From the point where the swordfish killed the whale we laid a course
southwesterly to the westward of Réunion. We had the southeast trades
all the way, and did not touch a brace until we were between Réunion
and Madagascar. There the trades left us, and we laid a southerly
course, with shifting winds. We were getting into the “horse
latitudes,” and the wind was generally strong, at first from the east
and northeast; still farther south it held usually from the westward,
stronger yet, and gales were frequent.
I had taken an unreasoning dislike to Smith. I could not account for
it, and I do not remember that I tried to. It was much like that of
a dog, and may have been due to the same cause. His outward behavior
was unexceptionable. He was always pleasant, properly deferential to
the officers, with due regard to each man’s taste in degree and kind
of deference. He was a diplomat. Even to Mr. Brown his manner was
perfect: silent, brief when words were needed, quite respectful and
pleasant. I think that Mr. Brown was wondering whether he had done
Smith entire justice. But the men were less alive and willing. Nobody
could help seeing it, although few would have ascribed the change to
Smith.
One day, when we were off the southern end of Madagascar, Peter spoke
to me of it.
“It ’s that Smith,” he said. “It ’s his doing.”
“Why don’t you report it to the old man?” I asked. “Or tell one of
the officers—Mr. Brown, if you like.”
“What ’d I report?” he said. “Smith has n’t said anything or done
anything. They ’d ask me what, and I ’d say he laughed at the men,
and they ’d laugh at me—and I ’d fall off the topsail yardarm, with a
knife in my back, as {250} like as not, in one o’ these gales we ’ll
be running into. And what good ’d that do to anybody?”
“Does Smith carry a knife?” I asked quickly.
“I ’ve never seen it; and he ’s one of the pleasantest-spoken men I
ever saw—always at my elbow when I ’m at my scrimshawing, admiring.
But he ’s a trouble-maker. He ’ll have the men ready for mutiny,
the first thing you know, with his laughing at them, and making fun
of them, and despising them for doing what they have to do. There
ain’t anything else will do it so quick or so sure. And there ain’t
anything he says or does ’t you can put your finger on. I ’ve been to
sea a good many years, and I know a beach-comber when I see one—full
of all kinds of hard drink that would burn out the insides of a
better man, and filled with disease and evil. Smith must have been a
good man to stand it so long—and come out no worse.”
At that moment Smith passed us, and Peter began to talk of something
else.
When we reached the latitude of the Crozets we began the regular
cruising programme at once. We were far enough south to see ice
occasionally, although it was a little late in the season for that;
but the water was very cold, and the wind, almost without exception
while we were in those waters, was very strong from the westward,
blowing a gale about half the time. We had a good deal of fog. I did
get sight of the Crozets once, distant, dark mountain peaks, cold and
forbidding. We had about us, most of the time, an albatross or two,
and gannets, boobies, petrels, and Cape pigeons in plenty. I suppose
they must nest on the islands.
Sperm whales are not to be found in these latitudes, although right
whales are.
We got no whales here; indeed, our actions led me to think that the
captain did not expect any, or want any. He took no great pains, at
any rate, and we quartered the grounds only once. Then we wore ship,
and ran down {251} to leeward. When we had reached the easterly
limit of our cruising ground, we did not come about and beat up, as I
expected, but continued to run to the eastward before a gale of wind,
with alternations of fog and rain, three hundred miles farther, more
or less. It was very disagreeable weather.
At last we found ourselves, one morning, in the midst of great
numbers of birds, some in the air, and many others in the water:
teals, giant petrels, gulls, terns, cormorants, Cape pigeons, and
albatrosses; and an abundance of penguins. The cormorants and
penguins were new to me. We knew, of course, that we must be very
near to some land, but the weather was so thick that we could not see
above half a mile. Sail was reduced, and we ran cautiously. We could
feel the nearness of land. Even I could do that. About the middle of
the day the fog lifted somewhat, and became a thick mist. Through it
we saw the mass of Kerguelen, or Desolation Island, its peaks lost in
the rolling clouds of fog. A little later we rounded a promontory,
and entered a bay with many little islands dotted over it. Of course
I compared the bay with Buzzard’s Bay, for that was my standard of
comparison always, especially the part from New Bedford to Cuttyhunk.
This bay seemed not very different in size, but the shores were as
different from the shores of Buzzard’s Bay as they well could be. The
land was steep and high and rugged, making the bay more like my idea
of a Norwegian fiord, although I know the fiords of Norway only as my
imagination pictures them. On that first day the land seemed to run
right up without limit beyond the clouds, which hung low. There were
days, later, when we saw the fields of perpetual snow on the summits
of the mountains, and caught glimpses of the glaciers running down
the valleys.
There was fresh water here in plenty, and some days were spent in
filling our casks and in giving the men a {252} run ashore. There
was no danger of desertion, and absolutely no chance of harm of the
sort usually connected with shore liberty. Indeed, it was funny to
see how afraid the men were that the ship would sail without them.
They went about in clumps, and Smith attached himself closely to
Peter and me. It was good to feel solid earth under our feet once
more.
We saw here some fur seals in the water, and a very few
sea-elephants, which had been left behind by the herd in its
southward migration a short time before, much as an occasional
robin is left in the north, into November or even December. The
sea-elephant is a strange beast. It has a snout somewhat prolonged,
and as flexible as an elephant’s, but this snout or trunk is short,
about the length of a tapir’s, I should guess. I never measured a
sea-elephant, but I should think they were from ten to twenty feet
long, and that they weighed from one to three tons, the bulls being
larger than the cows. They look much like huge leather water-bottles,
filled to bursting with water, and dumped on the ground by tired
porters.
As we saw them there, they were lying on the grass-covered slopes,
between the rocks. When we came too near, the beast would raise its
head, wrinkle its nose, contract its proboscis until it lay flat
on its face, and open its disgusting mouth, emitting what probably
passed, among sea-elephants, for a growl or a hiss. As I remember
them, the lower lip was very full and split, and they had a way of
thrusting it forward, as if pouting. I may be wrong, for it is a long
time to remember such details, and I was not engaged in a scientific
investigation. I am sure only that the expression of their faces was
very disgusting and expressed the most utter disgust. No doubt it
represented rage or alarm, perhaps both. When we advanced cautiously
nearer still, the beast would bestir itself, rise up on its flippers,
and go lumbering off with astonishing speed. {253}
After one of these excursions, as Peter and Smith and I were
approaching the shore where our boat lay, we saw a party of our men
coming out of a ravine loaded to the gunwales with some sort of a
plant.
“What ’s that they ’ve got?” asked Smith.
“It ’s likely to be Kerguelen cabbage,” Peter answered.
“I ’ve heard of it,” said Smith. “Sort of medicine, is n’t it?”
Peter shook his head. “I ’ve never eaten any. You ’re like to find
out. It seems early in the season to pick cabbages.”
Smith laughed, and started running to meet the men with the cabbages.
He was just the build for a runner, tall and lean, and he ran well
and easily. To tell the truth, I admired the man, while I disliked
him heartily; admired his physical qualities, which seemed unimpaired
by his mode of life, while I disliked his attitude toward everything,
and the kind of thoughts which seemed to occupy his mind—his mental
attributes, or rather the attributes of the heart, as we are apt to
put it.
The captain was glad to get the cabbages, immature as they must have
been, and they were fed to the crew in the next few days. There was a
sort of oily essence in them, and they had a peculiar taste; but it
was not unpleasant, once you were used to it, and the men had been
without green vegetables for so long that they would have welcomed
anything. The effect upon their health was marked. Whenever we landed
upon Desolation we laid in a supply of cabbages, and as long as we
were in that neighborhood the crew were in the best of condition.
We sailed before sunrise the next morning, and began our long beat to
the westward. The weather was still bad, with half a gale of wind,
and fog, mist, or rain. In fact, the weather in the neighborhood of
Kerguelen is uniformly bad, as far as my experience goes. We did not
have a dozen days of clear sunshine in all the time we were there.
{254}
Not long after this Captain Nelson got into a towering rage against
Smith for insubordination, and against Mr. Snow for permitting it.
Smith’s insubordination was, in itself, a small matter. He had
failed to carry out some order of Mr. Snow’s, but had done something
else instead. What he had done was just as good as what he had been
ordered to do—it may have been better—but on a ship orders are
orders, and must be obeyed. Mr. Snow, instead of insisting that
his orders be obeyed, had first stormed and blustered, and then
weakly pleaded with Smith. As far as I could gather, Smith had paid
no attention to his storming, had smiled at his blustering, and
disregarded his pleading, but had gone on with whatever he was doing.
He had done it very well, and in a smart and seamanlike manner. There
was no fault to be found with him on that count, but no shipmaster
can pass over such rank and obvious disobedience.
I had never seen Captain Nelson in a towering rage before, and I
witnessed it but once again. Twice is once too many. When he was in
such a rage he was quiet—ominously quiet, although he was always a
quiet man; his mouth became a straight, thin line half hidden by
his beard, and his eyes were cold and hard. He summoned Smith to
the cabin and asked him what he had to say for himself. I was not
present, but the quarters on a whaleship are not large, and the
partitions are not sound-proof. I could imagine, easily enough, the
captain’s eyes boring through Smith, and Smith’s opaque, china-blue
eyes gazing innocently at the captain; for Smith, in such an
encounter, was Captain Nelson’s equal. In education and breeding he
was superior, and I had no doubt that his experience of clashes of
the kind was far greater than the captain’s; but Captain Nelson’s
mental processes were not devious, as Smith’s were. He knew where he
was going, and went by the most direct path. If he found anything in
his way he smashed it. His intentions were good, and he {255} had
the authority, and he meant to maintain it; this above all things.
At first Smith pretended not to know what the captain was talking
about, but the captain cut him short. Then he proceeded to explain
why what he had done—I did not know just what it was—was better than
what he had been ordered to do; that it was dark, and they were in
some hurry, and it saved time. Smith was a thorough seaman—he would
have been good at anything he undertook—and the seamanship shown in
his explanation impressed Captain Nelson, and somewhat softened the
rebuke which came. But it came. Smith was dismissed with the warning
that his first duty was to obey orders, and never to let it happen
again. I had no difficulty in picturing his respectful, pleasant
smile, and his bow, as he withdrew with a “Thank you, sir.”
Mr. Snow’s interview was different. I did not hear him say anything.
Captain Nelson’s low voice said various cutting things very briefly.
I could not hear all of it, but the gist of the captain’s remarks
was that one of the first duties of an officer was to maintain his
authority; that he owed it to the ship, to his superiors, and to
the owners, and that any officer who was unable to do so would be
broken—deprived of his rank. Then I heard the murmur of Mr. Snow’s
voice as he asked a question. Captain Nelson’s answer came like a
bomb, with a blow of his fist upon the table.
“Shoot him, sir! Shoot him! I ’d do it in a second.”
Then Mr. Snow faded out of the cabin.
In the course of time we turned once more to leeward, and ran for
Desolation. This time we did not land in the great bay to which
we had first gone, but in a comparatively small harbor farther to
the westward. Nobody knew why we had come—at least, nobody but the
captain and perhaps some of the officers, and they said nothing. I
ventured to ask Captain Nelson. {256}
He smiled at my question. “May be something worth while, Tim,” he
said rather gruffly. “Never can tell.”
I said nothing more. There seemed to be nothing there that we wanted,
and we got up our anchor, ran along the coast a little way, and
poked our nose into the next harbor. There are a great many of these
natural harbors along the coast of Kerguelen, deep, with mountainous
sides, except on the western end. The prevailing winds are westerly,
and in the course of ages the sea has eaten into the shore of the
windward end, and smoothed it out.
We called at a number of these fiords. In one or two of them we
anchored, and the men were given a chance to stretch their legs,
only the officer in charge knowing his errand; into others we merely
sailed, and then sailed out again. At last we struck one that seemed
to be to the captain’s liking, and a large party went ashore, headed
by the captain.
The captain carried a Spencer carbine, and so did Mr. Brown.
Mr. Baker preferred a lance. There were but two of the Spencers
available, and we had no ammunition to waste, although there was
enough for ordinary occasions on a long voyage. The Spencer was a
short, repeating rifle, rather heavy, but an extremely handy gun. Its
magazine carried seven cartridges, with a lead projectile half an
inch in diameter, or thereabouts, and the rifle was sighted for half
a mile, to the best of my recollection. It was a gun which had done
good work in the Civil War, and there were a good many of them in New
Bedford.
When we had got away from the beach I was so glad to feel the springy
turf under my feet that I ran ahead at the top of my speed, which was
good enough to distance everybody, although several of the men were
running clumsily. That is, I distanced everybody but Smith. He could
outrun me easily, and kept ahead, flinging back over his shoulder
good-natured taunts. Somewhat stung by his taunts, I went after him,
and he led me off to one {257} side, up a slope covered thickly
with huge boulders, or perhaps outcroppings of rock. He ran up the
steep sides of these rocks—as I thought, to show off—and I followed,
struggling up where he had leaped, and jumping from the tops, as he
had done. At last we came to a rock steeper and higher than any other
that we had been over. Smith leaped lightly up its side, and jumped
from its top. My breath was gone, and I was tired, but I managed to
get up; my foot slipped as I was about to jump, and I fell instead,
striking my head.
When I came to myself Smith was on the top of the great rock from
which I had fallen, bending over, his hands busy with a big round
stone which rested on the rock, very near the edge. Even in my dazed
condition I knew enough to spring out of the way, for the stone would
have fallen upon me in a few seconds more.
“What are you doing?” I cried angrily.
Smith smiled pleasantly, and kept on tugging at the stone. “Only
trying to move this stone. I was afraid it would fall on you.”
My head was clearing—and aching. I was sure the stone had not been
there when I fell. And why, if his object was to save me, had Smith
not dragged me out of its way? It would have been easier, and
simpler, and the natural thing to do. Was he trying to kill me, and
in a way which would make my death seem a regrettable accident? It
was not to be borne. A great rage filled my heart as the question
seemed to answer itself.
Upon landing, I had provided myself with a club, as a boy will
naturally pick up any handy stick. That club lay where I had fallen;
but I staggered to my feet, and got it. In that moment I became as
mad as any Berserker. Nothing could hurt me, nothing could stop me.
I would kill Smith. I was no longer small, but fairly grown, and I
was strong. I heaved up my club, and I suppose I glared at Smith. He
stood there, on top of the {258} rock, and laughed; and I walked
around the rock, looking for a place to mount, where it would be less
like storming a citadel. Smith laughed as if he would split; and
there came a call for me, and Peter and Mr. Brown hove in sight.
I did not kill Smith. As I stood there, breathing hard, my rage left
me suddenly, as my rages always did. Smith jumped down off the rock,
and came to me, smiling, as though to say something, but I turned
away. In my heart I was sure of him now. He went to Mr. Brown, and
said something about my fall, and about its having put me out of my
head for a time. Mr. Brown listened, but made no reply.
After spending nearly the whole day in tramping over hills, we went
back to the ship empty-handed. I did not know what we had been
looking for.
It was February, 1874, before we left Desolation behind us, and
headed northerly for warmer seas. There was not a man aboard who was
not glad to see the last of this home of gales and wet and cold.
{259}