DEEP-WATER AMENITIES.
The cook stood by the galley stove, swelling with conscious dignity, as
of a man whose position is unassailable--above criticism. "Now then,
cook!" I cried, "where's that duff?" For all answer he seized his
"tormentors"--a sort of miniature pitchfork--and began jabbing them down
into the seething copper. "Look out, cook!" I said, in terror, "you'll
bust the duff-bag, won't you?" No answer deigned he, but presently, with
a mighty heave of both hands, he produced a square grey mass of
something unlike anything edible that ever I had seen. This he dumped
into the kid without a word, and waved his hand to bid me begone. Too
much amazed to speak, I bore the ugly thing into the fo'lk'sle, setting
it down in the midst of my expectant watch-mates, and silently retired
to my corner in hungry anticipation of some fun presently. Joe
approached the kid, knife and plate in hand, but on seeing the contents,
drew back with a start and an exclamation of "What the ---- is _that_?"
"Duff, the cook calls it," I murmured softly. "Well, I'll be ---- if ever
I see or smelt anything like it in all my life," said he; "but p'raps it
eats better'n it looks, so here goes." So saying, he attacked it with
his knife, but only succeeded in removing some sodden, sloppy morsels
from the outside of the lump. Upon the stuff itself he could make no
impression; it was like a piece of indurated gutta-percha. Heavens! how
he did swear. Then Oliver had a try; but in a minute he, too, was
reciting the commination service. For the mess was hopeless. It was
nothing but a mixture of flour and water, without yeast or fat, which
had been roughly moulded into a square, and, without any covering, had
been dropped into a cauldron of boiling, dirty sea-water. Of course it
had hardened and toughened, as well as attracted to itself all the
suspended grime in the water, until it had emerged the outrageous
abomination before us. The men's wrath was really too great for ordinary
bad language; they wanted to kill somebody. Presently Joe snatched up
the kid and rushed to the galley with it, but the cook had wisely
retreated to the cabin. Thither the furious men followed him, shouting
in strident tones for him to "Come out of that!" they wanted to speak to
him. Of course the old man showed himself first, blustering grandly
about the impudence that thus invaded the holy calm of his cabin. This
precipitated matters, and in about a minute there was a furious row. It
culminated presently in Joe hurling the kid and its slippery contents
right into the cabin, and striding forward with a savage string of oaths
to the effect that not another stroke would _he_ do until he got
something that he could eat. Quiet reigned for a brief space, until
presently Harry, the cabin-boy, poked his nose round the fo'lk'sle
door, saying with a grin, "Cook's awful sorry he spiled the duff, but
he's coming forrard presently with a tin o' soup and bully as soon's the
old man's back's turned. Don't go fer him, pore beggar! he's nearly
frightened to deth." The wrath having been mostly diverted to the
skipper, this proposition was not unfavourably entertained, and in due
time the cook sneaked forrard with a hang-dog air, a huge tin of
preserved soup under his apron. And so it came to pass that peace was
patched up for the time, although this outbreak of hostilities made the
way plain and easy for a succession of rows, until the skipper's
authority was a thing of naught. To make matters worse we actually fell
short of provisions. This was a most scandalous thing to happen, for we
were only six weeks out from Sydney, where all sorts of ship's
consumable stores were both excellent and cheap. And we were informed by
one of the apprentices that he knew for a fact that the owners had
ordered Captain Bunker to provision the ship fully in the colonies for
this very reason. We were stinted in everything; but by the connivance
of the cabin-boy, Harry, who used to leave the pantry door unlocked, I
made many a nightly raid upon its contents, such as they were. Many a
time I had to crouch in its dark recesses, while the old man, prowling
about on his bare feet, was peering in and inquiring querulously, "Who's
there? I thought I heard somebody!" The instant his back was turned I
would bolt for the fo'lk'sle, with my cap full of sugar or the breast of
my jumper full of cuddy biscuits, or whatever spoil was comeatable.
These nocturnal depredations were a source of endless delight to the
second mate. His fat sides would shake with silent laughter as he
watched the stealthy glidings to and fro, and heard the mutterings of
the suspicious skipper, who never dared say a wry word to him. One
night, at the wheel, I was telling him how savagely hungry I was, when,
to my amazement, he replied, "Well, there's a meat pie on the swingin'
tray, why don't ye go an' pinch it?" "What?" I said in a horrified
whisper, "an' have the old man come out an' catch me! Why he'd put me in
irons for a month." "G'way," he muttered scornfully, "he'd never hear
ye. No man thet smokes ez much ez he does is a light sleeper. You ain't
got pluck enough, that's what's the matter with _you_. Yew'd rather go
hungry than run a little risk." The fact was, I didn't trust him any too
much, for it occurred to me that it might fall in with his notions of
fun to see the old man come out and muzzle me in the very act of
embezzling that pie. His next move, however, completely dissipated all
my fears. For he rolled off the hen-coop, where he had been lolling, and
disappeared below, returning in a few minutes with the information that
he had lashed the old man's state-room door-handles together, so that he
couldn't get out if he did wake. I immediately resigned the wheel to
him, shot down into the darkness, and had that pie on deck before you
could count ten. I sat on the break of the poop and ate it, while the
second mate steered as well as he could for laughing at the precipitous
disappearance of the pie. When I had concealed it all, I replaced the
empty dish on the swinging tray, and returned to the wheel. Then the
second mate cast adrift the lashings on the door, and all resumed its
normal calm, preceding the hurricane at breakfast-time, when the loss
was discovered. But there was no breach of confidence, and the vanished
pie took its place among the unsolved mysteries of life for Captain
Bunker.
As we crept closer and closer to our port, favoured by fine weather,
discipline disappeared altogether as far as the skipper was concerned.
Work still went on as usual out of deference to the officers, with whom
the chaps felt they had no quarrel, but if the old man opened his mouth
he was sure to be insulted by somebody. I have not told--indeed, I dare
not tell--a tithe of the things that were said to him; the only persons
preserving any show of deference towards him being old Hansen and the
boys. The officers, of course, did not openly flout him--they just
ignored him, while he almost cringed to them. And then one day, a week
before our arrival off the mouth of the Irrawaddy, Harry came forrard
and told us something that made sport for all hands for the rest of that
voyage. Everybody was hungry now, fore and aft, the commons being
woefully short. But at the usual time for taking the forenoon sights for
longitude, the skipper being in his state-room with the door shut, Harry
went to call him, supposing him to be asleep. After knocking two or
three times, Harry heard a muffled voice within saying, "Go away, I'm at
my devotions." Such a statement took Harry's breath away for a moment,
but yielding to an uncontrollable impulse, he stooped and peeped through
the keyhole. There sat Captain Bunker, a square tin of biscuits between
his knees, a pot of jam open by his side, and his mouth bulging with the
delicate food. Harry had seen enough; and in ten minutes it was all over
the ship. From that time forward, "Don't disturb me, I'm at my
devotions," was heard whenever it was possible to drag it in, until the
monotonous repetition of the phrase became wearisome as a London
catch-word. It annoyed the skipper almost to madness; but that only gave
delight to the men, who felt that at last they had got hold of a cheap
and effective way of repaying him for the hardships they were enduring
through him.
We were favoured with splendid weather, although the north-east monsoon,
being almost "dead on end"--that is, blowing right from the direction in
which we had to go--made our progress exasperatingly slow; and as the
scanty stock of bad provisions got lower and lower the gloomiest
anticipations prevailed. But we managed to reach Elephant Point before
we were quite starved, and with the utmost joy received a white pilot on
board, who, finding that he was likely to hunger if he had to make any
lengthened stay with us, used all his skill to get us into port quickly.
There were some fine screw-tugs plying on the Irrawaddy, but, of course,
we could not avail ourselves of their assistance, the towage being
enormously high, and our old man most anxious to curtail expenses to
balance his waste in other directions. So we were treated to an
exhibition of backing and filling up the river on the flood, just as the
old Geordie colliers do to this day up the Thames: a feat of seamanship
requiring a great deal of skill for its successful accomplishment. Of
course the tide will carry a vessel up the river, but it is necessary to
keep her under control, and, with the wind blowing straight down the
river, the only way of doing this is to stand across the stream, say on
the starboard tack, with all sails full; then, when as far as possible
has been sailed, to haul the yards aback, and go stern foremost back
again. In this manner we worked up the noble stream, finding ourselves
at the turn of the tide within a few miles of our destination, at a spot
known as Monkey Point. Here we anchored for the night, the rushing of
the swift ebb past us keeping up a continual undertone of energy, and
straining our cable out taut as if we were stemming a gale. All manner
of bloodthirsty insects boarded us in battalions, lured in our
direction, doubtless, by the smell of fresh supplies of food, and
through their united efforts we spent a most miserable night. So much
were we tormented, that when daylight called us to resume our journey we
were languid and worn-out, hardly able to tear the anchor from its
tremendous hold upon the thick, elastic mud forming the bed of the
river. We got under way at last, however, and then another couple of
hours brought us up to the anchorage off the city, where a great fleet
of steamers and ships lay loading rice, mostly for India, for the relief
of a famine which was then raging.
We moored with an anchor ahead and another astern, as is usual in
crowded anchorages, so that the vessel, as I have before explained,
swings round and round as if moored to a post, taking up little more
room than her own length. In many respects this was the strangest place
that I had yet visited, the pointed spires of the numerous pagodas
rising out of the dense leafage giving the city a truly Eastern
appearance, while the lofty shining summit of the great pagoda dominated
everything else. As soon as the work of furling sails and clearing up
decks was done--as the skipper had hurried ashore--we were allowed the
remainder of the day to rest, and, rigging up an awning over the
forecastle, we proceeded to enjoy ourselves. Here the boats are
propelled by the boatmen in exactly the same way as a gondola is, and
the way those fellows managed their cumbrous craft in the swift current
was something compelling all our admiration. The native vessels, too,
that came majestically gliding down from far up country laden with rice
for shipment, were the most interesting that I had yet seen. They were
of large size, some of them carrying fifty tons of cargo, and roofed in
by a deeply slanting covering of bamboo mats to protect the cargo. Both
stern and bow rose in a graceful curve, while the stem often towered
high in air--a perpendicular beam of teak most richly carved into
elaborate designs of the quaintest and most eerie character. A tiny deck
aft accommodated the steersman, who with great effort manipulated a
gigantic oar working through a hole in the stern, also richly carved and
decorated in some cases with gilding. But the men--the yellow,
almond-eyed Burmese--not satisfied with the prodigious amount of labour
expended on the adornment of their craft, decorated their own bodies so
elaborately that it was difficult to understand however they could have
borne the tedium of the tattooing, to say nothing of the pain. No people
in the world carry the practice of tattooing to such artistic lengths as
the Burmese universally do. Every man we saw had a magnificent series of
designs covering his trunk to the waist, executed in vermilion, and
representing flowers, animals, and graceful whorls filling in any spaces
too small to allow of anything else being tattooed there. From the waist
to the knees they were tattooed in blue, the designs being plainer and
not so artistic as above. They were a jolly, cheerful lot; but
dignified, too, having none of the exuberance of the negro about them.
Just across the river, opposite to where we lay, was a great saw-mill,
where a herd of a dozen elephants were gravely occupied in drawing
teak-logs from rafts in the water up through the mud, and piling them in
stacks well above high-water mark. They worked in couples, and seemed to
need no directing what to do. Two or three natives lounged about among
them; but every effort they made was apparently the result of their own
initiative as far as could be seen. They worked in couples--sedately,
ponderously; but the sum-total of their labour was quite in keeping with
their huge bulk. One enormous beast was apparently the foreman (our
fellows called him the bo'sun). He roamed about leisurely, bearing in
his trunk a couple of yards of massive chain, which he flourished now
and then as if it were a scourge which he would use upon his toiling
charges should he see fit to encourage them to more strenuous effort.
But as we stared at the strange sight with intense interest, there was a
jet of steam from the mill, a deep whistle sounded, and on the instant
every elephant dropped whatever he had in his trunk and, with quickened
steps, made for his quarters. It was "knock-off time."
Work proceeded in a very easy-going fashion, for the captain had taken
up his quarters on shore and did not return for several days, being
supposed by all of us to have entered upon a steady course of spree. We
got the hold ready to receive the cargo, and did such other duties as
were required of us, without any undue strain upon our energies, while
our bumboatman kept us well supplied with all such luxuries, in the way
of fruit, soft-tack, eggs, etc., as sailors delight in in Indian ports.
Matters proceeded in this way until one day an order came off from the
skipper that an anchor-watch must be kept. This meant that, instead of
one man keeping watch all night, and being free from any other duty,
every man must take one hour's watch in addition to his day's work. Now,
this sort of vigil is only kept during a temporary anchorage, never as a
harbour duty; and, consequently, there was an instant refusal to obey
unless the day's work was shortened. The officers, having no authority
to do this, refused to entertain the idea, and the result was that no
regular watch was kept at all. Two or three nights passed until, in the
midst of a tremendous storm of thunder, lightning, and rain, I was
roused by old Hansen with the words, "Tom, id's your vatch, und de olt
man's 'longside, kigging up de fery teufel 'cause dere's nopody avake."
I was lying on the forecastle head under the awning, nearly stifled with
the heat; and, muttering a blessing upon the old man, I pulled off my
sole garment, and sallied forth into the black, steaming deluge in the
costume of Adam before the fall. As I reached the gangway the old man
just climbed on board; and at that moment a flash of lightning revealed
everything as if in full noonday glare--especially my shining white
skin. He was just angry drunk; and the sight of me standing there, naked
and not ashamed, nearly made him split with rage. He howled like a hyena
for the mate, who, startled beyond measure, came rushing out of his
cabin into the flood. Turning savagely to him, the skipper, almost
unintelligibly, demanded the reason of this disgraceful state of
affairs--pointing to me, standing, like Lot's wife, under the incessant
play of the lightning. It was an irresistibly funny tableau. Over the
rail peered the black faces and glaring eyeballs of the Hindu boatmen
who had brought the skipper off, their impassive faces showing no sign
of the wonder they must have felt at these unprecedented proceedings.
The hissing downpour of rain descended pitilessly, its noise almost
drowning the infuriated voice of Captain Bunker, who, foaming with
rage, berated the saturnine mate. Every other second we were all
invisible to each other--the darkness engulfed us. Then a rending glare
of white light revealed us all again, standing as if posing for our
portraits. The mate tired of it first, and, turning to me, said grimly,
"Go an' get some close on. Y'ought ter be 'shamed o' yerself comin' aft
like that." I instantly retreated forrard, while the old man, still
raging, followed the mate as he returned to his cabin without deigning a
word of reply. I rigged myself hurriedly and came aft again, prepared to
keep the rest of my watch under the poop-awning in such comfort as I
could. But I had hardly lit a cigar (the rupee a hundred sort), and
settled myself cosily in the skipper's long chair, when that restless
man emerged from the companion and strolled towards me. I did not
stir--indeed, it was too late, since I was caught. I could only brazen
it out. At first I feared his rage would choke him, for he gasped as if
the flow of eloquence was literally strangling him in its frantic
efforts to find a vent. Suddenly he made two steps towards me, gurgling
as he did so, "Git off my poop or I'll kick ye down the steps!" I sprang
lightly out of my seat and stood on the defensive, saying nothing, but
backing cautiously to the ladder, which I descended with my face towards
him. I heard no more of him afterwards, for my watch was soon over, and
my relief, one of the apprentices, came on watch at once. Next day there
was a regular inquiry into the vexed anchor-watch question; and, after
much heated discussion, it was arranged that we should resume work one
hour later each morning and keep regular watch one hour each through the
night. As soon as this was settled our worthy chief departed on shore
again; and there, to our great relief, he remained.