-room.”
“I’ll get the law and read it to ye so ye may ken it, ye hard-headed
sailor-man,” said McCloud, somewhat ruffled, and he started for the
door. The skipper unlocked it and let him out, holding O’Hara as hostage
against his return.
In a few minutes McCloud came back with several leather-covered books,
and, seating himself, opened one of them and began his search for
authority.
“Here it is,” he said, at length, while the skipper sat and looked
curiously at him. “Here’s law for ye, an’ good law at that. Just as
binding as any law ever writ.”
O’Hara nodded at the skipper and smiled an “I told you so.”
Jimmy Breeze came over to his passenger and looked over his shoulder
sheepishly. McCloud read, “And therefore be it enacted, that all such
masters of vessels when upon the high seas on voyages lasting one month
or more shall have authority to perform such services upon such members
of the ship’s company as they may see fit; provided that notice of the
consent of the contracting parties has been previously given, etc.”
“Wal, I swow!” said Breeze, after a short pause.
“Get married first,” suggested O’Hara, draining one of the mugs.
“Sink me if I don’t pull off the affair before eight bells, and if I
find your infernal book is wrong, blast me if I don’t ram the insides of
its law down your throat and whang your hide off with the leather
cover,” said the skipper, hopefully.
“’Tis good, rale good lure,” muttered O’Hara, looking for more beer.
“Who’s th’ leddy?”
Although no one had mentioned the name of the fair stewardess for fear
of precipitating an outburst on the part of the skipper, no doubt was
felt by the passengers that she was the object of the skipper’s
affections. His contempt for the O’Haras in general precluded the
possibility of a match with either of the young ladies of that
prosperous family. Besides, they both had pug-noses and were exceedingly
well freckled. The beauty of Miss Carrie had long been observed to have
had its effect upon Captain Breeze; so his answer to O’Hara’s apparently
hopeful question caused the latter little real disappointment, although
he may have had secret ambitions.
“Seems to me ye might give the lassie some notion of your hurry,
especially if it’s going to happen so soon. The puir child na kens your
purpose, no doubt,” said McCloud.
“Faith, I think ye right, Mac. I gave th’ owld gal nigh six months tu
git ready in----”
“Six thunder!” growled Breeze. “I mean to get married afore eight bells,
at high noon, according to good English law, and if you fellows want to
help you can get your wives and darters to bear a hand.” They went into
the saloon, where they found Carrie fixing the table for dinner.
The skipper hitched up his trousers impressively while his passengers
stood at either hand.
“Carrie,” said he, solemnly, “we’ll stand by to tack ship at seven
bells,--an’--an’--and after that we’ll make the rest of the voyage in
company. Hey? How does that strike you, my girl?”
“Mercy! What a man you are, Captain Breeze!” said Carrie, blushing
crimson. “Sure it’s sort of sudden like.”
“You’ll have half an hour to get ready in,” said the skipper.
“Plenty of time,” chimed in McCloud.
“An’ an aisy toime iver afterwards as th’ capt’in’s leddy,” said O’Hara,
with dignity.
“But who’s to marry us?” asked the maiden, shyly, glancing at the
skipper.
“I’m to marry you,” said Jimmy Breeze. “It’s law and it’s all right. I’m
master of this here hooker, and what I says goes aboard, or ashore
either, for that matter. It’s put down in that yaller book, an’ it’s
law.”
“Land sakes! I never could, Captain Breeze,--really, now, not before
these people,--I never could in the world.” And Carrie blushed
furiously.
“You passed your word last night, so I holds you in honor bound,” said
Breeze, with great fervor. “You have half an hour, so I leaves you.” And
he drew himself up and strode to the companion, and so up on the
main-deck out of sight.
McCloud and O’Hara, seeing danger ahead, strove with all the power of
their persuasive tongues to get the fair girl to listen to reason, or
rather law. She was stubborn on the point, however, and the female
portion of the O’Hara faction, together with Mrs. McCloud, was brought
to bear. These ladies, after expressing their modest astonishment at the
skipper’s unseemly haste, immediately, however, vied with each other to
argue in his behalf. They were so persuasive in their appeals, and so
adroit in painting the picture of Miss Carrie’s future happiness, that
in less than a quarter of an hour that refractory young lady gave way
in a flood of tears. After this she hastily prepared herself for the
ordeal by reading over the marriage service with Miss O’Hara, and things
looked propitious for the skipper.
At seven bells that truculent commander promptly put in an appearance,
dressed in a tight-fitting coat and cap with gold braid. He was followed
below by Mr. Enlis, who looked uncertain and sour. After a short
preliminary speech the skipper called the blushing bride to his side as
he stood at the head of the cabin table. The book lay open before him,
and without further ado he plunged boldly into the marriage service,
answering for himself in the most matter-of-fact manner possible. He
placed a small gold ring upon the middle finger of his bride’s right
hand, which she dexterously removed and transferred to her left, and
after the ceremony was over he glared around at the assembled company as
if inviting criticism.
No one had the hardihood to venture upon any. Then the paper which was
to do duty as certificate was drawn up by the clerky McCloud and was
duly signed by all present. It was afterwards transferred to the
skipper’s safe. Whiskey and water was produced for the men and ale for
the ladies, and before long even the sour mate was heard holding forth
in full career by the envious Mr. Garnett, who was forced to stand watch
while his superiors enjoyed themselves. It was a memorable affair for
some and immemorable for others, for the next day O’Hara could remember
nothing, and Mr. Enlis remembered that he had gotten exceedingly drunk.
Much he related to Garnett during the dog-watch, and that worthy rubbed
the top of his bald head and sniffed furiously at his vial, swearing
softly that the “old man” had made a fool of himself, and that he was
accordingly glad of it.
The cruise continued as a cruise should when a bride is aboard ship, and
at the end of a fortnight the Northern Light was in the latitude of the
river Plate. There had been never an oath uttered since the skipper’s
marriage, and the mates had begun to chafe under the restraint. The
bride was on deck nearly all the time, and was certain to make remarks
and cheer on any attempt at a fracas.
One afternoon the carpenter sounded the well and was astonished to find
a foot of water in the hold. The weather had been fine and the vessel
steady, so he was at a loss to account for this phenomenon. He sounded
again an hour later and found the water had gained six inches. Then he
lost no time in reporting the condition of the ship to the captain.
With water gaining six inches an hour, the crew manned the pumps with
set faces, appalled at the sudden danger in mid-ocean. Suddenly,
however, the pumps “sucked.” An investigation showed the ship was
rapidly becoming dry.
The water-tanks were examined and found to be empty, but no leaks in
them could be discovered.
To be at sea without water to drink is most dreaded by deep-water
sailors, so Jimmy Breeze started his condenser and headed his ship for
Buenos Ayres, cursing the fates for the foul luck that would ruin his
anticipated quick passage.
His wife consoled him as best she could and lamented her husband’s luck
to the passengers. Whereat she received the sympathy of the O’Haras and
Mrs. McCloud, and was looked upon as a very unfortunate woman.
“Ah, pore thing! to think av it happening on her honeymoon at that,”
cried Mrs. O’Hara.
“The sweet child, trying all she can to help her husband to forget his
lost chances for extra freight money. To think of it, and just married
at that,” said Mrs. McCloud.
“Pore young sowl,” said Kate O’Hara.
“’Tis a good wife that sticks to her husband in disthress,” said O’Hara.
“Ye ken it’s a jewel he has to be na thinking of money losses,” said
McCloud.
Finally the ship made port and anchored off the city to take in water
and continue her voyage at the earliest opportunity.
Mrs. O’Hara and Mrs. McCloud insisted on being allowed ashore to see the
sights. Captain Breeze would hear of no such thing, but finally, when
his bride added her voice to the occasion, he relented, and the ladies
went ashore together.
Mrs. Breeze pointed out many places of interest, as she admitted having
been there before, and at one of the principal hotels she left the
party. She told them not to wait for her, as she would stop and see a
friend, but to go down to the landing, where the boat might wait for her
after she was through her call.
The day passed gayly, but when the party assembled at the landing, Mrs.
Breeze was not there. They never saw her again.
The next day Captain Breeze called Mr. Enlis aft and took him below.
When he had him in the privacy of his state-room he pointed to his
little safe, and asked him to look through it.
This operation took but a moment, for it was almost entirely empty, and
when he was through he looked at the skipper.
“What would you do?” asked Jimmy Breeze, huskily.
“Me?” asked the mate, apparently amazed at the question.
“Yes, you.”
“About what?” asked Enlis, trying to look utterly lost.
“About that gal and the money, blast you!”
“Oh!” exclaimed Mr. Enlis, as if a sudden light had flooded the dark
recesses of his brain. He remained silent.
“Well, what?” asked the skipper, in real anger.
“I dunno,” said Mr. Enlis, after a long pause. “’Pears to me I wouldn’t
let on nothing about it. Mum’s the word, says I.”
“But the money, you swab?” growled the skipper.
“To be sure,” said Enlis. “The money.”
“Well?”
“Well, you might ask the police about the money on the quiet like,”
ventured the mate.
“Suppose you and Garnett go ashore and see about it without making any
fuss. Garnett is a good one for such matters. It would hardly do for me,
seeing as how I stand in the matter of husband.”
“Egg-zactly; we’ll do it right away;” and the mate hastened forward to
take advantage of the opportunity.
Garnett and Enlis went ashore with what money they could get, and they
entered a description of the missing stewardess with the police. “An old
hag with side whiskers, having a wart under her left eye and all her
teeth gone,” said Garnett, as he finished. “An’ I hopes you’ll soon find
her,” he added, with a leer at the official. “Ye’ll know her by the way
she swears.”
Several hours afterwards two exceedingly happy and drunken sailor-men
staggered down the street towards the landing. A beggar accosted them,
but after a search for coin, they protested they were cleaned out.
“Don’t make no difference. Give me clothes,” whined the mendicant.
“I’d give ye anything, me boy, for a weight is off my mind. Was ye ever
married?” cried Garnett.
“Give the pore fellow clothes, Garnett, you swine!” roared Enlis.
Garnett staggered against a house and undid his belt. Then with much
trouble he drew off his trousers and stood with his white legs
glistening in the moonlight.
“Here, pore fellow. You are a long-shore swab, but I knows by your look
ye are married. Take them, blast ye!” And he flung his trousers from
him. “This bean-swillin’ mate is too mean to give ye anything.”
“Not I!” bawled Enlis, casting off his belt. “Here, you swivel-eyed
land-crab;” and he drew off his trousers likewise and handed them to the
beggar.
“Thanky,” hissed the creature, and ran away.
The men in the boat looked up the street towards where they heard
singing, and they beheld two very drunken men in flowing jumpers
staggering trouserless along, while their voices roared upon the quiet
night,--
“A Bully sailed from Bristol town,
Singing yo, ho, ho, oh, blow a man down;
A Bully sailed, and made a tack,
Hooray for the Yankee Jack,
Waiting with his yard aback,
Soo-aye! Hooray! Oh, knock a man down.”
_CAPTAIN CRAVEN’S COURAGE_
Every man develops during the period of his growth a certain amount of
nerve-power. This energy or life in his system will usually last him,
with ordinary care, twoscore or more years before it fails. Sometimes it
is used prodigally, and the man suffers the consequence by becoming a
debtor to nature. It is this that makes the ending of many overbold men
out of keeping with their lives. Some religious enthusiasts would have
it that they are repentant towards the end of their careers,--that is,
if they have not led conventional lives,--and that accounts for their
general break-down from the high courage shown during their prime. Among
sailors, soldiers, hunters, and others who live hard lives of exposure,
the strain is sometimes peculiarly apparent.
It is often the case that the man of hard life dies before his
life-flame burns low, and then he is sometimes classed as a hero. For
instance, the captain of the Penguin, who ran his ship ashore on the
North Head of San Francisco Bay, was the most notorious desperado in the
whole Cape Horn fleet. Many men who sailed with him never saw the land
again. Their names appeared upon his log as “missing,” “lost overboard
in heavy weather,” etc. Investigation of such matters resulted in
nothing but expense to the courts and the development of the ruffian’s
sinister character and reputation. Yet when he ran the Penguin ashore
with the terrible southeast sea rolling behind her, he maintained his
rigid discipline to the last and saved his passengers and part of his
crew. He died as a brave man should, never flinching from his post until
his life was crushed out.
There were some who said he dared not come ashore, as he had overrun his
distance through carelessness, and that without the backing of his
ship’s owners he would have been stranded in a bad way upon the beach.
But the majority were willing to forget his record in his gallant end,
and he will be known in the future by the men who follow deep-water as a
hero.
Craven, the pirate, was a much bolder and desperate man, yet his end was
different. He hailed from the same port as the skipper of the Penguin,
and sailed with the Cape Horn fleet in its early days.
He retired from the sea at the age of thirty-five and settled on the
southern coast of California, taking to farming with that peculiar zeal
shown by all deep-water sailors. He fell desperately in love, married,
and the following year shot and killed a man who was less pious than
polite in his behavior towards Craven’s wife.
After this affair he fled. Nothing was heard of him again for several
years, but as he was an expert navigator it was supposed he took to the
sea for safety.
One day an American trader was standing in the Hoogla River, China, when
a junk appeared heading for her under all sail. Behind the junk, about a
mile to windward, came a trading schooner. The Chinese on the junk made
desperate efforts to overtake the American ship. When they came within
hailing distance they begged to be allowed alongside.
The skipper of the Yankee warned them off with his guns, and ten minutes
later the schooner had laid the junk aboard. There was some sharp firing
for a few minutes, and then the Americans saw the men from the schooner
swarm over the junk’s deck. After that Chinamen were dropped overboard
in twos and threes, and before they had drawn out of sight ahead the
schooner was standing away again, leaving the junk a burning wreck. When
the ship made harbor they learned that Craven had appeared on the coast.
He had been there the preceding year and had been recognized. Altogether
it was said he had taken over five hundred junks and put their crews
overboard. The captain of the American ship reported the incident he had
just witnessed to the English gunboat Sovereign, but no action was taken
in the matter. There was no treaty between the United States and China,
and, as Craven was an American, it was a case for the Chinese to settle.
Craven had been on the coast several times. He had a rendezvous to the
eastward somewhere among the numerous coral reefs, and from this den he
would sally forth in his schooner, armed with six twelve-pounders, and
swoop down upon some unsuspecting Chinese town. His boldness was
remarkable.
Once he held a whole village in check single-handed while his men
carried a boat-load of young maidens aboard the schooner, and then
returned for the rest of their booty left upon the sand. It was said
that had the emperor himself been within a day’s journey of the coast,
Craven would have had him aboard his vessel to gratify his sinister
humor.
His cruelty was phenomenal. A favorite amusement of his being to tie two
Chinamen together by their pigtails and sling them across a spring-stay.
Then he would offer freedom to the one who would demolish the other the
quicker. It was seldom that he failed to produce a horrible spectacle.
On one occasion when he captured a prominent mandarin he asked an
enormous ransom. Not getting it within the time specified, he had the
unfortunate man skinned and stuffed. Then he was carried ashore and left
standing for his friends to greet.
Craven’s crew numbered less than twenty-five men, and they were all
white, except two or three who acted as servants to the rest, taking a
hand in the fracases only when ordered to.
It might be supposed that the pirate wasted much time and energy for
little gain taking junks. He dared not touch a white trader, and the
junks were the easiest to handle. There was little left for him to prey
upon, so he went along the Chinese coast like a ravenous shark, leaving
a smoking wake behind, strewn with the blackened timbers of burned
junks and dotted with the corpses of murdered men. Everything Chinese
was game for his crew, and what he lost in quality of plunder he made up
in quantity.
While the American ship lay in the Hoogla an accident occurred aboard
which delayed her departure. During the time spent in making some of the
necessary repairs Craven appeared at the mouth of the river, and was so
bold that the English gunboat was at last prevailed upon to drive him
away. The Sovereign met him some twenty miles off shore in the act of
scuttling a captured junk. This was too much for the Englishman, and he
fired a shot to drive him off. To his surprise Craven returned the fire.
That settled the matter. The heavy Blakely rifle on the gunboat’s
forecastle was trained upon the schooner, and it sent a shell that cut
both masts out of her and left her helpless. Craven returned the fire
with vigor, landing several telling shots. A heavy shell from the rifle
was then fired at half a mile range, and struck the schooner in the
stern above the water-line. It ranged forward, raking her whole length,
and left her a burning wreck. She began settling rapidly by the head,
and the gunboat, firing a parting broadside, which destroyed the
schooner’s two boats, drew slowly away. The Englishman waited within
sight until the schooner disappeared beneath the sea, and then, thinking
it would be more merciful to let the crew remain in the water than to
bring them ashore, steamed away for the river.
A few weeks after this a Spanish brig came in. She was a trader bound
south, and the mate of the American ship made arrangements to take
passage on her as far as Singapore to get some necessary supplies for
his vessel.
The first person he met on rowing over to the brig to secure a passage
was a small, peculiarly yellow man with a Spanish cast of features, who
met him at the gangway and asked him his business before allowing him to
come aboard. On telling his desire to secure a passage to the southward,
he was peremptorily refused; but when he explained his business was
urgent and that he had many necessary supplies to secure, the man at the
gangway reconsidered the matter, and bade him wait alongside until he
could consult his skipper, who was below suffering from an attack of
gout in his leg.
In a little while he reappeared at the brig’s side and announced gruffly
that he might bring his things aboard the following morning, as that was
the time set for the brig’s sailing.
The next day the mate, Mr. Camp, came aboard the brig, and soon
afterwards she was standing out to sea. There were two passengers
besides himself aboard, Manila traders, who had come over from the
Philippines and who wished to get to the southward.
When the brig had made an offing, Camp was surprised at the appearance
of a most peculiar looking colored man, who limped up the companion-way
to the poop. His skin was an orange-yellow, and appeared dry and dark in
spots. His right leg was swathed in bloody rags, and he limped as if in
some pain. He had an eye that glinted strangely as the mate came within
its range of vision, and his face wore the determined look of a fighter
who is making a desperate stand against heavy odds. In a quiet voice he
addressed the man who had made the arrangement with the mate, Mr. Camp.
“Collins,” said he, “get me the glass. I believe I see a couple of birds
making in along the beach for the harbor.” This he said in good English,
with a slight Yankee accent, and Camp turned in astonishment to look at
him more closely.
The man Collins, who was the mate of the brig, handed him the glass, and
after a moment Craven laid it down with an oath.
“The two fellows we missed last week. They’ll loose off at having seen
us, and that gunboat will be hard in our wake before night. You might
send a few men aft to get to work on our passengers. They are poor
whelps.”
Camp went towards him.
“I don’t understand what you mean by that last remark,” said he. “I am
an American and wish a certain amount of civility aboard here.”
The skipper smiled grimly at him and sat upon the poop-rail.
“You’ll get the best the coast affords, my boy,” said he. “You’ll be a
gentleman of leisure after you quit this hooker. This is the brig
Cristobal, Captain Craven; and now you can make up your mind whether you
will be a member of the ship’s company or try and float a twelve-pound
shot. It’s piracy, says you? Well, it’s swim, then, says we, and good
luck to you,” and he chuckled hoarsely, while several men came aft and
stood by the mate for further orders.
Camp saw that it was death in a hideous form to disobey. Both he and the
two Manila men were led below, where they swore allegiance to Craven and
joined his crew. In a crisis of this nature a man even of strong mould
is apt to think twice before accepting the inevitable. Time is valuable
when one has but a few moments to live, and to gain it these three
innocent men were glad to accept any terms. They were sent forward with
the men and joined the crew, which now numbered fourteen hands. Here
they learned how Craven and four men had clung to some of the wreck of
his schooner for two days. Then the brig Cristobal picked them up in an
exhausted state. Two days later Craven and his fellows quietly dropped
the skipper overboard and announced to the crew their intention of
taking charge of the brig. All who wished to could join. There were six
unarmed men against five desperadoes armed to the teeth, and in a short
time matters were settled satisfactorily. Craven was in command of a
vessel and crew bound for China from the Philippines, and it was his
humor to keep her on her course and have a look at things in the harbor.
This he did to his satisfaction, and no opportunity offering for him to
revenge himself upon the gunboat there, he took on some supplies and put
to sea. When he met Camp at the break of the poop after the latter had
joined, he became more communicative than usual.
“This color we have will soon wear off, my boy,” said he. “Collins there
thought he knew something about medicine, and he broke open the medicine
chest to get this iodine to paint us with. He’s a clown. The infernal
stuff burned half the skin off, and that accounts for his looks. Where’s
the skipper of this hooker, says you? Well, that depends somewhat on his
morals. I don’t call to mind any island trader as will go to the heaven
some old women pray for. A trader’s life is always a hard one, so I
don’t think we did any harm in helping the fellow to something
different, although he did struggle mighty hard to stay. Some religious
people would call it bad to put yellow-skinned heathen overboard, but we
don’t look at it that way. Most of these junk-men are no better than
animals, and we do them a clean favor by ending their sufferings. Yes,
sir, that’s the way to look at the matter, my son. There isn’t a man
alive who can look back and see anything in his life worth living for
and suffering for. It’s all in his mind’s eye that something will be
better in the future. We know that’s all blamed nonsense, for that
something better never comes, so in helping him to what’s coming to all
of us we just do him a favor. Now, you are a likely chap, Camp, and I
hope you’ll see the reason of things. Go below and tell one of the girls
we got yesterday to give you your grog. Collins has the key. Then you
want to bear a hand and get our little battery in working order. We’ll
raise half a dozen junks before night and we’ve got a little business
with the first one.”
In a short time all hands were hard at work getting the brig’s
twelve-pounders in working order. In the late afternoon a lateen-sail
showed above the horizon, and everything was ready for action. By night
the junk ahead was still out of range, and the watch was set, and half
the men went below to get some rest.
At two in the morning Camp was turned out, and the smudge on the lee bow
showed that the brig would soon have the wind of the unsuspecting
Chinaman. In half an hour Craven had him under his lee, and he paid off
gradually until he brought him fair on his lee broadside, not two
hundred feet distant. Then he swung up his ports and let go his battery,
serving it with remarkable accuracy and rapidity.
The astonished Chinaman let go everything in the way of running gear,
and the junk, which was running free, broached to and lay helpless,
wallowing in the swell, with her deck crowded with screaming men. Craven
then brought the Cristobal to, and taking the boat with four men,
carried a line to the junk, and soon had her alongside.
The Chinamen were bound hand and foot after several who showed fight
were killed. Then Craven had them transferred to the Cristobal, and with
untiring energy went to work to transfer his ammunition and guns to the
junk. It was noon before this was accomplished, and then he told the
Chinaman who was the junk’s captain that he really owed him much for
swapping such a fine Spanish brig for his worthless old hulk. In
consideration of this debt he requested him to keep the brig on her
course to the Peninsula, and crowd on all sail if he saw an English
gunboat in his wake. If he failed, and showed such ingratitude as to
disobey this request during the next twenty-four hours, he hinted in a
mild way that he would overhaul him, and then fry him in whale-oil and
serve him to his shipmates. As Craven was never known to make an idle
threat, the conversation had its desired effect. The Cristobal stood
away on her course with a Chinese crew, and Craven, bracing his
lateen-sail sharp on the wind, headed slowly back again over the course
he had just run.
About eight bells in the afternoon the Sovereign was sighted dead ahead.
She was driving along full speed with a bone in her teeth. That is, with
the bow wave roaring off on either side in a snowy-white smother,
looking like a great white streak against her dark cut-water.
She passed within hailing distance, and Craven kept below the rail and
rubbed his wounded leg while he smiled grimly.
“I’ve a notion to let go at her,” said he to Camp. “We could slap a
couple of twelves into her before she knew what was up. I’d like to see
her skipper with a couple of shot through his teakettle before he knew
where he was at. Jim, suppose you lay the port guns on her.”
But Collins had sense enough not to get the guns trained in time. In ten
minutes the gunboat was a speck on the horizon.
Craven knew she would overhaul the brig in a few hours, but hoped his
merciful attack on the junk’s crew would lessen the heat of the chase.
He might have sunk her and escaped, but his fancy took a different turn,
and he played his game out.
Before sundown he was rapidly nearing the China coast and several junks
were made out ahead. All hands, tired as they were, turned out and stood
by for a fracas. It was not long in coming.
The nearest junk was laid close under Craven’s lee and the Chinamen
could be seen crowding about her decks. He was so close a conversation
could be carried on with the men on the junk, and the rush of the foam
under her forefoot sounded loud upon Camp’s ears.
Craven let go his port broadside into her without warning. In five
minutes he had her alongside. Several of her crew were dead, but he lost
no time in transferring the living to his junk and making them lend a
hand to shift his guns again. Then he sailed away with his battery
transferred for the second time.
Craven fought his way up the coast, shifting his guns and ammunition
from vessel to vessel at every available opportunity. Towns that had
been warned of his approach in a junk, would see a peaceful trading
schooner come quietly into the harbor at dusk. Nothing would be thought
of this until in the early hours of the morning a heavy cannonade would
arouse his victims, and those who survived would see the finest vessel
there standing out to sea in tow of a schooner that fairly disappeared
in the smoke of her own guns. The pirate had ammunition in plenty within
three days’ sail of Hong-Kong, and he dodged everything sent after him
for nearly a year. He kept the sea with remarkable cunning, and his
absolute fearlessness won him many recruits.
Once he was heard from far down the Straits of Malacca, where he engaged
a Malay pirate for several hours whose crew outnumbered his ten to one.
He finally sank her with all hands.
A few months after this he again fell in with the gunboat Sovereign. He
was sailing a huge junk at this time, and under this disguise came near
escaping again. He was recognized, however, and captured with his entire
crew. They were taken to Hong-Kong. Here he was confined for nearly a
year, an object of curiosity, until they were ready to cut off his head.
He and his men were led out every day or two and held in line while the
swordsman walked along them with upraised blade. When this grim
executioner had chosen a man, which he did at random, he would bring the
weapon down suddenly upon the back of his neck. This was trying on the
nerves of those of the crew who had to look on. No one knew just when
his turn would come.
Craven, however, stood it well for a month or two and was apparently
indifferent to the sight of death, but the long strain of hunting his
fellow-men and of being hunted in turn by them had done its work. His
nervous energy had been pretty well used up. One day a trader came into
the harbor and brought a woman to the English consul’s. She claimed to
be Craven’s wife. It took some time before she could get to see her
husband, but through the consul’s influence she finally did. Then came
the break in the man’s nerve.
From that time on he trembled when the sword struck. At the end of a
week he was hysterical, and they had to hold him when they brought him
out. His sole idea now was to live to see the woman who had caused his
ruin. This he struggled and cried for, and the idea of separating from
her again caused him more agony than one can well conceive.
The Chinese are always particular that great criminals of theirs shall
get great punishments. Craven’s sufferings were prolonged as much as
possible. There were forty men of his crew taken with him, and he had
seen the heads of nearly all cut off. When his turn came, and it was
next the last, he screamed shrilly as the swordsman swung up the blade
two or three times over the victim’s head before giving the final
stroke. Craven was trembling all over. He cried and begged for a little
delay. His horror of death was terrible, and he pleaded to see his wife
once more. The idea of separating from her now forever was more than he
could stand, and it caused the greatest possible amusement to the
on-lookers. They laughed and drew their long pigtails upward, meaningly,
in derision. When the sword fell, Craven had gone entirely to pieces and
died the death of a most pitiable coward.
Camp, who was the only man left, finally managed to get the English
consul to intercede in his behalf. He was afterwards released, but his
sufferings had been so great during his imprisonment that he died soon
afterwards.
_THE DEATH OF HUATICARA_
We were lying in the stream with the topsails hanging in the buntlines.
Everything was stowed ready for getting under way. The night was very
dark, as the sky was obscured by the lumpy clouds which had been banking
in from the westward all day before the light sea-breeze. Now it was
dead calm, and the water was smooth and streaky as it rippled past the
anchor-chain and cut-water, making a low lapping sound in the gloom
beneath us, which was intensified by the stillness of the quiet bay.
Gantline and I sat on the forecastle-rail, watching the lights of the
city and small craft anchored closer in shore. On the port bow the black
hull of the Blanco Encalada loomed like a monster in the gloom, her
anchor-lights shining like eyes of fire. Her black funnel gave forth a
light vapor which shone for an instant against the dark sky and
vanished. Long tapering shadows cast in the dim light of her turret
ports told plainly that she had her guns ready for emergencies. She lay
there silent and grim in the darkness, and our clipper bark of a
thousand tons appeared like a pilot-fish nestling under the protecting
jaws of some monster shark, as we compared the two vessels in respect to
size and strength.
It was quite late and our last boat had come aboard some time since,
bringing our skipper, Zachary Green, his pretty daughter, and two
passengers. At daylight we would clear with the ebb-tide and land-breeze
of the early morning, and then, with good luck, we would make an offing
and stand away for the States. We were sick of the war-ridden country,
and even the town of Valparaiso itself offered no attraction for us. Our
cargo hardly paid enough freight money to buy the vessel a suit of
sails, and it was with a feeling of great relief that we steved in the
last bale and closed the hatches.
While we sat on the rail we heard a slight rippling in the water ahead
of the vessel. It sounded as if a large fish was making its way slowly
across the bows. We listened in silence for some moments while the
sounds came nearer. I looked aft and saw two figures in the light from
the after companion-way, and I recognized Miss Green and the smaller of
the two passengers standing close to the hatch. The sounds in the water
interested me no longer, and I gazed rather hard at the figures aft. The
two passengers, who were missionaries on their way home, had been aboard
ship several times during the last week, but they had always been so
pious and reserved in manner that I never once thought to see one of
them talking to a young woman alone at such a late hour. But there are
many things a sailor must learn not to see. Memory is not always a
congenial friend of his.
Suddenly I heard a sound of some one breathing, followed by a smothered
oath, coming from the direction of the rippling water which drew more
and more beneath us.
“Ha! Voila, me gay sons, que voules vous--si padrone.--Hace bien tiempo,
manana--hell-fire but the bloody lingo gets crossways of me gullet,”
came a deep voice from the black water.
“Och! stow ye grandsons, ye blathering ijiot, an’ kape yer sinses. If
them’s Dagoes on watch ’twill be all up with us. Whist, then! Ye men on
the fo’c’stle!”
“What’s the matter?” asked Gantline and I in the same breath.
“Faith, an’ if yez have a drap av th’ milk av human pity in yer hearts,
ye’ll give two poor divils a lift out av this haythen country. Say not
er whurd, but let us come on deck quiet like. Ef ye don’t, th’ blood av
two innocent men will be upon yer sowls fer ever an’ ever, amen. Spake
aisy.”
“Now, Lord love ye, what kind of a man is this?” asked Gantline, as a
naked man climbed slowly up the martingale-stays and crouched close to
the starboard bow out of sight of the man-of-war.
“By th’ luck av Lyndon! Is this old Tom Gantline who talks? Gorry, man,
we’ve just escaped from th’ prison on th’ beach. Don’t you remember me?
I’m Mike McManus, own cousin to Reddy O’Toole who used to be mate with
ye an’ owld man Crojack.”
“No, I don’t remember you,” answered Gantline; “but if you had said you
were any one else you would have gone overboard again fast enough. No
one but a chip of that devil’s limb, O’Toole, would have come out here
in this tideway, right under the guns of that man-o’-war. Who’s with
you?” and he peered over at the man who still clung to the bobstays as
if uncertain whether to trust himself on board or again swim for it.
“That’s a man called Collins, a ’Frisco man, who got taken along with
me, when we was smugglin’ in th’ rifles, up to th’ north’ard. Whist!
below there; come up and make yerself known amongst friends. We’re
safe.”
“I ain’t so almighty certain about that,” growled Gantline; “what am I
to do with you but put you ashore? I can’t run the risk of having the
vessel overhauled for such fellows as you. You may be some bloody
cutthroats for all I know. What do you mean by smuggling rifles? Ain’t
there enough on shore without bringing any more into this infernal
country? I reckon a rifle won’t look as if it was worth so much when
they stand you up against a wall and let you peep into the muzzle of a
dozen or two.”
“Ah, shipmate, ye haven’t the heart to turn us over fer that, when all
we’ve done was to try an’ land a few fer thim poor fellows, an’ this
Dago with his ironclad overhauled us. Oh, me boy, ye haven’t seen th’
inside av one av thim black iron holes on th’ beach, to talk av puttin’
us ashore again. Gord! men, to sit ther fer six whole months behind them
steel walls and never see th’ sun rise or set, an’ do nothing but kill
lice and chintz-bugs all day long, an’ all night. No, ye may be in
sympathy with Chilly, but ye have th’ look av a sailor-man for all that”
As he spoke he climbed to the catheads and drew himself gently onto the
top of the top-gallant-forecastle. He was followed by the man Collins.
They crouched shivering behind the capstan, and I saw they were in a bad
condition. They were wasted and gaunt, and their flesh had a soft,
sickly look, as if they had spent a long time in close confinement. The
hair of their heads was long and matted. How they swam so far in that
tideway was strange, and told plainly of their desperate courage in
attempting to escape from the terrors of the beach.
Gantline stood irresolute a moment, looking at their shivering forms.
Then he glanced sharply at the man on watch, who walked in the port
gangway. It was too dark to see him distinctly, so trusting that he in
turn had seen nothing of what had occurred forward, he started aft. The
two figures I had noticed a few minutes before had now disappeared.
“Keep quiet,” I said to the naked men, whose teeth chattered in the cool
night air. “Lie flat on deck until he comes back and perhaps we can do
something. Haste! Not a word!”
The man Mike was about to make some reply, but at that moment the fellow
on watch came close to the edge of the forecastle. I stepped quickly in
front of the man, and in doing so trod on a projecting foot which
cracked horribly, and, twisting, brought me down in a heap upon them. A
deep groan told of the damage done, but I instantly regained myself and
began to hum a song in a low bass voice.
The man on the main-deck stopped a moment and looked hard at me, but it
was so dark he could see but little and my singing reassured him, so he
turned again and went off.
In a short time Gantline returned with a bundle.
“Now, bear a hand there, you men, and put these clothes on in a quarter
less no time,” he whispered. “Come, hurry up,” and he passed a shirt and
a pair of dungaree trousers to each.
“Och! he has broken me toe clane off,” groaned Mike, slipping on the
garments. His companion dressed rapidly in silence.
“Now then, up you go, both of you, into the foretop, and lie out of
sight till we get to sea, and if I see a hair of your heads inside the
next twenty-four hours I’ll turn you both over on the beach. Here, take
a nip apiece before you go,” and he passed a small bottle to the man
Collins.
The poor fellow’s eyes sparkled as he thrust the neck of it into his
thick beard and tilted his head back in order to let the liquor have
free way down his throat. Gantline suddenly jerked it out of his hand
and passed it to the Irishman, who put it to his lips, gave a grunt of
disgust, and threw the empty bottle over the side.
“Now wait till you see me go aft with the watch, and then aloft with
you,” said Gantline, as he left us.
When he reached the man he started off with him to the quarter-deck, and
as they disappeared together over the break of the poop the men crawled
for the rigging. They were so weak from their exertions that it seemed
as if they would never get over the futtock-shrouds, but finally the man
Collins gained the top, and dragged his companion after him. Then I went
into the forward cabin and took what salt-junk was left and carried it
aloft before Gantline returned. By the time I reached the deck he had
started forward again and joined me on the forecastle. His seamed and
lined face wore an anxious look as he took his place beside me and acted
as if nothing had happened to seriously interrupt our former
conversation. We sat a few moments discussing our stowaways and then
went aft to get a little sleep before clearing.
I turned in and lay awake thinking of the men in the foretop, hoping
nothing would occur to make it necessary for more than one man to go
aloft there. The sails were all loosed except the foreroyal, and this I
would go aloft for myself.
It was past midnight before I lost consciousness, and it seemed almost
instantly afterwards Gantline poked his head in my doorway and
announced, “Eight bells, sir.” I turned out and found it was still dark,
but a faint light in the east told of the approaching day. The men were
getting their coffee from the galley, and the steward was on his way to
the cabin with three large steaming cups for the skipper and passengers.
A light air was ruffling the water and the tide was setting seaward, so
if nothing unusual happened we would soon be standing out. The dark
outlines of the Blanco Encalada began to take more definite shape, but
all was quiet on board of her.
By the time the men finished their coffee Zachary Green came on deck,
and then he gave the order to “heave short.”
In a few moments all was noise and bustle on the forecastle-head. The
clanking of the windlass mingling with the hoarse cries of “Ho! the
roarin’ river!” and “Heave down, Bullies,” broke the stillness of the
quiet harbor.
“Anchor’s short, sir!” roared Gantline’s stentorian voice from the
starboard cathead. This was followed by an order to sheet home the
topsails. In a few minutes we broke clear and swung off to starboard
with the fore-and main-yards aback. Then we came around and stood out
with the ebb-tide, the light breeze sending us along with good steering
way.
In a short time we hauled our wind around the point, and, with
everything drawing fore and aft to the puffs that came over the
highlands, we started to make our offing, leaving the Blanco Encalada
with her brass-work shining in the first rays of the rising sun. We had
gone clear without mishap, but although we were making six knots an hour
off the land, we knew the breeze would not hold after the sun rose. As
we expected, it fell before the men had finished breakfast, and we lay
becalmed a few miles off shore on a sea of oily smoothness.
The passengers came on deck to take a last look at the harbor astern,
and their voices sounded pleasant to the ear as they held forth on the
beauties of a morning in the South Pacific.
These passengers were both clerical-looking men, and were fair types of
the missionaries who live on the islands of the South Sea. They had
engaged passage to the States more than a week before we sailed, and
since then were almost inseparable. Their clothes were of some dark
material, much alike in cut, but their faces and head-gear were in
marked contrast.
The younger one had a smooth, sallow face, without a sign of beard, and
wore a low black hat with a broad rim. The other looked to be ten years
older, apparently a little over fifty. His face was as brown as a
sailor’s and an enormous beard covered it almost to the eyes, which
sparkled merrily from under an old slouch hat. His hair was also long,
and his figure was of gigantic build.
“I was speaking to those poor fellows in the prison there only
yesterday,” the younger one was saying, as I came aft, “and I did my
best to cheer them, but they were both much set against spiritual
consolation; and the one, McManus, stole my pocket-knife with its saw
blade, which I used to carry to cut cocoanuts.”
“How do you know it was he who took it? Might not you have lost it?”
asked the big man, with a smile.
“Do you suppose I would bear false witness against any man?” replied
the younger, in a tone of reproach. “I noticed he came close to me while
I was praying for him, and felt his hand touch me, but did not know my
loss until after I left the prison. It will do him little good, however,
as he and his companion in crime are to be shot this morning. It is
probably just as well, for I know that those sailor men are a wicked lot
and much given to wine, women, and desperate deeds.”
“Ah!” said the big man in a deep voice, “it is probably true; but you
are rather severe on sailor-men, for all that. These sailors are an
intelligent lot for the most part. And think you, dear friend, that
there is probably not one who would not rather marry a sweet, good woman
and live a pleasant and pious life, even as we ourselves do. We do this
because we have money to maintain our positions; but the sailor has our
feelings and longings without the means to gratify them, and, as he is
intelligent enough to see that his life is hopeless, he gets as much
pleasure out of it as possible and hesitates not at a desperate deed for
gain.”
“Charity is very good and noble, but it gives me great pain to hear you
express such unsound views as that. If it were not for the many noble
deeds you have done for the islanders, I should be tempted to shun you
as a recreant I trust you only jest, but it is even ill to jest on such
subjects,” answered the younger, with a flushed face and a voice
vibrating with suppressed feeling.
The big man made no answer to this, but suddenly called his companion’s
attention to several large “alberco” which had followed the ship until
she lay becalmed, and then plunged and jumped like so many porpoises in
the wake. We drifted slowly all the morning, and about noon the
sea-breeze set in from the southward and sent us along at a comfortable
rate. Nothing occurred to make it necessary for a man to go aloft in the
foretop, and those who had gone up the main and mizzen in the early
morning had noticed nothing unusual. The platform in the top was as
large as that in a full-rigged ship, so the men who were hiding were not
visible from the deck as long as they lay flat on their backs or faces.
Gantline had decided to tell the skipper the whole affair of the night
before, but the old man was in such a bad humor that the mate delayed
telling him until the prospect of a serious burst of anger was less
apparent.
The day wore on and the bark held steadily on to the westward, making
from eight to ten knots an hour. After supper the skipper came on deck
with his passengers and they were soon joined by Miss Green. They sat
aft around the taffrail and chatted, the men smoking and very much at
their ease.
Miss Green was of an extremely religious disposition, but it was easy to
see that it was not entirely the devoutness of the younger passenger
that attracted her to him. There was a mysterious power about the man
that was apparent to any one after being an hour in his company.
Something in his deep, vibrating voice, when he was talking, appeared
to hold the attention, and I, more than once, looked at him as he sat
next to the skipper’s daughter, holding forth on matters of the church.
Zachary Green was still in a bad humor because of his low freight money,
and it was evident that he would ease his pent-up feelings on some one.
He had listened to the talk of the missionaries with ill-concealed
contempt, whenever they fell to discussing their ecclesiastical affairs,
and now he asked the younger abruptly when he was to return.
“Ah,” replied he, “I shall return as soon as possible, for my flock will
get along poorly without me. I have converted many chiefs, who wrangle
among themselves, as has also my friend here.”
The skipper turned with a look of disdain at the big-bearded man who
appeared to understand the implied interrogation and hastened to answer.
“It is true, I have converted many to the Christian faith,” he said, in
a low voice, “but I shall not return to the islands of the Pacific, for
I think there is a better field nearer home. Not that I believe my
labors wasted, for the converted natives never stole anything but
ammunition and utensils, while the others stole everything from me they
could lay hand to. Not that the effort was entirely vain, I say, but
that better work can be done among our own people, such as sailors, for
instance.”
“Eh! What’s that?” growled Zachary Green, as he listened to the last
part of this sentence. “What do you mean by sailors?” and his eyes
flashed ominously.
“Why, go among them, and see that they get the proper books in the
libraries sent out on vessels for them to read, for instance.”
“Now, by Gorry! you are talking some sense. Instead of whining around
among a lot of good-for-nothing niggers, like your friend here, you’ll
really do something if you follow that up. Yes, sir, if you’ll only put
something in these libraries besides ‘Two Years before the Mast,’ Bible
dictionaries, and the like, and get some police reports nicely bound,
along with some yarns like ‘Davy Crockett,’ you’ll be a blessing to
sailors, and skippers, too, for that matter. No, sir, don’t play fool
with those islanders any further. They were all right before they ever
saw a Christian, and they’ve been all wrong ever since. Hang it, you
talk like a man of sense, after all, and I hope what I’ve said won’t be
lost on you.” And as he finished his peroration he stood up and looked
astern.
“Hello!”
Before the astonished missionaries could say a word the skipper started
for his glasses, and, seizing them, he looked steadily at a faint trail
of smoke which rose above the horizon directly in the vessel’s wake.
“Now, by Gorry! That’s strange,” he muttered. “There’s no steamer bound
out to-day, and yet that fellow seems to be standing right after us.”
“Mr. Gantline!” he called, as he turned towards where the mate stood.
“Go aloft with the glass and see if you can make out that fellow astern
of us.”
“Aye, aye, sir!” answered Gantline. And he took the skipper’s glass and
made his way leisurely up the main-ratlines.
From the lower top he could see nothing but a black funnel and masts
without yards, so he went higher. On reaching the cross-trees he looked
forward, and there, lying prone on their stomachs, were the two hiding
men. Their eyes were straining at the vessel astern, and even if
Gantline had not already made out who she was, one look at those faces
would have told him. He came on deck and returned the skipper’s glasses
without a word, and then started forward, but Zachary Green stopped him.
“Could you make her out?” he asked.
“Well, there isn’t much of her rising yet, but I suppose she’s the
Blanco Encalada,” he answered.
“Seems to me it is hardly time for her to put to sea,” growled the
skipper, “and she’s heading almost the same course as we are. It is
generally the way with you, though, after you get ashore on the beach,
and it will take a week to soak the liquor out of you so you can see
enough to know a downhaul from a clew-line.” And the old man turned back
to his passengers.
Before two bells in the first watch that evening it was blowing half a
gale to the southward out of a clear sky, and the old bark flew along on
her course with everything drawing below and aloft.
There was no sea running, so she heaved over and drove along at a rate
that bade fair to keep the Blanco below the horizon for several hours.
As it grew late the air became quite chilly, and the skipper went below
with his passengers.
The moon rose and shone with great brilliancy, so that our towering
main-skysail must have been visible a long distance, while the foam
flaked and surged from the vessel’s black hull as white as a mass of
liquid silver. All night we drove along with nothing visible astern, and
at daylight the hull of the steamer was still below the horizon. At
seven bells Zachary Green came on deck.
“Name o’ thunder! What’s he after?” he growled, as he gazed astern. “By
Gorry! It is the Blanco, after all, Gantline; but what makes him hold on
like this? We are going to the westward of Juan Fernandez, and that is
more than a hundred miles out of his course.”
The mate made no answer, but went on with his work overseeing the
washing down of the quarter-deck. “It’s just like those Dagoes to go
running all over the Southern Ocean for no other purpose than to wear
out their gear and burn coal,” continued the skipper. “If this wind
keeps slacking up, he ought to be abreast of us before noon, though I
never knew this old hooker to send the suds behind her at the rate she’s
been doing all night. Breakfast! did you say? Well, steward, just give
those sky-pilots a chance to shake off the odor of sanctity they’ve
slept in and put on their natural one of hypocrisy and gin-and-bitters.
Pshaw! there’s lots lazier men than missionaries in the world, though I
can’t call to mind exactly where I’ve seen them. Mr. Gantline, you may
let her head a point more to the north’ard.” Saying this, the skipper
took a last look at the approaching steamer and then disappeared down
the companion-way.
Although the vessel still raced along at a rate that sent the foam
flying from her sharp clipper bows, she was no longer doing her utmost,
and the Blanco rose rapidly in her wake with the black smoke pouring
from her funnel.
Suddenly, while Gantline was watching her, she appeared to be enveloped
in a white cloud of steam. Then there was a sharp, shrieking rush as
something tore its way through the air close to the
main-top-gallant-yard, and struck the smooth sea almost half a mile
ahead, followed by the sullen boom of a heavy rifled gun.
The rush of the shot brought Captain Green on deck, closely followed by
his passengers.
“Gorry! what’s the matter?” he bawled, as he rushed to the taffrail,
while the younger passenger, who had followed close at his heels, smiled
grimly.
The Blanco came driving heavily along a couple of miles astern. She was
rapidly drawing up.
“Wants us to heave to, I suppose,” growled Gantline, and he eyed the
skipper suspiciously.
“Man alive!” roared Green, “why in the name of thunder don’t you do it,
then, before he cuts the spars out of us? Fore-and main-royals, there,
quick! Let go by the run. Main-clew-garnets--all hands!” And the skipper
bounded onto the poop and cast off everything he could lay hands on.
The bark was soon luffed and her main-yards backed. Then the Blanco came
abreast, and all hands had a chance to look into the muzzles of her
ten-inch rifles, which were trained towards us. A swarm of men crowded
the deck of the ironclad while a boat shot out from her side and
approached us rapidly, with a short, thick-set man in uniform sitting in
the stern-sheets.
Zachary Green stood at the break of the poop, scowling at him as he
swung himself lightly into the mizzen-channels and leaped onto the
quarter-deck, followed by six men. Hardly had he done so when the
younger of our two passengers drew a heavy revolver from somewhere about
his back and fired point-blank at this officer.
The Chilian was in the act of drawing his sword and the hilt was across
his breast at that instant. The bullet intended for him struck the hilt
and flattened on the brass. The next instant there was a rapid
fusillade, the six Chilians firing together, and the passenger with a
six-shooting revolver in each hand, backing away behind a cloud of
smoke.
It was all over in half a minute. Three of the blue-jackets were dead
and their officer badly hurt when the firing ceased. The passenger
tossed his empty pistols over the side and staggered aft, and not one of
the survivors dared follow him. He gained the after companion-way, and
as he did so the figure of the captain’s daughter appeared on deck. I
could see her face pale as she caught the look in the passenger’s eyes,
but she said no word. He went to her, kissed her lightly, and passed on
to the starboard taffrail. The Chilians now recovered themselves and
rushed for him. He climbed over with difficulty, but did not hesitate.
Then he plunged headlong into the sea before any one could seize him;
and as we rushed to the side we could see his body sink slowly down into
the green depths until it finally vanished.
The skipper, Gantline, and the big missionary stood looking on in
amazement, and then the wounded officer turned towards them.
“That was Señor José Huaticara; of course you did not know.” And he
nodded to the skipper. Then the dead were placed in the boat, while a
tourniquet was passed around the officer’s leg to stop the flow of blood
until he could reach his ship. In a few moments he and his men were on
their way back to the Blanco.
Zachary Green stood staring after them without a word. The name of the
dead desperado was too well known to him to protest against the manner
he was treated while on an American ship, but he desired some
explanation.
The Blanco dipped her colors, and he came to his senses. “Hard up the
wheel, there!” he bawled. “Stand by the lee-brace!” and the bark paid
off again on her course.
The ironclad headed away to the northward and in a few minutes was a
couple of miles away on the starboard quarter.
“I met him only a week ago,” explained the big missionary, in answer to
the skipper’s look, “and I thought, of course, he was what he claimed to
be.”
Zachary Green give a grunt of disgust and went aft.
“Mr. Gantline,” said he, as he met the mate, “are there any more
missionaries aboard this ship, for if there are we will put them ashore
on Mas-á-Fuera.”
“There are two more,” answered Gantline, looking the skipper in the
eyes.
“Show them to me,” said the skipper.
Gantline went forward and looked aloft.
“Come down from there!” he bawled, and two lean figures stood in the
foretop and then painfully descended the ratlines before the astonished
gaze of the crew.
When they gained the deck they followed the mate aft to Zachary Green,
who stared at them in amazement.
“We are off soundings and that fellow has no right to board me,” he
said, “but if you belong to that José gang, I’ll signal for him to come
back for you.”
“Faith, an’ if we did, Captain Green, it isn’t such a crowd av
cutthroats as ye seem to belave,” said McManus. “The fact is we’re just
broke away from bein’ shot fer no more than th’ carryin’ av a few
Remingtons. I see ye remember me, so for th’ sake av auld times ye
better give us a passage to th’ States an’ not make Crusoes av us on
the Fernandez.”
Zachary Green looked at Gantline.
“It’s the truth,” said the mate.
“Truth be hanged! Who says it’s the truth? I’ll----”
At that moment a slight figure appeared at the companion-way, and the
next instant Miss Green seized her father’s arm. He turned roughly, but
there was something in the poor girl’s face that made him look to her.
She led him below, and the escaped men stood staring after her.
“You fellows can turn to with the men forward,” said Gantline. And they
went.
A little later Zachary Green came on deck again and stood looking
silently over the bright Pacific. He stood there by the taffrail looking
long at the eastern horizon. No one approached or spoke to him, for all
knew Captain Green when his mind was full of unpleasant memories.
_A BLUNDER_
About three o’clock in the morning Garnett slid back the hatch-slide and
bawled, “Cape Horn, sir!”
Captain Green was asleep, but the news brought him to his feet in an
instant, and stopping just long enough to complete his toilet, which
consisted of gulping down four fingers of stiff grog, he sprang up the
companion-way and was on deck.
It was broad daylight, although the wind had shifted to the northward
and brought with it a thick haze which partly obscured the light of the
rising sun. Some miles away on the weather-beam rose a rocky hump,
showing dimly through the mist; but its peculiar shape, not unlike that
of a camel lying down with its head to the westward, told plainly that
it was the dreaded Cape. Beyond it lay Tierra del Fuego, now almost
invisible, and past it swept the high-rolling seas of the Antarctic
Drift.
Captain Green stood blinking and winking in the crisp air of the early
morning as Garnett walked up. It was January and daylight twenty hours
out of twenty-four, but it was cold and the morning watch was a
cheerless one. The old mate came up and pointed to the northward.
“It’s the Cape, I make it, though it don’t show up mighty high. We’ve
been holding on like this most of my watch, but it’s been getting a
dirty look to the west’ard,” and as he spoke he leaned over the
weather-rail and spat into the foam, which drifted past at the rate of
six knots an hour.
“It’s the Cape, right enough,” said Zack Green; “and if we can hold on a
few hours longer we ought to weather the Ramirez and get clear. How’s
she heading now?”
“Sou’west b’ sought,” answered the man at the wheel.
“Well,” said Green, “there’s almost four points easterly variation here,
so that brings her head a little to the s’uth’ard of west b’ south. Let
her go up all she will, Mr. Garnett, and call me when we make the
Ramirez. I don’t believe much in that drift; it’s all in that big
easterly variation. Watch the maint’gallant-sail if it begins to come
down sharp from the north’ard,” and as he finished speaking the skipper
disappeared down the companion-way.
Garnett sniffed the air hungrily as the odor of stiff grog disappeared
also.
“’Tis a pius drink, s’help me, ’tis a pius drink,” he muttered. “Yes, a
truly moral beverage, as they would say in the islands; but there’s no
use thinking a dog of a mate will get any pleasure in these days of
thieving ship-masters.” He walked fore and aft in no pleasant frame of
mind, glancing at each turn at the distant loom of the land on the
weather-beam.
“How d’ye head?” he bawled to the man at the wheel, in total disregard
for the skipper and sleeping passengers.
“Sought b’ west a quarter west, sir,” answered the helmsman.
“Well, what in the name of the great eternal Davy Jones are you running
the ship off like that for?”
“She’s touchin’ now, sir, an’ goin’ off all the time.”
“Going to----” but before he could finish the maintop-gallant-sail came
aback against the mast.
“For’ard there! clew down the maint’gallant-sail!” he roared, ad he
looked sharply to windward, where the giant Cape Horn sea came rolling
down through the deepening haze.
“Maint’gallant-sail!” echoed the cry forward, as the men sang out and
jumped for the halyards, while some of the watch sprang into the
ratlines and made their way aloft.
“Come, bear a hand there! Get that sail rolled up and lay aft to the
mizzen-top-sail.”
The vessel was driving along at a comfortable rate in spite of the heavy
sea, and it looked as though she might give the grim Cape the slip and
go scudding away on the other side of the world. A few hours running to
the westward with the wind holding and she would go clear. But the giant
sea began rolling down from the northwest, growing heavier, so by the
time the maintop-gallant-sail was rolled up and eight bells struck it
had the true Cape Horn heave to it.
Mr. Gantline came on deck to relieve the mate, and he soon had the ship
dressed down to her lower topsails. It was not blowing more than an
ordinary gale, but the tremendous sea made it dangerous to force the
vessel ahead, so she drifted and sagged off to leeward. The “sea-calmer”
was rigged forward, and soon the water to windward had an oily look,
while the wind, catching up the tops of the combers, hurled a spray down
upon the ship that made shroud and backstay, downhaul, and clew-line
smell strong of fish-oil, as they cut the wind like bow-strings and
hummed in unison until the volume of sound swelled into a deep booming
roar.
“Let her come up all she will!” bawled Garnett into Gantline’s ear, as
he started to go below. “If she sags off any more you better call the
old man, for it looks bad. By the way, Gantline, where’s that bottle of
alcohol the old man gave you for varnishing the wheel? I’ve got one of
his porous plasters on my chest, and the blooming thing has glued itself
to every hair on my body, and I can’t get it adrift.”
“It’s in the right-hand corner of the boson’s locker,” said the mate,
with a grin. “But go easy, Garnett. The old man put a spoonful of
tartar-emetic into the stuff, ‘for,’ says he, ‘tartar-emetic makes the
varnish have a more enduring effect against the weather.’”
“Sink him for a scoundrel!” growled Garnett, his little eyes flashing
and beard bristling with rage. “It’s always something he’s doing to make
bad feeling aboard ship. Why should he suspect a man of drinking raw
spirit, hey?”
“Why, indeed,” said Gantline.
And Garnett went below muttering a string of fierce oaths.
At six o’clock the gale had increased, and the noise of the bawling men
struggling with the fore-and mizzentop-sails awakened the skipper, who,
fearing all was not well, hastily made his toilet again and appeared at
the head of the companion-way.
“How is it now?” he asked of Gantline, who stood near the wheel.
“Gone off two points, and there’s an almighty sea running. I’m
shortening her down fast. Whew!”
As he spoke a great hill of water full forty feet high rolled down on
the weather-beam. The ship headed it a couple of points and sank slowly
into the slanting trough. Then she began to rise to it. The combing
crest struck her forward of the main-rigging, and with a roar like
Niagara crashed over the top-gallant-rail. It hove her down on her
bearings and filled the main-deck waist-deep, while the shock made the
skipper and Gantline clutch for support. The next instant Green sprang
on to the poop.
“All hands there!” he bawled. “Get that fore-top-sail on the yard!”
Garnett came struggling on deck, muttering something about being afloat
in a diving-bell, and was almost washed off his feet by the roaring
flood in the waist. In a few moments he was on the foreyard bellowing
out orders to the men stowing the topsail.
The uproar and cries of the men startled the two passengers, Dr. Davis
and his wife, who had undertaken the passage at a physician’s advice.
The physician, knowing nothing at all about the sea, had unhesitatingly
recommended a sea-voyage for the Reverend Dr. Davis as a certain cure
for the nervous ailment from which that gentleman suffered. The strain
at being face to face with death so often was doing wonders for the
minister, and he in turn was doing what he could for the crew. All
except Mr. Garnett had profited much by his presence on board, but the
mate stubbornly held out against any form of religion.
“Keep the main on her as long as it will hold!” bawled Green. “It looks
as if we will catch it sure.” Then, catching a glimpse of Dr. Davis’s
face at the companion-way, he added, “I’ll be hanged if I ever overload
a ship again and run such risk.”
The minister stepped out on deck.
“Good-morning, doctor; we are having a touch of the Cape this morning,”
cried the skipper.
“So it seems; is the Cape in sight?”
“No; but I guess you’ll see it again before we get clear.”
“Mr. Garnett said he thought we would make some northing to-day. He does
not believe in so much easterly variation, but says it is the drift that
makes it appear so. It seems to me an easy thing to decide.”
“Garnett be hanged!” snorted Green in disgust “He will get into trouble
some day with his fool’s ideas. Hello! there goes the steward with the
hash,” and the skipper dived below, where he was followed by his
passenger.
Garnett appeared at the table, but Mrs. Davis kept her bunk, as the
plunging ship made it difficult to eat with comfort. No one spoke during
the meal, as the crashing noise from the straining bulkheads drowned all
sounds save the roar of the elements on deck.
Garnett stopped in the alley-way to light his pipe and get a few whiffs
before relieving Gantline. Then he made his way to the poop and stood
close to the mizzen, trying to get shelter from the wind and spray,
while Gantline went below.
Dr. Davis came on deck and found the second officer trying to smoke, so
he joined him.
“It’s harder to be mate with a man like Green than anything I’ve
tackled,” said he. “I’ve been to a few places and seen a few men in my
day, but most of them would reason things out. There’s no reason in
him.”
“What’s the matter?” asked Dr. Davis.
“It’s all about variation now. He’s always trying to work off
new-fangled notions on me. When I first began coming around this way the
drift was good enough to figure by.”
“But hasn’t it been proved?”
“Proved nothing. How’s a man going to prove he’s steering north when
he’s heading nor’west in a three-knot drift with nothing to get a
bearing on? I’ll allow there’s some variation in a compass, but nothing
like that. Besides, he does other unreasonable things. There’s no reason
in him.”
“Well, I suppose it is hard to get along with unreasonable people,” said
the minister; “but there are some things we know are true without being
able to reason about them. For instance----”
“No, sir,” interrupted Garnett. “There ain’t anything we know about
anything unless we can reason it out. You have your ideas and I have
mine; that’s all there is to it.”
“Fore-staysail!” bawled the skipper from the wheel, and that piece of
canvas was run up, quickly followed by the trysail on the spanker-boom.
Dr. Davis, left alone, started aft. He went safely along until he
reached the middle of the poop, when a heavy sea struck the vessel and
made her heel quickly to leeward. The minister tried to seize the rail,
but missed it, and the next instant fell headlong into the seething
water alongside.
Garnett was not ten feet distant working at the trysail, and without a
moment’s hesitation he seized a downhaul and plunged overboard with the
line about him.
The passenger arose with a look of peaceful resignation on his face
which contrasted strongly with the old mate’s fierce expression of
determination. As the vessel was making no headway against the sea it
was less difficult than it appeared to seize the drowning man and give
the signal to haul away.
In another minute Garnett was on deck again with Dr. Davis, neither of
them much the worse for their bath. The cold, however, made it
necessary for them to change their clothes.
The gale held on all day, but nothing unusual occurred. At eight bells
that evening Dr. Davis had recovered sufficiently to again venture on
deck. It was Gantline’s dog-watch, but as there was as much light as
there had been during the day, Dr. Davis kept him company.
“Mr. Garnett is a very hard man to convince when he has once set his
mind against a thing,” said the minister. “There’s no way of showing him
he is wrong when he has made a mistake.”
“That’s true enough, especially if you try to rough him. He’s mad to-day
because the skipper found fault with his swearing at the men.”
“He does swear most horribly,” said Dr. Davis.
“It’s nothing to what he used to. He don’t realize he does it at all
now.”
“How do you mean?”
“Why, he used to be a most blasphemous old cuss. One day he went ashore
at Tinian, and the missionary there asked him to dinner. When he asked
Garnett what he would have he sung out, ‘Gimme a bowl of blood, ye tough
old ram of the Lord,’ just to shock the good man. The missionary rose
and ordered him out of the house, but Garnett wouldn’t go, so he struck
him over the head with a dish of fried plantains, he was that mad.
Garnett was two days getting over the stroke, for he had been stove down
before by a handspike in the hands of a drunken sailor. He always
thought the good man had called a curse down upon him, and since then
he’s been slow at figures.”
“I see,” said Dr. Davis.
“Yes, it’s a fact, you’ve got to show a thing pretty plain to Garnett
before he believes it. As to that missionary, he wasn’t overbright at
converting savages.”
“What do you mean? That he wasn’t strong enough physically?”
“No, no, love ye, no; that missionary could take care of himself and not
half try. What I mean is downright religious and Christian argument.
There was one chief he never could convert. The fellow had an idol, the
most uncanny thing I ever saw; sort of half bird, half beast, part fish,
and having a strain of dragon. He used to pray to the thing, although he
could speak English well enough and had seen plenty of white men. The
missionary told him it was wrong to worship anything in an image of
things in the heavens above, the earth beneath, or waters under the
earth, and the chief took it all kindly. The good man finally gave him
up, but the chief never could tell why. Once he offered to bet the
missionary two wives against a bottle of rum that there wasn’t anything
in the heavens above or earth beneath that resembled the strange thing
in any way; and as the good man couldn’t prove it, the matter ended.”
The gale increased as the night wore on, and the vessel lay to on the
port tack and drifted off with her head pointing northwest by north, but
she was to the westward of the Ramirez. It was Garnett’s watch and the
skipper was below. The ship was driving off to leeward, and the skipper
determined to wear ship and stand to the southward again if she was
headed off any farther. Garnett had orders to report any change which
might take place.
The old mate had a chart in his room with the variation marked on it
above the fiftieth parallel, some ten degrees less than where he now
was. But even this variation appeared excessive to him, and, as the
skipper told him to report if the vessel’s head fell off to the eastward
of north, he held on. Figuring on a two-knot drift, he would not be in
the vicinity of the rocks during his watch even if she headed as far as
north by west, for at noon she had made a good westing.
The ship’s head was to the eastward at four bells, but, as there was
really over twenty degrees’ variation, Garnett held on and made sail
whenever he could. Long before his watch was out the vessel had been
making little leeway and reaching heavily along under lower topsails. At
seven bells the wind hauled again to the southward and came harder than
ever, carrying the foretop-sail out of the bolt-ropes.
The noise of bawling men brought the skipper on deck, and he had the
mizzentop-sail rolled up and the fore-staysail ready for waring ship.
While he stood on the poop he looked to leeward. The mist seemed to
break into rifts in the dull light of the early morning, and through one
he saw an object that made him catch his breath. In an instant the
flying spume closed in again and all was blank.
Garnett came aft, and, although it was cold, he took off his sou’wester
and mopped the top of his bald head as he glanced at the skipper. The
old man stood petrified gazing into the blank to leeward. Then he turned
on the mate with a savage glare in his eye. “Get all hands on that
fore-staysail, quick!” he roared, and Garnett went plunging forward, the
skipper’s voice following him and rising almost to a shriek,--“Loose the
jib and foresail!” Then turning, he dashed for the wheel and rolled it
hard up. Back again on the poop he roared to Gantline, who came plunging
out on the main-deck to loose the foretop-sail.
The men started to obey orders and sprang to the halyards and braces,
looking over their shoulders to leeward at each roll of the ship to find
out the cause of the excitement.
Suddenly the flying spume broke again, and there, dead under the lee,
lay the outer rocks of the Ramirez not a mile distant. Then some of the
crew became panic-stricken, and it was all the mates could do to keep
them in hand.
“There’s no land there!” roared Garnett “H’ist away the fore-staysail.”
Then the ship’s head paid off, while the staysail tore to ribbons under
the pressure. The topsail was loosened, and it thundered away to bits,
almost taking the topmast with it. The jib followed suit, but together
they lasted long enough to get her head off before the wind. Then
Garnett, casting off the weather-clew of the reefed foresail, hauled it
down far enough to keep the wind under it, and away they went. In a few
moments her head swung to on the starboard tack, and as they hauled the
wind a deep thunderous sound rose above the gale. The trusty
maintop-sail was trimmed hard on the backstays, and all hands waited
with eyes straining to leeward.
“Will she go clear?” asked Dr. Davis, calmly, as he stood by the
skipper’s side on the poop. But Green’s teeth were shut tight, and the
muscles of his straining face were as taut as the clews of the
storm-topsail. Nearer and nearer sounded that dull, booming thunder, and
now, right under her lee, they could see the great white rush of those
high-rolling seas that tore over the ledges and crashed into a world of
smother that hid everything beyond in a thick haze.
“She’ll go clear,” said Garnett, and he took out his handkerchief and
mopped the dent in his bald head.
“But it’s a d--d close shave,” answered Gantline.
As he spoke a great rolling sea rose on the weather-quarter, lifting
full forty feet from trough to crest as it began its shoreward rush. On
and on it rolled in majestic grandeur, a gigantic, white-topped mass,
until it vanished into the thick haze of flying spray, but still bearing
more and more to the northward. They went clear.
Dr. Davis was not present at a little conversation held between Mr.
Garnett and the skipper some minutes later, but during the mate’s next
watch on deck he found a chance to speak to him. He saw him standing
under the mizzen watching the main-top-sail, and he crowded close into
the mast, wiping his spectacles.
“Well, what do you think of it now?” he asked.
“Nothing,” growled Garnett, “except I made a mistake; and if I’d held on
ten minutes there’d have been thirty more men gone to a lower latitude,
that’s all.”
“But think of the responsibility. How would you have felt with the lives
of thirty men on your conscience? Don’t you see, we have to accept some
truths without stopping to reason them out. There may be no reason for
that variation, but you see it exists, after all. It is the same way in
regard to the duty we owe our Maker, and I am afraid you will
acknowledge it only after you have ‘held on too long,’ as you admit in
this case. As for a man going to a lower latitude, as you call it, there
is no such place. A man’s hell is his own conscience.”
Garnett remained silent for some minutes watching the clews of the
maintop-sail, and appeared to be absorbed in deep thought.
“Maybe you’re right about there not being any hell below, and maybe
you’re not,” he finally said. “I hope you are right; but I’ve had some
experience in my day, and had all kinds of luck, both good and bad. It
don’t seem probable I’d strike it as rich as that. No, sir, it ain’t
probable; though, of course, it’s possible.”
And Dr. Davis left him standing there with a strange, hopeful gleam in
his eyes.
_TO CLIPPERTON REEF_
This rather singular expedition left San Francisco under the direct
charge of Professor Frisbow, of the West Coast Museum. While an entirely
private affair, its object was to secure specimens of several of the
almost extinct species of pelagic fish.
The vessel used for the purpose was a small sealing schooner of about
seventy-five tons, and the crew, including the captain and mate,
consisted of five able-bodied men. The rest of the party were the
professor and myself.
As we were both good sailors, the size of our vessel did not
inconvenience us, so that, after fitting up two state-rooms in the
cabin, we found, although a little crowded, we were as snug “as weevils
in a biscuit”
The wind was blowing almost a gale when we towed out between the heads
of the bay, and as it came from the northwest, a stout pea-coat was far
from uncomfortable while walking the narrow limits of the quarter-deck.
The setting sun shone red on the rolling hill-side of North Head, where
herds of cattle cropped the short grass of the highlands. In the clear
atmosphere small objects were visible with strange distinctness. To the
southward the jets of spray shooting skyward told plainly of the heavy
sea that fell upon the Seal Rocks. Our skipper shook out the double
reef he had in the mainsail and determined to drive his vessel off shore
as far as possible while the fair wind held.
It was nearly dark before the tug gave a short whistle for the men
forward to cast off the tow-line, and as the last light on the western
horizon faded into shadow the head-sheets were flattened and we stood
away to the southwest.
Clipperton Isle or Reef lies 10° 17´ north latitude and 109° 10´ west
longitude. The distance on a straight course being but little over
fifteen hundred miles from our starting-point, but as the northeast
trade is very light and unsteady along the coast of the continent, we
deemed it wiser to take the regular sailing route to the southward and
make our easting afterwards.
The first twenty-four hours out were uncomfortable enough, as the heavy
sea caught us fair on the starboard beam and made the stanch little
vessel roll horribly. Gradually, however, the wind hauled more to the
northward and we made better weather of it. Our Bliss log registered two
hundred and fifty-four miles for the first day’s run, and on the fourth
day out we picked up the trade in 26° north latitude and headed away due
south.
Our reason for selecting this almost unknown spot for our field of
operations was owing, principally, to the reports of the captains of two
whaling ships who had been consulted in regard to our object, and also,
I fear, to the keen desire of my companion, the professor, to explore
this curious island.
Fish of several varieties which we desired to procure abounded along the
southern coast of California, and the California Gulf swarmed with
almost every species of shark except the one we wished for. We had
finally decided, however, to stick to deep water, and had procured the
schooner for a small amount and the services of Captain Brown, an old
whaleman, who had been in the vicinity of the island on several voyages.
During the first week out we had an opportunity to get acquainted with
our skipper, who with his mate occupied the starboard side of the
after-cabin.
Old Captain Brown was a typical whaling skipper and as crusty an old
sailor as one could wish to sail with. He had acquired the true sailor
habit of finding fault with everything, and divided his time between
making sarcastic personal remarks to the mate and cursing the men.
As for Garnett, the mate, I had sailed before in his company and knew
him thoroughly. He had been nearly everything that was bad, and had been
in every part of the world. He was fifty-five and over, but he was one
of the roughest and toughest specimens of humanity, both morally and
physically, I had ever seen. His hairy chest bore a mark where a bullet
had passed through, the calf of his right leg was twisted where a
bayonet had penetrated, for he had been a soldier, and the index-finger
of his left hand was missing. Besides these trifles he had a large
dent, nearly half an inch deep, on the top of his bald head, where a
sailor had “stove him down” with a handspike. This was the only injury
he had received that had ever given him much trouble, and sometimes the
pain in his head affected his eyesight.
In spite of his ugly record and many drawbacks I knew him to be the best
sailor that ever handled canvas and worth a whole ship’s company in an
emergency. Therefore we let the skipper rate him, and while he confined
himself to sarcasm and insolence I believed Garnett would not turn
rusty.
It was not long before Captain Brown found out the mate’s defect in
vision, and at about the same time he was convinced that he was also the
greatest liar afloat. After this he used to amuse us by calling out
“Ship ahoy!” and gazing steadfastly at a part of the blank horizon.
Then, if Garnett was near, he would discuss the ship in detail, and the
mate would swear positively, with great emphasis, “My God! but that’s
the old Moose,” or some other vessel he had sailed in; and then the
skipper would suddenly break off and begin to walk fore and aft with
rapid and excited strides. When he would reach the vicinity of Garnett
he would look up at the main-top-sail and wish to know, in a loud voice,
why in the name of Ananias all the liars were not struck dead. Then he
would storm and swear at all people who ever told the truth, and thank
heaven he never told the truth when he could possibly help it; all of
which noise had about as much effect on Garnett as if he had been
pouring water gently into the dent in his oily bald head.
“Aren’t you afraid to curse and call on the Lord so often?” I asked,
during one of his fits.
“’Fraid o’ nothin’. Do you suppose the Lord minds my cursing at such a
fellow as Garnett? What difference does it make, anyhow? The Lord never
yet answered either prayer or curse of mine.”
“Yes,” I replied, “but Garnett might, and then----”
“He might, might he? Now, by all thunder, I guess not. He might as well
git it through his head that if there’s any swearing to be done I’ll do
it. Yes, sir, I’ll do it, s’help me----” And here he broke off into a
string of such expressive profanity, relating to gods, devils, and men,
that Frisbow came up from below to listen.
On the morning of the tenth day out we crossed the twelfth parallel, and
at noon we hauled our wind and headed straight for the island as located
by Sir Edward Belcher.
On the fifteenth day the wind left us in 10° 43´ north latitude and
about 113° west longitude, or nearly two hundred and fifty miles
westward of the reef. Here we encountered the most trying part of the
whole voyage out. For two days the log registered less than a ten-mile
run, and the four following less than twenty.
Finally, after ten days of drifting, we sighted the island, one bright
morning, almost directly over our knight-heads. As the wind was light,
our skipper feared to approach within less than a mile of the shore, as
there was danger of drifting into the breakers. There were hundreds of
fathoms of water close in near the beach, and it was useless to think of
anchoring, so we hove the vessel to about a mile to leeward.
After setting the shark line the boat was put overboard, and the mate
and one man proceeded to pull us to the shore.
On arriving close to the island the surf was found to be too heavy to
make a safe landing, and we were compelled to pull around to the
entrance of the lagoon on the south side. We landed with little
difficulty inside the entrance, and, securing the boat, proceeded to
explore the reef.
Lying low in the water, it presented a peculiar and, at the same time,
beautiful appearance. No part of it was over ten feet above the sea, and
it lay shaped into a most perfect oval. On the outside of the circle the
beach was of snow-white coral, which, as it sloped away seaward on the
north side, reflected various shades of green and blue through the clear
water.
On the south side the sea had just the faintest milky color, showing
that there was a slight set to the southward.
We devoted the whole day to exploring the reef, and only returned on
board when darkness made the schooner almost invisible.
As we passed through the entrance we made soundings, and found a depth
of five or six fathoms nearly all the way across, or enough water for
quite a large vessel to pass through. On getting aboard we found that
the skipper had caught several desirable specimens for our collection
and had sighted a small sperm-whale about a half a mile to windward just
before dark. This had stirred his blood, and he had been cursing his
luck heartily at our staying ashore in the boat when we might be after
big game, for we had several irons and a few tubs of line on board and
also a bomb-gun.
After supper we were so worked up by listening to Captain Brown’s
whaling yarns that we decided to have a try at the first whale sighted.
At daylight the next morning Garnett sung out to the skipper that there
was something off the weather-beam. We turned out and found the sea just
ruffled by a light air and the sun shining fiercely out of a cloudless
sky. On searching the horizon we found nothing visible except the reef,
which lay some three miles to the northward.
All of a sudden we noticed a blur of white to the westward, and Frisbow
immediately went below for the glasses. Garnett sung out again from
forward and pointed at the blur, then, thinking we could not see
anything, he came aft to where we stood.
By this time both the skipper and Frisbow had their glasses, and were
just in the act of focussing them upon the object when it suddenly
vanished.
Captain Brown began to mutter something about people who saw so many
strange things, and Garnett removed his cap to wipe the perspiration
from the dent in his head.
“What kind of vessel can it be?” asked Frisbow.
“I’ll be hanged if I know,” I answered.
“Might be the Flying Dutchman,” suggested Garnett, with his usual
gravity.
This was too much for the skipper, and he warned Garnett that such jokes
were out of place among intelligent men and liable to be followed by
disastrous consequences, and then added that “Most people knew a whale
when they saw it.” Suddenly the blur appeared again. This time it lasted
for over a minute. It was not a “blow,” and I was just about to ask the
skipper what he made it out to be when he quickly shoved his glass into
my hand and told me to “look quick.”
I did so, and saw that the blur was a great cloud of spray and foam
thrown up from the sea. Instantly a large gray object rose from the
churned water, then fell again in the thick of it, and I recognized the
form of a huge thresher-shark. He appeared to land heavily upon the
whale, for that animal, after lashing the sea furiously, sounded, and
presently the disturbance subsided.
After breakfast we saw a blow half a mile to windward, and the skipper
said it was the same whale we had noticed in the early morning.
We didn’t stop to argue the question, but hauled the whale-boat, that
was towing astern, alongside and made haste to get the gear into her.
Leaving the schooner in charge of the three men, all of whom were
picked sailors, the rest of us manned the boat and started out. Captain
Brown took his place in the bow as harpooner and boat-steerer, while
Garnett and the professor pulled bow and stroke oars respectively,
leaving me to handle the steering oar.
The sea was almost like glass, and under the skipper’s direction we
rapidly approached our game. My heart beat so with excitement that it
seemed to choke me as we silently drew head on to the monster, the
skipper motioning with his hand which way he wanted me to steer. Then we
shipped the oars carefully and took out the paddles for a close throw.
All of a sudden he raised the iron and hurled it at the black mass
ahead. Garnett and Frisbow backed water as hard as they could, and in an
instant there was a tremendous splash as the animal fluked and sounded.
The skipper stood by the line, while the professor took up the bomb-gun,
determined to have the honor of shooting the beast.
The whale didn’t go down far or stay long below the surface, but when he
did come up he came with a rush that took him clear of the water and
almost aboard of us. The surging splash he made as he fell alongside
nearly swamped us with the sea and sent Frisbow over the thwart into the
bottom of the boat, while the lance came near lodging in Garnett’s neck
as the gun exploded in the air.
Old Captain Brown stormed and swore, and, calling Garnett to tend the
line, he picked up the gun and began loading it himself as I passed him
a charge, while Frisbow scrambled to his feet and asked if he had
“killed him.”
A hoarse chuckle from Garnett warned him of his mistake, but before any
one could answer the skipper passed him the gun again and sprang forward
to the line. I looked over the side, and suddenly noticed a dark spot in
the clear depths directly beneath us growing rapidly larger. Putting
forth all my strength, I swung on the steering oar to slue the boat to
one side, and it was just by good luck I managed to do so in time. I
heard an exclamation from the skipper, and saw Frisbow standing with the
gun ready, when, without an instant’s warning, the great bulk of the
whale rose alongside close enough to touch. The professor fired with the
muzzle not two feet from the animal’s body, which, as it fell alongside,
half filled the boat with water.
Instead of sounding again the whale swam slowly away, towing us after
it. Captain Brown started to load the gun, and had just put in the
powder charge when the whale slowed up and began blowing rapid jets of
crimson spray.
“We’ve got him now,” he said, and laid down the gun to wait for the end.
In about ten minutes the animal was motionless upon the water, and after
waiting a little longer we hauled alongside. He was a small sperm-whale,
not over thirty feet in length, with about enough blubber to make a
“twenty-barrel,” as he was termed by the skipper. We made a line fast to
him and then sat and waited for the schooner, that was creeping slowly
up from leeward with the light breeze. The heat was terrific as we sat
there in the open boat, and it was long past noon before the schooner
picked us up.
After dinner Frisbow, myself, and two men manned the boat to tow the
whale ashore. We worked the schooner in as close as possible to the
entrance of the lagoon, and then we had to work into the lagoon in the
small boat with a white-ash breeze. We finally landed our prize inside
the entrance, and Frisbow turned to work at once to get off the skin.
This appeared to be a useless object, but as he was bent upon it there
was nothing else to do.
During the whole of the following week he was ashore nearly all the time
with one or two men, and sometimes, when the wind was light and we
drifted well off, it was nearly midnight before he would get aboard. It
was while this work was progressing that the incident occurred which
caused all our troubles.
Frisbow and Garnett had both tried to persuade Captain Brown that it was
the best and safest place for the schooner inside the lagoon, as there
was plenty of water and quite smooth anchorage. The skipper, like a true
deep-water sailor, dreaded the proximity of the beach even worse than he
did fresh water on his skin, and he was several times made furious at
the idea of putting his vessel inside the lagoon.
One day after Garnett and Frisbow had gone ashore, where they had been
hard at work at the whale, I told the skipper that I would look out for
the vessel, and he went below and turned in.
The two men left on board were idling about the galley. One of them, the
one who acted as cook, sat in the doorway and worked a pan of “duff”
which he held between his knees.
The schooner had her mainsail set and hauled flat aft, while her jib was
drawn to windward, thus heaving her to in the light air that barely
ruffled the surface of the ocean. There was not a cloud in the sky, and
only a dull haze tempered the fierce heat of the sun.
I had the wheel lashed hard down and lay at full length on the quarter,
trying to keep in the shadow of the mainsail. I smoked a cigar and gazed
at the eddies that drifted from the vessel’s side to windward.
After about an hour, when I had smoked my cigar down to a stump, I was
aware that the wind had died out entirely and that it was oppressively
hot on deck. I lounged aft and leaned over the rail and tried to see if
I could distinguish anything moving on the island, but could not, and
the distant hum of the surf was the only sound that broke the painful
stillness.
Suddenly the hum of the surf seemed to grow louder. I turned to look to
the westward, and in an instant saw the ocean whipped to foam along the
horizon.
“All hands!” I yelled, and sprang to the peak halyards.
I let them go by the run, and had just cast off the throat when with a
rush the white squall struck us just forward of the weather-beam. One of
the men let go the jib halyard and tugged at the downhaul and managed to
get the sail half down before the full weight of the wind struck us. The
mainsail, hanging half way down the mast, thundered away at a great rate
until it split from head to leach, while the little schooner lay on her
beam ends, letting the water pour in a torrent down the open
companion-way.
In less than five minutes it was all over. The wind slacked up as
suddenly as it began, and the vessel slowly righted. Captain Brown
clambered on deck half drowned from the flooded cabin and helped to get
in what was left of the mainsail. We got all the canvas in, but the sea
was as calm as before, except for the swell stirred up, and there was
not enough wind to fill a topsail.
“White squall, eh?” inquired the skipper as soon as we had the sails
secured.
“It was some kind of a squall,” I said; “but there was no warning
whatever of its coming.”
“There never is,” he answered, with a sickly grin. “I wonder how much
water we’ve got into us. If it had held on five minutes longer we’d have
passed in our papers, sure; and, as it was, I am all but drowned. It
seemed as if the whole ocean poured into my bunk and held me down.”
We found the cabin half full of water, and it took us all day to get
things straightened out below, while the men unbent the split mainsail
and began to repair it.
When Garnett and the professor came on board that night they were
astonished at the damage done, for there had been no sign of wind on the
reef.
In the schooner’s hold we found everything in a mess, and all our
fishing-gear and lines piled up on the port side in one big tangle.
Garnett managed to pick out the bomb-gun and some irons from the pile,
and Frisbow, after wiping the gun, had the cook fill it with beef tallow
to keep out the rust.
That night we held a council, and, as there were three to one for going
inside the reef, the skipper’s objections were finally overruled, and it
was decided that we should remain in there until work on the whale was
finished. The next morning at sunrise we headed in through the entrance,
and by noon were moored snugly enough on the inside.
The work of skinning the whale was soon accomplished, and the skin was
staked out, with one or two of the sharks we had captured, and left to
the care of the professor.
I did not fancy the work of getting out the animal’s skeleton, as the
stench from the body was now unbearable, so I spent my time in procuring
specimens of a more attractive sort from the clear waters of the reef.
I had been thus engaged for several days, and was returning to the
schooner one evening, when I heard a deep booming sound that seemed to
fill the air about me. The ground under me trembled violently and it
was with difficulty I kept my feet I hurried towards the schooner, and
met Frisbow on the beach opposite where she was moored. His face
expressed great anxiety, and he asked me if I had felt the earthquake. I
replied that I had, and wondered what would happen next. He didn’t
answer, but I could see that he was more excited than I had ever seen
him before.
When we reached the schooner Garnett was being rated by Captain Brown
for having suggested bringing the vessel into such a hole. The skipper
had felt the shock, and swore that we would have the accompanying tidal
wave in about half an hour, adding that if it caught us in there we were
as good as dead men.
It was not quite dark, so without a moment’s delay we made sail and
stood for the entrance. There was no wind to speak of, and the skipper,
fearing that we might drift into the breakers, had Garnett and the three
sailors man the whale-boat and tow us to keep up good headway.
I took the wheel and Captain Brown went forward to direct our movements.
We went straight for the middle of the cut, while the sun dipped below
the western horizon and the sudden tropic night fell upon the ocean. The
moon was a few degrees high in the east, and we knew that there would be
plenty of light, anyhow, to steer by, as we kept slowly on.
In a little while we neared the entrance, and it looked as if we would
be on the open ocean within half an hour, when all of a sudden I heard a
harsh, grinding sound, and the schooner, with a slight jar, became
motionless. The skipper came rushing aft and peered over the taffrail,
muttering a string of oaths through his set teeth.
“What is it?” I asked, as I left the wheel and rushed to the rail.
He said nothing, but dived below for a lead-line. In a moment he was
forward again and flung the lead overboard, but I noticed that the line
failed to run out.
“What is it?” I asked again.
He turned his face towards me, and I saw its ghastly expression in the
moonlight.
“God knows,” he growled, “but we are hard and fast on the reef, and
there isn’t half a fathom of water anywhere ahead of us.” He bawled for
Garnett to come on board, and I heard the startled exclamations from the
men in the boat as they hauled in the tow-line and came alongside.
In a moment the skipper jumped into the boat with the hand-lead and
started off through the entrance.
I could see him making soundings for nearly a quarter of a mile ahead as
they glided over the calm moonlit water, and then the boat was put about
suddenly, and she came for the schooner. Frisbow and I went to the side.
“We’re in for it now,” said the skipper, with an oath, as he clambered
on deck. “The whole bottom seems to have raised up, and there isn’t
enough water to float a junk-barrel across the whole cut.”
“Come, bear a hand!” he yelled to Garnett. “Get a line out aft and we’ll
see if we can kedge her off; we can’t lay here all night.”
Frisbow looked at me and I at him, but we said nothing. We were caught
like a rat in a hole, and the only thing to do was to get the schooner
afloat and wait for daylight, when things might not be as bad as they
appeared.
There was no time to speculate until we got the schooner off the ledge,
so we lent a hand and got the kedge into the boat, and Garnett bent on
the tow-line and dropped astern.
In a few minutes he came on board, and all hands tailed onto the line to
haul her off. We hauled and tugged, but it was no use, we couldn’t start
her. Finally we passed the line forward to the windlass, and after half
an hour’s heaving we had the satisfaction of feeling the little vessel
slide off into deep water again. There was nothing to do but to go back
to our moorings, so, sending the boat ahead again, we towed back and
made fast at our old berth, all hands quite worn out with our exertions.
There was no thought of rest, however, for any of us; our case was too
bad for that. We were in no immediate danger, but we were cut off from
the world as suddenly and as effectually as if we were confined on the
moon. Our provisions would last six months with care, but even in that
time the chances were against our sighting a vessel in that locality.
As soon as the schooner was safely moored we went ashore and explored
the reef, but there was no apparent change in any part above water. The
skipper was beside himself with rage at being caught, and blamed Garnett
for the whole affair. Garnett said little and mopped his head frequently
with his handkerchief, but I fancied I saw a peculiar gleam in his eye
when the captain became more than usually violent.
After spending the whole night trying to work out some solution of our
difficulty, we came to the conclusion that the only way was to strip the
vessel, heel her over on her bilge, and force her through the entrance.
We discussed every possible method of lightening her, and the skipper
finally thought that by taking everything out of her except her masts we
might get across the reef with what little current there would be to
favor us.
As soon as it was daylight we started for the entrance to examine it
carefully and find the deepest water. The air was hot and still, and the
water of the lagoon had a greasy look.
The first thing that attracted our attention was a large, dark object
that rose on the reef where yesterday there had been nearly fifty feet
of water. All eyes were directed to it as it lay there like a huge mass
of coral weed with great festoons hanging from its sides.
Suddenly the skipper sprang to his feet “My God, it’s a ship!” he cried.
All hands stopped rowing and turned in their seats, when Garnett, who
was steering, bawled out to “Give way together!” and we headed straight
for it.
As we approached, we saw that it was the hull of a large ship lying on
its bilge, but so covered with marine growths that its outline could
hardly be traced in the great mass. It lay well out, and the wash of the
surf broke against the stern; this is the reason we didn’t notice it
during the night. There were three or four feet of water around it, so
we forced the boat through the floating weed until we were alongside.
Garnett clambered to the deck amidships closely followed by Frisbow and
myself. We made our way aft aloft along the slippery incline by clinging
to the weed that covered everything, and reached a large hole that had
evidently been the entrance to the cabin. The whole design of the ship
was strange and different from any modern vessel I had ever seen. We
peered down the opening, but could see nothing inside except
various-colored marine growths.
The professor was for going below instantly, but Garnett held back and
contented himself with examining the steering-gear, where he was joined
by the skipper.
Frisbow let himself down the opening and I, feeling ashamed to let him
go alone, let myself down after him.
The cabin was dark inside, for the windows were covered with weed, but I
could make out the form of the professor as he groped his way along the
slippery floor into the darkness forward.
After going a short distance into what appeared to be a large saloon the
grass seemed to grow thinner and I stood up and looked about me. As I
did so my head came in sharp contact with a curious brass lamp which
hung suspended from one of the deck-beams. My exclamation caused Frisbow
to join me, and together we examined the strange fittings about us.
A table and some chairs, which were fastened to the floor, still held
their shapes although covered with grass and slime, and from the strange
carving on their legs, which was still visible in places, the professor
pronounced them to be Spanish.
A little farther on we came to a bulkhead with two doors, which were
open and led into an inky black space beyond. The professor struck a
match, and we saw that both doors had short companion-ways leading to a
cabin on the berth-deck and that the ladders were sound although covered
with slime. The match went out, but Frisbow instantly struck another and
started down. We reached the floor of a small cabin, which had two doors
on each side and which was quite free from the heavy sea-growth we had
encountered above. There was a table in the centre and the frames of
several heavy chairs, while from above hung a large brass lamp covered
with verdigris and similar in pattern to the one I had encountered with
my head.
Striking another match, we entered the first door to the right. There
was nothing in it but a large wooden chest, which lay open and contained
a pulpy and slimy mass. In a bunk was the same material, while on the
bulkheads were green brass rods which had evidently held some sort of
drapery that had long ago succumbed to the action of sea-water. In the
other rooms we found several old matchlock guns almost entirely rust and
also half a dozen long straight swords. On a shelf was a tinder-box of
brass with the flint as good as new, but the steel was a brown lump.
There were a number of rusty knives and several brass frames, together
with a lot of glassware and crockery. Some of this rubbish crunched
sharply underfoot in the ooze, but everything else not of wood or iron
had decayed beyond recognition.
The professor was down to his last match when we came across a small
chest in the last room. It was of iron but not heavy, so I took it under
my arm as we made for the companion-way.
It gave me a nervous feeling to be down in the black, slimy hold of that
lost ship, and I was rather glad to start for the deck again. Before we
reached the ladder the professor’s last match was out, and we groped our
way aft as best we could, encumbered with all the spoils we could carry.
The silence and darkness made me hasten my steps, when just before I
reached the ladder a terrific yell echoed through the blackness, causing
me to drop everything and start with a sudden terror. Then in a moment
the skipper’s hoarse voice bawled down to us from the door above,
wanting to know if we intended to remain aboard all the morning. The
old sword I had was too rusty to be of any use, otherwise I think I
should have run him through the body; so, cursing him loudly for his
impatience, to the professor’s great amusement, I picked up my things
and mounted the ladder.
On reaching the deck we found Garnett had discovered a brass gun lying
on the port side of the ship, and he was busy spinning a yarn to the men
in the boat, when the skipper bawled out for them to lend a hand to get
our stuff aboard. We placed the iron box in the stern and, jumping in,
started to examine the cut for a channel to get to sea.
We had only been on the wreck a few minutes, but we had no desire to
remain any longer until we found a way out of the lagoon.
After sounding all the morning we found the depth pretty much the same
all the way across, and we now noticed that the whole reef appeared much
higher on the south side than before. The part above high-water also
showed many seams and fissures that we had not seen there when we first
examined it.
About noon we headed for the schooner, feeling anxious and depressed.
Frisbow was more sanguine than the rest of us about lighting the
schooner and forcing her across the barrier, but I knew it would be a
desperate undertaking when we struck the breakers, that now rolled clear
across the entrance.
When we reached the schooner we pried off the lid of the iron box and
found a mass of discolored pulp, at the bottom of which was a brass
plate with the word Isabella cut upon it in large characters.
We were so tired out with our exertions that as soon as we had something
to eat all hands turned in for a short rest before beginning to unload
everything on the beach. This appeared to be the only way out of the
difficulty, and the skipper’s anxiety increased at every delay.
In the afternoon we began to get the gear out of the hold, and soon had
the deck covered with stuff of all kinds to be sent ashore. As we had to
break out some of our provisions, we closed the hatchway that evening on
account of the heavy dew that fell at night.
After supper we started to load the boat, but as the men were tired they
worked slowly. Garnett was growing ugly under the continual nagging by
the skipper, and once Frisbow started to remonstrate with the captain
for directing his abuse against the mate. This only had the effect of
precipitating matters, and Garnett, who was passing some of the gear
into the boat alongside, threw down the coil of rope he had in his hand
and swore a great oath that he would not do another stroke of work until
the skipper “mended his jaw tackle.”
This drove the old man into a frenzy, and before we could stop him he
grabbed a harpoon and poised it to hurl at the mate.
“You mutinous scoundrel,” he yelled, “I’ll show you who’s captain of
this craft!” Quick as thought he threw the iron, and I believed
Garnett’s end had come.
Quicker still did the old sailor spring to one side, and, grabbing the
bomb-gun, let drive at the skipper’s head, while the harpoon drove clear
through the port bulwarks and hung there. The recoil of the gun sent
Garnett staggering backward, while the captain, throwing up his hands,
fell like a log across the hatchway. Frisbow and I stood horror-stricken
for an instant and then we rushed to the captain’s side. I expected to
find half of his head torn off by the shell, but, although his face was
black with powder and the blood oozed from his mouth, he appeared to
have no wound whatever.
We carried him aft and laid him out in his bunk, Garnett lending a hand
as if nothing had happened between them. Then the professor went for the
medicine-chest.
After washing blood, grease, and powder from the old man’s bruised face
and applying a little spirits between his swelling lips, he suddenly
opened his eyes and saw Garnett standing close by. He made a quick
movement as though to rise, but Frisbow held him down. Then seeing we
had mistaken the motive, he smiled a ghastly smile and held out his hand
in the direction of the mate.
Garnett stepped forward and took it and their eyes met.
“You’ve killed me fair and square and I don’t bear you any malice,” said
the captain with great difficulty.
“Killed nothing,” growled Garnett, with half a smile; “I only blowed a
gallon or two of tallow into your whiskers; you were so almighty quick,
you know.”
Here the skipper muttered an oath and tried to get up again, but Frisbow
and I both held him quiet.
“You lie quiet to-night,” said the professor; “there’s no tremendous
hurry about this business, and to-morrow this dizziness will be out of
your head.”
He poured out a stiff glass of spirits, which the captain gulped down,
and, after bandaging up the lower part of the bruised face with wet
towels, we left him and went on deck.
Garnett kept chuckling to himself during the evening as we loaded the
boat, and when the moon came up he and two men started to carry the load
to the beach.
While they were absent Frisbow and I sat on the rail and discussed our
chances of getting to sea again in a few days. I did not like to tell
him how small our chances were, for he appeared to have perfect
confidence in our ability to float the vessel overland on a heavy dew if
it became necessary.
The boat had been gone about an hour and the moon was now high in the
cloudless heavens, and I was getting sleepy, so I lit my pipe and smoked
hard to keep awake. The water shone like a polished mirror of silver,
and the dark outline of the reef loomed distinctly through the night on
all sides. We could hear Garnett and the men talking on the beach as
they unloaded the boat, but besides this there was not a sound on that
desolate spot save the deep hum of the surf outside the barrier.
My thoughts turned to the wreck, which shone like a black speck in the
white wash of the sea, and we talked of how she had probably run on the
ledge in the night, years ago, and then slid off into deep water. Her
crew, even if they were rescued, must have died over a century ago, and
there was little chance of our ever finding any record of her loss. That
she was a Spanish ship and her name Isabella I felt quite certain; but
even that fact conveyed little knowledge to any of us.
While we sat on the rail and talked a deep booming like thunder suddenly
broke the stillness about us, and the little vessel trembled violently.
We started to our feet and listened as the great volume of sound filled
the air around us, dying away gradually in pulsations. We heard the
cries of the men on the beach, followed by a few moments of silence;
then the booming began again and lasted a few seconds, dying out as
before.
“I suppose we’re about as safe here as anywhere,” muttered the
professor; “but I must say that is the most terrific sound I’ve ever
heard.”
We waited ten or fifteen minutes in silence, when the stillness was
broken by the wash of oars as Garnett started to come aboard. We could
not see the boat against the dark outline of the shore, but we could
hear the clank of the rowlocks, and I leaned over the side, knowing it
would be in sight in a few moments.
As I watched the water I was suddenly aware of a strong current setting
past the vessel towards the entrance, and at the same instant Frisbow
uttered a startled exclamation. In an instant the boat showed clear in
the moonlight and Garnett’s voice bawled out for to throw him a line.
Seizing the main-sheet, I threw it to him as the men were bending to the
oars as if rowing through a rapid. The man forward caught it and hauled
alongside, all hands wasting no time in clambering to the schooner’s
deck.
“It’s a tidal wave, sure,” grunted Garnett, out of breath. “Look out for
the hatches.”
In less than a minute we had everything lashed down forward, and then
all hands came aft to the companion-way of the cabin. As we stood there
we heard a deep murmur from the northward and westward, which gradually
increased as the seconds flew by.
“How are the anchors?” asked the professor of Garnett.
“Every fathom of the best Norway iron tailing to each one,” answered the
mate; “but they’ll never hold if the sea comes over the reef.”
Suddenly the deep murmur swelled into a thundering roar. The schooner
strained at her cables as the water flashed past, and then above the
reef we saw a hill rise white in the moonlight with its crest ragged and
broken against the night sky. The very air shook with the jar of that
foaming crest as it fell with a mighty crash on the reef and went over
it.
“Get below!” roared Garnett, and we tumbled down the companion into the
cabin, the mate pulling the hatch-slide after him and fastening it.
The skipper had sprung from his bunk when the roar had awakened him, and
stood looking at us in dismay as we tumbled below. In an instant I felt
the schooner rise as, with a deafening, smothering crash, the surge
struck and passed over her. She seemed to mount into the air and fly
through space for nearly a minute. I found myself lying on the port side
with my feet against the deck-beams and my hands stretched out against
the cabin floor. The next instant she righted with a jerk and I found
myself lying on top of Garnett in the middle of the cabin. The water
poured through the crack of the hatchway and down the skylight, so for
an instant I supposed we were at the bottom of the sea. Garnett,
however, flung me aside and started for the deck.
The schooner made a few sharp rolls and then partly steadied herself on
an even keel as the mate slid back the hatch-slide. Instead of tons of
water pouring down upon us, as we looked up we caught a glimpse of the
full moon in a clear sky, and I don’t remember anything that looked half
so beautiful as it did to me at that moment.
We scrambled on deck and looked about us. There, a quarter of a mile
away to the northward, lay Clipperton Reef, quiet and peaceful on the
bosom of the calm Pacific Ocean. Not a thing was left, save a few
streaks in the moonlit water which looked like tide-rips, to show that
any disturbance had taken place.
As for the schooner, our bowsprit and foretop-mast were missing, and the
main-boom was broken at the saddle, but our lower masts were all right.
The bits forward were torn completely out of her with the surge on the
anchors, and her decks were swept perfectly clean, but when we sounded
the well and found only two feet of water in the hold we knew we were
safe. She had gone over the reef on the crest of the tidal wave and had
not even touched it. Whether we went through the cut or not it was
impossible to tell.
The boat was gone, so we could not go ashore again even if we wanted to,
but the professor was the only one who showed the slightest inclination
in this respect, and after we assured him of the loss of his specimens
he showed even less than the rest of us.
The skipper stayed on deck during the remainder of the night while we
worked the schooner away from the breakers. As there was no wind we had
to do this by means of a drag, which one man carried forward and dropped
overboard, while the rest of us tailed on to the rope which led through
a block on her quarter. By midnight we were out of all danger, and,
after putting the foresail on her, we divided into our regular watches
again.
The next morning we went to work to repair damages, and by noon we had
all the lower sails set. A light air drifted us slowly to the westward,
and before night we saw the reef for the last time.
We had nearly a hundred valuable specimens in the hold, and, considering
our bad luck, we were not entirely unsuccessful. Frisbow fretted a good
deal about his whale, but when we struck the trade-wind his spirits rose
so high at the prospect of being home again in a few weeks that even
this loss was forgotten.
The skipper and Garnett got along together splendidly, and there was
less swearing done on board during the run home than probably ever
before among five sailors afloat. The only great inconvenience was the
loss of our galley, which caused us to have to cook in the cabin and eat
with the forecastle mess things.
On the sixty-first day out we sighted the Farralone Islands, and that
night we were ashore in San Francisco.
After being ashore about a month I was astonished one day to find
Professor Frisbow’s card at my lodgings asking me to call at once on him
at the Museum. I did so and found him greatly excited. Without giving me
a chance to ask questions he immediately began to tell me about the
wreck we saw on the reef.
“She was the Spanish ship Isabella,” he said, “and I want your
confidence in the matter I’m going to arrange.”
I promised secrecy, and then he told me that upon looking up old records
he had found there was a ship by that name lost with all hands somewhere
in the Pacific, and that she was fairly loaded with silver bullion.
I did not place much faith in the matter, but told him I would try and
get a vessel to take him back there if he wanted to go.
He was much disappointed at my reception of his scheme, but he
accompanied me to Garnett’s boarding-place, where we discussed the
matter with that sailor at the risk of losing everything.
After a little talk the mate finally convinced Frisbow that the wreck
was either washed off into deep water or torn to pieces by the sea that
carried us over the reef, so that in either case it would be useless to
hunt for the treasure.
This ended the matter so far as the professor and I were concerned, but
I heard afterwards how Garnett had bribed the skipper of the next ship
he sailed on to put in there and examine the place.
No one ever knew if he found anything, for the captain and he were the
only ones who went ashore during three weeks spent there, but it was his
last voyage, for he afterwards bought a little farm up the valley and
lived quietly with a very young and pretty girl for a wife.
_THE TRANSMIGRATION OF AMOS JONES_
After supper Zack Green came on deck, and, seating himself on the bitt
coverings near the port quarter-rail, lit a villanous looking cigar and
began to smoke.
We had run into the southeast trade and were reaching along to the
southward under skysails. It was just seven bells and O’Toole, the first
mate, had half an hour more of his watch on deck. The evening was clear,
and the lumpy little trade-clouds flew merrily away to the northwest.
Not even a skysail halyard had been touched for a week, so O’Toole
lounged carelessly fore and aft on the quarter-deck, stopping at every
turn when he reached the skipper to see if he had anything to say.
In good weather Captain Green’s discipline was not too strict, and he
would often talk to the officer on watch. “I was thinking,” said he,
without taking his eyes from the horizon-line, “about this
transportation or emigration of souls you hear so much about nowadays.
You know what I mean,--one person’s soul getting the weather-gauge of
another’s; and do you know, by Gorry, I believe there’s some truth in
it”
“Sure! No fear, ’pon me whurd; I know it’s a fact,” said O’Toole.
“There’s no doubt of it.”
“I was just thinking av a case in hand, an’, ’pon me whurd, ’twas
typical av th’ machination. D’ye remember owld man Crojack? But ye must,
fer he was one av th’ owld shell-back wind-jammers av yer time, an’ a
man to decorate a quarter-deck.
“Ye remember th’ time he took Mr. Jones to Chaney? That’s th’ case in
hand. ’Twas transmigration av sowl fer sowl, sure.
“He was a contumacious rask’l, this Jones, an’ ’twas by this token I
came to like him.
“His governor offered Crojack one thousand dollars if he would take him
to sea an’ bring him back again minus th’ unaccountable thirst he had
fer iced wines an’ owld liquors. An’ th’ owld man did it.
“There was money enough in th’ Jones family. But that is where th’
trouble came in. Th’ young divil must have had nigh onto a ton av stuff
sent outside th’ bar to meet us th’ day we sailed. Bottles av all kinds
came over th’ rail whin th’ owld man lay th’ topsail to th’ mast an’
waited to see what th’ small boat ahead av us wanted. Crojack didn’t
object, fer he reckoned to lock th’ stuff in th’ lazarette an’ sell it
at a fair figure in Hong-Kong. I remember th’ outfly th’ youngster made
over th’ grub. We were living better than any ship in th’ Chaney trade,
an’ more like a man-o’-war than any trader afloat, but nothing would do
him.
“Wan morning he came to th’ owld man an’ said there was a bug in his
bunk. ‘Likely as not,’ said Crojack; ‘’pon me sowl, there’s wan in
mine.’
“If it hadn’t been fer me th’ owld man would have made out av th’ wines,
but when he had th’ stuff locked fast th’ young man came to me, so
sorrowful like, I didn’t have th’ heart to refuse him th’ loan av a
capstan-bar. Thin we went halves, an’ as fast as we’d drink th’ stuff he
would fill th’ bottles with good salt water an’ put them back again.
“‘Faith, ye have th’ makin’ av an uncommon nose on ye,’ said th’ owld
man one day to th’ young Jones. He was suspicious av th’ color. “’Tis a
good rule not to belave anything ye see an’ nothing ye hear,’ said that
Amos, cocking his eye at me. An’ th’ owld man never thought to examine
his lazarette till we made Singapore. Thin we came near having a mutiny
aboard.
“After this we grew mighty quiet, fer our grog was cut off intirely, an’
we began to nose around fer something to scratch. Jones drank all th’
Worcestershire sauce from th’ cabin mess, an’ wound up on th’ alcohol av
th’ varnish tins in th’ carpenter’s room.
“I was feeling blue, an’ by th’ time we struck into th’ hot calms av th’
Chaney Sea I was seeing queer things. Wan stifling, foggy morning I
could stand it no longer, fer I’d had a nightmare that set me shaking. I
went aft to th’ owld man an’ said, all tremblin’ like, ‘Captain, there’s
something wrong on this here ship, an’ I had a bad night last night.’
“‘Anything wrong for’ard?’ said he. ‘I thought ye were man enough to
manage a lot av fellers like these.’
“’‘Tain’t that,’ I said. ‘Nothin’ th’ matter there.’
“‘Well, what in blazes is it?’ he roared. ‘Out with it. What’s th’
matter with ye?’
“I must have looked pretty rough, fer he kept his eyes on me, staring
like, but I was a little nervous about telling my suffering. Finally I
had to let it come.
“‘It’s like this,’ said I. ‘Last night I lay out on the main-hatch
durin’ my watch below. I was draming av Billy Malone’s wake,--Bill, yer
know, that used to be mate with Cutwater,--an’ I could see it all so
plain, even Bill’s pet goat. Th’ goat had a pigtail as long as yer arrum
hanging right under his chin, an’ his eyes were bad looking. I gives th’
baste a kick, an’ Malone that’s dead sat right up an’ grinned horrible.
Thin he called fer water, an’ it seemed like th’ new taste was too much
fer him. He drank an’ drank an’ swelled an’ swelled till he got as big
as th’ mainsail, an’ all th’ time I heard th’ splash, splash, splash av
th’ liquid washing down his innerds. Thin he seemed to overshadow me an’
thin draw slowly away, beck’ning me to follow. An’ I tried to follow an’
woke up. ’Pon me whurd, fer a fact, may th’ saints belave me, there he
was drifting off th’ port beam, an’ I could hear th’ splash, splash,
splash fer a minute afterwards.’
“‘Is that all?’ said th’ owld man.
“‘No, sir; ever since we struck this calm, three days ago, I’ve been
feeling quare like, an’ I ain’t slept overmuch--an’, an’--well, if ye
have a drap av th’ craythur it would do me good.’
“‘Go for’ard an’ send th’ carpenter aft, an’ then come here.’
“So I did, an’ whin I got there th’ owld man give me an uncommon long
grog.
“‘Now,’ said he, ‘clear away th’ after battery an’ get out th’ muskets.
Ye air a fine dramist, Mr. O’Toole.’ So I lent a hand an’ got th’ two
six-pounders we carried on th’ poop clear fer firing. Thin I looks out
th’ muskets. Amos Jones came on deck an’ saw th’ manœuvres.
“‘What t’ell!’ said he. ‘Be ye going to engage in an engagement? Where’s
th’ inimy?’ For th’ wasn’t a rag above th’ sea-line.
“‘Pirits,’ said Chips, ramming a bag av powder into wan av th’ guns.
“‘Ye don’t tell!’ said Amos.
“‘Fact,’ said Chips; ‘an’ now if you’ll pass me a ball I’ll finish this
roarer.’
“But there wasn’t wan aboard. No, sir; powder there was in plenty, but
divil a ball aboard th’ ship.
“Th’ owld man swore, an’ we hunted all tween-decks, but ’t wasn’t any
use, so we dealt out th’ muskets an’ waited for night.
“Pretty soon Amos Jones came on deck again.
“‘I have it,’ said he. ‘Here’s th’ thing,’ an’ he held up a bottle
filled full av bullets an’ nails. ‘Stave me, but this is good
ammunition; ’twill fit to a T.’ An’ sure enough it did. It fitted th’
bore av th’ little guns exactly. A most uncommon bad thing to have hove
at ye close up.
“Th’ fog held an’ at night it was blacker than th’ inside av th’ galley
stove-pipe. We had begun to laugh at th’ skipper, but he said nothing,
except that we’d see something before morning or else he’d put me in
irons fer the biggest liar afloat. I was tired that night, but I kept
awake an’ was leaning on th’ port rail about midnight. Suddenly I heard
a rippling in th’ calm ocean off th’ port beam. I passed th’ whurd an’
we lay waiting, Amos standing at th’ lanyard av th’ port gun.
“All av a suddin we saw thim. Two junks right alongside jammed to th’
rail with pigtails.
“‘Turn her loose!’ bawled th’ owld man, an’ Amos let her go slap into
thim. That bottle burst close aboard, fer ye never heard sich yelling.
Thin they ranged alongside an’ was fast to us, an’ they swarmed over th’
rail like so many rats.
“Well, there was bloody murder aboard us fer half an hour. ’Twas a nasty
fight an’ things looked bad at wan time. But Amos trained a culverin
down th’ main-deck an’ gave thim ground glass, bullets, an’ lug-bolts to
th’ quane’s taste.
“Thin we cleared up th’ mess an’ they let go. But Amos had got it bad.
“A big pigtail had hit him a chip in th’ thick av his leg, an’ he was
bleeding fer further orders.
“There we were, two days’ sail from Hong-Kong, an’ no doctur aboard.
“We tied him up th’ best we could an’ drew th’ hooker with th’
quarter-boats ranged ahead. Finally th’ air come an’ we went along.
“Whin we made th’ harbor we had th’ doctur, an’ he said,--
“‘Lost too much blood.’
“‘Well,’ says Crojack, ‘there’s plenty av it in Chaney.’
“‘Fact,’ said th’ doctur, an’ he brought th’ first loafer he found
aboard.
“‘Now,’ says he, ‘I’ll have sum av yer juice, me boy, an’ pay ye tin
dollars fer it.’
“Th’ Chaneyman was scared at first, but th’ doctur said he would have
him skinned alive if he wouldn’t trade, so he finally did.
“He guv him some spirits an’ hitched th’ yeller boy’s artery to Amos
Jones’s. Thin th’ natur av th’ proceedings did th’ rest.
“We shut off grog on th’ voyage home an’ Amos acted like he was trying
to become a dacent member av his father’s church. Whin he landed an’
said good-by, Crojack was making his reckoning fer that thousand
dollars.
“He went to th’ office wan day an’ there he met Amos Jones senior, an’
he reminded th’ gent av his debt. ‘What?’ bawled Jones. ‘Cured him, do
ye say? Well, he was bad enough before, drinking like a gentleman, but
ye’ve ruined him intirely. Here he is getting biled rice cooked fer
every meal an’ getting drunk on Chaney saki every night. No, sir, not a
cent from me, sir.’ An’ they say he cried like th’ good owld father he
was.”
O’Toole stopped here and went to the break of the poop. When he
returned, Zack Green was thinking. “It may be so,” said the skipper;
“but did you ever hear what become of the Chinaman?”
“That I did,” said O’Toole.
“What?” asked Zack Green.
“Well, Amos Jones was a frind av mine, so, if ye’ll excuse me, I’ll not
say. ’Pon me whurd, I won’t.”
_MURPHY OF THE CONEMAUGH_
All deep-water ships carry mascots. As the mascot must be some kind of
living creature, a cat will often supply the necessary medium for
carrying on pleasant intercourse with the fickle goddess of fortune. But
men on deep-water ships must be fed, especially those who live in the
after-cabin or who help to form what is called the after-guard.
Therefore it is not an uncommon sight to see a ship’s deck looking like
a small farmyard afloat.
The clipper ship Conemaugh was noted for her long voyages. She was a
product of the old school of wind-jammers and her skipper was a Yankee
of Calvinistic views, who
“Proved his religion orthodox
By apostolic blows and knocks.”
He met little Murphy, the ship’s pig, the morning the youngster was
brought aboard. The little fellow was in the arms of his sponsor, James
Murphy, able seaman, and the way he kicked and squealed made the black
moke of a cook poke his head out of the galley door and grin.
“Take good care of that fellow,” said the skipper. “Them white hogs air
wuth two black ones on the West Coast, so if we don’t have to eat him I
kin swap him off easy enough.”
So Murphy was put in a pen under the top-gallant-forecastle, and Jim was
detailed to scrub him and otherwise attend to his wants. With all this
care it would seem that he could hardly help becoming a good pig. But he
was like many youngsters who have the best of care lavished upon them;
that is, he was thrown with mixed company. It is very hard, however, to
separate the sheep from the goats, and as luck would have it Murphy’s
lot was thrown with Jim, the sailor who had the worst reputation among
the mates of any man aboard the ship.
The day the vessel put to sea the skipper mustered the men according to
his custom, and made them an address.
“The master,” said he, “air greater than the servant, and the servant
ain’t above the master.” Here he looked straight at Jim. “So saith the
holy gospel,--an’ whatsoever saith the gospel is er fact,--an’ is truth.
If it ain’t, I’ll make it so if I have to take the hide off every
burgoo-eating son of a sea-cook aboard the ship.”
There were many men aboard there who had heard little of the Scriptures,
but even if they had heard much they would doubtless not have cared to
discuss them or any other matter with the skipper. His voice rose to the
deep, roaring tone of the hurricane on all occasions, and when it failed
to convince the listener of the owner’s logic, a sudden clap from his
heavy hand generally ended verbal matters about as effectively as a
stroke of lightning. Most of the men on board were used to kicks and
curses, for the skipper reckoned he could handle any class of men that
ever trod a deck. He had a fair sprinkling of all on this cruise. As the
mates followed the skipper’s example in matters of discipline, the ship
was as near to being a floating hell as anything above water could be.
Jim Murphy resented even the curses of the captain and mates, so he was
rated among the after-guard as the worst man on board. His friendship
for the pig was against him in the forecastle, and soon even the men of
the starboard watch began to hold off from him.
“What d’ye want to fool with that porker fer? Yell never get er taste of
him, hide or hair,” growled old Dan.
“He ain’t the only pig aboard this here ship,” answered Jim, “an’ I like
him better than most.”
“Kind goes with kind,” observed the second mate, whenever he saw them
together.
Remarks like this made by the second officer caused great amusement to
the men of the starboard watch. But those who applauded the most were
old Dan and his chum Bull Davis. These two worthies gave Mr. Tautline to
understand that he was the wittiest second mate afloat, in the hope that
he would “pet” them. When they found this was useless, the united curses
of the whole crew were weak in expression as compared to the audible
reflections of this worthy pair.
When the ship reached the latitude of the River Plate, old Dan came out
openly for mutiny. He told with grim coolness and great detail of how
he had taken part in an affair of this kind before. How he had crawled
along the projecting sheer-strake outside the bulwarks towards the
quarter-deck, while a companion had done likewise on the side opposite.
How they had made the sudden rush aft and had engaged with their
sheath-knives against the revolvers of the after-guard. A little more
nerve in a few men who hung back and the ship would have been taken.
He had served part of a ten-years’ sentence for this, had escaped, and
had been continuously afloat ever since.
Bull Davis was an escaped convict from Australia, and he seconded the
old villain’s project in every detail.
One day, off the Horn, Dan was careless in modulating his voice when the
second mate gave an order. The next instant he was sprawling in the
lee-scuppers and the second mate was addressing him coolly.
“Don’t make no remarks about the weather in my watch. It’s a square
wind, so up you go on that yard now a little quicker’n greased
lightning.”
The devil was peeping from the old villain’s eyes as he gained the
ratlines, but he said nothing.
When the ship ran into the southeast trade-wind, Murphy, the pig, was
turned out on the deck to root at the seams. He would start down the
gangways suddenly, without apparent reason, and go rushing along the
water-ways at full speed, punctuating his squeals with deep “houghs”
that would have done credit to a bear. On these occasions Jim, the
sailor, was perfectly happy. He would call the little fellow to him and
the pig would follow him like a dog.
“He is a cute little baste, an’ he makes me homesick,” Jim would say,
and the mates and men would rail and curse at him for it. The only
living thing on board the ship that was in sympathy with them was the
blasphemous green parrot belonging to the carpenter. This bird would
pray and curse in the same breath, and whenever Jim came near the galley
would call out “pig,” “pig,” in a high key. Then it would curse him and
pray for his soul.
One night Jim noticed that old Dan sat up late, sharpening his knife on
a piece of holy-stone. Just before his watch turned out at midnight he
awoke, and found that neither Dan nor Bull Davis were in the forecastle.
He went on deck and walked aft, waiting for the bells to strike.
In a moment Davis appeared, coming out of the cabin with Mr. Tautline.
“There’s something wrong with the port backstay in the fore-riggin’,”
said the sailor to the mate.
“What’s that?” asked Tautline.
“The lug-bolt in the lee fore-riggin’ is busted. You had better take a
look at it afore away goes the backstay,” said Davis.
“All right. Wait here till I get a pipe o’ tobacco, and we’ll look at
it.”
Jim hurried forward. He looked over the rail and peered into the
blackness alongside. The phosphorus flared in a ghostly manner as the
water rolled lazily from the vessel’s side, but everything appeared all
right.
Suddenly a gleaming bit of something shot upward. He started back
quickly, and a hand holding a knife struck savagely at his chest. The
blade ripped his shirt from neck to waist, but did not wound him. The
next instant old Dan arose from the channels and climbed over the rail
to the deck.
“The wrong man, ye murtherin’ villain,” growled Jim.
“So it was, messmate,” said Dan, coolly.
“What’s the row?” asked Tautline, coming up to where the men stood. He
saw something was wrong, but had not seen Dan come over the side.
“That busted dead-eye,” answered Dan. “I was just lookin’ at it.”
“Well, get out before I put a couple of dead-eyes in your ugly
figgerhead. Slant away!” And Dan slunk around the corner of the
deck-house.
As the good weather held, the galley cat came out of hiding and sunned
herself in the lee of the galley during the warm part of the day.
Jim saw her and tried to make friends.
“Keetie, keetie,--nice leetle keetie,” said he, trying to stroke the
brute on the head. But long confinement had told on Maria’s liver, and
she reached out and drew several long, bloody lines on the sailor’s
hand.
“Ye infernal shnake!” cried Jim; and he aimed a blow at the animal that
would have knocked it clear across the equator had it not jumped nimbly
to one side. His hand brought up against the galley with a loud bang.
“Let that cat alone. What d’ ye mean by trying to spoil a dumb brute’s
temper?” roared the voice of Tautline, and his form came lurching down
the weather gangway.
“Don’t strike me!” cried Jim, as they closed.
The belaying-pin in Tautline’s hand came down with a sickening crack on
the sailor’s skull.
“Stop!” he cried again.
But Tautline was carried away by his passion and they went to the deck
together.
It was all over in a moment. Tautline lay gasping in a red pool and Jim
sat up, sheath-knife in hand, staring about him in a dazed manner. Then
the captain and mate rushed up.
“Handcuff him! Put him in double irons!” cried the skipper, stretching
Jim with a heavy blow.
The next day little Murphy ran up and down the deck. The ports over the
water-ways had been knocked out as the ship was very deep; they had not
been nailed in again. Murphy came to where Jim was lying in irons under
the top-gallant-forecastle. He sniffed his bloody clothes and ran away
with a squeal. The sailor called after him, but he did not stop until he
reached the open port in the waist. Then he sniffed at the ominous stain
on the bright deck planks and poked his head through the open port.
“Blood! Blood! Blood!” screamed the parrot in the galley.
Murphy started, slipped, and was gone. The cook rushed to the side,
bawling out something that sounded like “man overboard,” and the noise
brought the starboard watch on deck with a rush.
“That bloomin’ old pig,” growled Dan, looking over the rail.
There he was, sure enough, swimming wildly and striking himself under
the jowl with every stroke.
The captain watched his pig drifting slowly astern for a moment. Then he
turned to the mate. “All hands wear ship!” he bawled, and the men rushed
to the braces.
“Mr. Enlis,” said the skipper, “you go aloft and keep the critter in
sight. Take my glass with you.”
The ship was heavy, so before she could be wore around the little pig
was lost in the blue waste of sparkling waters.
The mate came down from the ratlines with the glass and a smile which
peculiarly emphasized the singleness of a solitary tooth. He did not
like pork.
The skipper walked the quarter-deck and mused with his chin in his hand.
“That’s too bad. Too bad. Too bad,” said he. “I paid two dollars for
that pig.” And his voice was as mournful as the sound of the sea washing
through the ribs of a lost ship.
“Poor little pig,” muttered Jim, and he tried to look astern from his
place under the top-gallant-forecastle. “Poor little pig!” And the
tears ran down his dirty, sun-bronzed face.
“Wonder!” cried Dan, coming forward; “there’s a murderer for you. Crying
over an old pig he won’t get a taste of, hide nor hair.”
“It’s all that young devil’s fault,” mused the skipper. “The master is
above the servant an’ the servant ain’t the master’s equal. So says the
Holy Scriptures. When a man takes up with them what is below him, he is
gone wrong. That’s Jim with the pig. Yes, sir, the Scriptures say them
very words somewhere,--I can’t call to mind exactly where,--but they are
so. If they ain’t I’ll make them so, and I’ll hang that Irish dog when I
get him to ’Frisco.” And he did.
_MY PIRATE_
We were sitting in old Professor Frisbow’s room in the West Coast
Museum, and our host had been listening to accounts of wonderful
adventures on deep-water. Each had spoken, and it was Frisbow’s turn. We
settled ourselves comfortably, and he began:
“Few people remember the old town of St. Augustine as it was before the
war, with its old coquina houses and flat, unpaved streets, that
abounded with sand-fleas in dry weather and turned into swamps of mud
and sand when it rained. Those who can look so far back through life’s
vista will remember its peculiar inhabitants.
“The Southern negro, sleeping in the hot sunshine on the plaza, or
loafing about the sea-wall talking to the white ‘cracker,’ was, of
course, the most numerous; but there were also the Spaniards and
Minorcans, who married and intermarried among themselves, that made up a
large part of the population.
“St. Augustine was not a thriving town. Its business could be seen
almost any morning quite early, when a few long, narrow, dugout canoes,
with a swarthy Minorcan rowing on one side, and a companion sitting aft
paddling on the other, would come around the ‘Devil’s Elbow’ in the
Matanzas River, and glide swiftly and silently up to a break in the
sea-wall and deposit their loads of mullet or whiting. Then the canoes
would disappear with their owners, after a little haggling had been
indulged in between the latter and the purchasers of the fish, and the
quiet of the long, hot day would begin.
“It is astonishing how lazy one may become under the influence of that
blue, semi-tropical sky, with the warm, gentle breeze from the southern
ocean rippling the clear, green waters of the bay. Life seems a bright
dream, and any unwonted exertion causes a jar to the nerves such as one
feels when rudely awakened from a sound, pleasant sleep. During the
daytime in summer no one but the negro and a few long-haired Minorcans
would tempt the torrid sunshine; and even I, with my passion for sport,
would seldom show my pith helmet to the sun during July and August.
“The inlets and rivers along the coast of Florida abound with all kinds
of fish, from the little mullet to the mighty tarpon; and many a day’s
sport have I had with them in either canoe or surf along that sandy
coast.
“For a guide I often had an old Spaniard called ‘Alvarez.’ This old man
lived alone in a coquina house of rather large size, and affected the
airs and manners of a grandee. He associated with no one, and no one
seemed to know anything about him, except that he came there on a
schooner from the West Indies years ago, being then an old man. He had
bought this house, and had continued to live there without any visible
means of support other than the fish he caught. He always went to the
store opposite the plaza, at the end of every month, and paid cash in
Spanish or American gold and silver for his frugal supplies.
“I had been out ’gator-shooting, and was returning home after two days’
sport with a few good skins, when, on turning the last bend in South
River about twenty miles from St. Augustine, I came suddenly upon an old
man in a dugout canoe fishing. He had just hooked a large bass, and I
started the sheet of my sharpie to stop its headway, and waited until he
landed him. I then sailed up alongside of the canoe, intending to buy
the fish and take it home with me, thinking, of course, that the old man
would be glad to sell it. What was my surprise when he informed me
politely that he did not care to sell it, though he had a score or two
in the bottom of his canoe. This from an old long-haired Spaniard who
seemed in the depths of poverty excited my curiosity, and I endeavored
to start a conversation with him about the different fishing ‘drops’ in
the locality. He eyed me suspiciously at first, and finally answered my
questions with an ease that puzzled me greatly.
“There was one particular place, or ‘drop,’ for catching drum-fish down
the South River of which I had often heard but could never find, so I
ventured upon this subject to the stranger. To my great surprise he
offered to accompany me to it any time that I should find it convenient,
telling me at the same time that he lived in St. Augustine, and that I
would probably find him there the next day. I thanked him, and, letting
go, squared away before the southeast breeze and soon left him out of
sight.
“The next day I was walking along the sea-wall smoking my pipe and
thinking of this peculiar old fisherman with his mahogany-colored face
and bright eye, wondering if I could get him to pilot me on an
expedition to the southward. I had a rambling idea of spending several
weeks in fishing down the Indian River, and I wanted some one to pilot
me who knew the way through the inland passages. While I was trying to
form some plan of this intended trip I saw a canoe come around the bend
in the Matanzas, and, on its approaching nearer, I recognized the old
man whom I had met the day before. I went up to him as he landed at the
break in the sea-wall and asked him what luck he had had fishing. For a
reply he showed me as fine a catch of red bass as I had ever seen, at
the same time offering me a couple as a present. I took them; and after
he had tied his boat to a ring in the wall, he joined me and walked part
of the way home with me.
“On our way I asked him if he had ever been through the passages to the
Indian River, and he smiled as he answered ‘yes.’ I then asked him if he
would guide me through on a trip that I intended to make. He was silent
for some moments, and finally said he would, provided there was no party
going along with me. I then left him; and after going home with my fish
I went around to see my friend the sheriff, to find out more about him.
I was told that he was a peaceable old fellow, and as he fished a great
deal he probably knew all the best places for miles around, that his
name was Alvarez, and that he was a reliable man as far as any one knew.
“About a week after this we started out one fine day bound south.
Although Alvarez was an absent-minded old fellow, and in spite of his
peculiar manner, so different from the common class of dirty,
poverty-stricken Spaniards, we got along together splendidly. I was
never a great talker, especially when hunting or fishing, and the dearth
of conversation on this trip was one of the most enjoyable features of
it. Old Alvarez and I became quite good friends after this expedition,
and I often used to question him about himself and his affairs. As long
as the conversation related to his life in the town he would talk
readily enough, but anything regarding his birth or former life he
always avoided, merely saying that he ran away to sea when quite young,
and that was all that could be drawn from him.
“My fancy often pictured him a pirate or ‘beach-comber,’ and, in fact,
there was a rumor to that effect in the town. People said that he had
treasures buried along the shore somewhere on Anastasia Island; and that
if he chose to talk, more than one vessel that had cleared Cuban ports
and had never been heard from could be accounted for. This was mere idle
gossip and amounted to nothing, but once somebody had seen his canoe at
midnight hauled up on the sand on a narrow part of the island some ten
miles below the town.
“Sailing by, they had seen Alvarez walking up and down the beach with
his head bowed forward as if looking for something. It was not the
season for turtles’ eggs, so it was hard to imagine what he was looking
for in the soft yellow sand. People, however, did not like to inquire
too closely into his affairs, for when he was annoyed his face assumed
such a sinister expression that it boded no good for those who were
inclined to chaff him.
“One night a negro ruffian and a Minorcan forced an entrance into his
house with the evident intention of securing his imagined treasure. The
next morning Alvarez came out and told the sheriff that there were two
dead men in his house that he would like to have removed. The sheriff,
who was a Spaniard, came around, and there, sure enough, lay both; one
shot through the neck and the other through the head, while two immense
old-fashioned pistols lay empty on a table in his room. There were no
signs of a struggle except a long smear of blood from his room to the
hall where the body of the negro lay. He was easily acquitted, and
afterwards became more stoical than ever, but he was never disturbed
again.
“Although these things happened long before I knew him, I did not hear
of them until some time afterwards, and I’ve often wondered since what
made the old fellow take such a fancy to me.
“Alvarez and I used to shoot pelicans together. We would go down the
river to a narrow part of the island and then cross over to the front
beach. I had always remembered this place on account of a bunch of tall
palmettoes that grew on the outside of the island and towered above the
low bunches of scrub-oak. A more lonely spot it would be hard to find
even in that wild country. Here we would make a blind for the night, and
shoot the birds as they came in on the beach to roost among the
sand-dunes. By the light of a full moon fair sport could be had in this
way, and often we would secure a fine bird with long pencilled feathers.
“One night after shooting several birds we turned in on the sand,
intending to spend the rest of the night there, as there was no wind. I
awoke during the night, and, looking around, found that Alvarez had
disappeared. I looked across the sand-spit and saw the boat all right,
so I wondered where he could have gone. I arose, and, shaking the sand
from my clothes, followed his tracks, which were plainly visible down
the beach towards the clump of palmettoes that stood out sharply against
the moonlit sky. On nearing them I saw a figure sitting on the sand
under the largest tree, and on getting closer I saw that it was Alvarez
with his head bowed forward on his arms, which rested on his knees. He
started up suddenly on hearing me approach, and asked, sharply,--
“‘How long have you been here?’
“His voice sounded so different from what I had been accustomed to that
I was quite startled, and stood looking at him for some moments
wondering if he had gone mad. He returned my gaze steadily and gave me
a most searching look. I finally answered that I had come to look for
him; at the same time I wondered what he meant and tried to curb my
rising temper. His fixed look relaxed and he turned his head slightly. I
followed his glance, and saw that he was looking at the ground near the
foot of one of the palmettoes. The sand about the roots was much
disturbed, as if he had been digging for something.
“‘Alvarez,’ said I, ‘what have you been hunting for, and what do you
mean by asking how long I’ve been watching you?’
“He remained silent for some moments, then rising, he placed his hand on
my shoulder: ‘That’s all right, Mr. Frisbow,’ he said. ‘I have these
nightmare fits on me once in a while.’
“‘Well,’ I answered. ‘It’s a strange sort of nightmare that makes one go
rooting around in the sand like a hog.’
“He looked at me again with that curious expression, and then said,
slowly,--
“‘I was a young man when I first came onto the Florida reef, and there’s
many things happened about here and Barrataria before you was born. Some
day I’ll talk with you about old times, but not to-night. It’s late. We
go to sleep.’
“‘No,’ said I, ‘tell me what you mean. There’s plenty of time for sleep,
and, besides, it’s too hot, anyhow.’
“‘Well,’ said he, ‘there’s just one thing I think about every time I
come to this spot, and that is the fight which took place a couple of
miles off shore, abreast this clump of palmettoes.’
“‘What kind of fight?’ I asked. ‘I never heard of any fight taking place
off here.’
“He looked at me sharply, and I fancied the hard lines in his
weather-beaten face relaxed into the faintest suspicion of a smile.
“‘Quite likely not,’ he answered, ‘but there was one off here a long
time ago. It isn’t likely many people remember much about it, for the
men who took part in it probably died years ago. It was between two
schooners.
“‘There was one that carried fruit from Havana, and she started down the
coast one night from St. Augustine, homeward bound, but without any
lights. This was probably an oversight, or, perhaps, a desire on the
part of her skipper to save oil.
“‘There was another schooner coming up the coast that evening, and she
didn’t have any lights because she was all the way from the Guinea Coast
loaded with ebony.’
“‘I don’t see why a vessel carrying ebony shouldn’t carry lights,’ I
interrupted.
“Old Alvarez’s face showed a net-work of lines and wrinkles and the
stumps of his yellow teeth shone bright in the moonlight.
“‘There isn’t any real reason why they shouldn’t,’ said he; ‘but there
used to be a prejudice against the trade. As for me, I don’t see why
people considered it in such a bad light, for shipping the article not
only paid the owners but improved the ebony--after they got it ashore.’
“‘I see,’ I answered; ‘the ebony was alive, then, and in the form of men
and women.’
“‘Most likely,’ he replied, ‘though they do say that life in a ship’s
hold is not uncoupled with death, especially when a vessel gets caught
in the hot calms outside the Guinea Gulf. Anyhow, the vessel had no
lights and was crowding along with every rag on her.
“‘The first thing anybody on board knew of the whereabouts of the fruit
schooner was the crash of her bowsprit poking into the fore-rigging and
knocking the foremast out of the Guinea trader. Then she ranged
alongside, all fast, with her head-gear tangled in the wreck.
“‘There were a great many men on the vessel carrying the ebony, and in a
few minutes they swarmed on deck with muskets and cutlasses. As soon as
they found the fellow was a fruit schooner they started to cut her
adrift, cursing the captain and crew for the damage.
“‘Everything might have gone well and the vessels separated but for the
fact that the passengers on board were two officers and their families
bound for Havana. These two men came on deck in uniform, and in less
than a minute the men saw them. To let them go meant certain death to
all hands on the ebony schooner, so they started over the rail after
them.’
“Here Alvarez became suddenly silent for a few moments, and his eyes
wandered towards the trees, as if expecting to see some one. Then,
facing me again, he continued:
“‘They made a terrible fight, they say, cutting down half a dozen men as
they crowded aft. The captain and crew of the schooner were soon tied
up, and the men rushed onto the quarter-deck to take the officers at any
cost. It was all over in a minute, and the two wives and a beautiful
girl were carried on board the ebony schooner. The men were so worked up
that a plank was rigged from the weather-rail and the lashings cast off
from the feet of the prisoners. One by one they walked to their death
along that narrow strip of wood with their eyes bandaged and elbows
lashed fast behind them--and that was all.’
“He remained silent for some moments after this, and again looked
sharply at the clump of palmettoes.
“‘But, Alvarez,’ I said, ‘what became of the two women and the beautiful
young girl?’
“‘I never heard,’ he answered, dryly, and started to walk slowly back to
the blind.
“‘Did they ever catch the ebony schooner?’ I ventured again.
“‘I don’t know,’ he replied, shortly, and, as I saw he would talk no
more, I kept silent.
“After walking up and down the beach trying to get cool, we finally laid
down under the trees and slept until daybreak. Then we started home. On
the way back we were becalmed, and having drunk up all the water, we
drifted along under a scorching sun with our mouths too dry to open. As
I lay on my back in the bottom of the boat, I could not help thinking of
the stories about this old man, and it suddenly flashed upon me that he
had been seen near those same palmettoes before.
“I vaguely wondered if he had been a pirate and had buried his
ill-gotten money under those trees on that lonely shore. There he sat in
the stern-sheets, his grizzled hair shining in the bright sunlight under
his old slouch hat, and his small gray eyes looking seaward for the
first cat’s-paw of the coming morning breeze. His skin, tanned to
leather from long exposure to the weather, made him as impervious to the
sun’s rays as a negro. But in spite of this his features were as clearly
cut and as strongly marked as those of a Don of bluest blood. Altogether
he was not a bad looking old man, even with his slightly hooked nose and
too firm mouth.
“I soon fell asleep and dreamed of rich galleons fighting huge canoes
full of grizzled pirates, armed to the teeth, who squinted carefully
along their old muskets and fired with loud yells. I suddenly awoke to
find Alvarez calling to me to sit to windward, as we were heeling over
and rushing along through the water before the sea-breeze only a few
miles from town.
“The next day we started out bass-fishing in the surf on the outer
beach. A rod and reel would have been considered strange instruments in
those days down there. We used to take our hand-lines, which were very
long, and, coiling them carefully, would wade out to our armpits. Then
swinging the heavy sinkers about our heads until they acquired
sufficient velocity, we would send them flying out beyond the first line
of breakers, and paying out line, would wade back to the beach. Sharks
abounded, and often we lost our gear when they took a fancy to our
baits. We never feared their attacking us, as the waters abounded with
fish, and in such places they seldom if ever attack a man.
“One day after some good sport Alvarez seemed tired, and instead of
holding the end of his line in his hand he tied it around his waist. I
noticed this and was about to call his attention to the danger of it,
when I hooked a huge bass and was kept busy playing it for some time.
The lines we used were about the size of the cod-lines used in the
North, and capable of holding a strain of nearly two hundred pounds,
while the hooks were like the drum hooks now used. While I was playing
my fish my line, which was old, parted near the end, and I hauled it in
to fit a new hook and sinker. During the time I was thus engaged Alvarez
had waded out up to his shoulders in the surf and had cast his line into
deep water. He then started to wade slowly back towards the shore.
Before he had made a dozen steps I saw him suddenly reach for his line.
“Three heavy breakers had just rolled in, followed by a comparatively
smooth spell that lasted for a few moments. I stopped working at my line
and watched him, for I knew he must have had a good bite. Suddenly I saw
him throw his whole weight on the line, but in spite of this go slowly
forward. He was now in water so deep that he had to jump up every time
the swell came to keep his head out of the foam. In a moment I turned,
and as I caught the expression of his face I knew what had happened.
That face I’ve often seen since in my dreams, and I will never forget
the expression of sudden fear that filled it.
“He had gone out so far that he could not get a good foothold; a shark
had seized his bait and was making slowly out to sea. He called my name
and beckoned me to come and help him. With trembling fingers I finished
knotting the sinker to my line and rushed headlong with it down the
beach. Water is a yielding fluid, but all who have tried know what
tremendous exertion is required to make speed through it when in above
the knees. When I was close enough I swung my sinker over my head and
sent it whizzing straight and true towards the old man, who was now out
to the first line of breakers, and swimming, though steadily moving
outward.
“I flung the lead towards him, and he would have caught the line, but at
that instant a huge sea broke right over him and he disappeared in the
smothering foam. When he reappeared he was beyond reach and going
steadily seaward. With a sickening feeling I hauled in the line and
plunged into the surf to swim out to him. I made good headway until I
reached the first line of curling water, when a heavy breaker fell over
me and swept me back a hundred feet from where I started. Standing there
in the surf, with the bright sun shining, I saw old Alvarez passing
slowly out to sea to disappear forever. I tried to think what to do. He
evidently could not break the line. It was impossible to untie it with
the strain on it, and he being only half dressed had left his knife
ashore.
“I thought of our boat which was on the lee side of the island, and knew
that it would take a couple of hours to get around the point. However,
it seemed the only thing to do, so I made my way ashore and started
across the island as fast as possible. Just before entering the woods I
looked seaward, and there on the breast of a long swell, a quarter of a
mile off, was Alvarez, swimming steadily with his face turned towards
the beach.
“In about a quarter of an hour I reached the boat, hoisted the sail, and
shoved off. There was hardly any wind on the lee side of the island, so
I put out an oar and sculled until the perspiration poured down my face
and my heart seemed as though it would burst. In spite of this I made
but little headway, and finally had to give it up exhausted. It was
about two in the afternoon when I started, and it was after three before
I cleared the point and got wind enough to get to sea. I came around on
the sea side of the island and close enough in to see our coats on the
beach, but of Alvarez there was not a trace.
“I headed out to sea in the direction that he was going when I saw him
last, and searched about until dark, when I gave it up as hopeless. It
was late when I arrived in the town that night, so I waited until
morning before I reported the accident.
“The sheriff searched the house in which the old man lived, but nothing
was found except an old sea-chest filled with clothes, some of which
appeared to be Spanish uniforms, but very dilapidated. No money was
found in the house except a few Spanish gold coins, and these were in
the room that he occupied as a bedroom.
“For months afterwards I kept thinking of Alvarez and his tragic end.
Although I felt very sorry for him, I could not help wondering if he did
have money concealed in the neighborhood. I often felt heartily ashamed
of myself, after discussing with some friend the probability of his
having concealed wealth, but, nevertheless, the fancy that he had took a
strong hold of me.
“I tried to imagine where on earth he could have hidden anything, and
always my thoughts centred on that clump of palmettoes on that low sandy
island. This feeling finally took such hold of me that one night I
started out pelican-shooting with a shovel in the bottom of my boat.
“I felt something like a robber, but knowing that the old fellow had no
relations, or friends even, for that matter, I tried to convince myself
that I was right. It was about eight o’clock when I started with a good
sailing breeze off the land, so it could not have been more than ten
when I ran my boat’s bow on the sand and lowered the sail on the west
side of the island.
“As I took up my gun and shovel a feeling of excitement came over me,
and I felt as though I had already found a mass of untold wealth. When I
started to walk across the island this feeling increased, and soon I was
plunging and ploughing through the deep dry sand at a great rate.
“I could see the bunch of trees standing out clearly against the sky,
and also the white surf beyond, for, although the moon was only in its
first quarter, the night was clear and bright. I halted on the crest of
a circular sand-dune to get my breath, and a feeling of lonesomeness
crept over me as I looked towards the dark grove and down the lonely
beach where everything was lifeless. The stillness seemed intensified by
the deep booming of the surf, and I felt as if something or somebody was
watching me. I had just turned towards the trees and was starting down
the side of the dune when, with a sudden rush and flapping of wings, a
huge gray pelican started up within ten feet of me and made off like a
great gray ghost to seaward. A sudden chill shot up my spine. Dropping
the shovel, I grabbed my gun in both hands and fired instantly at the
retreating shadow. The shot was an easy one, but I missed; so, swearing
at myself audibly for my nervousness, I picked up the shovel and went
on.
“I halted under the largest tree, and, resting my gun against the trunk,
tried to form some plan of action. Although the trees were some thirty
feet above high-water, there were no tracks or anything else to indicate
that any one had ever been there before. I might dig the whole grove
up, for all that I had to guide me, before striking the right spot.
However, I went to work at the front of the big tree and started to dig
to the eastward.
“I toiled for an hour and was getting pretty warm. Thus far I had struck
nothing but the roots of a tree, so I began to despair. I knew that I
might keep on digging holes clear through to China, and, with nothing to
guide me, pass within a foot of what I searched for. I took off my
shirt, and the cool breeze blowing on my warm body invigorated me; so,
taking up the shovel again, I started to lengthen the hole to the
eastward. I dug steadily for another half-hour, when my shovel suddenly
struck something solid. This made my heart almost leap into my mouth,
and with quickening breath I dug fiercely on.
“Like a miner on making his first find of gold, I trembled all over, and
the perspiration poured down my naked breast and shoulders as I threw
clouds of sand on all sides. I was as drunk as if I had swallowed a pint
of liquor, and I remember nothing except that I felt like shouting with
delight. I finally cleared a box of the sand over it and then tried to
lift it. To my intense surprise it moved easily. But my excitement gave
way to the deepest disappointment, for I well knew that if a box about
six feet long, two wide, and two deep contained coin it would take more
than one man of my size to move it.
“I lost no time thinking these thoughts, but started to pry off the lid.
The wood, which was extremely well preserved, resisted the edge of my
shovel so well that it broke the iron. I was losing patience, so,
whirling the shovel above my head, I brought it down with crushing force
upon the lid. After a few blows it gave way, and I eagerly tore off the
splintered fragments. As I did so I leaned over and peered into the face
of a corpse.
“I leaped back and gazed at it in a stupefied way for some moments, my
head in a whirl, then partially recovering myself, I went forward to
examine it. It looked like the body of a man in the uniform of an
officer; at least so I judged by some buttons on the coat; but
everything had passed through the last stages of decomposition. There
was nothing left on the head at all, and the teeth grinned horribly in
the moonlight.
“As I stood and gazed I thought of Alvarez. So this was his secret! How
came a man to be buried in such a lonely spot? Was it a friend or victim
of his former days, brought ashore from some vessel in the offing that
dare not land at St. Augustine?
“I did not molest the body, but after recovering myself I put the
fragments of the lid back as well as I could and piled the sand over it.
I then dressed, and, taking my gun, started for the boat. After sailing
several hours with hardly any wind, I arrived at the town just as the
rising sun came up out of the ocean. I said nothing of my trip to any
one, and soon after left St. Augustine to return no more for years.
“The town is a queer old place, but it has changed greatly to one who
remembers it as it was years ago. Its quaint old fort and coquina walls
doubtless contain many secrets of their former owners. As for old
Alvarez, he carried his to sea with him that bright afternoon with a
shark for a pilot.”
_THE CURSE OF WOMAN_
“Some skippers are good and some are bad,” said Gantline, joining in the
talk on the main-hatch. He was second mate, so we listened. He
expectorated with great accuracy into a coil of rope and continued:
“Likewise so are owners. The same holds good to most kinds of people.
Some owners don’t want good skippers. They’re apt to be expensive on
long runs, for they won’t cheat a poor devil of a sailor out of his
lime-juice and other luxuries they have nowadays. At best a sailor gets
less pay and works harder than any man alive, leave out the danger and
discomfort on a long voyage on an overloaded ship. It’s only fair to
treat him as well as possible. This idea that feeding a man well and not
cursing him at every order will make him lazy is wrong, and ought to be
kept among the class of skippers who take their ‘lunars’ with a
hand-lead.
“There are some ships always unlucky. But the luck is mostly the fault
of the skipper.
“Take, for instance, the loss of the Golden Arrow or the big clipper
Pharos, that was found adrift in the doldrums without a man aboard her.
Everything was in its place and not a boat was lowered. Even the dishes
lay upon the table with the food rotten in them, but there wasn’t a soul
to tell how she came to be unmanned. She was an unlucky ship, for on
her next voyage out she stayed. No one has seen plank or spar of her for
twelve years. But the skipper and mate who left her adrift outside of
the Guinea current were well known to deep-water men.
“I’m no sky-pilot, and I don’t mean to say a skipper who prefers a
pretty stewardess to an ugly one--or none at all--is always a bad man,
but I do say that a skipper who cuts off a man’s lime-juice, gives him
weevils for bread, and two-year-old junk for beef, has got enough
devilry in him for anything, and is apt to have things comfortable in
the after-cabin.
“It was nothing but scurvy that killed young Jim Douglas, so they said;
but what about Hollender, the skipper, who brought him in along with
nineteen others?
“I went to see Jim in the hospital, and he was an awful sight. His eyes
rolled horribly, but he took my hand and held it a long time; then he
tried to talk. His mind wasn’t steady and he often lost his bearings,
but there was something besides delirium behind his tale.
“‘Her curse is on us, Gantline,’ he kept whispering. I held him, but he
lay mumbling. ‘Dan died, too, an’ we sewed him up in canvas like a ham,
an’ over he went; but it wouldn’t have helped, for the water was as
rotten as it lays in the deadwood bilge. ’Twas the ghost of the
skipper’s wife holding us back--her curse did the business, an’ I knew
it.’ Then he calmed down and talked more natural.
“‘She came aboard with the child, an’ Hollender’s stewardess wouldn’t
wait on her. Black-eyed she-devil that woman. An’ the skipper grinned,
an’ the poor thing cried an’ cried. “Don’t treat me so; have mercy!” But
he just grinned. “You can go forward an’ live with the mate if you don’t
like it,” he said. She just cried an’ cried. One night she came on deck
an’ rushed to the rail. She had her baby with her an’ she hesitated.
“’“Shall we go aft?” I said to Dan. “It’s mutiny an’ death,” says he.
“‘Then she cursed us all--an’ went over the side----’ Jim lay quiet
after this for a minute, then he began:
“‘Slower, slower, slower. No wind, two hundred days out, an’ the water
as rotten as it is in the deadwood bilge. The cat--I mean the mate--went
up on the forecastle, an’ he never came back. We ate him, an’ tied his
paws around our necks for luck. No wind, an’ the sails slatted to and
fro on the yards. Midnight, an’ bright moonlight when it struck us, an’
tore our masts out an’ drove us far out of the path of ships, an’ we lay
there with the boats gone, water-logged till we rigged enough gear to
drift home by---- Help! Gantline, help! The curse of the woman was on
the ship, for there wasn’t a man aboard----’
“He struggled and rose up in the cot. His eyes were staring at the blank
wall. I held him hard for an instant and he suddenly relaxed. Then he
fell back dead.
“Then, you see, there was the Albatross that sailed----”
“But hold on a bit. Stop a minute!” said Mr. Enlis. “If you keep on like
that, Gantline, you’ll ruin the passenger trade as far as wimmen are
concerned. As for stewardesses, there won’t be one afloat if you keep
croaking. You seem to think wimmen do nothing but harm afloat, whereas I
know plenty who have done good. I don’t see what wimmen have to do with
wittles, anyhow?”
“Who in the name of Davy Jones said they had?” growled Gantline,
angrily. “I’m no sky-pilot, and I----”
“Right you are, mate, you say true there, for if I was to go to you to
get my last heading I’d fetch up on a lee shore where there’d be few
strange faces.”
Gantline gave a grunt of disgust. “That’s just the way with you every
time any one starts a line of argument to prove a thing’s so; you always
sheer off, or bring in something that’s got nothing to do with the case
and don’t signify. Here I’ve been showing that bad luck to ships is
caused by something wrong with the skippers, and here you are trying to
bring wimmen into the case, just as if your thoughts ran on nothing
else. But, pshaw! everybody knows what kind of a fellow you are when
you’re on the beach.” And he jerked his pipe into his pocket and walked
aft.
“Never mind him,” said Mr. Enlis. “He’s an old croaker, and it’s just
such growling that makes trouble for skippers. But whenever you see a
man talk like that there’s always something behind it. Yes, sir, every
time.”
“How do you mean?” asked Chips.
“Well, when a man’s soured on wimmen there is always a cause for it, and
I happen to know something about Gantline’s past. It’s the old story,
but who wants to know how Jim or Jack’s wife fell in love with him?
Neither does any one care about how she comes to leave him, though
nearly all story books are written about such things, and that’s the
reason I never read them. There ain’t much novelty in that line.
“Lord, love is all alike, just the same in the poor man as in the rich;
but what I was about to say is this: Gantline, here, gives the idea that
wimmen are dangerous afloat and leaves off telling anything good about
them. That ain’t exactly fair. It’s true most wimmen who follow the sea
are not exactly to be considered fighting craft, and are mighty apt to
strike their colors do you but let it be known you’re out for prizes.
Still, I know of cases where they’ve done a power of good. There was
‘Short Moll,’ who was stewardess with old man Fane, and she made him.
“The old man, you see, had been getting lonely, and had taken to
carrying large invoices of grog, which is bound to break a man in the
long run.
“One day at the dock Moll came along and inquired for the skipper. The
old man saw her coming, and bawled out, ‘For Heaven’s sake, Mr. Enlis,
don’t let her come aboard!’ and dived below.
“I ran to the gang-plank as she started over and said, ‘Captain’s gone
up-town, and there ain’t no visitors allowed.’
“‘Oh, there ain’t?’ she said sort of sweetly, and she screwed up her
little slits of eyes. ‘If that’s the case, you may consider me one of
the crew, for I’ve got a notion they want a stewardess aboard.’
“‘There ain’t no passengers, so get back on the dock and obey orders!’
And I planted myself athwart the plank.
“Well, sir, if you ever seen a change come over a woman in three shakes
of a sheet-rope you ought to seen her.
“‘What!’ she yelled. ‘You stop me from coming aboard a ship in this free
an’ easy country of America? Git out o’ the way, you slab-sided,
herring-gutted son of a wind-jammer, or I’ll run ye down an’ cut ye in
two.’ And she bore down on me under full sail.
“She carried a full cargo, and I stepped down on the main-deck, for,
after all, that gang-plank was too narrow a subject for such
broad-minded folk as Moll and me to discuss on the spur of the moment.
“She never gave me a look, but steered straight for the cabin and
disappeared.
“There was a most uncommon noise, and I saw the skipper’s head pop up
the hatchway. But in a moment he was drawn slowly downward, and as he
turned his face he looked like a drowning man sinking for the last
time.
“Well, the first day off soundings there was another fracas, and Moll
came forward with a can of condensed milk in one hand and a bunch of
keys in the other. She gave me a leer and waved the can of milk, and I
knew we were to live high that voyage. I hadn’t tasted the stuff for
nigh two years.
“One day there was another scuffle below, and a bottle of liquor sailed
up the companion-way and smashed against the binnacle. There were all
kinds of noises after that, but I finally made out Moll’s voice bawling,
‘Not another drap, sir! Not another drap!’
“He was a sober man for two years until she left, and after Fane heard
of her death he wasn’t the same man. She really did more good than many
a better brought-up woman on the beach, and if he called her an angel
it’s nothing to laugh at, though her wings may have looked more like the
little winged animals that fly o’ night among the mosquitoes in the
harbor than like doves.
“So you see there’s no use going against the wimmen, for there’s lots of
good in them, only it takes strange circumstances at times to bring it
out.
“After all, I don’t blame Gantline. And between us I’ll tell you why.”
Here Mr. Enlis looked sharply fore and aft to see if anybody might
interrupt us, and then spoke in a low voice.
“He married a girl years ago, and one day he came home and found her
missing. She had run off with a fellow named Jones, who was once mate
with Crojack.
“He followed that fellow all over the world. That hole in his cheek is
where Jones’s bullet went through when they met once on the streets in
Calcutta. Jones got several bad cuts before they were separated. A year
or two after this they met again, and Gantline has had that list in his
walk ever since. You see, virtue and right don’t always come out winners
on deep-water, unless the virtue lies in the heft of your hand. That
mate Jones was a big man, and they used to say he was a powerful hand
for putting a crew through a course of study to find out who’s who and
what’s what. According to report they generally found Bill Jones was
something of both, and I heard that one voyage there wasn’t enough
belaying-pins left aboard to clew down the topsails on, so they left
them flying and put over the side for it as soon as the hook took the
ground.
“But what I am coming to is this: Gantline was second mate with that
same fellow Hollender the voyage one of his men sent his black soul to
hell. The mate was killed and Gantline was left in command.
“To the eastward of Juan Fernandez he picked up a boat adrift with one
man in it. He was alive and that was all. Gantline stood by while they
lifted the fellow on deck, and as he caught sight of his sun-blackened
face with the dry lips cracking over the black gums he gave a start and
swore horribly. Then he walked fore and aft on the poop, and they say
he chewed up nigh two pounds of tobacco during the rest of the day. When
the fellow’s mouth was wet enough to speak with, he raved and cried,
‘Saved at last! Saved at last!’ until they had to lash him in his bunk.
Sometimes he would call out a girl’s name, and Gantline would rush
forward onto the forecastle-head and storm at the men working on deck.
“It didn’t last long. The fellow was strong and began to recover, and
then Gantline had his say. He walked into the room one morning carrying
two glasses full of grog, and he put them both on the sea-chest.
“Jones looked up and recognized him--for he was clear in his mind
now--and he started for him. But he was too weak, and Gantline bore him
back into the bunk and poked a revolver into his face, telling him to
keep quiet.
“‘You are in my hands now, and I’ll give you a fair chance, but God
knows you don’t deserve it,’ he said. ‘I could tip you over the side as
well as not, but I won’t unless it’s your fate.’
“The fellow saw he was caught and started up again, but Gantline drew
the barrel of his pistol level with his eyes, so he kept quiet.
“‘Now,’ he went on, ‘you are too weak to fight with any chance, but I’ve
followed you too long to let you go unless it’s the will of Providence.
In one of those glasses of grog is a poison that will put one man out of
misery without any mess. I know which glass holds it, but you don’t; so
I’ll give you first chance. If it comes to me I’ll drink it, but if it
comes to you, you’ll drink it or I’ll put a hole in your face. Now let
her go.’
“The fellow Jones lay silent a moment and looked Gantline steadily in
the eyes. Then a smile broke slowly over his face. He picked up a glass
and drank off the liquor, and Gantline did the same. Then Gantline
hurried on deck.
“He walked fore and aft a few moments and then dived below for the
medicine-chest.”
“What!” cried Chips, “did he get the poison?”
“Sure,” said Mr. Enlis; “but you see Gantline isn’t such a fool as he
looks. He had done some thinking during those moments on deck, and it
seemed to clear his mind. It don’t do to lay down the law to Providence.
No, sir, it don’t do. You never can tell just what Providence will do.
Gantline measured a tremendous emetic and gulped it down. Likewise, in a
moment, up it came, and the poison with it.
“After all, he did the right thing by Jones. He put him ashore, and as
luck would have it, the war was on then, and he was shot just outside
Valparaiso by the Chilian soldiers, who took him for a deserter. That’s
the reason Gantline never says anything good about wimmen--and I don’t
blame him much!”
THE END
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