The master of a smack was lately accused of having murdered an
apprentice; so the mob made desperate attempts to lynch the prisoner
every time he was brought before the magistrates. They heard that the
dead boy used to be beaten with ropes'-ends, kicked, dragged along the
deck, drenched with cold water, and subjected to other ingenious modes
of discipline, and they were horrified. Yet only a few years ago no
surprise or indignation greeted a skipper who habitually ill-used his
cabin-boys. If screams were heard coming from a collier in the Pool, the
men in neighbouring vessels scarcely took the trouble to turn round.
They know that some unhappy boy was being corrected; and they believed
in stripes and bruises as necessary agencies in nautical education. When
a weakly lad chanced to die he was dropped overboard, and there was an
end of the matter; the strong lads who lived through these brutalities
grew into fine sailors.
Times are altered. The old-fashioned sailor is an extinct creature, and
modern conditions have developed a totally new variety. The
old-fashioned sailor was brought up in an atmosphere of rough cruelty;
the new-fashioned sailor will submit to no tyranny whatever. The
old-fashioned skipper was very like the Hull culprit in habits and
customs; the new-fashioned skipper is overbearing and often conceited,
but rarely brutal.
They formed a strange society, did those East Coast sailors of past
days. A boy grew up in one of the brisk little ports that lay between
Wivenhoe and Spittal. The notion of inland life had no place in his
mind, for his thoughts in early years suffered a sea change. He played
on the quay, and heard the growling talk of the lounging, bearded
sailors; so that he soon became critical in the matter of ships and
seamanship. He could tell you the name of every black and apple-bowed
vessel that came curtseying over the bar on the flood tide; and he would
prove the superiority of the "Halicore" over the "Mary Jane," with many
clenching allusions to aged authorities. If the black fleet went out
with a northerly breeze blowing, he could name the ship that would be
first clear of the ruck; if the wind were off the land, he knew which
ship would be suited by having the breeze on the beam. Long before he
ever saw the outside of the bar he had heard of every point on the
coast. The possibility of becoming anything but a sailor never entered
his head. He tried to copy the flat-footed rolling walk of the seamen,
and he longed for the time when he might wear a braided cap and smoke a
pipe. While yet little more than a child he went on his trial voyage,
and had his first experience of sea-sickness. Then he was bound
apprentice for five years, his wages beginning at L8 per year, and
increasing yearly by L2 until the end of his term. His troubles began
after his indentures were signed. The average skipper had no thought of
cruelty and yet was very cruel. The poor lad had a very scanty allowance
of water for washing; yet if he appeared at breakfast-time with face and
hands unclean he was sent squeaking up to the galley with a few smart
weals tingling upon him. All sorts of projectiles were launched at him
merely to emphasize orders. The mate, the able seamen (or
"full-marrows"), the ordinary seamen (or "half-marrows") never dreamed
of signifying their pleasure to him save with a kick or an open-handed
blow. His only time of peace came when it was his watch below, and he
could lay his poor little unkempt head easily in his hammock. In bad
weather he took his chance with the men. The icy gusts roared through
the rigging; the cold spray smote him and froze on him; green seas came
over and forced him to hold on wheresoever he might. Sometimes the
clumsy old brig would drown everybody out of the forecastle, and the
little sailor had to curl up in his oilskins on the streaming floor of
the after-cabin. Sometimes the ship would have to "turn" every yard of
the way from Thames to Tyne, or from Thames to Blyth. Then the cabin-boy
had to stamp and shiver with the rest until the vessel came round on
each new tack, and then perhaps he would be forced to haul on a rope
where the ice was hardening. It might be that on one bad night, when the
fog lay low on the water and the rollers lunged heavily shoreward, the
skipper would make a mistake. The look-out men would hear the thunder of
broken water close under the bows; and then, after a brief agony of
hurry and effort, the vessel beat herself to bits on the remorseless
stones. In that case the little cabin-boy's troubles were soon over. The
country people found him in the morning stretched on the beach with his
eyes sealed with the soft sand. But in most instances he made his trips
from port to port safely enough. His chief danger came when he lay in
the London river or in the Tyne. As soon as a collier was moored in the
Pool or in the Blackwall Reach, the skipper made it a point of honour to
go ashore, and the boy had to scull the ship's boat to the landing. From
the top of Greenwich Pier to the bend of the river a fleet of tiny boats
might be seen bobbing at their painters every evening. The skippers were
ashore in the red-curtained public-houses. The roar of personal
experiences sounded through the cloud of tobacco-smoke and steam, and
the drinking was steady and determined. Out on the river the shadows
fell on the racing tide; the weird lights flickered in the brown depths
of the water; and the swirling eddies gurgled darkly and flung the boats
hither and thither. In the stern of each boat was a crouching figure;
for the little cabin-boy had to wait in the cold until the pleasures of
rum and conversation had palled upon his master. Sometimes the boy fell
asleep; there came a lurch, he fell into the swift tide, and was borne
away into the dark. Over and over again did little boys lose their lives
in this way when their thoughtless masters kept them waiting until
midnight or later.
Through hunger and cruelty and storm and stress, the luckier cabin-boy
grew in health and courage until his time was out. When he went home he
wore a thick blue coat, wide blue trousers, and a flat cap with mystic
braid; and on the quay he strolled with his peers in great majesty. Tiny
children admired his earrings and his cap and his complicated swagger.
Then in due time came the blessed day when he called himself ordinary
seaman, and when the most energetic of mates dared not thrash him
(unless, indeed, the mate happened to be much the stronger man, in which
case professional etiquette was apt to be disregarded); his pay rose to
L2 a month; he felt justified in walking regularly with a maiden of his
choice; and his brown face showed signs of moustache and beard. Then he
became A.B., then mate, and last of all he reached the glories of
mastership and L8 a month. By that time he had become a resolute,
skilful man, with coarse tastes and blunt feelings. Danger never cost
him a thought. He would swear fearfully about trifling annoyances; but
in utmost peril, when his ship was rolling yard-arm under, or straining
off the gnashing cliffs of a lee-shore, he was quiet and cool and
resigned. He took the risk of his life as part of his day's work and
made no fuss about it. He was hopelessly ignorant and wildly
conservative; he believed in England, and reckoned foreigners as a minor
species. His sinful insularity ran to ludicrous manifestations
sometimes. An old coaster was once beating up for his own harbour and
trying to save the tide. A little Danish brig got a slant of wind and
rattled in over the bar, while the collier had to stand off for six
hours. The captain was gravely indignant at this mischance, and,
sighing, said, "Ah! God cares far more for them furriners than He does
for His own countrymen."
As he grew in years his temper became worse, and his girth greater. The
violent exertion of his earlier days was exchanged for the ease of a man
who had nothing to do but stand about, eat, sleep, and throw things at
cabin-boys. He had all the peremptory disposition of an Eastern tyrant;
and the notion of being called to account for any one of his doings
would have thrown him into apoplectic surprise. So he lived out his
days, working his old tub up and down the coast with marvellous skill,
beating his boy, roaring songs when his vessel lay in the Pool, and
lamenting the good times gone by. When at last his joints grew too
stiff, and other troubles of age came upon him, he settled ashore in
some little cottage and devoted himself to quiet meditation of a
pessimistic kind. Every morning he rolled down to the quay and
criticised with cruel acuteness the habits of the younger generation of
mariners; every evening he took his place in the tavern parlour and
instructed the assembled skippers. At last the time came for him to go:
then the men whom he had scored with ropes'-ends in his day were the
first to mourn him and to speak with admiration of his educational
methods.
The skipper of the new school is a sad backslider. He would think it
undignified to beat a boy; he wears a black frock coat, keeps novels in
his cabin, wears a finger-ring, and tries to look like a ship-broker. He
mixes his north-country accent with a twang learned in the West-end
theatres, and he never goes ashore without a tall hat and an umbrella.
His walk is a grievous trouble to his mind. The ideal ship-broker has a
straight and seemly gait; but no captain who ever tried to imitate the
ship-broker could quite do away with a certain nautical roll. The
new-fashioned captain is not content with that simple old political
creed of true sailors, which began and ended with the assertion that one
Englishman could beat any six foreigners. This is crude in his eyes. He
knows all about Gladstone and the Land Bill; he is abreast of his age in
knowledge of the Eastern Question; and he claims kindred with a Party.
His self-confidence is phenomenal, but not often offensive. In short, he
is a sort of nautical bagman, with all the faults and all the
business-like virtues of his kind.