The Cruise of the "Esmeralda" Part 20

It appeared to me that I had not been in my berth more than five minutes when, about a quarter of an hour before noon, Forbes called me in order that we might together take the meridian alt.i.tude of the sun; and I was no sooner on my feet than it became apparent that the s.h.i.+p's motion was by no means so violent as it had been when I lay down; which was sufficiently accounted for by the information imparted to me by the mate that the gale had broken, and that in another hour or two the weather would probably have moderated sufficiently to permit of our filling away upon our course. This news was fully confirmed by the general aspect of affairs when I reached the deck; for the sun was now s.h.i.+ning brilliantly in a cloudless sky, and the air was genially warm; while the wind, though still blowing heavily enough to justify us in retaining the close reefs in the topsails, had abated its violence so far that it now blew steadily, instead of beating upon the s.h.i.+p in gusts of headlong fury.

The sea, moreover, though it still seemed to run as high as ever, was no longer so steep as it had been; the great mountains of water moving more slowly, and carrying a good wholesome slope on their lee sides, that enabled the s.h.i.+p to ride them easily and comfortably without the provocation of a constantly recurring feeling that each great menacing wall of water was about to overwhelm her.

We had taken the sun, and made it eight bells, and I was on the point of leaving the deck again to work out the sights in my own cabin, when, while exchanging some remarks with Forbes, I thought I caught a momentary glimpse of _something_--what, I knew not--as the s.h.i.+p hung poised for an instant upon the crest of an unusually heavy wave. It was but the barest, most fleeting glimpse; for before I could direct Forbes's attention to it by so much as a word, we were plunging headlong down the weather slope of the wave, with our horizon on either hand bounded by a hissing crest that was rearing itself as high as our maintop, and the barque taking a weather roll of such portentous extent that both of us instinctively made a dash for the mizzen shrouds and clung to them for dear life in antic.i.p.ation of the coming--and correspondingly abnormal--lee roll; while the roar of the bow wave and the wind aloft created such a din that I could not have made myself heard even had I been foolish enough to have attempted it. But I was confident that I had seen something; and when the s.h.i.+p reached the bottom of the abyss, where we on deck were becalmed, and the roar of the surge under our bows had died away, I mentioned the matter to the mate; so that when we were swung aloft again both of us were eagerly on the lookout for the object. As almost invariably happens, however, after the pa.s.sage of an usually heavy wave, the two or three that now succeeded were only of moderate height, and higher crests each time intervened between us and the spot where the object was last seen; it was also probable enough that the object, whatever it might be, would be sunk in the trough of the sea just at the moment when we happened to be hanging on a wave-crest; and it thus happened that several minutes elapsed without my again catching sight of it. To cut the matter short, therefore, I handed Forbes my s.e.xtant to hold; and, seizing a favourable opportunity, sprang into the weather main rigging and swarmed aloft as far as the maintop, from which elevation I knew that I should soon sight it if it were still above water.

It was not until I was halfway up the shrouds that I fully realised how heavily it was still blowing, or how violent still was the motion of the s.h.i.+p. With every lee roll that we took I was involuntarily forced to cling with all my strength to the rigging, for it seemed to me that unless I did so I should infallibly be pitched head-foremost into the top; while when the s.h.i.+p rolled to windward the pressure of the air upon my body was so great that I was literally jammed hard and fast against the rigging, unable to move hand or foot. This was even more apparent when I reached the futtock-shrouds and was surmounting the edge of the top, the wind sustaining me so completely that I am confident I might have relaxed my hand-grasp for several seconds without the slightest danger of falling. However, I gained my lofty perch at last, and, lying p.r.o.ne in the top in order that I might see under the foot of the fore-topsail, soon again caught sight of the object.

It was distant about seven miles from the s.h.i.+p, bearing about north-north-east by compa.s.s, and floated very low in the water; a circ.u.mstance which, from the thick mist still overspreading the surface of the water, rendered it impossible at that distance to determine precisely what it was. It looked as much like a dead whale as anything else, and had I felt quite certain that it was really this, I should of course have troubled no more about it. But there were moments when, probably from some slight change in its position with regard to us, the resemblance I have mentioned ceased, and the conviction forced itself upon me that, whatever it might be, it was _not_ a whale, living or dead; and at length, to set the matter at rest, I determined to fill upon the s.h.i.+p and get a nearer look at it. I accordingly descended to the deck, and, Forbes rousing out Joe and San Domingo, we all went to work, and, with some difficulty, succeeded in setting the fore-topmast staysail without splitting it, after which we filled the fore-topsail and headed the s.h.i.+p for the mysterious object.

We were now close-hauled upon the larboard tack, with the object a bare three points upon the lee bow, and it soon became apparent that, as we were making fully that amount of leeway, it would require some rather fine steering to fetch it without breaking tacks--an operation which I was particularly anxious to avoid, short-handed as we were. Forbes, however, was at the wheel, and as he was a splendid helmsman, it was pretty certain that if the thing could be done he would do it.

When luncheon was announced we had drawn up to within about four miles of the object; but so heavily was the sea still running that, even at that distance, it was only occasionally that we could catch sight of it, presenting now, as looked at through the s.h.i.+p's telescope, the appearance of a large fragment of floating wreck.

The news which I took to the luncheon table, that a mysterious floating something of considerable size had been sighted ahead, and that we were making for it, had a very stimulating effect upon the occupants of the saloon, who, enveloping themselves in mackintoshes, followed me on deck when I rose from the table, with an eagerness born of the longing for some occurrence to break the monotony of and make them forget for a time the wearisome pitching and rolling of the s.h.i.+p, the monotonous, unceasing clank and jar of the cabin-doors on their hooks, the continuous creaking of the bulkheads, the thump of the wheel-chains on the deck, the never-ending wash of the water, and the howling of the wind in the rigging. And, despite the merciless buffeting of the wind, and the ceaseless drenching showers of spray that flew over us, the change from the saloon to the deck was unanimously voted an improvement; for it involved a transition from a close, oppressive atmosphere to an exhilarating breeze, redolent of the strong salt odour of the brine, and bracing by reason of its very violence; while the brilliant suns.h.i.+ne, sparkling upon the deep, windy blue of the vast mountain surges that surrounded us, and converting every spray-shower, into a gorgeous rainbow, const.i.tuted an ever-changing picture of rich and splendid colour and wild, tumultuous movement that was not to be easily forgotten. I thought Miss Merrivale had never looked so lovely as she did then, enveloped in a thin, soft, silky-looking mackintosh, with a dainty little, close-fitting hat upon her head, her beautiful hair all blown adrift and streaming, a long golden web of ringlets, in the fiery breeze, her cheeks flushed to a delicate pink with the rude buffeting of wind and sea, and her eyes fairly blazing with excitement and exhilaration at the wild scene around her.

Our first glances were naturally directed ahead in search of the mysterious object for which we were steering, and it was quickly discovered about two miles distant, and a good point on the lee bow. To the unaided eye its character still remained uncertain, but a single glance through the s.h.i.+p's telescope now sufficed to satisfy us that it was a wreck, or a portion of one. It had all the appearance of a small craft, capsized; for the telescope enabled one to see a small strip of wet, black side showing above water, with a considerably greater expanse of copper-sheathed planking. But, even now that we had so greatly decreased the distance between us and it, there was still great difficulty in determining its precise character; for it was only when we and it happened to be upon the top of a sea at the same moment that it came within our ken, and those moments were comparatively rare.

As we continued to close, however, our glimpses of it became increasingly frequent; and at length, when we had approached to within half a mile, the heave of the sea having meanwhile flung it round into a more favourable position, it became apparent that it was a small craft of some sort--seemingly a brig--that had capsized, and now lay with her masts p.r.o.ne along the water, for we could now and then catch a glimpse of the spars, with the canvas still set, lifting a foot or two out of the water with the heave of the sea, only to settle back again the next moment, however. What interested us most keenly of all, however, and excited our profoundest astonishment, was the fact that a dark patch in her main rigging--for which I could not at first account--soon afterwards proved to be a group of men! for we presently saw one of them scramble along the shrouds until he reached the vessel's upturned side, and then--despite the heavy ma.s.ses of water that were continually breaking over the hull--rise to his feet and wave something that looked like a man's jacket, by way of a signal, in answer to which I immediately ran our ensign up to the gaff-end.

The excitement of the fairer occupants of our p.o.o.p was now intense, especially that of Miss Merrivale, who, in the extremity and oblivion of her enthusiasm, not only addressed me as "Jack," but also volunteered to do all sorts of impossible things by way of a.s.sisting in the rescue that she took for granted. But how was such a thing to be achieved? We were only five men on board the _Esmeralda_, all told, and what could our united efforts accomplish? We certainly could not launch a boat, even had we dared to hope that so small a craft would live in such a wild and fearful sea; for the lightest of our gigs--the only boat it would have been possible to launch, under the circ.u.mstances--would need at least four men to do anything with her in such weather, which would leave only one man on board to look after and handle the s.h.i.+p during the process of rescue--which amounted to a physical impossibility.

I was, however, determined to save the men, if it could be done; we therefore steered the barque as close up under the lee of the wreck as we dared, and backed our mainyard, with the brig's royal-mastheads showing just awash not ten feet to windward of us. It was an extraordinary and appalling picture that we now looked upon. The vessel--a brig of about one hundred and eighty tons--had been thrown over on her starboard side, and now lay submerged to about halfway up her hatchways, with her masts p.r.o.ne along the water, into and out of which they dipped and rose two or three feet with the wash of the sea and the roll of the hull. She was a wooden vessel, apparently American built, and was under whole topsails, foresail, spanker, and jib, which sufficiently accounted for her present predicament if, as seemed probable, she had been caught under that canvas in the outburst of the previous day. She had no quarter davits, and the chocks over the main hatchway--where the long-boat, and sometimes the jolly-boat as well, is usually stowed--were missing; but the gripes were still there, showing that the boat or boats that had been stowed there had evidently been washed away. There was, moreover, the remains of what had once been a gig on her gallows. She appeared to have been generously fitted up; for, as she rose and fell, we caught the flash of bra.s.s work about her skylight and companion, and when her stern lifted high enough out of the water a handsome bra.s.s binnacle, securely bolted to the deck, became exposed to our view. Lastly, huddled in her weather main rigging, about twelve or fifteen feet from the rail--where they were tolerably clear of the seas that constantly broke over the vessel's upturned side--was a group of nine men, most of them bareheaded, clad in garments that clung to their bodies with the tenacity of clothing that has been soaked for many consecutive hours in water.

They were in a miserable and most precarious plight, indeed; and I could not help wondering how they had possibly managed to cling for so many hours to so insecure a refuge--a.s.suming, of course, that the brig had capsized on the previous afternoon, as I surmised.

The first thing was to communicate with them; and this I first attempted by means of the speaking trumpet. But the roar of the wind and the wash of the sea, together with our drift--which was, of course, much more rapid than that of the wreck--rendered my voice inaudible; so it became necessary to resort to other methods. There happened to be a "bull-board" kicking about the p.o.o.p; and setting this up on the skylight, where it could be distinctly seen, with its black face towards the wreck, I got a piece of chalk, and hastily wrote upon it the following words, one after the other, receiving a wave of the hand from those on the wreck in token that they had deciphered each word before I obliterated it and wrote the next:--

"Only--four--men--on--board--so--cannot--send--boat--Will--stand--by-- and--take--you--off--if--possible."

By the time that the last word of this communication had been written and acknowledged we were some distance to leeward of the wreck, and it became necessary to fill upon the s.h.i.+p once more. This done, the next matter for determination was the means whereby we were to get the people away from the wreck, and safe on board the barque--a problem which, had we been fully manned, would have proved sufficiently puzzling; while, circ.u.mstanced as we were, it seemed all but impossible.

At length, however, I hit upon a scheme that I thought might be worth trying; and we proceeded forthwith to put it into practical shape without more ado, since the unfortunate people on the wreck were in a perilously exposed situation, and evidently in such a terribly exhausted state that they might relax their hold, and be washed away at any moment.

There were, as I have already mentioned, nine men to be rescued. Now, the _Esmeralda_ having been, ever since she was launched, a pa.s.senger-s.h.i.+p, was well found in life-saving appliances, life-buoys among the number, of which we carried no less than twelve; eight being stowed away in one of the cutters on the gallows, while the remainder were distributed about the p.o.o.p, ready for immediate use.

The first thing done was to get up on deck two good stout warps, and bend them end to end, so that we might have plenty of length to work with; and the inner end of this long line was then made fast inboard at the fore-rigging. To the other end nine life-buoys were next securely bent, in the form of a chain, with a length of about a fathom between the buoys; and, finally, a long light heaving-line was bent on to the extreme outer end of the warp. The warp was then carefully coiled down on deck, ready for paying out; the buoys piled on the top of it; and the spare part of the heaving-line carried out to the flying-jib-boom end, where it was snugly coiled and stopped, ready for use.

Our preparations were now complete; and, having meanwhile been plying to windward, the helm was put up, and we wore round to return to the wreck.

This operation provided work for us all, including Sir Edgar; and when at length we got the s.h.i.+p round upon the starboard tack we found, to our extreme vexation, that the circle we had made was so large that we should be unable to fetch the wreck. This was terribly annoying at a time when every minute lost might mean a human life; but we could do nothing to rectify the matter except stand on far enough upon the new tack to insure that when we next wore we should not again under-shoot our mark. And if it was vexatious for us, what must it have been for the poor fellows who, standing as it were within the very jaws of death, were anxiously watching our every movement?

To our eagerness and anxiety the minutes seemed hours; but at length we felt that we had reached far enough to justify another attempt; and upon getting the s.h.i.+p round again we had the satisfaction of seeing that we had measured our distance just right, and should be about able to fetch the wreck, with little or nothing to spare. As we approached the brig, the negro--who, now that he was separated from his late companions, proved himself to be not only a first-rate seaman, but also a very willing, good-natured fellow--most earnestly besought me to entrust to him the task of manipulating the heaving-line, vehemently a.s.serting his ability to cast it further and straighter than any of the rest of us; and I accordingly deputed that duty to him, whereupon he laid out to the flying-jib-boom end and, placing himself astride the spar, outside the royal stay, clinched himself there in the most extraordinary manner by means of his feet and legs, and then calmly took the coil of heaving-line in his hand and held himself ready for a cast. The ease with which the fellow clung to the bare end of that dancing spar was a revelation to me; for the motion out there was, proportionately, as violent as it would have been in the maintop; yet there he sat, as composedly as though he had been in an easy-chair, while most white men would have found it difficult enough to maintain such a position with the aid of hands as well as feet, leaving out of the question any possibility of executing such a manoeuvre as that of throwing a line to windward against a whole gale of wind.

San Domingo thus safely established at his station, Joe and Sir Edgar placed themselves at the braces, standing by to back the main-topsail at the instant that I should give the word; while I climbed into the weather fore-rigging, as the best position from which to con the s.h.i.+p; and in this order we edged gradually and warily down toward the wreck.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

THE END OF THE ADVENTURE.

Our situation, now, was everything that could be desired for the execution of the delicate manoeuvre that I contemplated, and only a few minutes elapsed from the time of my stationing myself in the fore-rigging when the critical moment arrived for us to attempt it. I accordingly signed to Forbes to put the helm down; which he instantly did, las.h.i.+ng it fast; when he and I sprang simultaneously to the weather main-braces, to a.s.sist Sir Edgar and Joe in backing the main-topsail.

This proved to be a tough drag for four men; but we managed to get the yards round far enough to lay the sail aback, when I once more darted forward into the fore-rigging to superintend the remainder of the work; Forbes returning to his station at the wheel, while Sir Edgar and Joe stood by the warp, in readiness to pay it out quickly, and to throw the life-buoys over clear of the rail.

Everything now depended upon the strength and skill of San Domingo.

The wreck, when I reached my post of observation in the rigging, was on our weather-bow, not more than twice our own length from us; and the barque, with her way already somewhat r.e.t.a.r.ded by the backing of the main-topsail and the putting down of the helm, was slowly forging up to it, with her bows inclining toward the exact spot where the nine men were still huddled together in the main rigging, anxiously watching our approach and wondering what we were about to do. They saw that San Domingo was preparing to heave them a rope's-end; but that did not very greatly enlighten them until Joe and Sir Edgar each raised a life-buoy to the rail, and prepared to throw it overboard. Then they got an inkling of our intent; and a feeble shout went up from among them.

Slowly, and more slowly still, the barque continued to forge ahead; and I began to fear that, in my anxiety to avoid an actual collision with the wreck, I had backed my topsail a second or two too soon, and that we should not, after all, get near enough to her to accomplish the rescue.

Still, we had not wholly lost our way; and foot by foot--or rather, inch by inch--we continued to creep nearer and nearer to the wreck, until the negro, on the end of his spar, was soaring and swooping wildly within some fifty feet of the group of half-drowned men; and then our way stopped. This was the moment that San Domingo had been waiting for.

Watching his opportunity, he seized upon the instant when the wreck and ourselves were both sunk in the trough of a sea, and therefore comparatively sheltered from the wind, when, with a single powerful swing of the coil round his head, he sent it whizzing straight and fair in among the group who were anxiously waiting for it.

"Get as far aft as you can, and then haul away upon the line!" I shouted.

One of them waved his hand to signify that he understood what I wanted; and then they all took hold of the line, and, with it grasped firmly in their hands, made their way cautiously in toward the hull, we watching their movements, meanwhile, in a state of the most intense anxiety and suspense. For now that we were within a biscuit-toss of them the appalling precariousness and peril of their situation became fully apparent to us; more completely so, indeed, than it probably was to the unfortunate fellows themselves. For, huddled together as they were in the rigging, they were sheltered to some extent by the hull of the brig, and were thus unable to clearly see and measure the stupendous proportions of the vast roaring mountains of foam-capped water that came hissing and swooping down upon them from to windward, each huge comber seemingly sentient with a full determination to overwhelm and engulf the already stricken and helpless fabric that lay p.r.o.ne and waterlogged at their mercy; while we, from the superior elevation of our buoyant deck, could look over and beyond the nearly submerged hull, and watch with breathless anxiety the swoop of every giant wave as it surged down upon the wreck and buried her in a blinding smother of seething, milk-white foam. But, beaten down, inert, and waterlogged as was the brig, her cargo was evidently of such a character as to impart a considerable measure of buoyancy to her; for though every sea that broke over her completely buried her for the moment, she invariably reappeared on the hinder slope of the baffled comber, apparently little or none the worse for her momentary submergence. Her triumphant survival, indeed, of these continuous and overwhelming onslaughts soon convinced me that her crew had little to fear from the prospect of her speedy foundering; their danger lay not in any such probability, but consisted in the likelihood of their being torn from their precarious hold in the rigging by every sea that swept and raged over them.

This danger was, of course, greatly increased when the men began to move inward toward the hull, thus more fully exposing themselves to the fury of every surge that swept over it. And of this fact we soon had a most painful and melancholy ill.u.s.tration; for as the group, after waiting for two or three minutes for a favourable opportunity, essayed to scramble out of the rigging, and make their way aft along the brig's upturned side to her quarter--where they would be clear of the gear and rigging when they took to the water--a small and comparatively innocuous sea broke over the hull, which, harmless as it was compared with most of its predecessors, had still enough of weight and spite in it to sweep one of the poor fellows from his precarious foothold into the seething, hissing swirl to leeward. The man tossed his arms over his head, with a wild shriek for help, as the smother carried him along in its suffocating embrace, and Joe promptly made a spring for a spare _life-buoy_ that we had provided for such an emergency; but before it could be thrown the unfortunate wretch was hurled over the brig's mainyard as it lifted out of the water, and the next instant he disappeared beneath the foot of the main-topsail, the wide s.p.a.ces of which immediately shut down upon and buried him as the roll of the hull once more submerged her spars.

We never saw the poor fellow again, and there is no doubt that, caught and entangled beneath the cloths of the topsail, he was drowned there.

Meanwhile, we were drifting rapidly away to leeward, and the full length of our warps was almost paid out; it was therefore imperative that the men on the wreck should act quickly. I shouted to them to this effect, and, awaking from the momentary stupefaction produced by the painfully sudden loss of their comrade, the remaining eight men made a dash for the brig's quarter, and succeeded in reaching it just as the vessel was uphove upon the crest of another tremendous sea. We saw them slip the string of life-buoys over their heads, and the next instant they were buried in the vast volume of water that broke, roaring and hissing, over the fabric that they stood upon. To our anxious minds it seemed an endless time before they reappeared; but at length we saw the string of life-buoys floating in the midst of the lacework of foam, some ten fathoms to leeward of the wreck, well clear of the heaving spars and snake-like coils of loose and unrove gear, eight out of the nine buoys having each a man in it.

"Hurrah!" I shouted, swinging myself on deck out of the rigging. "We have them! Haul away gently upon the line, and let us get them alongside."

As I spoke I saw that San Domingo was laying in from the jib-boom end, he having, like myself, seen that we had got hold of the men; and presently he ranged up alongside me and, following my example, industriously set to work to throw the coils of braces, halliards, clewlines, and so on off the pins, and bend the ends of them into bowlines in readiness for hauling the rescued men up the side.

The task of getting the poor fellows safely inboard was soon accomplished, when, administering to each man a pannikin of scalding hot coffee that had meanwhile been prepared in the galley, I sent them below into the forecastle with instructions to strip, rub each other well down, and turn in until a good meal could be prepared for them; when, the rescued crew being thus temporarily disposed of, we filled upon the s.h.i.+p and resumed our voyage.

A good substantial meal of beef, potatoes, and s.h.i.+p's bread, backed up with a few hours' sleep, and a s.h.i.+ft into dry clothes, sufficed to set the rescued men upon their pins again, little or nothing the worse for the hards.h.i.+p and exposure they had so recently undergone; and that same evening I obtained from the mate of the brig, a man named Cooper, the particulars of their adventure.

From this man's story it appeared that the brig, a vessel of one hundred and seventy-four tons register, named the _Golden Gate_, hailed from San Francisco, from which port she had sailed in search of a cargo of sandal-wood. The quest had been successful, a full cargo had been obtained, and all had gone well with the craft up to the afternoon of the preceding day, when her crew, like us, had found themselves becalmed. Unlike myself, however, the skipper of the _Golden Gate_--who proved to be the man who had unfortunately been swept away and lost during the process of rescue--had obstinately refused to believe that the threatening aspect of the weather meant anything worse than a sharp thunderstorm, and had declined to accede to the suggestion of his mate that sail should be shortened, averring that all the wind they were likely to get they would need to help them out of the region of the equatorial calms. The result had been that when the hurricane burst upon them the s.h.i.+p was hove over upon her beam-ends, with her sails flat upon the water, in which position she had gradually filled, her cargo only preventing the waterlogged hull from sinking under the feet of her crew. Fortunately for all hands, they had entertained sufficiently serious doubts of their skipper's judgment to determine them to remain on deck and see the matter out; hence, when the brig went over, they were in a measure prepared for the catastrophe, and lost no time in clambering on to the vessel's upturned side. From this position the sea, breaking heavily over the hull, soon drove them into the rigging, where they had remained, constantly drenched with spray and frequently submerged beneath the vast volumes of water that poured over the wreck, until rescued by us.

In exchange for his story I briefly informed the rescued mate that I had sailed from Sydney, in ballast, for the Canton river, intending to cut a cargo of sandal-wood on the way; but that the bulk of my crew, a gang of desperadoes from the gold-diggings, had frustrated my purpose by attempting to take my s.h.i.+p away from me, and that I had therefore been compelled to leave them on an island; and further, that when I sighted the _Golden Gate_, we were on our way to the Sandwich Islands, hoping to there obtain men enough to navigate the barque to China. I said that, if he and his men wished it, I would still go on to Honolulu, and land them there, from whence they would doubtless soon find an opportunity to return to San Francisco; or, if they preferred it, I would s.h.i.+p them all, at the current rate of wages, for the voyage to China, and, if they gave me satisfaction, thence home to England. He said he would lay my offer before the men, and acquaint me with their decision forthwith; and at once retired to the forecastle. Whereupon I at once called Joe and San Domingo to me, and laid the strictest injunctions upon them both that under no circ.u.mstances whatever were they to make the slightest allusion to the treasure in the hold; hinting pretty strongly that, if they did, their own share of it would probably fall very far short of what it would be should the secret be well kept. The caution I believed to be quite needless, so far as Joe was concerned; but its necessity, as regarded the negro, was made quite apparent by his remark when I had finished speaking--

"Golly, sar; it just as well you tole me dat in time, odderwise I dead sure to hab said someting about it de fust time I had a chance. But now dat you has warned me, sar, you may depend abs'lutely upon my discresshun. I wants all de dollars I can git; and I doan' feel inclined to share dem wid men dat has had no hand in de saving of dem."

The mate soon returned to the deck with the decision of his crew. He informed me that the men were quite unanimous in their desire to leave the s.h.i.+p at Honolulu, and make the best of their way back to San Francisco with as little delay as possible, if such an arrangement would accord with my convenience; but that, in the mean time, they would gladly turn to and a.s.sist me to work the s.h.i.+p so far, without pay, in acknowledgment of my having saved their lives.

The weather, meanwhile, was fast moderating; so much so that during the second dog-watch we took a good drag upon the topsail halliards, and set the foresail and mizzen; the wind gradually hauling round further from the northward and breaking us off until we headed north-east by compa.s.s.

The mercury was rising almost as rapidly as it had fallen, and there was every prospect of a fine night. Cooper, the late mate of the _Golden Gate_, offered to do duty as second mate, while the cook of the craft expressed his desire to continue the functions of his office; the remainder of the men declared their readiness to go to work forthwith; and that night, accordingly, we once more kept two watches, each consisting of an officer and four men, while I, who had been on deck almost continuously for thirty hours, turned in and, with a mind intensely relieved by the acquisition of so much valuable help, slept like a log until seven o'clock the next morning.

I awoke of my own accord, and had no sooner opened my eyes than I knew, without any need of telling, exactly how we were situated. The s.h.i.+p was rolling, with a long, steady, even swing, from side to side, with an occasional heave and settlement of her quarter as the swell took her; the canvas was alternately flapping out with rifle-like reports, and thundering against her masts as she rolled; the bulkheads were creaking and groaning; the cabin-doors were rattling upon their hooks; the wheel-chains were clanking as the rudder kicked to the wash and swirl under the counter; and there was a gurgling, dripping wash of water along the bends, without any seething sound in it, that told me, apart from the other noises of the s.h.i.+p, that we were again becalmed. The sun was streaming brilliantly in through the porthole of my cabin, flooding the little apartment with warmth and golden light; and the swis.h.i.+ng and scrubbing sounds overhead told me that the hands were busy at the job of was.h.i.+ng decks. It was a welcome, joyous sound, as evidence of the fact that we once more had a crew on board us; and I thrust my feet into my slippers and went on deck to get my morning bath with a feeling of gaiety and blithesomeness that taught me, for the first time, how heavy had been the load of anxiety that I had lately borne, and that had slipped from my shoulders with the arrival of the _Golden Gates_ crew on board.

It was a glorious morning, with a clear, brilliantly blue, cloudless sky overhead, out of which the sun, though only an hour high, already blazed with an ardour that gave promise of a scorching day; the sea was oil-smooth, with a glittering sheen like that of quicksilver in the wake of the sun, while away to the westward of us it flashed and gleamed in hues of the softest, purest, opalescent blue to the side of the s.h.i.+p with the running of the swell. There was not a breath of wind, nor the remotest sign of any; so I ordered the lighter canvas and the courses to be hauled down and clewed up, to save them from thras.h.i.+ng themselves to rags; and, having revelled in the luxury of a shower-bath of cool, sparkling brine from the hose, left the s.h.i.+p under the topsails and fore-topmast staysail, and went below to dress for breakfast.

The calm that had now fallen upon us lasted unbroken for five full days, during which we sweltered, day and night, in the melting heat of the tropics, with the blazing sun right overhead every day at noon, and a waning moon soaring into the heavens later and still later each night to render the hours of darkness magical with the witchery of her beauty and mystery. And during the whole of this time we never s.h.i.+fted our position by so much as a single mile a day. At length, however, on the sixth day, a few cat's-paws came playing at intervals over the surface of the gla.s.s-smooth water, momentarily ruffling it into little evanescent patches of tender blue, and causing a transient ripple to play over the stagnant cloths of our canvas. As the day wore on the cat's-paws increased in frequency, in area, and in strength; and shortly before sundown a gentle, dainty little air of wind came stealing softly up from the eastward, to woo which we joyfully spread every rag of canvas we could show to it: and oh! how ineffably pleasant and delightful was the sound of the first faint liquid tinkling ripple that broke from our cut.w.a.ter, and gushed gently past the bends in a stream of tiny bursting air-bells, as the beautifully moulded hull yielded to the faint impulse of the soft breathing and began to move under it with the languorous motion of a sleeping swan! Then, as the soft, warm, star-spangled darkness of the tropics closed down upon us and wrapped us within its impalpable folds, the breeze gathered strength and weight by imperceptible degrees, until the scarcely audible tinkle under the bows merged into the sound of a knife shearing through a tautly stretched silken web, with a musical fountain-like plas.h.i.+ng at the cut.w.a.ter and a crisp, gus.h.i.+ng curl of the gla.s.sy wave under the lee bow as it broke and hurried past into our wake in a lacework of creamy swirling froth, gemmed with countless glittering foam-bubbles; while the log told us that the s.h.i.+p was slipping her way through the small wrinklings of the brine at a speed of fully six knots in the hour.

By-and-by the moon--her orb now reduced to less than half its full dimensions--stole ghostlike above the horizon; and by her wan light we saw that a host of soft, fleecy clouds--shaped like the smoke belched from the mouth of a cannon upon a windless day--were mustering their squadrons in the eastern quarter; and we knew them for the welcome trade-cloud, the sure indication that the breeze we now had would be a lasting one.

And so it proved; for the fleecy ma.s.ses soared upward until they overspread the whole of the visible sky; and as they soared so the breeze hardened, until at length, by the time that the middle watch drew toward its close, the saucy _Esmeralda_, with the wind well over her starboard quarter, and everything packed upon her, from the royal studding-sails down, was storming through it at a pace nearer to sixteen than to fifteen knots in the hour, while the wild weird melody of a hundred harps singing through the taut mazes of her rigging aloft mingled with the roar of the wind out of the great s.p.a.ces of her straining canvas, and the deep, continuous thunder of the bow wave, raising a concert of such mad, soul-stirring harmony as causes the sailor's heart to leap and bound within him in ecstatic exultation to the swift, buoyant leaps and plunges of the good s.h.i.+p beneath him.