DEPARTURE
Morning broke over the Eddy homestead grey and cheerless, a fitting
reflection of the frame of mind holding sway over its inmates. Rube
came down with his grip-sack in his hand, his best clothes donned, and
an air of stern resolve on his strong features. He found his father and
mother awaiting him in the humble room where he had met them ever since
his mind first awakened to the knowledge of worldly matters. For a few
moments after the ‘good mornings’ were said, no word further passed the
lips of the three. Suddenly the mother spoke, saying:
‘Rube, my son, you never told us _whar’_ you were goin’.’
To some of us perhaps it may seem strange that neither father nor
mother had asked this question before, but the fact is that in their
secluded lives the mere idea of one of them leaving home for so long
was sufficiently terrible, without any definition of the precise
locality to which the wanderer might be directing his steps being
thought of. But the mother’s heart was already in prospect reaching out
after the absent one, and therefore it was but fitting and natural that
she should be the first to desire to know whither he was going. Rube
flushed a deep red as the necessary vagueness of his reply dawned upon
him, but he said:
‘I’m goin’ ter sea, mother; thet’s all I know at present. When I git t’
Noo Bedford an’ find out whar’ I kin git letters or write frum, be sure
I’ll let you know to onct. I’m drefful sorry I kain’t tell you anythin’
more ’n thet.’
The morning meal, ample and palatable as it always is on these Eastern
farms, was spread, and the three took their places at the board; but
although they made a brave show of eating, the food would not be got
rid of, and suddenly Rube arose, as if the sight of his father’s worn
face and his mother’s eyes, bleared with weeping through the long
night, was too much for him, saying as he did so:
‘Wall, it’s time I wuz off. Good-bye, mother; good-bye, father. I know
yewr prayers’ll hover roun’ me wharever I go; and ez soon ez I hev
worn out this drefful restless feelin’ I’ll come back and settle down,
please God, never to go away any more.’
A silent kiss from the mother, a grave handshake from the father, and
Rube turned his back upon home. Nor did he once look behind him as he
strode down the road towards where, in the little village, a conveyance
was waiting to take him to the station, whence he might reach New
Bedford by railroad. He did not look back because he feared to see
his mother’s face. Not that his resolve to go would have been thereby
weakened, but that he could not help feeling guilty in that he was
weakly fleeing from what he could not help knowing was his duty--weakly
giving way to what he could not help knowing was after all, cowardice.
But who shall dare to judge the action of his fellow-men under
abnormal conditions? ‘Put yourself in his place’ is a good motto,
but how very rarely is it possible for us to act it out! Therefore,
although many of us may very well feel inclined to judge Rube harshly
for thus deserting father and mother and a life of usefulness, and
becoming a wanderer on the face of the deep simply because the woman
of his choice could not be his, let us not forget that ever since
the world began, and men and women have been able to recount their
experiences, strange things have been recorded as done by disappointed
lovers against their better judgment.
Rube’s mind as the train sped him onwards towards the beautiful New
England town whence he was to start upon his long sea journeyings was
almost a blank. Never given much to a habit of introspection, he was
by reason of the shock that he had recently received less able now to
devote himself to concentrated thought than ever; and so, had he been
asked what he was thinking about during that long railway journey, he
would have replied, no doubt with perfect frankness, ‘Hardly anything.’
I think this experience is not uncommon, even among men and women given
to meditation, when suddenly they have received a mental blow. Be that
as it may--and I will own that it is a debatable point--when Rube
arrived at New Bedford he had just the air of stolid bewilderment that
is generally noticeable upon the faces of country-bred people first
coming in contact with the strangeness of life in a seaport town. And
truly one might have sailed the wide world round and not have found
a more wonderful seaport than New Bedford was in those days. Men of
almost every nation under heaven, clad in outlandish garments, jostled
each other along the strongly smelling wharves and picturesque streets
bordering the bay. New Bedford was then in the height of her prosperity
as metropolis of the whaling world. Over six hundred fine ships came
and went on their adventurous sea-questings, bringing with them from
the uttermost ends of the earth queer-looking denizens of those far-off
lands. Kanakas from the multitudinous Isles of the Pacific, Aborigines
from Central America, Aleuts from Alaska, Japanese from Nippon,
Chinese, Malays, Papuans, and Dyaks from the East Indian Archipelago,
Lascars from Hindustan, Arabs from the Persian Gulf, and last, but
by far the most numerous of all these wanderers, Portuguese of every
hue, from deepest black to creamy white, from the Fortunate Isles.
The diversity of peoples was not more wonderful than the quaintness
of their costumes, which were, indeed, a chance medley of all the
national dresses of the world. Yet in every case a keen observer, and
one acquainted with the subject, might have recognised evidences of an
attempt on the part of the wearer to give to his nondescript raiment
some national peculiarity. Not only were the people a wonderful sight,
but another sense--that of smell--was overpoweringly arrested on the
crowded wharves, where scores of weatherbeaten ships discharged their
greasy spoils, the odour from which permeated the entire atmosphere,
seizing upon a stranger with almost intoxicating effect. Then the
sounds!--the loud cries of the labourers as they toiled to discharge
the cargoes from the ships, the wonderful medley of languages spoken
by the strange seafarers slouching along the shore, and, pervading
all, the hollow murmur of the sea as it rolled in on the beaches of the
beautiful bay under the stress of a strong landward gale.
Amidst these novel sights, sounds, and smells, Rube made his way like
a man in a dream towards the place whither he had been directed, not
without considerable difficulty, as three out of every four persons
of whom he inquired his direction did not understand a word that he
said. This, to a man who had never before met with anybody not speaking
his own tongue, was really bewildering, and it was not therefore
to be wondered at that by the time Rube had found the building he
sought, his mental processes, never too acute, were reduced almost
to numbness. Inquiring timidly at the door of the building to which
he had been directed as the place where he should find Mr. Sawtell,
he was answered nonchalantly by an elderly man, whose grey beard was
plentifully streaked with tobacco juice, that if he went right in
and took the first door on the left he’d find what he sought. Rube
meekly obeyed, and entered a large, high-ceilinged room, scantily
furnished, with several desks enclosed by a low fence and some benches.
Two men sat at the desks looking as unlike the embodiment of our
modern ideas of clerks as could well be imagined, for both of them
had soft wideawake hats perched on the backs of their heads, both
were smoking enormous cigars, and both bore in their countenances
the expression of temporarily out-of-work pirates more than that of
peaceful quill-drivers. As Rube approached the nearest desk he was
somewhat amazed to see the clerk with his chair tilted back and his
feet apparently resting upon the papers before him. He gazed at the
strongly-marked lineaments of the official, and that worthy returned
his look with interest, presently removing the cigar from his mouth
and saying: ‘Wal, young feller; an’ wut kin I hev the pleasure?’ Rube
stammered out, rather incoherently: ‘Mr. Sawtell engaged me th’ other
day to come down here to jine a ship to go to sea.’ ‘Oh!’ said the
clerk, ‘Sawtell engaged yer, did he? And wut mought be the name of
the ship?’ ‘I don’ know,’ replied Reuben, who was fast recovering his
equanimity; ’he jest told me to come right here.’ ‘That’s all right,
sonny,’ said the clerk. ‘Sit down thar an’ wait fer him; he’ll be roun’
bimeby.’
Reuben sat down as directed, and for nearly two hours had the interest
of seeing individuals, something like himself, enter, ask almost the
same question, and receive almost the same reply, until the room was
fairly full. Then, when Reuben began to think that the whole affair
must be a mistake, Sawtell entered. With him there came a man looking
more like an Eastern patriarch than a seafarer--a tall, loose-jointed,
hook-nosed, grey-bearded man, clad in homespun, a long coat reaching
nearly to his feet, and a soft steeple-crowned felt hat upon his head.
But quaint as his figure might be, there was no mistaking the keen,
eagle-like glance of his eyes as he swept them round on the silent
men meekly awaiting the arbiter of their fate. And it was he, the
Patriarch, who spoke first. ‘Is this the crowd you’ve gut fur me,
Sawtell?’ ‘Yes, Cap’n Hampden, an’ ez likely a lookin’ lot ’s ever
I see.’ ‘H’m, mebbe so, but jest naow I guess there’s a consid’ble
quantity of plough soil hangin’ to ’em. But they _do_ seem likely
enough, as yer say. However, I gut no time to spare. We’re bound out
first tide to-morrer, an’ if these gentlemen air _quite_ disengaged’
(waving his hand towards the clerks) ‘we’ll purceed to business to
once.’ Then, raising his voice, he addressed the waiting candidates
comprehensively, saying: ‘Wal, young men, so ye feel inclined to try
yewr fortunes upon the ragin’ deep, do ye?’ Muttered responses went up,
of which no man might gather the import, save that they were in the
affirmative. ‘Right an’ good,’ said the Patriarch; ‘step up here, and
hear this _gentleman_’ (with a sarcastic inflection upon the last word)
‘read eout t’ ye the conditions of sarvice.’
With an unexpected alacrity one of the clerks sprang to his feet,
and, from a somewhat grimy document, read in a high sing-song tone of
voice an agreement whereby the said crew covenanted to proceed in the
good ship _Xiphias_ to any port or ports of the navigable ocean in
pursuit of whales, seals, and any other denizens of the deep capable
of being made profitable to crew and owners; voyage not to exceed four
years. It must be confessed that, slurred over as the last two words
were (unintentionally, no doubt), several of the candidates suddenly
showed a wistfulness of countenance, as if they had a prospective idea
of what those four years might mean, but no word was spoken by any of
them. Then, one by one, they stepped up to the desk and signed their
names, first being told that they would be entitled to receive a good
and sufficient quantity of cooked provisions, and the 250th lay, in
return for their unquestioning obedience at all times to all orders
that Captain Hampden and his officers might issue to them. And this
important preliminary finished, they were all sternly ordered, as being
men now under command, to be down at the ship by six o’clock in the
morning at latest.
So the newly engaged crew filed out of the office and stood in a little
group on the sidewalk hesitatingly. A few words passed--invitations to
drink for the most part--and one or two spoke to Rube; but he answered
them unthinkingly, feeling, indeed, the need for being alone. It was
all so new and strange to the country-bred man, and he felt that
conversation with anybody would be insupportable. So, with muttered
excuses, he left the company, and went for a stroll along the wharves,
taking in all the wonders of this strange place with wide-open eyes,
but most of his other senses nearly out of action. At last, utterly
weary, he turned into a respectable-looking eatinghouse by the
waterside, and called for some food, inquiring of the young woman who
brought it whether he might take up his lodging there for the night.
She answered ‘Yes’ with a surprised air, and, apparently unable to
overcome her curiosity, put several questions to him, as to whence he
came and whither he was going, all of which he answered evasively,
conveying the idea that what he wanted was to be left alone in peace
with his own thoughts. Quite unaccustomed to such rudeness on the
part of her customers, the young woman tossed her head and departed,
leaving him to his solitary meal. Nor did she return again until,
rapping on the table, he summoned her and asked to be shown his room.
With a scornful look at a man who could be so utterly unresponsive to
the offer of polite conversation, she led the way to a very small,
barely-furnished chamber, showed him in and left him; and he, with the
same bewildered air that he had worn ever since reaching the town,
slowly took off his clothes and got into bed, although it was hardly
yet dark. In a few minutes the strain of the past twenty-four hours was
relaxed, and he was fast asleep.