In bringing the ship close to the wind in this terrible gale, without
springing a spar, we had done what I never should have believed
practicable to four men, taking into consideration the size of the
ship and the prodigious force of the wind; and when I looked aloft and
considered that only a few hours before, so to speak, the ship was
carrying all the sail that could be put upon her, and that three men
had stripped her of it and put her under a close-reefed main-topsail
fit to encounter a raging hurricane, I could not help thinking that we
had a right to feel proud of our endurance and spirit.
There was no difficulty now in holding the wheel, and, had no worse sea
than was now running been promised us, the helm might have been lashed
and the vessel lain as comfortably as a smack with her foresail over to
windward.
The torn sails were making a hideous noise on the yards forward, and
as there was no earthly reason why this clamour should be suffered to
last, I called to Cornish to get his knife ready and help me to cut the
canvas away from the jackstays. We hauled the braces taut to steady the
yards, and then went aloft, and in ten minutes severed the fragments of
the foresail and topsail, and they blew up into the air like paper, and
were carried nearly half a mile before they fell into the sea.
The wind was killing up aloft, and I was heartily glad to get on deck
again, not only to escape the wind, but on account of the fore-topmast
and top-gallant mast, both of which had been heavily tried, and now
rocked heavily as the ship rolled, and threatened to come down with the
weight of the yards upon them.
But neither Cornish nor I had strength enough in us to stay the masts
more securely; our journey aloft and our sojourn on the yards, and our
fight with the wind to maintain our hold, had pretty well done for
us; and in Cornish I took notice of that air of lassitude and dull
indifference which creeps upon shipwrecked men when worn out with their
struggles, and which resembles in its way the stupor which falls upon
persons who are perishing of cold.
It was fair, however, since I had had some rest, that I should now take
a spell at the wheel, and I therefore told Cornish to go to the cabin
lately occupied by Stevens, the ship's carpenter, and turn in, and then
crawled aft to the poop and desired the boatswain to go below and rest
himself, and order the steward, who had not done one-tenth of the work
we had performed, to stand by ready to come on deck if I should call to
him.
I was now alone on deck, in the centre, so it seemed when looking
around the horizon, of a great storm, which was fast lifting the sea
into mountains.
I took a turn round the spokes of the wheel and secured the tiller
ropes to steady the helm, and held on, crouching to windward, so that
I might get some shelter from the murderous force of the wind by the
slanting deck and rail.
I could better now realize our position than when at work, and the
criticalness of it struck and awed me like a revelation.
I cast my eyes upon the main-topsail, and inspected it anxiously, as
on this sail our lives might depend. If it blew away the only sail
remaining would be the fore-topmast staysail. In all probability the
ship's head would at once pay off, let me keep the helm jammed down as
hard as I pleased; the vessel would then drive before the seas, which,
as she had not enough canvas on her to keep her running at any speed,
would very soon topple over her stern, sweep the decks fore and aft,
and render her unmanageable.
There was likewise the further danger of the fore-topmast going, the
whole weight of the staysail being upon it. If this went it would take
that sail with it, and the ship would round into the wind's eye and
drive away astern.
Had there been more hands on board I should not have found these
speculations so alarming. My first job would have been to get some of
the cargo out of the hold and pitch it overboard, so as to lighten the
ship, for the dead weight in her made her strain horribly. Then with
men to help it would have been easy to get the storm trysail on if the
topsail blew away, clap preventer backstays on to the foremast and
fore-topmast, and rouse them taut with tackles, and send down the royal
and top-gallant yards, so as to ease the masts of the immense leverage
of these spars.
But what could four men do--one of the four being almost useless, and
all four exhausted not by the perils and labour of the storm only, but
by the fight they had had to make for their lives against fellow-beings?
Alone on deck, with the heavy seas splashing and thundering, and
precipitating their volumes of water over the ship's side, with the
gale howling and roaring through the skies, I grew bitterly despondent.
It seemed as if God Himself were against me, that I was the sport of
some remorseless fate, whereby I was led from one peril to another,
from one suffering to another, and no mercy to be shown me until death
gave me rest.
And yet I was sensible of no revolt and inward rage against what
I deemed my destiny. My being and individuality were absorbed and
swallowed up in the power and immensity of the tempest, like a
rain-drop in the sea. I was overwhelmed by the vastness of the dangers
which surrounded me, by the sense of the littleness and insignificance
of myself and my companions in the midst of this spacious theatre of
warring winds, and raging seas, and far-reaching sky of pouring cloud.
I felt as though all the forces of nature were directed against my
life; and those cries which my heart would have sent up in the presence
of dangers less tumultuous and immense were silenced by a kind of dull
amazement, of heavy passive bewilderment, which numbed my mind and
forced upon me an indifference to the issue without depriving me of the
will and energy to avert it.
I held my post at the wheel, being anxious that the boatswain and
Cornish should recruit their strength by sleep, for if one or the other
of them broke down, then, indeed, our case would be deplorable.
The force of the wind was stupendous, and yet the brave main-topsail
stood it; but not an hour had passed since the two men went below when
a monster wave took the ship on the starboard bow and threw her up,
rolling at the same time an immense body of water on to the decks; her
stern, where I was crouching, sank in the hollow level with the sea,
then as the leviathan wave rolled under her counter, the ship's bows
fell into a prodigious trough with a sickening, whirling swoop. Ere she
could recover, another great sea rolled right upon her, burying her
forecastle, and rushing with the fury of a cataract along the main-deck.
Another wave of that kind, and our fate was sealed.
But happily these were exceptional seas; smaller waves succeeded, and
the struggling, straining ship showed herself alive still.
Alive, but maimed. That tremendous swoop had carried away the jibboom,
and the fore top-gallant mast--the one close against the bowsprit head,
the other a few inches above the top-gallant yard. The mast, with the
royal yard upon it, hung all in a heap against the fore-topmast, but
fortunately kept steady, owing to the yard-arm having jammed itself
into the fore-topmast rigging. The jibboom was clean gone adrift and
was washing away to leeward.
This was no formidable accident, though it gave the ship a wrecked
and broken look. I should have been well-pleased to see all three
top-gallant masts go over the side, for the weight of the yards,
swaying to and fro at great angles, was too much for the lower-masts,
and not only strained the decks, but the planking to which the
chain-plates were bolted.
My great anxiety now was for the fore-topmast, which was sustaining
the weight of the broken mast and yard, in addition to the top-gallant
yard, still standing, and the heavy pulling of the fore-topmast
staysail.
Dreading the consequences that might follow the loss of this sail, I
called to the steward at the top of my voice, and on his thrusting his
head up the companion, I bade him rouse up Cornish and the boatswain,
and send them on deck.
In a very short time they both arrived, and the boatswain, on looking
forward, immediately comprehended our position and anticipated my order.
"The topmast 'll go!" he roared in my ear. "Better let go the
staysail-halliards, and make a short job o' it."
"Turn to and do it at once," I replied. Away they skurried. I lost
sight of them when they were once off the poop, and it seemed an
eternity before they showed themselves again on the forecastle.
No wonder! They had to wade and struggle through a rough sea on the
main-deck, which obliged them to hold on, for minutes at a time, to
whatever they could put their hands to.
I wanted them to bear a hand in getting rid of the staysail, for, with
the wheel hard down, the ship showed a tendency to fall off. But it was
impossible for me to make my voice heard; I could only wave my hand;
the boatswain understood the gesture, and I saw him motion to Cornish
to clear off the forecastle. He then ran over to leeward and let go the
fore-topmast staysail sheet and halliards, and, this done, he could do
no more but take to his heels.
The hullabaloo was frightful--the thundering of the sails, the snapping
and cracking of the sheets.
Boom! I knew it must follow. It was a choice of two evils--to poop the
ship or lose a mast.
Down came the topmast, splintering and crashing with a sound that rose
above the roar of the gale, and in a minute was swinging against the
shrouds--an awful wreck to behold in such a scene of raging sea and
buried decks.
I knew well now what ought to be done, and done without delay; for the
staysail was in the water, ballooning out to every wave, and dragging
the ship's head round more effectually than had the sail been set.
But I had a wonderful ally in the boatswain--keen, unerring, and
intrepid, a consummate sailor. I should never have had the heart to
give him the order; and yet there he was, and Cornish by his side, at
work, knife in hand, cutting and hacking away for dear life.
A long and perilous job indeed!--now up aloft, now down, soaked by the
incessant seas that thundered over the ship's bows, tripping over the
raffle that encumbered the deck, actually swarming out on the bowsprit
with their knives between their teeth, at moments plunged deep in the
sea, yet busy again as they were lifted high in the air.
I draw my breath as I write. I have the scene before me: I see the
ropes parting under the knives of the men. I close my eyes as I behold
once more the boiling wave that buries them, and dare not look, lest
I should find them gone. I hear the hooting of the hurricane, the
groaning of the over-loaded vessel, and over all the faint hurrah those
brave spirits utter as the last rope is severed and the unwieldly wreck
of spars and cordage falls overboard and glides away upon a running
sea, and the ship comes to again under my hand, and braves, with her
bows almost at them, the merciless onslaught of the huge green waves.
Only the day before, one of these men was a mutineer, blood-stained
already, and prepared for new murders!
Strange translation! from base villainy to actions heroical! But those
who know sailors best will least doubt their capacity of gauging
extremes.