INTO THE PACIFIC
After close to two and a half months at sea we had reached the turning
point on the long course to Honolulu. The Atlantic with its trials lay
behind us, and just in our wake the sullen waters of the Horn lashed
themselves against the coast of Terra Del Fuego. Ahead stretched the
broad Pacific, greatest of oceans, and fraught with every angle of
adventure that comes to the men who sail. Indeed the sailing of a great
ship like the _Fuller_ is the rarest kind of sport from the standpoint
of seamanship, where every stitch of canvas is made to draw to its full
capacity in every wind that blows. From the cold latitudes of the Cape
up to abreast of Valparaiso, we had good lively sailing. Great rollers
followed us, for the winds were mostly fair, and, as the seas overtook
us and expended themselves to the north, we drove onward, cutting down
the latitude in record time; the cape pigeons were left behind, but
several albatross formed a convoy almost to the edge of Capricorn.
During these weeks of strenuous weather a favored few of us were told
off to lay up sennet for use in making chafing mats, and as "service"
on the backstays, where subject to the wear of gear. We would perch
ourselves on the coils of rope stowed on the fore hatch tarpaulin under
the fo'c'sle head, where we were sheltered from the weather and at the
same time within easy call from aft.
Frenchy was the leading sailor in these arts and taught us to lay up
_round_, _flat_, and _French sennet_. The less skilled men busied
themselves in making _nettles_ and _foxes_, using the primitive
"spinning jinney," and rubbing down the small stuff with canvas to
"smooth" it before balling. Here, too, we were initiated into the fine
points of marling spike work, Frenchy, Brenden, and Jimmy Marshall
showing the less knowing ones how to turn in many a splice and knot.
Turk's heads of three, five, and seven strands were made, and the
more difficult series of four, six and eight strands were mastered by
some of us. Jimmy worked a wonderful set of manropes for the after
companion, crosspointing them in red, white and blue, and topping them
with rose knots.
I was delighted to pick up a vast amount of interesting and useful
knowledge about the different knots and hitches used at sea. How many
sailors today can properly cast a _carrick bend_, turn in a _mariner's
splice_, or a _Flemish eye_, or work a _cringle_ into a _Bolt rope_?
Hitchen, of the starboard watch, taught us how to make the _English bag
knot_, an intricate and beautiful formation cast in the bight of a line.
Our work under the fo'c'sle head got all hands started, and during many
a dismal wet dog watch we practiced the forming of every knot from the
_bowline_ down; Peter, the boy, and myself trying to outdo each other
in the variety of our achievements. Frenchy taught us a new way to
form that "king of knots," the _bowline_, in which the loop is passed
through the gooseneck twice, forming a double loop, a most useful knot
employed in the French Navy. When a man is to be lowered over side, he
sits in one of the loops and the other is passed under his arm pits,
the gooseneck coming against his chest. His weight tautens the part
under the arms, and it is impossible for a man to drop out of this
bowline, even though he becomes unconscious.
In this manner much of the unrecorded lore of the sea was passed on to
us in the _Fuller_ as the same things have been handed down through
the ages since the Phoenicians, the Norsemen, and the more ancient
sailors of Cathay first rigged their barks, fashioning their bends and
hitches in the same manner as the sailors of today. Where the marvelous
knots originated, no one can tell. Who invented them, no one knows;
but we do know that the rope craft of the sea is standard and defies
improvement. It takes time to learn the knots, bends, hitches, and
splices; how much longer it must have taken to discover them can only
be imagined.
In time, much of this will be entirely superseded by wire and steel, as
indeed all lower standing rigging is already of wire. But turnbuckles
and riveted plates are part of the metal ships, unyielding and stiff,
that buckle the hollow steel masts, or sheer the channel plates clean
from the hull, when wrenched by the resistless power of the sea.
In the days of wood, of tough live oak, and tarred hemp lanyards, with
their "give" and "spring," the old style rigging knots and splices
endured for thousands of years. Can steel and steam resist the hands of
time as well?
On the _Fuller_ we were taught that everything had to be done just so
to be "shipshape and Bristol fashion," as the old sea phrase has it.
It was always:
Worm and parcel with the lay,
Then turn and serve the other way.
And the humblest tools have had their form decreed since the art
of seamanship began. The _serving board_ and the _serving mallet_
used by Noah; the _fid_, the _marling spike_, the sewing _palm_,
and the _caulking iron_, are the ultimate tools of the most ancient
handicraft; the art of building and rigging ships. We used all of these
implements with industry as the blustery weather sent us up from the
Horn to Honolulu. We saw how able sailors fit a cringle to the tough
four-stranded hempen bolt ropes on the storm canvas; we learned the
proper way to _strop_ a block, with the splice _where it belongs_, as
every sailor knows, and the throat seizing _frapped_ and _hitched_ in
sailor fashion.
The hours spent under the fo'c'sle head during those days of the voyage
were not so tedious. The Horn was behind us and the prospect of fine
weather ahead. Yarning was always going on, and often we spent the dog
watches in making fancy plaitings and knottings for sea chest covers
and the like. I realized that such men as Marshall, Old Smith, Hitchen,
Axel, Brenden, and Frenchy were of a dwindling breed, soon to be as
rare as the makers of stone axes, or the seamen of the Roman galleys.
One other sailor of the ship's company asked odds of no one in the
range of his knowledge of the sea. Whatever else we may have thought
of him, we were forced to acknowledge Mr. Zerk a seaman of the most
accomplished sort. Versed in the art of wire splicing and up to every
dodge in sailmaking and rigging, he combined the ability of the marling
spike man with the gift of the larger seamanship involved in the
handling of a vessel under all conditions. If his eye ever lights on
this, and I hope it will, I herewith accord to him the full measure
of my admiration, for the combination of these two types of sailor is
rare; as rare as the few remaining ships of the school that brought him
forth.
The _Fuller_ was a wooden vessel, Bath built, and coppered, not with
the beautiful "red copper" we read about in Clark Russell, but with a
composition resembling brass, tough, yellow, and antifouling; a less
expensive sheathing than the pure copper, and, to my mind, every bit
as good a color, the bright yellow, between the deep blue sea and the
black hull, striking a pleasing line that glints like gold when the
sun just hits it at the proper angle.
Our ship was a full-bodied model, really a medium clipper, surprisingly
sharp, and with a clean run aft that gave her a handy pair of heels
in any kind of a favorable wind. Like most ships "of a certain age,"
the old girl was troubled with her timbers and joints. These had an
uncomfortable way of sliding over each other and complaining in a truly
agonizing manner.
"She has lots of 'give' to her," one of the men remarked on our running
into the first sea after leaving port.
The working of the vessel's timbers kept her bilge "sweet" by admitting
a liberal quantity of nice cool sea water seeping in all the way from
the garboard strake to the channels, a circumstance that necessitated
constant pumping, back breaking labor that in heavy weather continued
during the whole of the twenty-four hours, with two hands bending over
the lee bilge pump. The wheel, the lookout at night, and the bilge
pump, were taken in rotation by all hands. For back breaking, soul
destroying labor, nominate the bilge pump. I had a standing offer in
the fo'c'sle to stand two wheels for one bilge pump, Scouse and Fred
and Martin being my best customers until I was dated up so far in
advance on the steering that I had to take this on as well as the
pumping, which came along oftener as it called for two men.
In the matter of small trading we did a thriving business in the
fo'c'sle, some of us even branching out into foreign trade with the
starboard watch. I was the one to introduce this practice on board the
_Fuller_, a relic of my schoolship days, when pools were formed in the
different messes and five and ten rations of cold corned beef traded
off for potatoes, or potatoes and butter paid out as rental for the use
of the precious frying pans of which there were a few on board. When
I worked out a system of credits for different kinds of grub on the
_Fuller_ it was found to be a source of diversion and made possible
some adjustment along the lines of personal taste, in the matter of
our meals. We had stock fish every once in a while, no doubt as a
concession to the Scandinavian contingent, to be found in every ship
that sails the seas. I invariably passed off my share of this delicacy
to Fred or Martin and would be credited with their rations of apple
jack, a stew of musty dried apples; or I would contract for half of
their whack of lime juice and vinegar.
Mr. Zerk, with whom I always was a favorite, that is until we got to
Honolulu, occasionally gave me a jar of preserves, of which he had a
large store. These were home-made pickles and jams, and when brought
into the fo'c'sle caused quite a commotion.
"Rats with 'im and 'is rotten marmerlade," declared Jimmy in great
dudgeon when I brought forward the first fruits of my "stand in."
"Eat it yerself but don't ast no self-respectin' man to touch it," was
the sarcastic way in which the haughty Marshall voiced his sentiments.
"Wot do you say?" he demanded, glaring about the fo'c'sle to see if
anyone dared dispute him.
"Righto," piped up Joe. "That rotten skunk aft has poisoned the stuff,
I'll bet."
"No, it's good," I declared, dipping in with the tip of my sheath
knife. It was a jar of very red cherry jam. It also had a very pleasant
aroma as well as a pleasing taste. I purposely took a second very large
helping and could see that the temptation to fall was great.
"Here, Frenchy, don't eat any, now. Just _taste_ it, perhaps it does
taste a little funny." Frenchy tasted. "I don't know. It does taste
funny," he said.
"Here, gimme a piece o' tack," and Joe was sampling the jam very
liberally.
In a moment all hands, including Jimmy, were tasting it, and all
declared it tasted funny. As a matter of fact it did taste very funny
if we accepted apple jack as a standard.
As the last smear of jam was cleaned from the jar the hypercritical
Jimmy had the nerve to remark, "That was the rottenest marmerlade I
ever tasted."
However, after that no questions were raised when I brought a donation
forward, though to tell the truth these treats were scarce, as the
mate's private stock ran out long before we got to Honolulu.