A ship tempest-tossed, labouring amid the surges of an angry sea; her
crew on the alert, doing their utmost to keep her off a lee-shore. And
such a shore! None more dangerous on all ocean's edge; for it is the
west coast of Tierra del Fuego, abreast the Fury Isles and that long
belt of seething breakers known to mariners as the "Milky Way," the same
of which the great naturalist, Darwin, has said: "One sight of such a
coast is enough to make a landsman dream for a week about shipwreck,
peril, and death."
There is no landsman in the ship now exposed to its dangers. All on
board are familiar with the sea--have spent years upon it. Yet is there
fear in their hearts and pallor on their cheeks, as their eyes turn to
that belt of white frothy water between them and the land, trending
north and south beyond the range of vision.
Technically speaking, the endangered vessel is not a ship, but a barque,
as betokened by the fore-and-aft rig of her mizenmast. Nor is she of
large dimensions; only some six or seven hundred tons. But the reader
knows this already, or will, after learning her name. As her stern
swings up on the billow, there can be read upon it the _Calypso_; and
she is that _Calypso_ in which Henry Chester sailed out of Portsmouth
Harbour to make his first acquaintance with a sea life.
Though nearly four years have elapsed since then, he is still on board
of her. There stands he by the binnacle. No more a boy, but a young
man, and in a garb that bespeaks him of the quarter-deck--not before the
mast, for he is now the _Calypso's_ third officer. And her second is
not far-off; he is the generous youth who was the means of getting him
the berth. Also grown to manhood, he, too, is aft, lending a hand at
the helm, the strength of one man being insufficient to keep it steady
in that heavily rolling sea. On the poop-deck is Captain Gancy himself,
consulting a small chart, and filled with anxiety as at intervals
looking towards the companion-ladder he there sees his wife and
daughter, for he knows his vessel to be in danger and his dear ones as
well.
A glance at the barque reveals that she has been on a long voyage. Her
paint is faded, her sails patched, and there is rust along the chains
and around the hawse-holes. She might be mistaken for a whaler coming
off a four years' cruise. And nearly that length of time has she been
cruising, but not after whales. Her cargo, a full one, consists of
sandal-wood, spices, tortoise-shell, mother-of-pearl, and real pearls
also--in short, a miscellaneous assortment of the commodities obtained
by traffic in the islands and around the coasts of the great South Sea.
Her last call has been at Honolulu Harbour in the Sandwich Isles, and
she is now homeward-bound for New York around the Horn. A succession of
westerly winds, or rather continuation of them, has forced her too far
on to the Fuegian coast, too near the Furies; and now tossed about on a
billowy sea, with the breakers of the Milky Way in sight to leeward, no
wonder that her crew are apprehensive for their safety.
Still, perilous as their situation, they might not so much regard it
were the _Calypso_ sound and in sailing trim. Unfortunately she is far
from this, having a damaged rudder, and with both courses torn to
shreds. She is lying-to under storm fore-staysail and close-reefed
try-sails, wearing at intervals, whenever it can be done with advantage,
to keep her away from those "white horses" a-lee. But even under the
diminished spread of canvas the barque is distressed beyond what she can
bear, and Captain Gancy is about to order a further reduction of canvas,
when, looking westward--in which direction he has been all along
anxiously on the watch--he sees what sends a shiver through his frame:
three huge rollers, whose height and steepness tell him the _Calypso_ is
about to be tried to the very utmost of her strength. Good sea-boat
though he knows her to be, he knows also that a crisis is near. There
is but time for him to utter a warning shout ere the first roller comes
surging upon them. By a lucky chance the barque, having good
steerage-way, meets and rises over it unharmed. But her way being now
checked, the second roller deadens it completely, and she is thrown off
the wind. The third then taking her right abeam, she careens over so
far that the whole of her lee-bulwark, from cat-head to stern-davit, is
ducked under water.
It is a moment of doubt, with fear appalling--almost despair. Struck by
another sea, she would surely go under; but, luckily, the third is the
last of the series, and she rights herself, rolling back again like an
empty cask. Then, as a steed shaking his mane after a shower, she
throws the briny water off, through hawse-holes and scuppers, till her
decks are clear again.
A cry of relief ascends from the crew, instinctive and simultaneous.
Nor does the loss of her lee-quarter boat, dipped under and torn from
the davits, hinder them from adding a triumphant hurrah, the skipper
himself waving his wet tarpaulin and crying aloud:
"Well done, old _Calypso_! Boys, we may thank our stars for being on
board such a seaworthy craft!"
Alas! both the feeling of triumph and security are short-lived, ending
almost on the instant. Scarce has the joyous hurrah ceased
reverberating along her decks, when a voice is heard calling out, in a
tone very different:
"The ship's sprung a leak!--and a big one too! The water's coming into
her like a sluice!"
There is a rush for the fore hatchway, whence the words of alarm
proceed, the main one being battened down and covered with tarpaulin.
Then a hurried descent to the "'tween-decks" and an anxious peering into
the hold below. True--too true! It is already half full of water,
which seems mounting higher and by inches to the minute! So fancy the
more frightened ones!
"Though bad enuf, 'tain't altogether so bad's that," pronounced Seagriff
the carpenter, after a brief inspection. "There's a hole in the bottom
for sartin'; but mebbe we kin beat it by pumpin'."
Thus encouraged, the captain bounds back on deck, calling out, "All
hands to the pumps!"
There is no need to say that. All take hold and work them with a will:
it is as if every one were working for his own life.
A struggle succeeds, triangular and unequal, being as two to one. For
the storm still rages, needing helm and sails to be looked after, while
the inflow must be kept under in the hold. A terrible conflict it is,
between man's strength and the elements, but short, and alas! to end in
the defeat of the former.
The _Calypso_ is water-logged, will no longer obey her helm, and must
surely sink.
At length, convinced of this, Captain Gancy calls out, "Boys, it's no
use trying to keep her afloat. Drop the pumps, and let us take to the
boats."
But taking to the boats is neither an easy nor hopeful alternative,
seeming little better than that of a drowning man catching at straws.
Still, though desperate, it is their only chance, and with not a moment
to be wasted in irresolution. Luckily the _Calypso's_ crew is a
well-disciplined one, every hand on board having served in her for
years. The only two boats left them--the gig and pinnace--are therefore
let down to the water, without damage to either, and, by like dexterous
management, everybody got safely into them. It is a quick embarkation,
however--so hurried, indeed, that few effects can be taken along, only
those that chance to be readiest to hand. Another moment's delay might
have cost them their lives, for scarce have they taken their seats and
pushed the boats clear of the ship's side, when, another sea striking
her, she goes down head foremost like a lump of lead, carrying masts,
spars, torn sails, and rigging--everything--along with her.
Captain Gancy groans at the sight. "My fine barque gone to the bottom
of the sea, cargo and all--the gatherings of years. Hard, cruel luck!"
Mingling with his words of sorrow are cries that seem cruel too: the
screams of seabirds, gannets, gulls, and the wide-winged albatross, that
have been long hovering above the _Calypso_, as if knowing her to be
doomed, and hoping to find a feast among the floating remnants of the
wreck.