Our "salt tute" had gone through many a storm at sea; had once escaped,
the only soul saved out of fifty-three, from a foundered bark, and
endured five days' suffering, without bread or water, on a raft. But,
as I heard him tell Mr Clare afterwards, he had never undergone an
experience more painful than those two or three hours of gale in our
little cutter. It was his affection for us boys; the reflection that he
had proposed the pleasure sail, and the terrible sense of
responsibility: those together had tried the old man's heart, head, and
nerves, as they had never been tried before.
Among the exciting events of that night, one circumstance impressed me
with astonishment, though it was but small matter perhaps for a boy to
have noticed at such a time. It was that the Captain several times
expressed himself in terms of piety, and even ejaculated that prayer
when our safety was secured. We had sometimes heard him swear before
that, and had always noticed, in contrast to Mr Clare, his indifference
to any religious service or subject; indeed, the only emotion we had
ever seen him display with regard to such matters was on the occasion of
Mr Clare's address after the combat between Drake and Alfred.
It was eight o'clock when we landed on our little rocky island of
deliverance. Boatswain's Reef was, as its name described, only half an
acre in extent--a jagged, stony reef, raised but a few yards at its
highest point above high-tide mark.
Very cold, somewhat anxious, and much exhausted, we found in a few
moments the only shelter it afforded--a level place of sand and sea
grass, about six yards square, defended on the south-west by a miniature
cliff. There a lot of seaweed had accumulated, and the driftings of
many gales collected. Several barrel staves, a large worm-eaten ship's
knee, part of a vessel's stern, with all but the letters "Conq"
obliterated, (the name had probably been _Conqueror_, conquered now, as
Alfred observed, by old ocean); and many pieces and splinters of spar.
The Captain made the discovery with us, and immediately suggested that
we should shelter ourselves there and light a fire.
"Thanks, boys, to the necessities of my pipe, I always have a tinder-box
in my pockets. Perhaps there are some not wet. Here, hunt for them;
I'll throw off my pea-jacket, for I must go to work and try to save
something from the poor _Youth_--our grub at least. I want you to stay
where you are, out of the storm, and to get a good fire going. It may
possibly show them on the cape that we are safe."
"O Captain!" exclaimed Walter, "do let me help you. I don't want to sit
here and do nothing but build a fire whilst you are at work and perhaps
in danger."
"Come along, then, as you are the biggest and strongest--come along,"
replied the Captain, and away they hurried to where our good old boat
was groaning on the beach and pounding against rocks with every beat of
the sea.
She had been driven up too far to get off easily, but with a big hole in
her bows it seemed probable that she would go to pieces before morning.
The sky was black everywhere. The roar of wind and waves was
tremendous. The spray dashed in sheets, at every blow of the sea, over
our spot of defence, so that it was difficult to start a fire. We were
successful, though, and its light showed the figures of the Captain and
Walter, by the stranded boat, climbing on board through the froth of the
surf; pitched up and down as she tossed and bumped; getting down the
tattered sail and hauling it ashore; jumping on the beach again with
coils of rope; saving all that could be saved. And then, the tide
having risen high, both together left her for the last time, bearing, at
much risk, the anchor with them, which they fastened in a cleft of the
rocks, that when our dear old boat--the home of many and many a fine
time--did break up, something might be left of her.
We could not hear their voices, but saw the gestures for us to come and
help, and in a few minutes we were all engaged carrying the rescued
remnants up to our safe place.
Ugly helped. First he dragged a coil of rope and laid it beside the
cliff; then he got hold of a loaf of bread which had dropped from among
the other provisions, and carried that with some trouble but much pride.
In the storm and darkness, only fitfully broken by the firelight, we ate
our supper under what shelter the low cliff afforded. Our boyish
spirits were much subdued and awed by the peril we had passed through
and the sombre scene about us.
The meal being finished, we made some preparations for the night,
fastening the sail, by the weight of large stones laid on one edge of
it, to the top of the rock, and then bringing its other edge, the boom
side, to the ground and steadying it there with pegs. In that way we
constructed a kind of tent, in which we piled a bedding and covering of
dry seaweed.
The Captain stood by the fire, smoking his pipe and watching our
arrangements. When they were completed, and we boys, gratified with our
success, began to declare our situation "rather jolly," he interrupted
us somewhat abruptly in this way:--
"You chaps always say your prayers before you sleep, I dare say. If so,
you'll not forget them to-night--will you?"
"No, sir," we answered.
"Young shipmates, you remember how Mr Clare talked to you one day in
the _Clear the Track_--eh? Well, then, for the first time in nigh forty
years--think of that, nigh _forty_ years--I said my prayers, the only
ones I ever said, that my--mo--ther taught me; and somehow they came so
clear to me that I felt like as if my--mo--ther was kneeling beside me.
I ran away to sea, like the young fool that I was, when I was eleven
years old. It was going on four years before I came back to my old
home. I had forgotten my prayers. I tried hard to remember them, too,
_then_, and some of the Scripture stories and lessons my--mo--ther used
to teach me; for she was--gone."
His voice did not tremble, but he spoke very slowly, as if he wanted to
speak out to us, and yet wished to do it without betraying the deep
feeling that the events of the evening had intensified. Each time
before he spoke the words "my mother," he took the pipe from his mouth
and hesitated a moment, as if to steady himself. Somehow the old
Captain's voice was softer, I thought, than I had ever heard it before--
it may have been fatigue and the noises of the storm that made it sound
so. His face, too, looked to me as if it had lost its hard lines and
roughness--perhaps the firelight caused that to seem so. And those
bold, sharp eyes of his were as gentle as my little sister Aggie's. He
continued:--
"Hard times a youngster often has at sea, not in all ships, but in many,
I tell you, and bad companions on every side. No gentle looks or kind
words, but knocks and oaths. No time to read, and all that; hardly a
chance to think. Well, I was a bad one, and worse when I went back
again, and had my--mo--ther no longer to love me, and no one anywhere in
the world to care a button for Rowly," (his Christian name was Roland).
"I was a pretty reckless, hearty, devil-me-care fellow, I tell you. I
could rough it and fight my way with the strongest, and never thought
further ahead than the moment I was living in. So, for thirty years and
more I knocked about the world, coming scot-free through a thousand
dangers. Yes, and I got ahead all the time and prospered, thinking
mighty well of myself, my _good luck_, clear head, and tough arm. I
never thought of God. I don't know but that I had almost forgotten that
there was a God; at any rate, if I thought of Him, it was with doubt and
indifference. Yet, boys, in all that time, `He cared for me, upheld me,
_blessed me_.'"
His words grew hurried and thick, his head was turned so I could not see
his face, and the old black pipe had fallen from his fingers to the
ground. Ugly walked around and snuffed at it in amazement. But the
Captain went on:--
"Now I feel it all--_how_ I _feel_ it--since I heard Mr Clare that day.
Nearly forty years deaf, but I hear God's voice within me _now_, louder
and louder every day; and what has He done for us to-day? How He has
spoken! Ah! boys, you'll never be the old sinner I have been.
`Remember _thy_ Creator in the days of thy youth.' Part of the only
hymn I can remember, of my mother's, has come again and again to my ear
to-night--that--
"`God moves in a mysterious way,
His wonders to perform;
He plants His footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.'
"I forget the rest, except--
"`Trust Him for His grace:
Behind a frowning Providence
He hides a smiling face.'
"Boys! turn in now. I am on watch, and shall keep the fire going. Turn
in, I tell you."
With those last words to finish his talk and order us to bed, his voice
regained its sailor-like strength and roughness, but it melted again as
he added--
"My dear old boys, we shall all pray to-night, eh? and from wiser and
better hearts. _Thank God_!"
The last things I was conscious of that night were the whistling of the
wind and the roaring of the waves, and the snapping and fizzing of the
red embers, thus telling their stories to the storm of the brave ships
of which they once formed parts.