While it is true that as much was combined as could be wished for to
render this voyage agreeable, those who have been at sea will not
believe that we were free from the ordinary discomforts or annoyances
of sea-life. For the satisfaction of those who have suffered in sailing
vessels it will be well for me to show our dark side of sea-life in
some of its principal annoyances; doing this, however, for the sake
of the truth, that the voyage may not appear to have been out of the
ordinary experience of those who go down to the sea.
One of the first things which we all suffer at sea is revealed in the
inspired account of sea-faring experience, which we are presented with
in the contrasted experience of being on shore: “Then are they glad
because they be quiet.” There are times at sea when stability seems to
be the most enviable state. In weariness the invalid passenger, tossed
and not comforted, feels constrained to quote one of the earliest
verses of inspiration: “Let the dry land appear.” Yet there is so much
that provokes mirth in the midst of discomfort that it is not easy to
say on which side the balance lies, whether of discomfort or amusement.
Behold three men, two of them at least used to the sea, setting out
from different parts of the main cabin to make their way to the table
in the forward cabin. The ship rolls over on her port side, and the
cabin-floor is at once an inclined plane at a grade very much removed
from horizontal. They have a steep hill to ascend; and a seven-pound
weight on either foot, ashore, would not be more cumbrous than that
which seems now to be holding them to the floor. The sensation in
trying to move cannot be unlike that which would be felt in an
exhausted receiver. If the weight of the atmosphere on the human body,
fifteen pounds to the square inch, instead of being equally diffused
could be concentrated on the feet, the sensation probably would not
be unlike that which one feels in trying to get across a ship’s deck
when she is thrown over to the side opposite to that whither you are
going. So these three gentlemen stand immovably fixed in the middle of
the floor, their feet discreetly wide apart to preserve the upright
position of the body. Then the ship rolls over on the other side, and
the three travellers to the dinner table go involuntarily fast to the
side of the cabin and hold on by a door, while the ship rolls once
more, and comes back, it may be, with mitigated severity. At last a
favorable opportunity is seized and the three slide into their seats in
postures more necessary than graceful. Then begins a series of mishaps
at table. No careful adjustment of the dishes, nor even the security
provided for them by the racks can guard against the accidents which
befall cups and saucers indiscreetly filled, or plates of soup not
well provided with suitable dunnage of slices of bread underneath the
lee side. A barrel of apples falls against the door of a locker and
empties itself over the floor; and a canister of lamp-oil, whose cork
had not been made tight, follows after the apples, and they are no
longer eatable. Oh to be quiet! What seems more desirable than a good
foundation?
One day when the ship was rolling heavily it was difficult to keep your
seat on the settee, and impossible to lie reclined. Every thing which
was not lashed to some fixture about the room, or to staples driven
into the floor, was sure to adopt a nomadic state and go from side to
side. Among other things a “Pilgrim’s Progress,” which had been left
on a table, fell from it and went sliding to and fro, exciting lively
sensations in me at the thought that Mr. Ready-to-Halt and his friend,
Mr. Despondency, were moving at a pace ill suited to the crutches of
the old gentleman; for the book went like a shuttle back and forth on
the floor.
The little stove in the cabin felt the changeable wind, and did not
draw well. This required the frequent attention of the steward. He
was a Portuguese man, with a dark skin. He sat on the canvas carpet
whittling, to make lightwood, to start the fire. The ship went down
on one side, and the steward with it, whittling all the while, then
sliding back in his upright position, maintained with becoming gravity,
till the passengers, no longer able to contain themselves, were made
merry at the sight. This made him show his white teeth, silently,
without anything so undignified as a laugh; at which the passengers
were increasingly merry.
What shall I say of the cockroaches, red ants, tarantulas, and mice?
One thing can be said in favor of all of them,--they were not
musquitoes. This was a nightly consolation; but it was the only good
thing which could be said of them all. The ants would cover every
vessel in which they could find any thing to drink; fresh water seemed
to be their chief delight; if a wet sponge were hung up to dry, on
taking it down the little creatures would be there in legions. The
white ant is the bane of the Indian climate; their depredations,
however, are chiefly on shore. I was going up the front stairs of a
gentleman’s dwelling in China, when his foot went through a stair.
“Ah,” said he, “the ants have been at work here!” But at sea we found
the cockroaches most destructive. It is not pleasant to find several of
them on your pillow when you go into your stateroom at night. They are
harmless to the person, but the covers of books, and everything which
has been pasted or glued, all lacker work, and paper generally, suffer
from them. Yet there are housekeepers on shore who can inveigh against
vermin, as well as people at sea.
There are some people who cannot bear any noise overhead at night.
If the gale does not wake them and keep them awake, twenty or thirty
sailors hoisting or lowering the spanker, their boots making a noise
not so gentle as that of prunello dancing-pumps will do it. If the
stillness of the night and the passenger’s sleep are broken by the mate
pacing the deck to keep himself awake, the heels of his boots will be
chiefly answerable; for these make the principal disturbance; he cannot
always comfortably wear India rubbers during his watch; he is to be
pitied if he has a nervous passenger, and thanked if he is able to
forego his walks on the house for the invalid’s sake.
It would seem as though there should be a special punishment for those
who practise fraud in ships’ stores. Your appetite is delicate; you
have no source of supply but your locker; that is furnished with
bottles and jars which profess to hold, for instance, jellies, made
and provided expressly for sea-faring appetites. Your hopes of a
comfortable supper are vested in a jar of jelly which the steward
has placed on table, hoping to provoke an appetite. On opening it,
instead of the fruit jelly which the label assures you is within, you
find only gelatine, flavored with an extract resembling the fruit.
There is nothing on the table for which you feel any desire but the
promised jelly; you find yourself secretly invoking a sea-faring
experience like this upon the man who has so deceived you, till at
last your suffering is so great under your disappointment, which grows
intense as the tasteless supper proceeds, that in stern disapprobation
of this annoying ship-chandler trick, you feel resolved to make it
known, promising him that if you ever go to sea again you will pay
special attention and see if his name is on the labels of the jellies.
He who writes this and they who read it will not fail to remember
that invalids are apt to be unreasonable. So small a matter as a jar
of preserves disappointing the expectation of a nervous patient,
especially at sea, where there are no means of alleviation, may be more
than a match for the philosophy and the resolution of the best of men
and women.
When I have said these things, very few discomforts or annoyances
remain which are not incident to almost any situation on shore. Many
things there we are freed from at sea; the noise of cats at night,
the barking of dogs, the scream of locomotives, the painfully regular
puffing of stationary engines, the roar of wheels, the annoyances
of mischievous boys, these you escape at sea; all of them in
sailing-vessels, for in steamers you have some of them. If one should
fairly add up the comparative discomforts of ship and shore, would life
at sea prove to have the most of them? I came to the conclusion that a
good sailing-ship, with agreeable company, is as near a perfect state
of rest and peace as ever falls to our lot.