Suspicions Laid, And Something About The Calmuc
Though abounding in details full of the savor of reality, Samoa’s
narrative did not at first appear altogether satisfactory. Not that it
was so strange; for stranger recitals I had heard.
But one reason, perhaps, was that I had anticipated a narrative quite
different; something agreeing with my previous surmises.
Not a little puzzling, also, was his account of having seen islands the
day preceding; though, upon reflection, that might have been the case,
and yet, from his immediately altering the Parki’s course, the Chamois,
unknowingly might have sailed by their vicinity. Still, those islands
could form no part of the chain we were seeking. They must have been
some region hitherto undiscovered.
But seems it likely, thought I, that one, who, according to his own
account, has conducted himself so heroically in rescuing the
brigantine, should be the victim of such childish terror at the mere
glimpse of a couple of sailors in an open boat, so well supplied, too,
with arms, as he was, to resist their capturing his craft, if such
proved their intention? On the contrary, would it not have been more
natural, in his dreary situation, to have hailed our approach with the
utmost delight? But then again, we were taken for phantoms, not flesh
and blood. Upon the whole, I regarded the narrator of these things
somewhat distrustfully. But he met my gaze like a man. While Annatoo,
standing by, looked so expressively the Amazonian character imputed to
her, that my doubts began to waver. And recalling all the little
incidents of their story, so hard to be conjured up on the spur of a
presumed necessity to lie; nay, so hard to be conjured up at all; my
suspicions at last gave way. And I could no longer harbor any
misgivings.
For, to be downright, what object could Samoa have, in fabricating such
a narrative of horrors—those of the massacre, I mean—unless to conceal
some tragedy, still more atrocious, in which he himself had been
criminally concerned? A supposition, which, for obvious reasons, seemed
out of the question. True, instances were known to me of half-
civilized beings, like Samoa, forming part of the crews of ships in
these seas, rising suddenly upon their white ship-mates, and murdering
them, for the sake of wrecking the ship on the shore of some island
near by, and plundering her hull, when stranded.
But had this been purposed with regard to the Parki, where the rest of
the mutineers? There was no end to my conjectures; the more I indulged
in them, the more they multiplied. So, unwilling to torment myself,
when nothing could be learned, but what Samoa related, and stuck to
like a hero; I gave over conjecturing at all; striving hard to repose
full faith in the Islander.
Jarl, however, was skeptical to the last; and never could be brought
completely to credit the tale. He stoutly maintained that the
hobgoblins must have had something or other to do with the Parki.
My own curiosity satisfied with respect to the brigantine, Samoa
himself turned inquisitor. He desired to know who we were; and whence
we came in our marvelous boat. But on these heads I thought best to
withhold from him the truth; among other things, fancying that if
disclosed, it would lessen his deference for us, as men superior to
himself. I therefore spoke vaguely of our adventures, and assumed the
decided air of a master; which I perceived was not lost upon the rude
Islander. As for Jarl, and what he might reveal, I embraced the first
opportunity to impress upon him the importance of never divulging our
flight from the Arcturion; nor in any way to commit himself on that
head: injunctions which he faithfully promised to observe.
If not wholly displeased with the fine form of Samoa, despite his
savage lineaments, and mutilated member, I was much less conciliated by
the person of Annatoo; who, being sinewy of limb, and neither young,
comely, nor amiable, was exceedingly distasteful in my eyes. Besides,
she was a tigress. Yet how avoid admiring those Penthesilian qualities
which so signally had aided Samoa, in wresting the Parki from its
treacherous captors. Nevertheless, it was indispensable that she should
at once be brought under prudent subjection; and made to know, once for
all, that though conjugally a rebel, she must be nautically submissive.
For to keep the sea with a Calmuc on board, seemed next to impossible.
In most military marines, they are prohibited by law; no officer may
take his Pandora and her bandbox off soundings.
By the way, this self-same appellative, Pandora, has been bestowed upon
vessels. There was a British ship by that name, dispatched in quest of
the mutineers of the Bounty. But any old tar might have prophesied her
fate. Bound home she was wrecked on a reef off New South Wales.
Pandora, indeed! A pretty name for a ship: fairly smiting Fate in the
face. But in this matter of christening ships of war, Christian nations
are but too apt to be dare-devils. Witness the following: British names
all—The Conqueror, the Defiance, the Revenge, the Spitfire, the
Dreadnaught, the Thunderer, and the Tremendous; not omitting the Etna,
which, in the Roads of Corfu, was struck by lightning, coming nigh
being consumed by fire from above. But almost potent as Moses’ rod,
Franklin’s proved her salvation.
With the above catalogue, compare we the Frenchman’s; quite
characteristic of the aspirations of Monsieur:—The Destiny, the
Glorious, the Magnanimous, the Magnificent, the Conqueror, the
Triumphant, the Indomitable, the Intrepid, the Mont-Blanc. Lastly, the
Dons; who have ransacked the theology of the religion of peace for fine
names for their fighting ships; stopping not at designating one of
their three-deckers, The Most Holy Trinity. But though, at Trafalgar,
the Santissima Trinidada thundered like Sinai, her thunders were
silenced by the victorious cannonade of the Victory.
And without being blown into splinters by artillery, how many of these
Redoubtables and Invincibles have succumbed to the waves, and like
braggarts gone down before hurricanes, with their bravadoes broad on
their bows.
Much better the American names (barring Scorpions, Hornets, and Wasps;)
Ohio, Virginia, Carolina, Vermont. And if ever these Yankees fight
great sea engagements—which Heaven forefend!—how glorious, poetically
speaking, to range up the whole federated fleet, and pour forth a
broadside from Florida to Maine. Ay, ay, very glorious indeed! yet in
that proud crowing of cannon, how shall the shade of peace-loving Penn
be astounded, to see the mightiest murderer of them all, the great
Pennsylvania, a very namesake of his. Truly, the Pennsylvania’s guns
should be the wooden ones, called by men-of- war’s-men, Quakers.
But all this is an episode, made up of digressions. Time to tack ship,
and return.
Now, in its proper place, I omitted to mention, that shortly after
descending from the rigging, and while Samoa was rehearsing his
adventures, dame Annatoo had stolen below into the forecastle, intent
upon her chattels. And finding them all in mighty disarray, she
returned to the deck prodigiously, excited, and glancing angrily toward
Jarl and me, showered a whole torrent of objurgations into both ears of
Samoa.
This contempt of my presence surprised me at first; but perhaps women
are less apt to be impressed by a pretentious demeanor, than men.
Now, to use a fighting phrase, there is nothing like boarding an enemy
in the smoke. And therefore, upon this first token of Annatoo’s
termagant qualities, I gave her to understand—craving her pardon—that
neither the vessel nor aught therein was hers; but that every thing
belonged to the owners in Lahina. I added, that at all hazards, a stop
must be put to her pilferings. Rude language for feminine ears; but how
to be avoided? Here was an infatuated woman, who, according to Samoa’s
account, had been repeatedly detected in the act of essaying to draw
out the screw-bolts which held together the planks. Tell me; was she
not worse than the Load-Stone Rock, sailing by which a stout ship fell
to pieces?
During this scene, Samoa said little. Perhaps he was secretly pleased
that his matrimonial authority was reinforced by myself and my Viking,
whose views of the proper position of wives at sea, so fully
corresponded with his own; however difficult to practice, those purely
theoretical ideas of his had hitherto proved.
Once more turning to Annatoo, now looking any thing but amiable, I
observed, that all her clamors would be useless; and that if it came to
the worst, the Parki had a hull that would hold her.
In the end she went off in a fit of the sulks; sitting down on the
windlass and glaring; her arms akimbo, and swaying from side to side;
while ever and anon she gave utterance to a dismal chant. It sounded
like an invocation to the Cholos to rise and dispatch us.