"The dismal wreck to view
Struck horror to the crew."
Old Song.
The earlier history of a human being's life is engraved upon his mind as
with a pen of steel. After one comes to what are termed years of
discretion, the soul is not so impressionable, and events must be of
more than usual interest to be very long remembered. The story, then,
of a chequered life cannot be told with even a hopeful attempt at
minuteness, unless a log has been kept day after day and year after
year; and my opinion is, that although diaries are often most
religiously commenced, especially about New Year's time, they are seldom
if ever kept up very long.
My own adventures, and the scenes I passed through in the first stages
of my existence, were not, as the reader already knows, of a kind to be
very easily forgotten, even had my mind never been very impressionable.
It was easy enough, therefore, to record them in some kind of
chronological form.
The few adventures I and my friend Ben Roberts tell in the pages that
follow, and our sketches of life, are given as they occur to our memory;
often brought back to our minds by the incidents of our present everyday
life.
But I do not think that even if Ben and I live as long as Old Parr, we
shall either tire of spinning our yarns, or fall short of subject
matter.
Let me say a word or two about the place I live in now, and where Ben so
often pays me a visit.
We call it Rowan Tree Villa.
It stands mid-way up a well-wooded hill, about two and a half miles from
a dreamy, drowsy old village, in one of the dreamiest, drowsiest nooks
of bonnie, tree-clad Berkshire.
The top of the hill is covered by tall-stemmed pine trees, and from this
eminence you can see, stretching far away below, all the undulating
country, the fertile valley of the Thames, and the river itself winding
for many and many a mile through it--a silver thread amidst the green.
From the top of this hill, too, if you take the trouble to climb it, you
can have a bird's-eye view of Rowan Tree Villa.
There it is, a pretty, many-gabled cottage, with a comfortable-looking
kitchen garden and orchard behind it, and a long, wide lawn in front.
Now this lawn has one peculiarity. From the gate on each side up to the
terrace in front of the house sweeps a broad carriage drive, bounded on
both its sides, first by a belt of green grass, carefully trimmed and
dotted here and there with patches of flowers, and secondly by two rows
of rowan trees (the mountain ash), trained on wires, and forming the
prettiest bit of hedge-work you could easily imagine.
If you were Scotch, and looked at that hedge even for a moment, the
words, and maybe the air as well, of the Baroness Nairne's beautiful
song would rise in your mind--
"Thy leaves were aye the first in spring,
Thy flowers the summer's pride;
There was nae sic a bonnie tree
In a' the country side.
And fair wert thou in summer time,
Wi' a' thy clusters white,
And rich and gay thy autumn dress
Of berries red and bright.
Oh, rowan tree!"
Well, it is June to-day--an afternoon in June; a day to make one feel
life in every limb--a day when but to exist is a luxury. The roses are
bending their heads in the sweet sunshine, for there is not a cloud in
Heaven's blue. The butterflies are chasing each other among the flowers
on the lawn, where we recline among the daisies, and the big velvety
bees go droning and humming from clover blossom to clover blossom.
"Strange, is it not, my dear Ben," I said, "that on such a day as this,
and in the midst of sunshine, I should bethink me of some night-scenes
at sea and on land?
"I remember well my first experience of a storm by night in the Northern
Ocean. We were going to the Arctic regions, cruising in a sturdy and,
on the whole, not badly fitted, nor badly found ship.
"The anchor was weighed, the sails were set, and spread their wings to
the breeze; the crew had given their farewell cheer, and the rough old
pilot, having seen us safely out of Brassy Sound, had shaken the captain
roughly by the hand, and wishing us `God-speed and safely home,' had
disappeared in his boat round a point.
"We were once more on the deep and dark blue ocean. Then the night
began to fall, and soon the only sound heard was the tramp, tramp on
deck, or the steady wash of the water, as our vessel ever and anon
dipped her bows or waist in the waves.
"The captain had given his last orders on deck, and came below to our
little saloon, the only occupants of which were myself and the ship's
cat.
"Poor Pussy was endeavouring, rather ineffectually, to steady herself on
the sofa, and looked very much from home, while I myself was trebly
engaged: namely, in placing such articles as were constantly tumbling
down into a safer and steadier position, in keeping the fire brightly
burning, and in reading a nautical book.
"There was a shade of uneasiness on the captain's face as he looked at
the barometer; and when he entered his state-room, and presently after
emerged dressed in oilskins and a sou'-wester hat, I felt as sure we
were going to have a dirty night as though he had rigged himself out in
sackcloth and ashes.
"He sat down, and, calling for some coffee, invited me to join in a
social cup.
"`Is there plenty of sea-room?' I inquired.
"`Very little sea-room,' he replied; `but she must take her chance.'
"Then we relapsed into silence.
"About an hour or two after this it became a difficult matter to sit on
a chair at all, so much did the vessel pitch and roll.
"The captain had gone on deck, and as I had neither the need nor the
desire to follow him, I threw myself on the sofa, at the risk even of
offending my good friend and companion, Pussy.
"The storm was now raging with terrible fury.
"Two watches were called to shorten sail, and the din and noise of
voices could be distinctly heard rising high over the dashing of the
waves, and the whistling of the wind among the rigging and shrouds.
Every timber was stretched, every plank seemed to creak and wail in
agony; yet the good ship bore it well.
"Tired of the sofa I turned into bed, hoping to have a few hours of
sleep; but was very soon obliged to turn out again, having been awakened
from a pleasant dream of green fields, pine-clad hills, and a broad,
quiet river, where ferns and water-lilies grew, by the crashing of
crockery in the steward's pantry. It sounded as if bottles, dishes,
plates, and cups were all in a heap in the middle of the floor breaking
each other to infinitesimal pieces. And that is precisely what they
were doing.
"Things in the saloon were fast verging into a state of chaos, and
appeared to be making very merry in my absence. The fender and
fire-irons presided over the musical department.
"The captain's big chair was dancing very emphatically, but rather
clumsily, with the coal-scuttle as a partner; the table was bowing to
the sofa, but the sofa begged to be excused from getting up. The only
reasonable-looking article of furniture in the room was a chair, which
was merely staggering around with my coat on, while the cat had gone to
sleep in my sou'-wester; and while endeavouring to restore quiet and
order, I was thrown below the table like a pair of old boots, where, for
the want of ability to do anything better, I was fain to remain.
"`Clear away the wreck!' I could now hear the captain's voice bawling,
for our fore-mast had gone by the board.
"_His_ voice was not the only one I heard. On passing the man at the
wheel, I heard the captain ask, `What! are you getting afraid, man?'
And the brave British voice that so firmly replied `Not at all, sir!'
explained better than printed volumes could have done the secret of all
our naval greatness; for to hearts like his, and hands like his, in many
a dark and stormy night, Britannia entrusts her honour, and bravely is
it kept and guarded.
"Musing on this fact, I fell soundly to sleep beneath the table, and
when I awoke the storm had ceased.
"There are few situations in which a healthy man can be placed that are
more full of discomfort than that of being at sea in a small ship during
a storm. I do not refer to a mere `capful of wind;' I mean a great-gun
gale. There is, literally speaking, no rest for the sole of the foot.
Tossed about in all directions, in vain do you seek to exchange your
chair for the sofa. Probably you are sent rolling off on to the deck,
and thankful you ought to be if the cushions are the only things that
follow you. Flesh-sore and weary, perhaps you seek for solace in a cup
of tea: thankful you may be again if the steward succeeds in pouring it
into your cup, instead of spilling it down your neck. Then, if you so
far forget the rules of the sea as to place it for a moment on the table
without a hand to guard it, you are instantly treated to a gratuitous
shower-bath.
"Still the ocean has its pleasures and its charms as well as the land.
My mind, even now, carries me back and away to a scene very different
from that which I have just been describing.
"I am sitting in my little cabin. It is a summer's evening, and all is
peace within and around my barque. Yonder is my bed, and the little
port close by my snow-white pillow is open, and through it steals the
soft, cool breeze of evening, and wantonly lifts and flutters the little
blue silken hangers. Not far off I can catch glimpses of the wooded
hills and flowery valleys of a sunny land. And night after night the
light wind that blows from it is laden with the sweet breath of its
flowers; and between there lies the ocean, asleep and quiet and still,
and beautiful with the tints of reflected clouds.
"Often in the cool night that succeeds a day of heat have I lain awake
for hours, fanned by the breath of the sea, gazing on the watery world
beneath and beyond me, and the silvery moon and tiny stars, that make
one think of home, till sleep stole gently down on a moonbeam, and
wafted me off to dreamland.
"But in witnessing even the war of the elements at sea, a sailor often
finds a strange, wild pleasure. Enveloped in the thundercloud you mount
with every wave to meet the lightning's flash, or descend, like an
arrow, into the gulf below--down, down, down, till the sun, lurid and
red, is hidden at last from view by the wall of black waters around you.
"Or fancy the picture, which no artist could depict, of a ship far away
in ocean's midst by night in a thunderstorm. Dimly through the murky
night behold that tumbling sea, lighted only by its own foam and the
occasional flash from the storm-cloud. See that dark spot on the sea;
it is a ship, and living souls are there--human beings, each with his
own world of cares and loves and thoughts that are even now far away,
all in that little spot. Whish! now by the pale lightning's flash you
can see it all. The black ship, with her bare poles, her slippery,
shining deck and wet cordage, hanging by the bows to the crest of that
great inky wave. What a little thing she looks, and what a mighty ocean
all around her; and see how pale appear the faces of the crew that
`cling to slippery shrouds,' lest the next wave bear them into eternity.
"Whoever has been to prayers at sea during a storm has had a solemn
experience he will never forget."
"Perhaps there is no more impressive ocean-scene ever beheld by the
sailor," said Captain Ben Roberts, "than the phosphorescent seas
witnessed at times in the tropics." But though far more common in these
regions than in the temperate zones, this extraordinary luminosity of
the water is sometimes observed around our own coasts.
"I shall always remember," he continues, "the first time I witnessed the
phenomenon, though I've often seen it since.
"What a happy day we had had, to be sure! We were a party of five--I
but a schoolboy, my comrades little more. It was the first time I had
been to that most bewitching of western islands called Skye. We had
started off one morning early on a ramble. We simply meant to go
somewhere--anywhere, so long as we did not come back again for a night
or two. Not that we were not happy enough in the old-fashioned manse of
K--. But we wanted change, we wanted adventure if we could find any,
and if we did not, then probably we should be able to make some. There
was, at all events, the wild mountain peak of Quiraing to be climbed,
with its strange top--the extinct crater of a burning mountain. Ah! but
long before we came anywhere near it, there was a deal to be done.
"We had started from the beautiful little bay of Nigg, keeping a
northerly course over a broad Highland upland.
"It was the month of June; the heather was not purple yet, but it was
long and rank and green, and it was inhabited by many a curious wild
bird, whose nests we hunted for, but did not rob; we saw some snakes,
too, and one of us killed a very long one, and we all thought that boy a
very hero, though I know now it was no more dangerous or deadly than a
tallow candle.
"But the best fun we got was when we took to horse-catching. There was
not much harm in this after all. There were dozens of ponies roaming
wild over the green moor, and if they allowed themselves to be caught
and ridden for miles through the heather, why, it did not hurt them;
they soon danced back again.
"We laughed, and screamed, and whooped, loud enough to scare even the
curlews, and that is saying a good deal. I'm not sure, indeed, that we
didn't scare the eagles from their eeries; at all events we thought we
did. Then we began to ascend Quiraing, a stiff climb and somewhat
hazardous; and light-hearted though we were, I believe we were all
impressed with the grandeur of the view we caught from between the
needle-like rocks that form one side.
"We went down to the plains below more quickly than we came up.
"Presently we came to a little Highland village close to the sea, and
there, to our joy, we found that a large fishing-boat was going round
the northernmost and east part of the island to Portree, the capital.
For a trifle we managed to take a passage. We had lots of bread and
cheese in our wallets, and we had some money in our pockets, good
sticks, and stout young hearts; so that we should not be badly off even
although we should have to trudge on foot back again to the old manse.
Which, by the way, we had to.
"Our voyage was a far longer one in time than we had expected it would
be, because the wind fell. But the beauty of the scenery, the hills,
the strange-shaped mountains, the rocks and cliffs, with waterfalls
tumbling sheer over them and falling into the sea; the sea itself, so
calm and blue, and the distant mainland, enshrouded in the purple mist
of distance, repaid us for all, and made the day seem like one long,
happy dream.
"But daylight faded at last, and just as the gloaming star peeped out
there came down upon our boat a very large shoal of porpoises, which the
boatman gravely assured us at first was the great sea-serpent. These
creatures were in chase of herrings, but they were so reckless in their
rush and so headlong, that we were fain to scream to frighten them off,
and even to arm ourselves with stones from the ballast, and throw at
those that came too near.
"Night fell at last, and we were still at sea, and the stars came out
above us. But if there were stars above us there were stars beneath us
too; nay, not only beneath us, but everywhere about and around us. The
sea was alive with phosphorescent animalculae; the wake of the boat was
a broad belt of light behind us, every ripple sparkled and shone, and
the water that dripped from the oars looked like molten silver."
"Ah!" said I, "that was one of your first experiences of the open sea,
wasn't it, Ben?"
"I was only a boy, Nie," replied my friend. "I've had many a sleep in
the cradle of the deep since then."
"I was reading this morning," I said, "of that terrible shipwreck in the
Atlantic. It puts me in mind of the loss of the _London_. I was in the
Bay of Biscay in that very gale, Ben; our vessel unmanageable, wallowing
in the trough of the seas, the waves making a clean breach over us; and,
Ben, at the very darkest hour of midnight, we saw, by the lightning's
gleam, a great ship stagger past us. We were so close that we could
have pitched a coil of rope on board. There were no men on her decks;
her masts were carried away, and her bulwarks gone, and it was evident
she was foundering fast. There were more ships lost, Ben, that night in
the Bay of Biscay than ever we shall know of--
"`Till the sea gives up its dead.'"