"Maircy on us!" exclaimed Mr Macdougall, who at that moment was just
gingerly passing down the standard compass to Jorrocks, the boatswain,
standing up in the stern-sheets of the long-boat alongside, and
stretching up his hands as carefully to receive the precious instrument;
and the sudden blinding flash of the explosion and concussion of the air
that it caused, almost made him drop this in his fright. "Whateever on
airth ees that noo?"
"Matter?" repeated the skipper after him coolly, taking in cause and
effect at a glance. "Why, the gas generated by the heated coal in the
hold has blown out the forepeak, that's all! It is providential,
though, that the wrench which the foremast gave to the deck-beams and
bulkhead there when it carried away, so far weakened the ship forwards
as to enable the gas to find vent in that direction, otherwise the
entire deck would probably have been blown up--when it would have been a
poor look-out for all of us here aft!"
"Gudeness greecious!" ejaculated the mate again, blinking bewilderedly,
like an owl unexpectedly exposed to daylight; but Captain Billings did
not waste time in any further explanations or unnecessary words.
"I hope nobody's hurt! Run forwards, Leigh, and see," he said to me.
Fortunately, however, all had escaped without a scratch, although
fragments of the knees and other heavy portions of the vessel's timbers
had been hurled aloft and scattered in all directions, as if a mine had
been sprung below--the woodwork descending afterwards in a regular
hailstorm on our heads, blown into small pieces no bigger than matches,
and mixed up with a shower of blazing sparks and coal-dust, making us
all "as black as nayghurs," as Pat Doolan said.
The stump of the foremast, in particular, described a graceful parabolic
curve in the air, coming down into the water in close proximity to the
bows of the long-boat--where, under the supervision of the boatswain,
the steward and the carpenter were stowing provisions under the thwarts,
making the two almost jump out of their skins. It descended into the
sea with the same sort of "whish" which the stick of a signal rocket
makes when, the propelling power that had enabled it previously to soar
up so majestically into the air above being ultimately exhausted, it is
forced to return by its own gravity to its proper level below, unable to
sustain itself unaided by exterior help at the unaccustomed height to
which it was temporarily exalted.
And in this respect, it may be observed here, although I do not believe
the remark is altogether original, that a good many human rockets may be
encountered in our daily life, which exhibit all the characteristic
points and weaknesses of the ordinary material model that I have likened
them to--composed of gunpowder and other explosive pyrotechnic
substances, and familiar to all--for, they go up in the same brilliant
and glorious fashion, and are veritable shining lights in the estimation
of their friends and the fickle testimony of public opinion; only, alas,
to descend to the ordinary level of every-day mortals, like the rocket-
stick comes down in the end!
I need hardly say, though, that I had no thought of these reflections
now; for, immediately after the explosion forwards, the flames which
mounted aloft with it burst forth with full vigour, released from the
confined space of the hold to which they had been previously limited,
and the entire fore-part of the ship, from the waist to the knight-
heads, became a mass of fire, the cavity disclosed by the riven deck
adjacent to the fo'c's'le being like a raging volcano, vomiting up
clouds of thick yellow smoke from the glowing mass of ignited coal
below, which almost suffocated us, as the ship went too slowly through
the water for the vapour to trail off to leeward.
The mainmast was still standing, with the mainsail set before the
southerly wind, that was blowing in towards the land, the force of the
explosion not being vented much further aft than the windlass bitts;
but, almost as we looked, tongues of flame began to creep up the main
rigging, and the huge sail was presently crackling away like tissue
paper to which a lighted match has been applied, large pieces of the
burning material being whirled in the air.
The heat now became unbearable, and Captain Billings, much to his grief,
saw that the time had come for him to abandon the ship.
"We must leave her, Leigh," said he to me, with as much emotion as
another person might have displayed when wishing a last farewell to some
dearly-loved friend or relative. "There is no good in stopping by the
old barquey any longer, for we can't help her out of her trouble, and
the boats may be stove in by the falling mainmast if they remain
alongside much longer. Poor old ship! we've sailed many a mile
together, she and I; and now, to think that, crippled by that gale and
almost having completed her v'yage, she should be burnt like a log of
firewood off Cape Horn!"
"Never mind, sir," said I, sympathisingly. "It has not happened through
any fault of yours."
"No, my lad, I don't believe it has, for a cargo o' coal is a ticklish
thing to take half round the world; as more vessels are lost in carrying
it than folks suppose! However, this is the last we'll ever see of the
old _Esmeralda_, so far as standing on her deck goes; still, I tell you
what, Leigh, you may possibly live to be a much older man than I am, but
you'll never come across a ship easier to handle in a gale, or one that
would go better on a bowline!"
"No, sir, I don't think I shall," I replied to this panegyric on the
doomed vessel, quite appreciating all the skipper's feelings of regret
at her destruction; but just then the flames with a roar rushed up the
main hatch, approaching towards the poop every moment nearer and nearer.
This at once recalled Captain Billings from the past to the present.
"Have you got everything aboard the boats?" he sang out in his customary
voice to Mr Macdougall, his tones as firm and clear as if he had not
been a moment before almost on the point of crying. "Are all the
provisions and water in?"
"Aye, aye, an' stoowed awa', too, Cap'en," answered the mate, to whom
had been entrusted the execution of all the necessary details. "A very
thin's aboord, and naething forgot, I reecken."
"Then it's time we were aboard, too," said the skipper. "Boatswain,
muster the hands!"
Jorrocks didn't have to tap on the deck with a marlinspike now to call
them, in the way he used to summon the watch below to reef topsails in
the stormy weather we had off Madeira and elsewhere; for the men were
all standing round, ready to start over the side as soon as the skipper
gave the word of command to go.
Captain Billings then called over the list of the crew from the muster
roll, which he held in his hand along with the rest of the "ship's
papers"--such as the _Esmeralda's_ certificate of registry, the manifest
of the cargo, and her clearance from the custom-house officers at
Cardiff; when, all having answered to their names, with the exception of
the two invalids, Mr Ohlsen, and Harmer, the seaman, both of whom were
already in the long-boat, the skipper gave the word to pass down the
gangway, apportioning seven hands in all to the jolly-boat, under charge
of Mr Macdougall, and the remainder of our complement to the long-boat,
under his own care.
Including the invalids, we were seven-and-twenty souls in all--now
compelled to abandon our good ship, and trust to those two frail boats
to take us to the distant coast of Tierra del Fuego, of which we were
not yet even in sight; and it was with sad hearts that we went down the
side of this poor _Esmeralda_ for the last time, quitting what had been
our floating home for the two months that had elapsed since we left
England, for the perils we had encountered in her had only endeared her
the more to us!
Captain Billings was the last to abandon the ship; lingering not merely
until we had descended to the boats, seven in one and nineteen as yet
only in the other without him, but waiting while we settled ourselves
along the thwarts; when, turning round, he put his feet on the cleats of
the side ladder and came down slowly, looking up still at the old
vessel, as if loth to leave her in such an extremity.
The jolly-boat had been already veered astern on receiving her allotted
number, the long-boat only waiting alongside for the skipper, with a man
in the bows and another amidships, fending her off from the ship's side
with a couple of boat-hooks, so that the little barque should not dash
against the hull of the bigger one, now she was so loaded up--a
collision would have insured destruction to all in her, the huge billows
of the Southern Ocean rolling in at intervals, and raising her so high
aloft as to overtop the ship sometimes, and again carrying her down
right under the _Esmeralda's_ counter, thus making her run the risk of
being stove in every instant.
It was too perilous a proximity; so, as soon as Captain Billings had got
down into the stern-sheets, he gave the order to shove off.
"Easy her away gently, men," he said, as he took up the tiller lines,
watching with a critical eye the movements of the men amidships and in
the bow, as they poled the boat along the side of the ship until it
passed clear of her by the stern. "Be ready there with your oars,
sharp!"
In another moment the boat was tossing about in the open sea, the height
and force of the waves becoming all the more apparent now that we had
lost the protection of the _Esmeralda's_ lee. The flames just then, as
if angry at our having escaped them, darted up the mizzen rigging, and
presently enveloped the poop in their blaze, so that the whole ship was
now one mass of fire fore and aft, blazing like a tar-barrel.
The skipper would have liked to have lain by and seen the last of the
vessel, but there was too much sea on, and the wind seemed getting up
again; so, knowing how treacherous the weather was in the vicinity of
the Cape of Storms, he determined, for the safety of those under his
charge, to make for the land as speedily as possible--an open boat not
being the best craft in the world to be in, out on the ocean, when a
gale is about!
As Captain Billings could see, the wind was blowing on shore, in the
very direction for us to go; and, as the rollers were racing towards the
same goal, the only way for us to avoid being swamped by them was to
travel at a greater rate forwards than they did, or else we would
broach-to in the troughs of the waves, when a boat is apt to get for the
moment becalmed, from the intervening wall of water on either side
stopping the current of air, and taking the breeze out of her sails.
The long-boat was fitted with a couple of masts, carrying a large
mainsail and a mizzen, both of which the skipper now ordered to be set,
the former close-reefed to half its size. A bit of a staysail was also
hoisted forwards in place of the jib, which was too large for the wind
that was on; and then, it was wonderful to see the way the long-boat
began to go through the water when the sail was put on her! She fairly
raced along, dragging astern the jolly-boat, which we had taken in tow,
the little craft leaving a curly wave in front of her cutwater, higher
than her bows, and looking as if it were on the point of pouring over on
top of those in her.
It was now late in the afternoon of this, our sixty-third day out of
port; and, as the sun sank to rest in the west, away in the east,
according to our position in the boat, there was another illumination on
the horizon.
It was that caused by the burning ship. But it did not last so long:
the fire of coals and wood could not vie with that of the celestial orb.
We could still see the blazing hull, as we rose every now and then on
the crest of the rollers; while, when we could not perceive it from the
subsidence of the waves under the boat's keel, making us sink down, a
pillar of smoke, floating in the air high above the _Esmeralda_ in a
long fan-like trail, and stretching out to where sky and sea met in the
extreme distance, told us where she was without any fear of mistake.
Soon after we had quitted the vessel the mainmast, when half consumed,
tumbled over the side; and, presently, the burning mizzen, which had
been standing up for some time like a tall fiery pole, disappeared in a
shower of sparks.
The end was not far off now.
As we rose on the send of the next sea, Captain Billings, by whose side
I was sitting in the stern-sheets of the long-boat, grasped my arm.
"Look!" he said, half turning round and pointing to where the burning
ship had last been seen.
She was gone!
The smoke still hung in the air in the distance, like a funeral pall;
but the wind was now rapidly dispersing it to leeward, there being no
further supply of the columns of cloud-like vapour that had originally
composed it.
Soon, too, the smoke had completely disappeared, and the horizon was a
blank.
"All's over!" cried the skipper, with a heavy sigh.
All was over, indeed; for, whatever fragments of the ill-fated
_Esmeralda_ the remorseless fire may have spared, were now, without
doubt, making their way down to the bottom of that wild ocean on which
we poor shipwrecked mariners were tossing in a couple of frail boats--
uncertain whether we should ever reach land in safety, or be doomed to
follow our vessel's bones down into the depths of the sea!
Night fell soon after this; but the long-boat still held her way,
running before the wind, and steering a nor'-nor'-west course by
compass. We had now been going in that direction some two hours or
more, and the skipper calculated that we were some thirty miles off the
Wollaston Islands, which we ought to fetch by daylight next morning.
Fortunately, it was a bright clear night, although there was no moon,
only the stars twinkling aloft in the cloudless azure sky; and, thus, we
were able to watch the waves so as to prevent them pooping us when two
seas ran foul of each other, which they frequently did, racing against
the wind, and eager, apparently, to outstrip it. Still, the most
careful steering was necessary, and Jorrocks had to have out an oar
astern, in order to aid the skipper's control of the tiller, when he put
the helm up or down suddenly so as to get out of the wash of the
breakers.
The jolly-boat, too, occasioned us much uneasiness; for when the tow-
rope slackened at these moments of peril, she ran the chance of slewing
round broadside on to the sea. However, thanks to the interposing aid
of Providence, we got through the dangers of the night, and day dawned
at last.
It was a terribly anxious watch, though, for all hands--especially for
the skipper and Jorrocks, and the men told off to hold the sheets of the
sails; for these latter couldn't be belayed, having to be hauled taut or
let go at a moment's notice.
With the advent of day came renewed hope, in spite of our not being able
yet to see land--nothing being in sight ahead or astern, to the right or
the left, but the same eternal sea and sky, sky and sea, which the
rising sun, although it lent a ray of radiance to the scene, only made
infinitely more dreary and illimitable.
Towards noon, however, away on the port bow, the peak of a snow-topped
mountain was perceived just above the horizon.
"Hurrah!" cried Captain Billings. "There's our old friend Cape Horn!
Another couple of hours straight ahead, and we ought to rise those
islands I was speaking of. Do you see the Cape?" he shouted out across
the little intervening space of water to Mr Macdougall in the jolly-
boat.
"Aye, aye--and it's a glad seeght!" replied the mate, to which statement
all hands cheered. Some provisions, which, through the thoughtful
precaution of the skipper and the assistance of Pat Doolan, had been
cooked before being placed on board, were now served out around--the
long-boat the while steadily progressing on her course, now hauled a bit
more to the westwards of north.
About three o'clock in the afternoon another cheery hail broke the
stillness that reigned amongst us; for we were all too anxious to talk,
and those of the crew who were not attending to the sheets of the sails
had composed themselves to sleep, under the thwarts amidships and on the
gratings aft.
"Land, ho!"
The cry came from a man on the look-out in the bows; and the
announcement was received with a ringing shout, for the heavens were
beginning to get overcast, and the wind was rising, promising that,
should we be compelled to remain afloat another night, we should not
find it quite so pleasant as our experiences of the past one, in spite
of what we then thought the dangerous character of the following waves;
and, if it came on to blow in addition, the heavy running sea which we
had then to contend with would be mere child's play in comparison with
what we might expect would get up in an hour or two.
But, the nearness of the land led us to hope that we should not
experience any further risk of being swamped. Long before sunset we
approached it close enough to see where we were going.
The nearest shore was that of an island, with high mountain peaks, but
of little apparent extent, looking, as we saw it, barely a mile long.
Near this were three or four other islands, although further to the
northwards; while on the extreme left, some miles to the westwards, was
the high snow-white peak which the skipper had said was Cape Horn,
standing on a little island of its own that stretched out into the sea
to a more southerly point than any of the other islets composing the
archipelago.
"Why, sir," said I to Captain Billings, "I always thought that Cape Horn
was part of the mainland, jutting out from the end of Tierra del Fuego--
that's what my school geography taught, at all events!"
"Oh, no," he replied. "It is on an island, sure enough, as all mariners
know, although these chaps that write books for schools may not think it
island enough to mention the fact. Where it stands is called Horn
Island, and the next large one beyond it Wollaston Island; but I'm going
to make for that little one ahead, as it is the nearest."
"And what is that called?" I asked.
"Herschel Island, after the great astronomer," answered the skipper.
"I've been here before, my lad, and recognise the whole lot of them, and
that is how I come to know about 'em."
"Are any people living there?" said I, presently, the boat nearing the
island so quickly that we could see a line of white beach, with the
waves breaking on it, lying below the chain of mountain ridges that ran
across it "fore and aft," as a sailor would describe it.
"Only cannibals," replied the skipper, placidly.
"Cannibals on Herschel Island, and we going there!" I exclaimed, half
astonished, half frightened.
"Aye, they are there or thereabouts; but, at all events, we're going to
land on Herschel Island, as it's a case with us of any port in a storm!
Look out there, forwards!" he called out a moment or two after to the
men. "Be ready to down the mainsail when I give the word. Steady with
the sheets. Now!"
And, with a grating noise, the boat's keel struck the shore, carried
forwards on the top of a huge wave, whose backwash, however, dragged us
back into the deep the next second, slewing the head of the boat round
at the same time, so that she hung broadside on.
"Out oars, men--out oars for your life!" shouted the skipper, seeing the
terrible danger that now threatened us in the very moment of safety;
but, before the order could be executed, the long-boat was upset, and we
were all tumbling about in the surf!