A GREAT STORM, IN WHICH PANURGE PLAYS THE COWARD.
[Illustration: Initial T.]
The next morning the fleet started from Tohu and Bohu, cheered by the
people, who were all in the best humor, because Pantagruel had left
among them a new stock of frying-pans and skillets, so shining that
they could see their faces in them. The sky was bright; the wind was
fair; the very sea seemed to laugh,--all the fleet was happy. But
Pantagruel sat on deck, looking very sad.
Friar John was the first to notice how still Pantagruel was. On seeing
his Prince so glum, the good Friar, who was always a comforting kind
of man, was just about asking him the reason, when James Brayer, the
pilot, after cocking one eye at the sea, and the other at the sky, and
then turning both eyes up towards the flag drooping on the poop, as
though it would never wave again, knew that a storm was coming on, and,
therefore, bid the boatswain pipe all hands on deck, and even summon
the passengers.
"In with your top-sails!" he shouted. "Take in your spritsail! lower
your foresail! lash your guns fast!"--all of which was done as quick as
hands could do it.
Of a sudden, as though a great hand from above had swept down to stir
the waters and make them mad, the sea began to swell, and moan and
roar, and rise up into mountains, and sink into valleys. An awful
north-west wind had got caught in with a hurricane,--so James Brayer
said,--and the two together whistled through the yards, and shrieked
through the shrouds. The sky itself seemed to be splitting open, and
dropping down thunder, lightning, rain, and hail. In broad daylight it
grew all dark, and the water rose to mountains, and sank to the depths
in perfect blackness, save for the great flashes of lightning that
showed the white faces of men, and the whiter foam of the sea.
It looked as though the end of the world had come, and that those on
the sea had been the first to know it.
[Illustration: A STORM COMES ON.]
James Brayer soon had every one about him busy at the work of saving
the flag-ship. Even Pantagruel was pressed into service. It was no time
for ceremony; the danger was too great for that. James Brayer bawled
through his trumpet:--
"My Lord, I must ask you to stand amidship. Your Highness is so heavy
that, in a sea like this, whichever side of the ship you may be on
is bound to keel over. The sea is mad,--I have never seen it so mad
before!"
Pantagruel, in the midst of all this shouting of men, and raging of
the waves, and shrieking of the winds, was kneeling perfectly quiet,
but praying with all his good heart to the Almighty Deliverer to save
them. Hearing James Brayer call, he at once rose from his knees, and
said cheerfully:--
"Here I am, good pilot! But how am I to stand amidship without
interfering with the handling of the ship?"
"Easily enough, Your Highness. All you have to do is to put your arms
around the mainmast, and stand still."
[Illustration: PANTAGRUEL HOLDS THE MAST.]
This Pantagruel did, holding the mast firmly with both hands, and
keeping it straighter than two hundred tacklings could have done.
Everybody worked hard,--everybody except cowardly Panurge, who, when
the sea first began to churn, sank upon deck all in a heap, more
dead than alive. He could do nothing but whine and cry _boo! boo!
boo! boo!_ and call upon Heaven to save him. In the meanwhile, all
the others were as busy as beavers,--Friar John, Gymnaste, Carpalim,
Xenomanes, even Epistemon and old Ponocrates himself! All did wonders;
but nobody worked like Friar John during all the storm; so, at least,
declared James Brayer. Why, Friar John even pulled off his monk's gown,
a thing he had, until then, been known to do only once, and that was
when he saved the Abbey-Vineyard. "It bothers me, and I can't work in
it," he said, as he pulled it off. With his waistcoat for a coat, he
stood at his post with strong arm and cheery word for everybody. Every
now and then he would glance at Panurge, still squatted on deck and
crying, "_Boo! boo! boo! boo!_ Friar John, my friend, good father, I
am drowning. _Boo! boo! boo!_ The water has got into my shoes. _Boo!
boo! boo! boboo!_ I drown! Oh, how I wish I was a gardener, and planted
cabbages, for then I would be sure of always having at least _one_ foot
on land! Oh, my friend, the keel goes up to the sun. I hear the hull
splitting. We are all drowned! _Boo! boo! boo! holos! holos!_" At last
Friar John's patience gave out,--it was at the close of the sixth hour
he had been working,--and he roared out to Panurge:--
"What art thou bellowing there for, like a calf? Panurge the cry-baby,
Panurge the whiner, would it not better become thee to help thyself and
friends? Come, be a man!"
Just then a huge sea broke on the deck. Panurge was too frightened even
to look up. All the answer he could give to Friar John was, "_Boo! boo!
boo! boboo!_ The ship is capsized! I drown!"
[Illustration: A SEA BREAKS OVER PANURGE.]
At that moment, Pantagruel's voice was heard even above the storm, so
mighty was it in prayer: "Save us, good Lord, if it be Thy will." The
Giant's prayer must have been heard. The thunder still crashed; the
lightning still blazed; the rain still poured; but it was not half so
bad as before. The sea still rose; but it rose in hills, not mountains,
now. Pantagruel still stood, as he had from the first, with his arms
clinging to the mainmast while he braced it up, and his eyes trying
to pierce through the blackness. At last, just as the day broke, he
shouted:--
"Land! land! My children, I see land! We are not far from port. I can
see the sky clearing up southwards. Cheer up, all!"
James Brayer was at his side as quick as lightning.
[Illustration: LAND IN SIGHT.]
"Up, lads!" he shouted. "Our prince sees land, and the sea is smoother.
We can put out a trifle of sail. Hands aloft to the maintop! Mind your
steerage; clear your sheets; port, port! Helm-a-lee! Steady, steady!"
And steady it was, too. Before all eyes on the ship land was now to be
seen in full sight, some twenty miles off. The sun was just beginning
to shine a little. The sea was no longer mad. It was only sobbing,
sobbing, sobbing, as though half-ashamed it had so troubled the good
Giant who knew how to pray.
[Illustration: IT WAS LATE IN THE AFTERNOON.]
It was late in the afternoon when James Brayer brought the flag-ship
into port. It was so late that it was resolved not to go on shore until
next day.