[Jack London's first story, published at the age of seventeen]
It was four bells in the morning watch. We had just finished breakfast
when the order came forward for the watch on deck to stand by to heave
her to and all hands stand by the boats.
"Port! hard a port!" cried our sailing-master. "Clew up the topsails!
Let the flying jib run down! Back the jib over to windward and run down
the foresail!" And so was our schooner _Sophie Sutherland_ hove to
off the Japan coast, near Cape Jerimo, on April 10, 1893.
Then came moments of bustle and confusion. There were eighteen men to
man the six boats. Some were hooking on the falls, others casting off
the lashings; boat-steerers appeared with boat-compasses and
water-breakers, and boat-pullers with the lunch boxes. Hunters were
staggering under two or three shotguns, a rifle and heavy ammunition
box, all of which were soon stowed away with their oilskins and mittens
in the boats.
The sailing-master gave his last orders, and away we went, pulling three
pairs of oars to gain our positions. We were in the weather boat, and so
had a longer pull than the others. The first, second, and third lee
boats soon had all sail set and were running off to the southward and
westward with the wind beam, while the schooner was running off to
leeward of them, so that in case of accident the boats would have fair
wind home.
It was a glorious morning, but our boat-steerer shook his head ominously
as he glanced at the rising sun and prophetically muttered: "Red sun in
the morning, sailor take warning." The sun had an angry look, and a few
light, fleecy "nigger-heads" in that quarter seemed abashed and
frightened and soon disappeared.
Away off to the northward Cape Jerimo reared its black, forbidding head
like some huge monster rising from the deep. The winter's snow, not yet
entirely dissipated by the sun, covered it in patches of glistening
white, over which the light wind swept on its way out to sea. Huge gulls
rose slowly, fluttering their wings in the light breeze and striking
their webbed feet on the surface of the water for over half a mile
before they could leave it. Hardly had the patter, patter died away
when a flock of sea quail rose, and with whistling wings flew away
to windward, where members of a large band of whales were disporting
themselves, their blowings sounding like the exhaust of steam engines.
The harsh, discordant cries of a sea-parrot grated unpleasantly on the
ear, and set half a dozen alert in a small band of seals that were ahead
of us. Away they went, breaching and jumping entirely out of water. A
sea-gull with slow, deliberate flight and long, majestic curves circled
round us, and as a reminder of home a little English sparrow perched
impudently on the fo'castle head, and, cocking his head on one side,
chirped merrily. The boats were soon among the seals, and the bang!
bang! of the guns could be heard from down to leeward.
The wind was slowly rising, and by three o'clock as, with a dozen seals
in our boat, we were deliberating whether to go on or turn back, the
recall flag was run up at the schooner's mizzen--a sure sign that with
the rising wind the barometer was falling and that our sailing-master
was getting anxious for the welfare of the boats.
Away we went before the wind with a single reef in our sail. With
clenched teeth sat the boat-steerer, grasping the steering oar firmly
with both hands, his restless eyes on the alert--a glance at the
schooner ahead, as we rose on a sea, another at the mainsheet, and then
one astern where the dark ripple of the wind on the water told him of a
coming puff or a large white-cap that threatened to overwhelm us. The
waves were holding high carnival, performing the strangest antics, as
with wild glee they danced along in fierce pursuit--now up, now down,
here, there, and everywhere, until some great sea of liquid green with
its milk-white crest of foam rose from the ocean's throbbing bosom and
drove the others from view. But only for a moment, for again under new
forms they reappeared. In the sun's path they wandered, where every
ripple, great or small, every little spit or spray looked like molten
silver, where the water lost its dark green color and became a dazzling,
silvery flood, only to vanish and become a wild waste of sullen
turbulence, each dark foreboding sea rising and breaking, then rolling
on again. The dash, the sparkle, the silvery light soon vanished with
the sun, which became obscured by black clouds that were rolling swiftly
in from the west, northwest; apt heralds of the coming storm.
We soon reached the schooner and found ourselves the last aboard.
In a few minutes the seals were skinned, boats and decks washed, and
we were down below by the roaring fo'castle fire, with a wash, change
of clothes, and a hot, substantial supper before us. Sail had been put
on the schooner, as we had a run of seventy-five miles to make to the
southward before morning, so as to get in the midst of the seals, out
of which we had strayed during the last two days' hunting.
We had the first watch from eight to midnight. The wind was soon blowing
half a gale, and our sailing-master expected little sleep that night as
he paced up and down the poop. The topsails were soon clewed up and made
fast, then the flying jib run down and furled. Quite a sea was rolling
by this time, occasionally breaking over the decks, flooding them and
threatening to smash the boats. At six bells we were ordered to turn
them over and put on storm lashings. This occupied us till eight bells,
when we were relieved by the mid-watch. I was the last to go below,
doing so just as the watch on deck was furling the spanker. Below all
were asleep except our green hand, the "bricklayer," who was dying of
consumption. The wildly dancing movements of the sea lamp cast a pale,
flickering light through the fo'castle and turned to golden honey the
drops of water on the yellow oilskins. In all the corners dark shadows
seemed to come and go, while up in the eyes of her, beyond the pall
bits, descending from deck to deck, where they seemed to lurk like some
dragon at the cavern's mouth, it was dark as Erebus. Now and again, the
light seemed to penetrate for a moment as the schooner rolled heavier
than usual, only to recede, leaving it darker and blacker than before.
The roar of the wind through the rigging came to the ear muffled like
the distant rumble of a train crossing a trestle or the surf on the
beach, while the loud crash of the seas on her weather bow seemed almost
to rend the beams and planking asunder as it resounded through the
fo'castle. The creaking and groaning of the timbers, stanchions, and
bulkheads, as the strain the vessel was undergoing was felt, served to
drown the groans of the dying man as he tossed uneasily in his bunk.
The working of the foremast against the deck beams caused a shower of
flaky powder to fall, and sent another sound mingling with the tumultous
storm. Small cascades of water streamed from the pall bits from the
fo'castle head above, and, joining issue with the streams from the wet
oilskins, ran along the floor and disappeared aft into the main hold.
At two bells in the middle watch--that is, in land parlance one o'clock
in the morning--the order was roared out on the fo'castle: "All hands on
deck and shorten sail!"
Then the sleepy sailors tumbled out of their bunk and into their
clothes, oil-skins, and sea-boots and up on deck. 'Tis when that order
comes on cold, blustering nights that "Jack" grimly mutters: "Who would
not sell a farm and go to sea?"
It was on deck that the force of the wind could be fully appreciated,
especially after leaving the stifling fo'castle. It seemed to stand
up against you like a wall, making it almost impossible to move on
the heaving decks or to breathe as the fierce gusts came dashing by.
The schooner was hove to under jib, foresail, and mainsail. We proceeded
to lower the foresail and make it fast. The night was dark, greatly
impeding our labor. Still, though not a star or the moon could pierce
the black masses of storm clouds that obscured the sky as they swept
along before the gale, nature aided us in a measure. A soft light
emanated from the movement of the ocean. Each mighty sea, all
phosphorescent and glowing with the tiny lights of myriads of
animalculæ, threatened to overwhelm us with a deluge of fire. Higher and
higher, thinner and thinner, the crest grew as it began to curve and
overtop preparatory to breaking, until with a roar it fell over the
bulwarks, a mass of soft glowing light and tons of water which sent the
sailors sprawling in all directions and left in each nook and cranny
little specks of light that glowed and trembled till the next sea washed
them away, depositing new ones in their places. Sometimes several seas
following each other with great rapidity and thundering down on our
decks filled them full to the bulwarks, but soon they were discharged
through the lee scuppers.
To reef the mainsail we were forced to run off before the gale under the
single reefed jib. By the time we had finished the wind had forced up
such a tremendous sea that it was impossible to heave her to. Away we
flew on the wings of the storm through the muck and flying spray. A wind
sheer to starboard, then another to port as the enormous seas struck the
schooner astern and nearly broached her to. As day broke we took in the
jib, leaving not a sail unfurled. Since we had begun scudding she had
ceased to take the seas over her bow, but amidships they broke fast
and furious. It was a dry storm in the matter of rain, but the force
of the wind filled the air with fine spray, which flew as high as the
crosstrees and cut the face like a knife, making it impossible to see
over a hundred yards ahead. The sea was a dark lead color as with long,
slow, majestic roll it was heaped up by the wind into liquid mountains
of foam. The wild antics of the schooner were sickening as she forged
along. She would almost stop, as though climbing a mountain, then
rapidly rolling to right and left as she gained the summit of a huge
sea, she steadied herself and paused for a moment as though affrighted
at the yawning precipice before her. Like an avalanche, she shot forward
and down as the sea astern struck her with the force of a thousand
battering rams, burying her bow to the catheads in the milky foam at the
bottom that came on deck in all directions--forward, astern, to right
and left, through the hawse-pipes and over the rail.
The wind began to drop, and by ten o'clock we were talking of heaving
her to. We passed a ship, two schooners, and a four-masted barkentine
under the smallest of canvas, and at eleven o'clock, running up the
spanker and jib, we hove her to, and in another hour we were beating
back again against the aftersea under full sail to regain the sealing
ground away to the westward.
Below, a couple of men were sewing the "bricklayer's" body in canvas
preparatory to the sea burial. And so with the storm passed away the
"bricklayer's" soul.