[The following story is by no means a piece of mere
invention. The principal points were narrated to me by a
very intelligent young North-Sea fisherman, who had
frequently heard the legend from a grizzled old sailor on
board the smack in which he was an apprentice. The veteran
used to tell the story as having happened to himself; and he
had told it so often, that he firmly believed it, and used
to get into a passion when any of the crew dared to doubt or
laugh. I have, of course, licked the rough outlines of the
story or anecdote into something like shape; but the main
incidents are repeated to this day by the sailors of the
'Barking Fleet,' as the squadron of handsome smacks are
called, which, hailing from the town of Barking, in Essex,
pursue the toilsome task, in all seasons, and almost in all
weathers, of supplying the London market with North-Sea
turbot, soles, and cod. The story is told in the first
person, as Dick Hatch himself might have narrated it.]
Nigh forty years ago, mates, when I was as young and supple as the boy
Bill, there--though I was older than him by some years--I was serving
my apprenticeship to the trade aboard the sloop _Lively Nan_. There
were not such big vessels in the trade then, mates, as now; but they
were tight craft, and manned by light fellows; and they did their work
as well as the primest clipper of the Barking Fleet. Well, the _Lively
Nan_ was about this quickest and most weatherly of the whole fleet;
and she had a great name for making the quickest runs between the
fishing-grounds and the river. But it wasn't owing so much to the
qualities of the smack, as to the seamanship of the skipper. A prime
sailor he was, surely. There wasn't another man sailed out of the
River Thames who could handle a smack like Bob Goss. When he took the
tiller, somehow the craft seemed to know it, and bobbed up half a
point nearer to the wind; and when we were running free with the
main-sheet eased off, and the foresail shivering, her wake would be as
straight as her mast; only, he was a rare fellow for carrying on, was
old Captain Goss! We would be staggering under a whole main-sail, when
the other smacks had three reefs in theirs; and it was odds but we had
one line of reef-points triced up, when our neighbours would be going
at it under storm-trysail and storm-jib. He worked the _Lively Nan_
hard, he did, did Captain Goss. Sweet, and wholesome, and easy as she
was--for she would rise to any sea, like as comfortable as a duck--Old
Goss all but drove her under. Dry jackets were scarce on board the
_Lively Nan_. If there was as much wind stirring as would whirl round
the rusty old vane on the topmast head, 'Carry on, carry on!' was
always the captain's cry; and away we would bowl, half-a-dozen of the
lee-streaks of the deck under water.
Well, mates, Old Goss was a prime sailor; but he was a strange sort of
man. To see him in a passion, was something you wouldn't forget in a
hurry; and you wouldn't have known him long without having the chance.
Most of us can swear a bit now and then; but you ought to have heard
Captain Goss! He used even to frighten the old salts, that had common
oaths in their mouths from morning till night. He was worse than the
worst madman in Bedlam when his blood was up; and even the strong,
bold men of the crew used to cower before him like as the cabin-boy.
And yet, mates, he was but a little, maimed man, and more than sixty
years old. He had a regular monkey-face; I never saw one like
it--brown, and all over puckers, and working and twitching, like the
sea where the tide-currents meet. He had but one eye, and he wore a
big black patch over the place where the other had been; but that one
eye, mates, would screw into you like a gimlet. Well, Captain Goss was
more than fifty when he came down to Barking, and bought the _Lively
Nan_, and made a carrier[1] of her; and nobody knew who he was, or
where he came from. There was an old house at Barking then, and I have
heard say that its ruins are there yet. The boys said that Guy
Fawkes--him they burn every 5th of November--used to live there; and
the story went that it was haunted, and that there was one room, the
door of which always stood ajar, and nobody could either open or shut
it. Well, mates, Old Captain Goss wasn't the sort of man to care much
about Guy Fawkeses or goblins; so he hires a room in this old
house--precious cheap he got it!--and when he was ashore, you could
see a light in it all night; and if you went near, you might listen to
Old Goss singing roaring songs about the brisk boys of the Spanish
main, and yelling and huzzaing to himself, and drinking what he called
his five-water grog. Five-water grog, mates--that was one of his
jokes. It was rum made hot on the fire; and he could drink it scalding
and never wink: and he would drink it till he got reg'lar wild. He was
never right-down drunk, but just wild, like a savage beast! And then
he would jump up, and make-believe he was fighting, and holler out to
give it to the Spanish dogs, and that there were lots of doubloons
below. I've gone myself with other youngsters, to listen at the door;
and once when he was in the fit, yelling and singing, and laughing and
swearing, all at once, I'm jiggered if he didn't out with a brace of
old brass-mounted ship's pistols, and fire them right and left in the
air, so that we cut and run a deal faster than we came. Of course the
report soon got about that Captain Goss was an old pirate, or at the
best an old bucaneer; and the Barking folks used to tell how many
crews he had made walk the plank, and how there was blood-marks on his
hands, which he used to try to cover with tar. But no one dared to say
a word of this to him; and as he was a prime sailor, and even kind
after his fashion, when he had taken first a reg'lar quantity of his
five-water grog, he never wanted hands. At sea, he was often wild
enough with liquor; but he no sooner put his hand on the tiller, than
he seemed all right: and the _Lively Nan_ walked through it like
smoke. I'm jiggered, mates, if that old fellow couldn't sail a ship
asleep or awake, drunk or sober, dead or alive.
Well, then, such was my old captain, Bobby Goss; and now I'll tell you
what happened to him. One evening, in the autumn-time, and just when
we were beginning to look out for the equinoctials, the _Lively Nan_
was lying with her anchor a-peak--for we didn't mean to stay long--in
Yarmouth Roads. There were three men on board, and one boy with
myself; they called him Lawrence. I forget his other name, for I aint
seen him for many a year. Well, the men had all turned in for'ards,
and we two were left to wait for the captain, who had gone ashore; and
after he came back, to take our spells at an anchor-watch till
daylight, when we were to trip, and be off to the Dogger. The weather
was near a dead calm, and warm for the time of year. The _Lively Nan_
was lying with her gaff hoisted half-way and the peak settled down, so
that we mightn't lose any time in setting the sail in the morning; and
Lawrence and I were lying in the fo'castle, with our pipes in our
mouths, watching the shore, to see if the captain was coming off, and
seeing the sun go down over the sand-hills and the steeples and the
wind-mills of Yarmouth. There weren't many vessels in the Roads; but
the Yarmouth galleys, that go dodging about among the sands, were
stretching in for the beach with the last puff of the evening breeze;
and the herring-boats could be seen going off to their ground like
specks out upon the sea. Then presently it got dark, and the
town-lights of Yarmouth came sparkling out, the harbour-light the
biggest, and away to the south'ard, the Lowstofft Light-house. But,
after all, there aint much amusement in watching lights, and we both
of us wanted to turn in; but till the captain came, there was no warm
blankets for either. So we got wondering what Old Goss was doing at
Yarmouth, and what was keeping him, and whether he'd come aboard drunk
or sober, and whether he'd blow us up, and whether he'd rope's-end us,
which was as likely as not, or perhaps more. Well, so hour after hour
passed, and the night was so calm we could hear the chimes of the
Yarmouth clocks, and the water going lap-lap against the sides of the
_Lively Nan_, and the rudder going cheep-cheep as the sway of the sea
stirred it. At last, says Lawrence: 'It's reg'lar dull here; let's go
below.'
'What's the use?' says I: 'there's no light, and the hands are all
fast asleep.'
'No,' says he; 'to the captain's cabin I mean. There's a lamp there;
and we can hear the oars of the boat, and be on deck again, and no one
the wiser.'
Well, mates, I had some curiosity to get a glimpse of the captain's
cabin, where I very seldom went, and never stayed long: so down we
went, lighted up the lamp, and looked about us. There wasn't much,
however, to see. It was a black little hole, with a brass stove and
lockers, and a couple of berths, larboard and starboard, and a small
picture of a fore-and-aft rigged schooner, very low in the water, and
looking a reg'lar clipper; and no name to her. Well, mates, all at
once I caught sight of a pack of cards lying on a locker. 'Here's a
bit o' fun,' says I; 'Lawry, let's have a game;' and he agreed. So
down we sat, and began to play 'put.' A precious greasy old lot of
cards they were; and so many dirt-spots on them, that it required a
fellow with sharp eyes to make out the dirt from the Clubs and Spades.
However, we got on somehow. When one was ready to play, he knocked the
table with his knuckles, as a signal to the other; and for hours and
hours we shuffled and dealt and knocked until it was late in the
night, which I ought to have told you was Saturday night. At last,
just as we ended a game, and when we were listening if a boat was
coming, before beginning another, we heard the Yarmouth clocks ring
twelve.
'Put up the cards,' says Lawrence; 'I'll not play more.'
'Why not?' says I.
'Because,' says he, and he stammered a little--'because it's Sunday.'
Well, mates, I had forgotten all my notions of that kind, and so I
laughed at him. But it was no use.
'Them,' says he, 'that plays cards on a Sunday, runs a double chance
of death on Monday.'
His mother had told him this, and so he refused out-and-out to go on.
'Well,' says I, 'I aint afraid, and I'd play if I had a partner.'
Mates! the cards were lying in a pack, and the words were hardly out
of my mouth, before they slipped down, and spread themselves out upon
the table! Lawrence gave a loud screech, and jumped up. 'Oh!' says he,
'it's the Old Un with us in the cabin!' and up the companion he
tumbled, and I at his heels; and rushed for'ard as hard as we could
pelt, and cuddled under the foresail--which was lying on the deck--all
trembling and shaking, and our teeth chattering.
'I told you what it would be,' says Lawrence.
'I'll never play cards again,' says I, 'on a Sunday!'
Just at that minute we heard oars, and then a hail: 'The _Lively Nan_,
ahoy!' It was Old Goss's voice, and it was so thick, we knew he wasn't
sober. So we slunk out, all trembling and clinging to each other. The
lamp was burning up the cabin skylight, but we were afraid to look
down. But if we didn't look, we could not help hearing; and sure
enough there was the rap of knuckles on the table, as if Somebody was
impatient that his partner didn't play. Well, we were more dead than
alive when the captain came alongside in a shore-boat, and tumbled up
the side, abusing the boatmen for the price he had to pay them. He had
a lantern, and noticed the state we were in at once.
'Now, then,' says he, 'you couple of young swabs, what are ye standing
grinning there for, like powder-monkeys in the aguer? What's come over
you, ye twin pair of snivelling Molly Coddles?' We looked at each
other, but we were afraid to speak. 'What is it?' he roared again, 'or
I'll make your backs as hot as a roasted pig's!' And on this, Lawrence
reg'larly blubbered out: 'The devil, sir; the devil is in the cabin
playing at double dummy "put!"'
You should have heard Old Goss's laugh at this. They might have heard
it ashore at Yarmouth. Just as it stopped, the sound of the knuckles
came up through the skylight.
'Who's below?' says the captain.
'No one,' says I.
'But Davy Jones,' says Lawrence.
'Then,' says the captain, with an oath that was enough to split the
mast, 'I'll play with him! It's not been the first time, and it mayn't
be the last. Go for'ard, you beggars' brats, and don't disturb us;'
and he went down the companion.
But we did not go for'ard. No; we stretched ourselves on the deck, and
peeped down the skylight. We could only see faintly, but we did see
the captain sitting, holding his hand of cards, and another hand
opposite, all spread out, but no fingers holding it, and no man behind
it. There was a rap on the table, and I am sure it was not the captain
that struck it.
'Very well,' says he; 'wait till I've thought. You're so confounded
sharp.'
Then he played, and there was a dark shadow on the table--we did not
know what, but it made our hair stand on end.
'Play fair, Old Un!' says the captain. 'There goes king of trumps. Ha!
that's what I thought! Of course, the devil's own luck--it's a
proverb. Well, never say die. There!' and he played again.
But we could stand it no longer. We scrambled to our legs, and the
next minute were down in fo'castle, rousing the men. They were sleepy
enough, you may be bound; but we almost lugged them out of the
hammocks. 'Turn out, turn out, shipmates, for God's-sake: the devil's
aboard this ship, and he's playing cards with the captain in the
cabin.' At first, mates, the hands thought we had gone mad; but we
both of us told in a breath what we had seen; and so in a minute or
two we all went aft, creeping like cats along the deck. But there was
no need. We heard Old Goss's voice raging like a fury.
'You're a cheat, Old Un,' he was yelling out. 'You cheat all mankind:
you've cheated me. Come, play; double or quits on the first turn-up.
What's that? Nine of Spades! Seven of Spades! What! no trumps? I say,
don't you mind the old craft under the line? That's her opposite you;
so, play away.'
'Mates,' says an old salt--his name was Bartholomew Cook--'mates,'
says he, 'this is a doomed ship, an I won't ship for another v'y'ge.'
'Nor I;' 'nor I,' says several, as we crept along.
'He's only mad with drink,' whispered the mate. 'It's all five-water
grog.'
'Is it?' said Bartholomew. 'Look down there!'
The men crept to the skylight, and peeped; and so did I. What we saw,
not a man forgot the longest day he lived. The captain was dealing the
cards furiously; his face working and swelling; his hair bristling up;
his good eye gleaming, and the patch off the other, the blind one,
which was shining, too, as it were, like a rotten oyster in the dark.
'Play!' roars Goss at last; and then he paused, as if he was thinking
of his next card. The table was rapped. He played; and then quick and
furious the cards came down; the captain all the while raving,
shouting, and foaming at the mouth.
'Against me--against me--against me! Avaunt! A man's no match for ye.
Ye have all! Lost again! No; here--stop. On the next card, I stake
myself--my ship--my'--
'Stop!' shouted old Bartholomew. He had been standing at the foot of
the companion, and he burst into the cabin. 'Stop, Captain Goss, in
the name of God!'
Goss turned round to him. His face was so like the Evil One's that we
did not look for any other. Then a brass-mounted pistol--a shot--and
rolling smoke: all passed in a minute. Then the captain flung a card
upon the table, and with a yell like a wild beast, shouted out:
'Lost!' fell over the cards, extinguished the lamp; and we neither
heard nor saw more, till there came a shuffling on the companion, and
Bartholomew crawled out with his face all blackened by the powder, and
the blood trickling from his cheek, where the ball had grazed it. We
all went for'ard, mates, and had a long palaver, and resolved to go
ashore at daybreak, and leave a doomed captain and a doomed ship. But
we didn't know our man. In the gray of the morning, we heard the
handspike rattle on the hatch, and we tumbled up one after the other.
The captain was there, looking much as usual, but only paler.
'Man the windlass,' says he.
'We're going ashore, sir,' says Bartholomew firmly.
'How?' says the captain.
'In the boat,' says Bartholomew.
'Are you?' says Goss: 'look at her!' He had cut her adrift, and she
was a mile off.
'And now,' says Goss, 'I was drunk last night, and frightened
you--playing tricks with cards. Don't be fools; do your duty, and defy
Davy Jones. If not'--And then he flung open his pea-coat, and we saw
four of the brass-mounted pistols in his belt. But, mates, his one eye
was worse than the four muzzles, and we slunk to our work, and obeyed
him. The easterly breeze came fresh, and we were soon bowling away
nor'ard. The captain stood long at the helm, and we gathered for'ard.
'We're lost!' said Bartholomew; 'we're lost men! We're bought and
sold!'
'Bartholomew,' shouts the captain, 'come and take the helm!' He went
aft, mates, like a lamb; and the captain walked for'ards, and looked
at us, one after another; and the one eye cowed us. We were not like
men; and he was our master. When he went below, we grouped together,
and looked out to windward. It was getting black--black; the wind was
coming off in gusts; and the _Lively Nan_ began to dance to the seas
that came rolling in from the eastward. 'The equinoctial!' we says one
to another. In an hour more, mates, all the sky to windward was like a
big sheet of lead; with white clouds, like feathers, driving athwart
it--the clouds, as it were, whiter than the firmament. You know the
meaning, mates, of a sky like that; and accordingly, by nightfall, we
had it; and the _Lively Nan_, under close-reefed main-sail and
storm-jib, was groaning, and plunging, and diving in the seas--the
wind blowing, mates, as if it would have wrenched the mast out of the
keelson. Many a gale have I been in, before and since, but that was
the worst of all. Well, mates, we thought we were doomed, but we did
our work, silent and steady; and we kept the smack under a press of
canvas that none but such a boat could bear, to claw her off the
lee-shore--off them fearsome sands that lie all along Lincolnshire.
Captain Goss was as bold and cool as ever, and stood by the
tiller-tackle, and steered the ship as no hand but his could do.
It was the gloaming of the night, mates, when the gale came down,
heavier and heavier--a perfect blast, that tore up the very sea, and
drove sheets of water into the air. We were a'most blinded, and clung
to cleats and rigging--the sea tumbling over and over us; and the
poor, old smack at length smashed down on her beam-ends. All at once,
the mast went over the side; and as we righted and rose on the curl of
a seaway, Bartholomew sung out, loud and shrill: 'Sail, ho!' We
looked. Right to windward, mates, there was a sort of light opening in
the clouds; something of the colour of the ring round the moon in
dirty weather, and nigh as round; and in the middle of it was a smack,
driving right down on us, her bowsprit not a cable-length from our
broadside. She looked wondrous like the _Lively Nan_ herself, and some
of us saw our own faces clustered for'ard, looking at ourselves over
the bow!
As this notion was passed from one to another, we cried out aloud,
that our hour was come. Captain Goss was in the middle of us. 'Hold
your baby screeches,' says he. 'You'll be none the worse; it's me and
the smack she has to do with.' Even, as he spoke, she was on us. Some
fell on their knees, and others clenched their fists and their teeth;
but instead of the crash of meeting timber, we heard but a rustle, and
the shadow of her sails flitted, as it were, across us; and as they
passed, the wind was cold, cold, and struck us like frost; and the
next minute the _Lively Nan_ had sunk below our feet, and we found
ourselves in the roaring sea, struggling among the wreck of the mast.
The smack was gone, and the strange ship gone, and the gale blowing
steady and strong. One by one, mates, we got astride of the mast, and
lashed ourselves with odds and ends of broken rope; and then we began,
as we rose and fell on the sea, to look about and muster how many we
were. The crew, including the captain, was seven hands, but we were
sure there were eight men sitting on the mast. It was too dark to see
faces; but you could see the dark figures clinging to the spar.
'Answer to your names, mates,' says Bartholomew, who somehow took the
lead. And so he called over the list till he came to the captain.
'Captain Goss?'
'Here,' says the captain's voice.
We now knew there was somebody behind him who was not one of the crew.
It was too dark, however, to see distinctly, and Goss interrupted our
view such as it was.
'Who is the man on the end of the mast, Captain Goss?' says
Bartholomew.
'You might be old enough to guess that!' replied the captain, and his
voice was husky-like, but quite clear; and it never trembled. 'Some
men call him one thing, some another; and we of the sea call him Davy
Jones.'
Mates, at that we clustered up together as well as we could, and
fixing our eyes on what was passing at the other end of the mast, we
hardly attended to the seas that broke over and over us. At last, we
saw Captain Goss, by the light of the beds of bursting foam, fumbling
for something in his breast.
'Is it a Bible you have there?' cried Bartholomew. The captain didn't
answer, but pulled out the thing he was trying for; and we guessed
somehow, for we could hardly see, that it was the greasy pack of
cards.
'Double or quits!' he shouted, 'on all I've staked;' and in another
instant there was one horrid, unearthly screech, like what we heard in
the cabin before, and the mast, as it were, tipped the heel of it, the
cross-trees rising many feet above the water. Whether or no it was the
motion of the waves that had tossed it, no man can say; but when the
mast rolled again with the next sea, the heel came up empty: Captain
Goss and his companion were gone!
'Thank God,' says Old Bartholomew, 'for Jonah is in the sea.' In less
than half an hour, mates, we were tossed ashore, without a bruise or
scratch. We walked the beach till daylight, and then we saw that the
mast had disappeared. None ever saw more a timber or a rope's-end of
the _Lively Nan_. She had been staked and won; but the greasy cards,
mates, lay wet and dank upon the beach, and we left them to wither
there among the sea-weed.