_Faithfully Narrating the Amazing Experiences of a
Newfoundland Schooner and Describing Billy Topsail's
Conduct in a Sinking Boat_
THE deck of the _Rescue_ was now littered with wreckage and casks.
Splinters of the jib-boom, all tangled with the standing rigging, lay
upon the forward deck. The maintopmast had snapped off, and hung from
the mainmast in a tangle of wire and rope. They had already cut the
mainsail halyards, and the big sail lay upon the boom, on the port
side, in disarrayed folds.
The bows were high out of the water, as if the ship had run up a steep,
submerged shelf of ice; and the seas, which the wind of the night had
raised, from time to time broke over the stern. It was impossible,
however, to determine the general situation of the schooner. The fog
was too thick for that, and the day had not yet fully broken. All that
was revealed, in a glance about, was that upon one hand lay a waste of
breaking water, and upon the other a dull white mass, lifting itself
into the mist.
"'Tis bad, lads," said the skipper, when the first and second hands had
joined him under the mainmast shrouds.
"She's lost," said the first.
"We'll be takin' t' the boat," said the second.
"I'm not so sure that she's lost," said the skipper. "Whatever, we'll
not take t' the boat till we have to."
The first and second hands exchanged a glance, and together looked at
the boat. The swift glance and look were a danger-signal to the skipper.
"Does you hear me?" he shouted, his voice ringing out above the wash of
the waves and the noise of the wind. "We'll not leave her. Take a spell
at the pump, both o' you!"
For a moment the skipper's authority was in doubt. The men wavered.
A repetition of the command, however, with clenched fists ready to
enforce it, decided them. They relieved young Billy.
"Is the water gainin', b'y?" said the skipper to the lad.
Billy looked up steadily. The fright had left his eyes. He had
recovered his self-possession.
"No, sir," he said, quietly. "'Tis gettin' less all the while."
At that moment the ship lurched slightly and slid off the shelf. The
skipper shouted an order to raise the foresail, and ran aft to take
the wheel. But the fall of the topmast had so tangled the rigging
and jammed the gaff and boom that before the crew could remove the
unconscious cook and lift the sail, the wind had turned the schooner
and was driving her stern foremost, as it appeared, on the ice.
The skipper, from his station at the wheel, calmly observed the nearing
berg, and gave the schooner up for lost. There was no time to raise
the sail--no room for beating out of danger. He saw, too, that if she
struck with force, the quarter-boat, which was swinging from davits
astern, would be crushed to splinters.
"She's lost!" he thought. "Lost with all hands!"
Nearer approach, however, disclosed the strange fact that there was a
break in the ice. When the schooner was still a few fathoms nearer, it
was observed that the great berg was in reality composed of two masses
of ice, with a narrow strait leading between them.
The light was now stronger, and the fog had somewhat thinned; it was
possible to distinguish shadowy outlines--to see that great cliffs of
ice descended on each side of the passage to the water's edge. Still
deeper in the mist it was lighter, as if the strait indeed led directly
through the berg to the open sea beyond. The crew was gathered aft,
breathlessly awaiting the schooner's fate, helpless to fend or aid; and
the cook was lying on the roof of the cabin, where they had laid him
down, revived in part, and desperately struggling to recover his senses.
[Illustration: "SHE'S LOST!" HE THOUGHT. "LOST WITH ALL HANDS."]
"Lads," said the skipper, at last, "the Lord has the schooner in His
hands. They's a way through the ice. He's guidin' her into it, but
whether He'll save us or not, He only knows."
The _Rescue_ drifted fairly into the passage, which was irregular, but
in no part less than twice the width of the vessel. She was swept on,
swinging from side to side, striking her bow here and her stern there;
and with every shock fragments of rotten ice fell in a shower from
above.
How soon one might strike one of their number down, no man knew. How
soon some great mass, now poised in the mist, might be dislodged
and crush the schooner in its fall, no man knew. How soon the towering
cliffs might swing together and grind the ship to splinters, no man
could tell. Were these masses of ice connected deep down under water?
Or were they floating free?
There were no answers to these questions. On went the schooner, stern
foremost, slipping ever nearer to the open.[5]
"Skipper, sir," the first hand pleaded, "leave us launch the
quarter-boat an' pull out. 'Tis--'tis--too horrible here."
"Ay, lads, if you will," was the reply.
It was then discovered that a block of ice had fallen in the boat at
the bows, and sprung the planking. She was too leaky to launch; there
was nothing for it but to wait.
"We'll calk those leaks as best we can," said the skipper. "They's no
tellin' what might----"
The stern struck a projection, and the bow swung round and lodged
on the other side. The schooner was jammed in the passage, almost
broadside to the wind. They made a shift at calking the leaks with rags
and a square of oiled canvas. At all hazards the schooner must be
freed.
"We must get her off quick, lads!" the skipper cried. "Come, now, who's
going with me in the boat t' tow?"
"I, sir," said young Billy, stepping forward eagerly.
"I, sir," said the first hand.
"So it is," said the skipper. "Andy, Tom, when we hauls her bow off, do
you stand here with a gaff an' push. Lower away that boat, now! Billy,
do you fetch a bucket for bailin'."
The boat was launched with great difficulty from her place in the
stern davits. She began at once to fill, for the calking had been ill
done, and she was sadly damaged. It took courage to leap into her from
the taffrail, leaky as she was, and tossing about; but there was a
desperate sort of courage in the hearts of the men who had volunteered,
and they leaped, one by one.
Billy fell to bailing, and the skipper and the first hand rowed forward
to catch the line. The line once caught and made fast, they pulled out
with might and main.
"She's fillin' fast, sir!" Billy gasped.
"Bail, b'y, bail!"
The tow-rope was now taut. The skipper and the first hand pulled
with such strength that each stroke of an oar made a hissing little
whirlpool.
"'Tis gainin' on me fast, sir," said Billy.
"Give way! Give way!" cried the skipper.
The bow of the schooner swung round inch by inch--so slowly that the
sinking of the boat seemed inevitable.
"She'll sink, sir!" said Billy, in alarm, but still bailing steadily.
"Pull! Pull!"
When the schooner was once more in her old position--stern foremost,
and driving slowly through the passage--the water was within an inch
of the seats of the boat, which was now heavy and almost unmanageable.
Twenty fathoms of water lay between the boat and the bow of the
schooner.
"She's goin' down, sir!" said Billy.
"Cast lines!" the skipper shouted to those aboard.
Water curled over the gunwales. The boat stopped dead, and wavered, on
the point of sinking. Two lines came whizzing towards her, uncoiling in
their flight. The one was caught by the first hand, who threw himself
into the water and was hauled aboard. Billy and the skipper caught the
other. With its help and a few strong strokes they made the bow chains
and clambered to the deck.
"She's drivin' finely," said the skipper, when he had looked around.
"Stand by, there, an' be ready with the fores'l! We'll soon be through."
It was true enough; in a few minutes the schooner had safely drifted
through the passage, and was making off from the berg under a reefed
foresail, while the mist cleared and the sun shone out, and the peaks
and cliffs of the island of ice, far astern, shone and glistened. And
three days later the young skipper bounded up the path at Ruddy Cove,
and the little toddler whom he loved was at the kitchen door to greet
him.
FOOTNOTE:
[5] At this point it may be of interest to the reader to know that the
incident is true.