UNLOADING--WITH A BIT OF POLITICS
All hands working together made us better acquainted with the men of
the starboard watch. Axel and I developed a lasting friendship, and
of course Old Smith joined the higher councils of our watch. Hitchen
and Mike and Tommy proved to be a great team of kidders, and with
Australia, of our side, formed a dandy quartette, singing such old
time favorites as "Tom Bowling" and "All in the Downs." Hitchen, a
very superior sort of sailor, an Englishman, reticent about himself,
but a volume of information about the ports of the world, was a great
addition to our life aboard. In fact the men of both watches were sea
worn and tired of each other, and we welcomed the new contact with our
shipmates. Add to this the unusual sights of the shore and the fresh
provisions, as well as the possibility for rational sleep, and sailors
will know what I mean when I say that we were a very happy lot of men
aboard the _Fuller_.
Scouse had a large mouth organ, "Made in Germany," a gaudy tin affair
well fitted for his capacious maw. Tony had an accordion, and no one
could deny that we were a lively crowd forward. On the other hand the
people aft were shrouded in gloom. The mate lived very much alone and
Captain Nichols was separated by more than a bulkhead from his first
officer. Chips was also a lonesome figure, dining in dreary state at
the second table. Tommy said that since the second mate had gone, the
Jap boy felt it beneath his dignity to wait on Chips, and the lanky
carpenter found the table set with all that he was to have at one load,
soup, meat, dessert, etc. "I wisht they'd let me at it once," said Joe,
his mouth watering at the mention of dessert.
The second mate did not return on board the night following his racket
with the mate, and we were in hopes he would quit the ship. Our wishes
were realized, for the afternoon of the second day in port, while
we were in the midst of breaking out the coal in the main hatch,
Mr. Stoddard came to the coaming and looked down on the grimy crowd
shoveling coal. He carried a dilapidated satchel and had evidently been
paid off by the skipper.
"So long, you dirty bums!" he called down, sending a squirt of tobacco
juice into the midst of the coal-dust and sweat-covered gang.
Tony, who was in the hatch, dropped his round-nosed shovel, and picking
up a lump of coal hove it at Mr. Stoddard, just missing him as he
dodged back from the coaming.
"Wait until I get you ashore, you dirty ---- ---- ---- ----," shouted
our ex-officer, shaking his fist at the hatch as he ran over the
gangway.
"Thank heaven he's gone," I remarked to Frenchy, both of us looking
down at the play from our perch on the fore tops'l yard where we were
unreeving the downhauls.
"A good thing he's done with us, and the ship saves thirty dollars a
month while we are in port," was Frenchy's wise comment.
That night Tony and Tommy went ashore for the purpose of finding Mr.
Stoddard and beating him up. The ex-second mate was boarding in a
Chinese house in Beretania Street, according to reports from some of
the Kanakas, and the two avengers trailed him from that place to the
Criterion saloon.
The true story of what happened was long obscured, for both Tony and
Tommy came aboard very late and turned in refusing to say anything
until the next morning, when they were given the third degree by
the exacting masters of fo'c'sle affairs in the persons of Jimmy and
Australia.
The stories did not tally and for a long time it was thought that Mr.
Stoddard had given them more than they counted on. The truth came out
when Chips told the yarn to some cronies on the beach. It seems that
Mr. Stoddard met Tony and Tommy as he was leaving the saloon. Their
determined manner, and clenched fists, at once warned him of trouble.
With a knowledge of sailor psychology, nothing short of masterly, he
advanced toward them in true "come on" style, greeting them with a
warmth of cordiality entirely unexpected, and a moment later Tony and
Tommy were with him at the bar drinking imported beer at two bits a
glass, and wondering how they had ever been so mistaken in him.
No doubt Mr. Stoddard would have got his licking had he remained in
port, but we learned that he shipped before the mast on the bark _W. H.
Dimond_ bound for San Francisco.
A day at the coal got us rid of that objectionable part of the cargo,
and when we took up the tarpaulins we found a large consignment of
case oil filling most of the 'tween decks. Case oil, let it be known,
is kerosene in large square cans, packed two in a case, and nicely
calculated as to weight so that a good husky sailor man can just about
lift one of them without straining himself too much. However, I can
vouch for the fact that these cases are very hard to handle and get
heavier and heavier as the exercise is continued.
The stevedores ashore, so we learned later, were Republicans, a jolly
lot of progressive Kanakas, demons for work and constantly chattering
like crazy brown magpies. On the other hand, the donkey crew, the
man at the dolly, and the hatch man, a lively Kanaka named Nigger,
were Royalists of the bluest strain compatible with their swarthy
complexions. The Royalists did their level best to send the case oil
out on the wharf so fast that the lowly Republicans could not handle
it. Below decks, in the stifling heat, we labored in gangs, running the
cases to the square of the hatch from two sides, while Old Smith and
Frenchy adjusted the slings about the stacks of twelve cases and up
they would shoot. It seemed that the cargo hook was constantly dangling
in the hatch like a hungry black worm while that demon Nigger raised a
hell of sweat and hurry with his constant shouting to "_Hook her up!
Hook her up!_" and every few minutes the mate would bend over the
hatch and roar down his bit of encouragement.
My job was to help hand the cases down from the tiers, lifting them to
small trucks upon which we rushed them to the hatch opening. A half day
of this exertion found us pretty well blown, and when the noon whistle
sounded over the harbor we got on deck, bolted our dinner and stretched
out on anything that was handy and relaxed. Some of the boys slept, but
I was too sore to sleep and had a feeling that it was better to stay
awake, anyhow, as the rest would seem longer.
When we turned to at one o'clock the gang on the wharf started to howl
defiance at Nigger and his men, and the cruel ball began again with the
mate, as king driver, egging along the performance. Being rid of the
second mate and with the captain ashore, he was thoroughly enjoying
himself.
The cases of oil were hard to grab hold of, and as I have said, got
heavier and heavier as the weary day advanced. Cursing and sweating in
hot 'tween deck, we strove like mad to keep up our end of the fight.
"Don't let them niggers beat us," shouted Brenden, as he dug in with
renewed energy, the sweat dripping into his eyes as he began slinging
down the cases like a madman.
"The dirty black bastards!" shouted Jimmy. "I hopes they croaks afore I
sees the last o' this place."
By the time the afternoon was half over my arms and back were numb with
pain. I had ceased to sweat and every effort was made by super-force
of will. We were red-eyed with the labor and the heat; swearing had
ceased, and we plugged along doggedly as the damnable Nigger kept up
his constant bawling to "_Hook her up!_" or "_Liki! Liki!_" (meaning
"the same").
Frenchy, who was under the hatch, suddenly brought us to our senses.
"_Rain, boys! Rain!_" he shouted.
In our torture we had not noticed how dark it was getting, and when
the first large cool drops pattered down on the 'tween deck hatches
covering the cargo in the hold, we knew that relief was at hand. A
minute more and the rain came down in tropical torrents while we
struggled to get the big strongback into place, the hatch covers on,
and the tarpaulin spread. Our black tormentors had fled to cover under
a nearby shed, and the donkey engine crew were drawing the fire from
beneath their boiler. Nigger, too, had disappeared, for Scouse came up
determined to take a fall out of "that black ---- ----."
To say that we were thankful for the rain is mild; we were saved by
it, nothing less, and as we went to the fo'c'sle that night we were as
badly beaten a lot of men as ever cumbered the port of Honolulu.
"Say, Smith!" yelled Joe, shouting through the partition that separated
the fo'c'sles.
"Well, what do you want?"
"You was right when you said sumthin' about me workin' here."
"I told you you'd sweat, didn't I?" shouted back Old Smith.
"Say, Smith," in a chastened tone.
"Yes?"
"Was you sweatin', too?"
"Shut up! Shut up!" cried Jimmy in alarm. "If you wants to start a
fight, do it tomorrow, an' let your betters get some rest."