no mean order of seamanship. The distance was too short for
tacking, and moreover the water was filled with blind rocks and
skerries which made the approach tenfold dangerous. It seemed to
the unskilled eyes of the boys that for nearly half an hour The
Cormorant was tumbling aimlessly upon the waves, shipping seas
which it was a wonder did not swamp her, and righting herself,
as by a miracle, when again and again she seemed on the point of
capsizing. And yet all these wonderful feats were only the result
of the coolest calculation and the most consummate skill.
Just as they were clearing the hidden skerries at the western point
of the island the wind veered a point to the north, but did not
fall off perceptibly. The spray rose from the shore like a dense
and blinding smoke, and in the depths of every black abyss which
opened before them death’s jaws seemed to be yawning. Harry closed
his eyes; and though he was no coward, his heart failed him.
“What is the use of fighting any longer?” he said to Magnus, who
was lying at his side, clinging like him to the mast; “we are going
to the bottom, any way. The archangel Gabriel himself couldn’t land
us on this shore, with all the heavenly hosts to assist him.”
“But Grim is a better sailor than Gabriel,” Magnus replied, quite
unconscious of his joke. “He knows every inch of the bottom here
from the time he was a boy and used to row out here and gather
eider-down. He has told me about it often. If I were you I wouldn’t
give up yet.”
“All right, old fellow,” Harry answered, taking heart once more. “I
am ready for anything. But I am an unlucky chap--a sort of a Jonah,
who has a talent for getting into scrapes. I shouldn’t wonder if,
in case you threw me overboard, the storm would fall off and you
might sail home in comfortable fashion.”
“We mean to go overboard, all of us, in a few minutes,” Magnus
retorted, hugging Harry tightly with his left arm, which he had
freed for that purpose. “Now I am going to propose something to
you. Let us tie ourselves together with a rope so that each may
help the other; and we may either live or perish together.”
“I am afraid you would be the loser by that arrangement,” his
friend exclaimed. “You are a good deal stronger than I am, and you
will need every bit of your strength if you are to plow your way
through those awful breakers.”
Magnus, instead of answering, slipped the end of a rope about
Harry’s waist and secured it tightly; the other end he tied about
his own waist, although he came near losing his balance, and going
headlong over the gunwale. The Cormorant had now slipped around
to the leeward side of the island, where, under the shelter of
the steep rock, the water was a trifle less tumultuous. And yet a
gigantic surf was running and the undertow on the steeply sloping
bottom seemed strong enough to take an elephant off his feet. The
wind yelled and screeched from the top of the towering rock, and
rushed down in thundering eddies on the leeward side. If it had
not been for a momentary clearing of the sky, which showed the
position of the breakers and the outline of the shore, it would
have been madness to risk landing; and even as it was, the chance
of being dashed to pieces against the rocks seemed altogether to
preponderate. But Grim apparently took a different view of the
situation; as long as the sail was whole and the boat true to her
rudder he saw no cause for despair.
“Now, lads,” he roared, hoarsely, “steady on yer shanks. No
chicken-hearted chap among ye! Uncoil the rope! Thar’s a bit of
sandy beach thar--sixty or a hundred feet wide. If we be in luck
we’ll be thar in a minute.”
The ridge of the island was now half visible against the dark
horizon, but the beach below was wrapped in a dense smoke, through
which came glimpses of the black jagged rock.
“Almighty Lord! thar’s a skerry ahead,” screamed one of the
boatmen, as the retreating surf broke with a wild uproar over the
hidden rock and rose like a mighty water-spout against the sky.
There was a moment of breathless suspense. Each man seemed to hear
the beating of the other’s heart. As the boat was flung upward
again on the next wave, the wind gave a frantic shriek; the mast
bent forward under the terrible strain. The incoming surf buried
the skerry under a mountain of towering water, and high upon its
crest The Cormorant rode triumphant, only to be hurled from its
crest, fairly shooting through the air, upon the beach.
“Jump overboard!” bellowed Grim, and seizing Magnus in his arms he
leaped from the stern just as the boat struck the sand and broke
into fragments. Every man followed his example; but the undertow
swept them off their feet. Still Grim stood like a rock, holding
with his gigantic strength the rope to the other end of which Harry
was attached. Once he tottered, and if he had had sand under his
feet he would have been dragged down by his double burden. But by
a lucky chance he had planted his heels upon a bowlder which rose
slightly out of the surf. When the wildest force of the wave had
been exhausted he sprang up on the beach, depositing Magnus and
the half-unconscious Harry beyond the reach of the waves. Back he
rushed again to his former station, just as one of the boatmen, who
had momentarily regained his footing, was scrambling up toward him.
“I am tied to the rope,” shouted the man; “someone is tugging at
it.”
“Hand it to me,” commanded Grim.
The man struggled to his feet and planted himself resolutely at his
captain’s side. All this was the work of a moment. With the next
incoming wave, which was happily much smaller than the preceding
one, four men were flung up on the sand; but they seemed half dead,
and made no effort to save themselves. Grim, who thought he saw a
glimmer of brass buttons in the water, dashed forward and seized
Olaf by the collar, just as he would have been sucked back by the
undertow. He bore him up on the shore, while the boatman came
dragging two of his unconscious comrades out of the roaring surf.
One was still missing; but as the next wave that broke in tumult at
their feet showed no trace of him, they knew that he was beyond the
reach of human help.
The work of resuscitating the men was a long and tedious one; but
Grim and Magnus both worked with their hearts in their throats, yet
with a resolution which scorned fatigue. Harry revived the moment
they had poured a glass of brandy down his throat, and he soon
recovered his spirits and volunteered his help. But the midshipman
was both badly battered and had swallowed a quantity of water; and
it was only after long and persistent efforts on Grim’s part that
his breath came back to him. Their next thought was of fire; for
the wind was raw and chill, and the last glimmer of daylight was
vanishing. The problem, however, was a serious one, for there was
not a tree growing on the island, except perhaps a few stunted
juniper shrubs up in the crevices of the rocks. And to get at these
in the dark was no easy undertaking. Nor was their situation in
other respects an enviable one. Above them loomed the black cliff,
and the surf was thundering at their feet. And there they were
sitting, huddled together in a heap to keep each other warm, and
yet shivering in their wet clothes, and thinking with horror of
the long hours of the night which must pass before they could be
rescued.
“Lads,” cried Magnus, suddenly extricating himself from Harry and
Olaf’s embrace, “I am the only one of you who is not wet to the
skin, and I am going to explore this island and see if we can’t
scare up some fuel. To sit here hugging each other in the dark is a
dismal sort of business, and I am not so affectionately disposed as
the rest of you.”
“A mighty peart chap ye be, lad,” Grim said, raising his tall
figure out of the group; “but ye had better let me crawl ahead, and
ye keep astern o’ me. I know summat o’ the island and ye don’t know
nothin’.”
“I’ll keep abreast of you, Grim,” Magnus replied, “but your stern
would obscure my view; so take your bearings and let’s be off.”
“Ye be a mighty lively customer,” Grim grumbled, admiringly, giving
the boy a caressing pat in the dark.
They had scarcely crawled fifty yards up the beach when their
fumbling hands touched something cold and clammy, which felt like
the nose of some aquatic animal. There came immediately a little
chorus of whining barks, which was followed by a great flapping, as
if something broad and wet struck against the stones.
“Thunder and lightning, Grim,” cried Magnus, “what sort of beasts
are these?”
“A herd of seals,” answered Grim, quietly; “it was funny I didn’t
think o’ them. Here we have got our fuel.”
In the same moment a cold nose was stuck right into Magnus’ face
and he tumbled backward, scarcely knowing how to return the
unexpected caress.
“Draw yer knives, lads,” shouted Grim to the men, “a herd of seals
is a comin’ right upon ye.”
The seals were now in full flight, rolling, tumbling, and pushing
themselves on over the smooth sand. They instinctively knew, even
in the dark, the way to the water, and they thus came plump down
upon the shipwrecked men, who had arisen in response to Grim’s call
and were ready to give them a warm reception. In the storm and the
fright of the sudden attack the keen scent of the animals scarcely
served them at all. They rushed right down upon their enemies, and
within a few minutes fully a dozen of them lay gasping and bleeding
upon the beach. The rest plunged into the surf, where their
plaintive bark was heard as they battled with the raging sea.
Grim and Magnus in the meanwhile pushed on, groping their way over
the slippery bowlders, and keeping close together so as to help
each other in case of accident. But the farther they climbed the
steeper grew the rock, and as far as they could ascertain by their
sense of touch there was no sign of vegetation.
“Now look sharp, lad,” cried Grim, warningly.
“Look sharp!” repeated Magnus, “how am I to look sharp when it is
as dark as pitch about me?”
“Right ye be, lad, right ye be,” the other retorted; “ye be a smart
chap and a peart one. But don’t ye lay hold o’ nothin’ here before
ye know it is rock. Thar be thousands o’ birds here on the lee’ard
side when thar be a storm from the north; and ef ye mistook a gull
or a cormorant fer somethin’ solid ye might tumble down and break
yer precious neck. Mark ye my word, chap, thar will be a mighty
lively hubbub here in a couple o’ minutes.”
Grim had hardly uttered this prophecy when Magnus felt something
feathery under his touch, and in the same instant there came a
piercing scream and a powerful wing dealt him a blow across the
bridge of his nose. Immediately there commenced a wild chorus of
screams and chattering protest, as if the more sober-minded birds
were deprecating this senseless uproar. Magnus thought, too, that
he heard his name called from below, but the deafening thunder
of the surf and the noise of the birds drowned all other sounds,
and he concluded that he had been deceived. It was a terrible
sensation, all these invisible wings flapping about him in the
dark; unseen bodies precipitated against him and tumbling blindly
about him with a murderous tumult from a thousand discordant
voices. He raised his elbows above his head to protect himself from
the blind assaults and the perpetual beating of wings. It hardly
occurred to him to assume the offensive until he heard Grim’s voice
shouting to him:
“Draw yer knife, lad, and make it lively fer them screamin’
rascals. Their down is worth money and they’ve got blubber as
thick as a seal’s. Give ’em no odds, I tell ye, my laddie.”
Magnus followed this advice promptly. He drew his knife, and fought
with a will, thrusting and striking right and left, and hearing
the great birds tumbling about him down the steep sides of the
rock. He had been thus occupied for a few minutes when suddenly,
to his unutterable amazement, a great blaze rose from the strand
below, lighting up the barren wall of the cliff, and showing him
how narrow the ledge was upon which he was sitting. It was a superb
spectacle, too, to see the whirling host of gulls, auks, and
cormorants eddying wildly about his head, the great black cliff
looming up above him, and the spray of the surf spouting, with
angry brawl, high up into the nocturnal air.
“Hurrah! lad,” yelled Grim, through the ear-splitting noise and
confusion, “I war a blasted fool not to think on it. They be
a-burnin’ the wreck.”
The descent was a much easier affair than the ascent; for the light
of the fire below blazed up every now and then and enabled them to
see where they were treading. They picked up between them several
dozen birds, of nearly half as many varieties, and flung them down
before the fire, where the company were now seated in comparative
comfort, warming their stiffened limbs. Two of the boatmen were
engaged in skinning the seals and cutting off the blubber, which,
after squeezing out the blood, they flung into the fire. Soon the
oil began to ooze out, and, flowing over the wood, burned with a
clear and strong flame.
“I am going to make myself comfortable, fellows,” said Harry, who
was looking very pale and chilly after his involuntary bath; “and
if you don’t mind it, I’ll make a scarf of this big duck. She fits
very nicely about my throat, though she won’t accommodate herself
to the bow-knot. This little one I am going to stuff down my bosom.
She feels so deliciously warm and downy! I tell you,” he went
on, with emphasis, suiting his actions to his words, “I mean to
patent this invention, when I get back home, as an infallible cure
for rheumatism, toothache, consumption, chillblains, corns, and
kidney disease. I am going to call it Winchester’s In-_w_incible
_W_ivifier. That will sound well and catch the public eye. I was
about ready to give up the ghost awhile ago, and now I feel quite
jolly.”
He stretched himself luxuriously on the windward side of the fire,
arranged half a dozen ducks and auks under his head as a pillow,
and closed his eyes. Magnus and Olaf soon followed his example,
each tying a big gull about his throat, and feeling a grateful
warmth creeping through their half-frozen bodies. The men had the
good luck to find a bunch of drift-wood large enough to keep the
fire going until morning, and to satisfy their hunger they roasted
a piece of seal-flesh, which, in spite of its oily flavor, tasted
better than they had expected. When Grim saw that the boys were
asleep he covered them carefully with his own oil-skin clothes,
while he himself kept marching up and down on the beach to keep his
blood in motion. After midnight the wind shifted suddenly to the
west and fell off gradually, the clouds were scattered, and the
moon sailed calmly through the dark-blue sky.
The three boys slept soundly after their terrible hardships, and
the eastern sky was already bright with the dawn when they opened
their eyes. The whole screaming colony of birds were again on the
wing, and whirled about the projecting crags of the cliff with wild
clamor. Several sails were already visible on the horizon and,
as soon as signals of distress were hoisted, steered toward the
island. Harry, who was ravenously hungry, made a courageous assault
upon the roasted seal-flesh, but after two futile attempts declared
that he was not sufficiently acclimated to relish such diet. If
necessity compelled him, he preferred to roast his boots, and to
use the seal-oil as gravy.
“What do you say you call this island?” he asked Grim, who was
trotting at his side up and down on the sand.
“The Bird Island,” answered Grim.
“I should rather call it the ‘Skerry of Shrieks,’” said Harry; “for
in all my living days I have never heard a finer assortment of
varied yells than I heard here last night. It must be a jolly place
in summer, when the nights are light and the weather comfortable.”
“It ain’t bad fer such as like it,” was Grim’s non-committal reply.
“And do you know,” Magnus put in eagerly, “during the early fall
the island is quite covered with eider-ducks’ nests, so that you
can hardly move your feet without stepping into them. All those
little round depressions up on the slope there are such nests; and
thousands of dollars have been made here in times past by gathering
the down with which the eider-duck lines her nest; and it is even
possible during the brooding season to catch the bird alive and
pull the down from her breast; though I think that would be cruel,
as she probably needs all she has left after having picked herself
for the benefit of her young.”
“The eider-duck must be very tame,” Harry observed.
“Yes, it is very tame, indeed, because people rarely molest it,”
said Magnus; “the peasants have a kind of superstitious respect for
it, and they won’t allow anyone to kill it. It is very much the
same kind of feeling as they have for the swallow. They think a
misfortune will befall him who robs or pulls down a swallow’s nest.”
Several boats were by this time within hailing distance, and they
were easily persuaded to run up and take the shipwrecked company
on board. They insisted, however, upon drawing their nets before
returning, and thus it happened that it was nearly noon before the
party set foot on shore. They now learned that a great many boats
besides their own had been wrecked during yesterday’s storm, and
that some fifty or sixty men had been drowned. Many dead bodies
were washed ashore during the day, and some were even drawn up in
the nets and sent home to their sorrowing widows. Sad, indeed, was
the sight of the little fleet of boats which sailed southward that
afternoon, each with a tarred pine box showing above its gunwales.
The three boys, although they would scarcely have admitted that
the disaster had discouraged them, concluded, after a short
consultation, that the experience they had already had of the
fisheries was an instructive one and would probably last them for
the remainder of their lives. They therefore, without much regret,
induced Grim to hoist the sails and pilot them safely home.
FIDDLE-JOHN’S FAMILY.
I.
“Queer sort of chap that Fiddle-John is,” said the men, when
Fiddle-John went by.
“Quaint sort o’ cr’atur’ is Fiddle-John,” echoed the women; “not
much in the providin’ line.”
“A singular individual is that Violin-John,” said the parson;
“I can never make up my mind whether he is a worthless scamp or
a man of genius.” “Possibly both,” suggested the parson’s wife.
“Apartments to let,” remarked the daughter, tapping her forehead
significantly.
“Hurrah! There is Fiddle-John,” cried the children, flocking
delightedly about him, clinging to his arms, his legs, and his
coat-tails. “Sing us a song, Fiddle-John! Tell us a story!”
Then Fiddle-John would seat himself on a stone at the road-side,
while the children nestled about him; and he would tell them
stories about knights and ladies, and ogres, and princesses, and
all sorts of marvellous things.
“Worthless fellow, that Fiddle-John,” said the passers-by; “there
he sits in the middle of the day talking nonsense to the children,
when he ought to be working for the support of his family.”
It was perfectly true; Fiddle-John ought to have been working.
He would readily have admitted that himself. He was well aware
that his wife, Ingeborg, was at home, working like a trooper to
keep the family from starving. But then, somehow, Fiddle-John had
no taste for work, while Ingeborg had. He much preferred singing
songs and telling stories. And a very pretty picture he made, as
he sat there at the roadside, with his handsome, gentle face, his
large blue eyes, and his wavy blond hair, and the children nestling
about him, listening in wide-eyed wonder. There was something very
attractive about his face, with its mild, melancholy smile, and
a sort of diffident, questioning look in the eyes. He had an odd
habit of opening his mouth several times before he spoke, and then,
possibly, if his questioner’s face did not please him, he would
go away, having said nothing. And, after all, it was diffidence
and not insolence which prompted this action. It would never have
occurred to Fiddle-John to take a critical view of anybody; he
approved of all humanity in general, only he had an intuitive
suspicion when anyone was making fun of him, and in such cases he
found safety only in flight and silence.
By profession Fiddle-John was a ballad-singer; a queer profession,
you will say, but nevertheless one which in Norway enjoys a certain
recognition. He had a voice which the angels might have envied
him--a clear and sweet tenor which rang through the depths of the
listener’s soul. Hearing that voice, it was impossible not to stay
and listen. The deputy sheriff, who once came to arrest Fiddle-John
for vagrancy, when Fiddle-John began to sing, sat and cried. It
came over him so “sorter queer,” he said. The parson, who had made
up his mind to give Fiddle-John a thundering reproof for neglect of
his family, the first time he should catch him, quite forgot his
sinister purpose when, one day, he saw the ballad-singer seated
under a large tree, with a dozen children climbing over him, and,
with rollicking laughter, tumbling and rolling about him. And when
Fiddle-John, having quieted his audience, took two little girls on
his lap, while the boys scrambled and fought for the places nearest
to him, the parson could not for the life of him recall the harsh
things he had meant to say to Fiddle-John. The fact was--though, of
course, it is scarcely fair to tell--the ballad which Fiddle-John
sang to the children reminded the parson of the time (now long ago)
when he was paying court to Mrs. Parson, and sometimes, on slight
provocation, dropped into poetry.
“Thy cheeks are like the red, red rose,
Thy hands are like the lily.”
These were the very extraordinary sentiments which the parson had,
at that remote period, professed toward Mrs. Parson, and these were
the very words which Fiddle-John was now singing. No wonder the
parson forgot that he had come to scold Fiddle-John. “I suppose
that such good-for-nothings may be good for something, after all,”
he said to his wife as he related the incident at the dinner-table.
Fiddle-John and his family lived in a little cottage close up
under the mountain-side, where the sun did not reach until late in
the afternoon. In the winter they were sometimes snowed down so
completely that they had to work until noon before they could get
a glimpse of the sky. The two boys, Alf and Truls, would go early
in the morning with their snow-shovels and dig a tunnel to the
cow-stable, where a lonely cow, a pig, and three sheep were penned
up. Their father would then sit at the window, holding a lantern,
the light of which vaguely penetrated the darkness and showed
them in what direction they were digging; but, after awhile, this
monotonous occupation wearied him, and he would take his fiddle and
play the most mournful tunes he could think of. It never occurred
to him to lend a helping hand; and it never occurred to the boys to
ask him.
They accepted their fate without much reasoning; it seemed part of
the right order of things that they and their mother should work,
while their father played and sang. Ingeborg, their mother, had
nursed a kind of tender reverence for him in their hearts, since
they were babes. He seemed scarcely part of the coarse and common
work-a-day world to which they belonged; with his gentle, handsome
face, and his clear blue eyes, he seemed like some superior being
who conferred a favor upon them by merely consenting to grant them
his company. His songs travelled from one end of the valley to
the other, and everybody learned them by heart and sang them at
weddings, dances, and funerals. Even though the parishioners might
themselves find fault with Fiddle-John, and call him quaint and
queer, they stood up for him bravely if a stranger ventured to
attack him.