upon its bond-servants are the varied voices by which it makes known
its ever-changing moods. They are not for all ears to hear. Many a
sailor spends the greater part of a long life in closest intercourse
with the ocean, yet to its myriad beauties he is blind; no realised
sense of his intimacy with the immensity of the Universe ever makes
the hair of his flesh stand up, and to the majestic music of the
unresting deep his ears of appreciation are closely sealed. Not that
unto any one of the sons of men is it ever given to be conversant
with all the countless phases of delight belonging to the sea. For
some cannot endure the call of deep answering unto deep, the terrible
thundering of the untrammelled ocean in harmony with the uttermost
diapason of the storm-wind. All their finer perceptions are benumbed
by fear. And other some, who are yet unable to rejoice in the sombre
glory of the tempest-tones, are intolerant of the lightsome glee
born of zephyrs and sunlight when the sweet murmur of the radiant
breaths is like the contented cooing of care-free infancy, and every
dancing wavelet wears a many-dimpled smile. For them there must be
a breeze of strength with a strident, swaggering sea through which
the well-found ship ploughs her steady way at utmost speed with
every rounded sail distent like a cherub’s cheek, and every rope and
stay humming a merry tune. Least of all in number are those who can
enjoy a perfect calm. Indeed, in these bustling, strenuous days of
ours opportunities of so doing are daily becoming fewer. The panting
steamship tears up the silken veil of the slumbering sea like some
envious monster in a garden of sleep making havoc of its beauty.
She makes her own wind by her swift thrust through the restful
atmosphere, although there be in reality none astir even sufficient
to ruffle the shining surface before her.
Still, the fact must not be overlooked that many sea-farers do
verily enjoy to the full all sea-sights and sea-sounds, but of their
pleasures they cannot speak. Deep silent content is theirs, a perfect
complacency of delight that length of acquaintanceship only makes
richer and more satisfying, until, as the very structure of the
Stradivarius is saturated with music, so the mariner’s whole being
absorbs, and becomes imbued with, the magic of wind and wave. This
incommunicable joy a monarch might well envy its possessor, for it is
independent of environment, so that although the seafarer may grow
old and feeble, be far away from his well-beloved sea, even blind
and deaf, yet within his soul will still vibrate those resounding
harmonies, and with inward eyes he can feast a farther-reaching
vision than ever over those glorious fenceless fields.
The voices of the sea are many, but their speech is one. Naturally,
perhaps, the thought turns first to the tremendous chorus uplifted
in the hurricane, that swells and swells until even the tropical
thunder’s deafening cannonade is unheard, drowned deep beneath the
exultant flood of song poured forth by the rejoicing sea. Many
epithets have been chosen to characterise the storm-song of the
ocean. None of them can ever hope to satisfy completely, for all must
bear some definite reflex of the minds of their utterers, according
as they have been impressed by their experiences or imaginings. But
to my mind most of the terms used are out of place and misleading.
They generally endeavour to describe the tempestuous sea as a
ravenous monster, a howling destroyer of unthinking ferocity, and
the like. Alas, it is very natural so to do. For when this feeble
frame must needs confront the resounding main in the plenitude of
its power, our mortal part must perforce feel and acknowledge its
insignificance, must dwindle and shake with fear, although that part
of us which is akin to the Infinite may vainly desire to rejoice with
all seas and floods that praise Him and magnify Him for ever. Not
in the presence of ocean shouting his hymn of praise may we satisfy
our desire to join in the triumphant lay, although we know how full
of benefits to our race are the forces made vocal in that majestic
Lobgesang. As the all-conquering flood of sound, with a volume as
if God were smiting the sapphire globe of the universe, rolls on,
we may hear the cry, “Life and strength and joy do I bring. Before
my resistless march darkness, disease, and death must flee. When
beneath my reverberating chariot-wheels man is overwhelmed, not mine
the blame. I do but fulfil mine appointed way, scattering health,
refreshment, and well-being over every living thing.”
But when as yet the sky is serene above and the surface of the
slumbering depths is just ruffled by a gentle air, there may often
be heard another voice, as if some gigantic orchestra in another
star was preparing for the signal to burst forth into such music
as belongs not to our little planet. Fitful wailing notes in many
keys, long sustained and all minor, encompass the voyager without
and within. Now high, now low, but ever tending to deepen and
become more massive in tone, this unearthly symphony is full of
warning. It bids the watchful seaman make ready against the advent
of the fast approaching storm, that, still some hundreds of leagues
distant, is sending its pursuivants before its face. Nor are these
spirit-stirring chords due to the harp-like obstruction offered by
the web of rigging spread about the masts of a ship to the rising
wind. It may be heard even more definitely in an open boat far from
any ship or shore, although there, perhaps because of the great
loneliness of the situation, it always seems to take a tone of
deeper melancholy, as if in sympathy with the helplessness of the
human creatures thus isolated from their fellows. It belongs, almost
exclusively, to the extra-tropical regions where storms are many. And
within a certain compass, its intimates find little variation of its
scale. Always beginning in the treble clef and by regular melodic
waves gradually descending until with the incidence of the storm it
blends into the grand triumphal march spoken of before. But when it
is heard within the tropics let the mariner beware. None can ever
mistake its weird lament, sharpening every little while into a shrill
scream as if impatient that its warning should be heeded without
delay. It searches the very marrow of the bones, and beasts as well
as men look up and are much afraid. For it is the precursor of the
hurricane, before which the bravest seaman blanches, when sea and sky
seem to meet and mingle, the waters that are above the firmament with
the waters that are under the firmament, as in the days before God
said “Let there be light.”
Far different again is the cheerful voice of the Trade wind over the
laughing happy sea of those pleasant latitudes. No note of sadness
or melancholy is to be detected there. Brisk and bright, confident
and gay, it bids the sailor be glad in his life. Bids him mark anew
how beautiful is the bright blue sea, how snowy are the billowy
clouds piled peacefully around the horizon, while between them and
the glittering edge of the vast circle shows a tender band of greyish
green of a lucent clearness that lets the rising stars peep through
as soon as they are above the horizon. Overhead through all the
infinite fleckless dome eddy the friendly tones. Yet so diffused are
they, so vast in their area that if one listen for them he cannot
hear aright--they must be felt rather than heard. Well may their
song be of content and good cheer. For they course about their
ordained orbits as the healthful life tides through the human body,
keeping sweet all adjacent shores and preventing by their beneficent
agitation a baleful stagnation of the sea. By day the golden sun
soars on his splendid road from horizon to zenith until he casts no
shadow, and all the air quivers with living light, then in stately
grandeur sinks through the pure serenity of that perfect scene, the
guardian cumuli clustering round his goal melting apart so that,
visible to the last of his blazing verge, he may go as he came,
unshadowed by haze or cloud. Then, as the radiant train of lovely
rays fade reluctantly from the blue concave above, all the untellable
splendours of the night come forth in their changeless order, their
scintillating lustre undimmed by the filmiest veil of haze. One
incandescent constellation after another is revealed until, as the
last faint sheen of the departing day disappears from the western
horizon, the double girdle of the galaxy is flung across the darkling
dome in all its wondrous beauty. And unceasingly through all the
succeeding beauties of the day and night that flood of happy harmony
rolls on.
How shall I speak of the voice of the calm? How describe that sound
which mortal ear cannot hear? The pen of the inspired writers alone
might successfully undertake such a task, so closely in touch as they
were with the Master Mind. “When the morning stars sang together, and
all the Sons of God shouted for joy.” Something akin to this sublime
daring of language is needed to convey a just idea of what floods
the soul when alone upon the face of the deep in a perfect calm. The
scale of that heavenly harmony is out of our range. We can only by
some subtle alchemy of the brain distil from that celestial silence
the voices of angels and archangels and all the glorious company of
heaven. Between us and them is but a step, but it is the threshold
of the timeless dimension. Again and again I have seen men, racked
through and through with a very agony of delight, dash aside the
thralls that held them, sometimes with passionate tears, more often
with raging words that grated harshly upon the velvet stillness. They
felt the burden of the flesh grievous, since it shut them out from
what they dimly felt must be bliss unutterable, not to be contained
in any earthen vessel. On land a thousand things, even in a desert,
distract the attention, loose the mind’s tension even when utterly
alone. But at sea, the centre of one vast glassy circle, shut in on
every hand by a perfect demi-globe as flawless as the mirror whereon
you float, with even the softest undulation imperceptible, and no
more motion of the atmosphere than there is in a perfect vacuum,
there is absolutely nothing to come between the Soul of Man and the
Infinite Silences of Creation. There and there only is it possible
to realise what underlies that mighty line, “There was silence in
Heaven for the space of half-an-hour.” Few indeed are the men,
however rough and unthinking, that are not quieted and impressed by
the marvel of a perfect calm. But the tension is too great to be
borne long with patience. Men feel that this majestic environment is
too redolent of the coming paradise to be supportable by flesh and
blood. They long with intense desire for a breeze, for motion, for a
change of any sort. So much so that long-continued calm is dreaded
by seamen more than any other phase of sea-experience. And yet it is
for a time lovely beyond description, soothing the jarring nerves and
solemnising every faculty as if one were to be shut in before the
Shekinah in the Holy of Holies. It is like the Peace of God.
Thus far I have feebly attempted to deal with some of the sea-voices
untinctured by any contact with the land. But although the
interposition of rock and beach, cliff and sand-bank introduces
fresh changes with every variation of weather, new combinations of
sound that do not belong solely to the sea, any description of the
sea-music that should take no account of them would be manifestly
one-sided and incomplete. And yet the mutabilities are so many, the
gamut is so extended that it is impossible to do more than just take
a passing note of a few characteristic impressions. For every lonely
reef, every steep-to shore has an infinite variety of responses that
it gives back to the besieging waves. Some of them are terrible
beyond the power of words to convey. When the sailor in a crippled
craft, his reckoning unreliable, and his vigour almost gone by a
long-sustained struggle with the storm, hears to leeward the crashing
impact of mountainous waves against the towering buttresses of
granite protecting a sea-beset land, it is to him a veritable knell
of doom. Or when through the close-drawn curtains of fog comes the
hissing tumult of breaking seas over an invisible bank, interpolated
with the hoarse bellowing of the advancing flood checked in its free
onward sweep, bold and high indeed must be the courage that does not
fail. The lonely lighthouse-keeper on the Bishop Rock during the
utmost stress of an Atlantic gale notes with quickening pulse the
change of tone as the oncoming sea, rolling in from freedom, first
feels beneath it the outlying skirts of the solitary mountain. Nearer
and deeper and fiercer it roars until, with a shock that makes the
deep-rooted foundations of the rocks tremble, and the marvellous
fabric of dovetailed stone sway like a giant tree, it breaks, hurling
its crest high through the flying spindrift over the very finial of
the faithful tower.
But on the other hand, on some golden afternoon among the sunny
islands of summer seas, hear the soft soothing murmur of the gliding
swell upon the slumbering shore. It fills the mind with rest. Sweeter
than lowest lullaby, it comforts and composes, and even in dreams it
laps the sleeper in Elysium. The charm of that music is chief among
all the influences that bind the memory to those Enchanted Isles. It
returns again and again under sterner skies, filling the heart with
almost passionate longing to hear it, to feel it in all its mystery
once again. Still when all has been said, every dweller on the
sea-shore knows the voice of his own coast best. For him it has its
special charm, whether it shriek around ice-laden rocks, roar against
iron-bound cliffs, thunder over jagged reefs, or babble among fairy
islets. And yet all these many voices are but one.
THE CALLING OF CAPTAIN RAMIREZ
When two whale-ships meet during a cruise, if there are no signs
of whales near, an exchange of visits always takes place. The two
captains foregather on board one ship, the two chief mates on board
the other. While the officers are thus enjoying themselves, it is
usual for the boats’ crews to go forrard and while away the time as
best they can, such visitors being always welcome. This practice
is called “gamming,” and is fruitful of some of the queerest yarns
imaginable, as these sea-wanderers ransack their memories for tales
wherewith to make the time pass pleasantly.
On the occasion of which I am writing, our ship had met the _Coral_
of Martha’s Vineyard off Nieuwe, and gamming had set in immediately.
One of the group among whom I sat was a sturdy little native of Guam,
in the Ladrone Islands, the picture of good-humour, but as ugly as
a Joss. Being called upon for a song, he laughingly excused himself
on the ground that his songs were calculated to give a white man
collywobbles; but if we didn’t mind he would spin a “cuffer” (yarn)
instead. Carried unanimously--and we lit fresh pipes as we composed
ourselves to hear of “The Calling of Captain Ramirez.” I reproduce
the story in a slightly more intelligible form than I heard it,
the mixture of Spanish, Kanaka, &c., being a gibberish not to be
understood by any but those who have lived among the polyglot crowd
in a whaler.
“About fifteen years ago now, as near as I can reckon (for we don’t
keep much account of time except we’re on monthly wage), I was
cruising the Kingsmills in the old _Salem_, Captain Ramirez. They
told me her name meant ‘Peace,’ and that may be; but if so, all I can
say is that never was a ship worse named. Why, there wasn’t ever any
peace aboard of her. Quiet there was, when the old man was asleep,
for nobody wanted him wakened; but peace--well, I tell ye, boys, she
was jest hell afloat. I’ve been fishing now a good many years in
Yankee spouters, and there’s some blood-boats among ’em, but never
was I so unlucky as when I first set foot aboard the _Salem_. Skipper
was a Portugee from Flores, come over to the States as a nipper and
brung up in Rhode Island. Don’t know and don’t care how he got to be
skipper, but I guess Jemmy Squarefoot was his schoolmaster, for some
of his tricks wouldn’t, couldn’t, have been thought of anywheres else
but down below. I ain’t a-goin’ to make ye all miserable by telling
you how he hazed us round and starved us and tortured us, but you
can let your imagination loose if you want to, and then you won’t
overhaul the facts of his daily amusements.
“Well, I’d been with him about a year when, as I said at first, we
was cruising the Kingsmills, never going too close in, because at
that time the natives were very savage, always fighting with each
other, but very glad of the chance to go for a ship and kill and eat
all hands. Then again we had some Kanakas aboard, and the skipper
knew that if they got half a chance they would be overboard and off
to the shore.
“Sperm whales were very plentiful, in fact they had been so all
the cruise, which was another proof to all of us who the skipper
was in co. with, for in nearly every ship we gammed the crowd were
heart-broken at their bad luck. However, we’d only been a few days on
the ground when one morning we lowered for a thundering big school
of middling-size whales. We sailed in full butt, and all boats got
fast. But no sooner was a strain put on the lines than they all
parted like as if they was burnt. Nobody there ever seen or heard of
such a thing before. It fairly scared us all, for we thought it was
witchcraft, and some of ’em said the skipper’s time was up and his
boss was rounding on him. Well, we bent on again, second irons, as
the whales were all running anyhow, not trying to get away, and we
all got fast again. ’Twas no good at all; all parted just the same
as before. Well, we was about the worst gallied lot of men you ever
see. We was that close to the ship that we knew the old man could see
with his glasses everything that was going on. Every one of us knew
just about how he was bearing it, but what could we do? Well, boys,
we didn’t have much time to serlilerquise, for before you could say
‘knife’ here he comes, jumping, howling mad. Right in among us he
busted, and oh! he did look like his old father Satan on the rampage.
He was in the bow of his boat, and he let drive at the first whale
he ran up against. Down went the fish and pop went the line same as
before. Well, I’ve seen folks get mad more’n a little, but never in
all my fishing did ever I see anything like he showed us then. I
thought he’d a sploded all into little pieces. He snatched off his
hat and tore it into ribbons with his teeth; the rattle of Portugee
blasphemion was like our old mincing-machine going full kelter, and
the foam flew from between his teeth like soapsuds.
“Suddenly he cooled down, all in a minute like, and said very quiet,
‘All aboard.’ We were all pretty well prepared for the worst by this
time, but I do think we liked him less now than we did when he was
ramping around--he looked a sight more dangerous. However, we obeyed
orders smart, as usual, but he was aboard first. My! how that boat of
his just flew. ’Twas like a race for life.
“We were no sooner on board than we hoisted boats and made them fast.
Then the skipper yelled, ‘All hands lay aft.’ Aft we come prompt,
and ranged ourselves across the quarter-deck in front of where he
was prowling back and forth like a breeding tigress. As soon as we
were all aft he stopped, facing us, and spoke. ‘Somebody aboard this
ship’s been trying to work a jolt off on me by pisonin’ my lines. Now
I want that man, so’s I can kill him, slow; ’n I’m going to have him
too ’thout waiting too long. Now _I_ think this ship’s been too easy
a berth for all of you, but from this out until I have my rights on
the man I want she’s agoing to be a patent hell. Make up yer mines
quick, fer I tell yer no ship’s crew ever suffered what you’re agoin’
to suffer till I get that man under my hands. Now go.’
“When we got forrard we found the fo’c’s’le scuttle screwed up so’s
we couldn’t get below. There was no shelter on deck from the blazing
sun, the hatches was battened so we couldn’t get into the fore-hold,
so we had to just bear it. One man went aft to the scuttle butt for
a drink of water, and found the spigot gone. The skipper saw him,
and says to him, ‘You’ll fine plenty to drink in the bar’l forrard,’
and you know the sort of liquor _that’s_ full of. Some of us flung
ourselves down on deck, being dog tired as well as hungry and
thirsty, but he was forrard in a minute with both his shooting-irons
cocked. ‘Up, ye spawn, ’n git some exercise; ye’r gettin’ too fat ’n
lazy,’ says he. So we trudged about praying that he might drop dead,
but none of us willing as yet to face certain death by defying him.
The blessed night came at last, and we were able to get a little
rest, he having gone below, and the officers, though willing enough
to keep in with him at our expense, not being bad enough to drive
us all night unless he was around to see it done. Along about eight
bells came the steward, with a biscuit apiece for us and a bucket of
water--about half a pint each. We were so starved and thirsty that
the bite and sup was a godsend. What made things worse for us was
the suspicion we had one of the other. As I said, we was, as usual, a
mixed crowd and ready to sell one another for a trifle. He knew that,
curse him, and reckoned with considerable certainty on getting hold
of the victim he wanted. Well, the night passed somehow, and when
morning came he was around again making us work, scouring iron-work
bright, holy-stoning decks, scrubbing overside, as if our very lives
depended on the jobs being done full pelt.
“We was drawing in pretty close to a small group of islands, closer
than we had been yet in those waters, and we all wondered what was in
the wind. Suddenly he gave orders to back the mainyard and have the
dinghy lowered. She was a tiny tub of a craft, such as I never saw
carried in a whaler before, only about big enough for three. A little
Scotchman and myself was ordered into her, then to our amazement the
old man got in, shoved off, and headed her for the opening through
the reef surrounding the biggest island of the group. It was fairly
well wooded with cocoa-nut trees and low bushes, while, unlike any
of the other islets, there were several big rocks showing up through
the vegetation in the middle of it. We weren’t long getting to the
beach, where we jumped out and ran her up a piece so’s he could step
out dry. We waited for a minute or two while he sat thinking, and
looking straight ahead of him at nothing. Presently he jumped out
and said to me, ‘Come,’ and to Sandy, ‘Stay here.’ Off he went up
the beach and straight into the little wood, just as if somebody
was calling him and he had to go. Apparently there wasn’t a living
soul on the whole island except just us three. We had only got a
few yards into the bush when we came to a little dip in the ground:
a sort of valley. Just as we got to the bottom, we suddenly found
ourselves in the grip of two Kanakas, the one that had hold of the
skipper being the biggest man I ever saw. I made one wriggle, but my
man, who was holding my two arms behind my back, gave them a twist
that nearly wrenched them out of their sockets and quieted me good.
As for the skipper, he was trying to call or speak, but although his
mouth worked no sound came, and he looked like death. The giant that
had him flung him on his face and lashed his wrists behind him with
a bit of native fish-line, then served his ankles the same. I was
tied next, but not so cruel as the skipper, indeed they didn’t seem
to want to hurt me. The two Kanakas now had a sort of a consultation
by signs, neither of them speaking a word. While they was at it I
noticed the big one was horribly scarred all over his back and loins
(they was both naked except for a bit of a grass belt) as well as
crippled in his gait. Presently they ceased their dumb motions and
came over to me. The big one opened his mouth and pointed to where
his tongue had been, also to his right eye-socket, which was empty.
Then he touched the big white scars on his body, and finally pointed
to the skipper. Whole books couldn’t have explained his meaning
better than I understood it then. But what was coming? I declare I
didn’t feel glad a bit at the thought that Captain Ramirez was going
to get his deserts at last.