An Old Sailor's Yarns Part 12

"Well, let's see; you say you was 'long of old Captain Isaiah Hazard?"

"Yes; are you acquainted with him?"

"I've heard tell on him. Let's see, where do you belong?"

"To New Bedford; are you much acquainted down that way?"

"Some."

"Perhaps, then, you may know my father, old General Morton?"

"I've heard tell on him"----A pause, during which Captain Slowly took a fresh chew of tobacco, and Morton looked at his watch with great impatience----"Well, let's see; what kind of a time did you have on't 'long with old Captain Hazard?"

"Very good."

"Make a pretty good v'y'ge?"

"Middling: thirty-two hundred barrels."

"Well, I declare"--another pause--"well, let's see. Calculate to go round that way again?"

"Yes; and that's what I have called to see you about: the owners approve of me, and have sent me down to you, and I wish you would give me an answer."

"Well, I expect I'm supplied with both my officers."

"I thought that was what you was coming to. Good morning, sir."

"Won't you step down below, and take a little so'thing?"

"No, I thank you;" and Morton walked away, cursing him by all his G.o.ds.

After satisfying himself that there was no chance for him in Salem, he returned to Boston. Lounging about the wharves the next day, he was attracted towards a fine, large, new s.h.i.+p that was setting up her lower rigging. He drew near, to examine her more closely. Her guns were lying on the wharf, as were also her boats and spare spars. From the number of men employed, and the activity with which their operations were carried on, it was evident that the s.h.i.+p was to be off as soon as possible.

Morton stepped on her deck: an elderly man, with a fine, open, manly countenance, expressive of great kindness of disposition and goodness of heart, was superintending the duty. Morton was about to address him, thinking to himself, "This is no Captain Slowly," when the senior gave him a nod, accompanied by that peculiar half audible greeting that pa.s.ses between two strangers.

"You have a n.o.ble s.h.i.+p here, sir," said Charles, by way of starting the conversation.

"Yes, she is--so, nipper all that; Mr. Walker, you're getting that mainmast all over to starboard--yes, yes; she's a fine s.h.i.+p, that's certain. Your countenance seems familiar to me, and yet I can't tell where 'tis I've seen you."

"I belong to New Bedford; my name is Morton."

"Morton! what, old Jonathan Morton's son?"

"The same, sir."

"Why, d--n it, man, your father and I were old schoolfellows--and are you old Jonathan Morton's son?"

"Yes, sir; I have followed the sea ever since I left college, and am now looking for a voyage."

"Well, perhaps we can suit you; times are pretty brisk just now, and you will not be obliged to look long or far--and are you Jonathan Morton's son?"

After a short explanatory conversation, a bargain was made.

"And when will you be ready to commence duty?"

"I am ready this moment," was the answer of the impetuous young man.

"No you are not. Don't be in too big a hurry; take your own time;" and they parted, mutually pleased with each other; Morton treading upon air, and very much disposed to build castles and other edifices in that unquiet element.

Reader, if thou art a sailor, thou canst understand and appreciate the pleasure mixed with pain that fills and agitates the heart when thou hast unexpectedly obtained a voyage to thy liking. It is then that ideas come thick and fast into the mind, treading upon each other's heels, and climbing over one another's shoulders; the parting with much-loved friends; the antic.i.p.ated delights of the voyage, seen through that bewitching, multiplying, magnifying gla.s.s, the imagination; the pride and delight that fills a seaman's breast as his eyes run over the beautiful proportions and lofty spars of his future home; all these feelings are worth, while they last, an imperial crown. But soon comes the reality, like Beatrice's "Repentance with his bad legs:" bad provisions, bad water, and not half enough of either; ignorant and tyrannical officers; a leaky, bad-steering, dull-sailing s.h.i.+p; the vexatious and harra.s.sing duty of a merchantman, where the men are deprived of sufficient sleep, for fear that they should "earn their wages in idleness," and of a sufficient supply of wholesome food, lest they should "grow fat and lazy." Such is the theory and practice of most New-England merchants: it was different forty years since, and the outfit of the good s.h.i.+p Albatross had an eye to the comforts of the crew as well as the profits of the owners; for merchants then thought that the two were inseparable--the march of intellect has proved the reverse.

Although, as I have already taken occasion to observe, Fortune is peculiarly hostile to lovers, yet she is sometimes "a good wench," and so she proved herself, at least for a time. The pa.s.sage of the Albatross from the cradle of liberty and aristocracy to Valparaiso was unusually short, considering that vessels outward bound at that period made a regular practice of stopping at Rio Janeiro, whether in want of supplies or not. She was singularly fortunate, likewise, in crossing the "horse lat.i.tudes," not being becalmed there much over a week, a period hardly long enough to call into proper exercise the Christian virtues of patience and resignation.

Her pa.s.sage into the Pacific was shortened by another fortunate circ.u.mstance: Captain Williams was an adventurous as well as a skillful seaman, and having a steady breeze from the north-east, he ran boldly through the Straits of Le Maire, and thus shortened his pa.s.sage perhaps by a month; for s.h.i.+ps have been known to be four months off Cape Horn beating to the westward, and after all obliged to bear up and run for Buenos Ayres for supplies.

CHAPTER XI.

Behold The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut, Bounding between the two moist elements, Like Perseus' horse.

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

It was on a fine Sunday morning, in the month of December, 179-, that the oblique beams of the sun were reflected back by the snow white canva.s.s of a stately s.h.i.+p of about six hundred tons, that with a fair wind, a good breeze, and all sail set, was steadily pursuing her course, somewhat east of north. She was in, or about, the lat.i.tude of eighteen north, and one hundred and fifteen degrees west of Greenwich; consequently, she was in the Pacific Ocean, and not far from the west coast of Mexico. The north-east trade-wind, which is generally almost due east, was sufficiently _free_ to allow her to carry her starboard studding-sails, under which she flew gracefully and swiftly on her appointed course.

The weather, as usual within the limits of either trade-wind, was extremely beautiful and mild; the heat, that on sh.o.r.e in the same lat.i.tude would have been excessive, was moderated by the refres.h.i.+ng breeze. Indeed, it has never been my lot to find such lovely weather in any other part of this round world, as we meet with through the whole course of the trade winds. The long, regular swell, so peculiar to that part of the ocean, gave the n.o.ble s.h.i.+p a peculiarly easy, rolling motion, extremely grateful to a seaman, as the regularity and length of the swell is a certain indication of a continuance of good weather. As she lifted her huge bows above the foaming, sparkling wave, her bright copper, polished by das.h.i.+ng so long and so fast through the water, flashed in the sunbeams like burnished gold; at the same time, her temporary and partial elevation above the surface, revealed a sharpness of model below the water's edge, that at once accounted for the graceful and majestic swiftness of her motion. The whiteness of her canva.s.s, and her bright-varnished sides, sufficiently indicated her to be a Yankee, without the trouble of hoisting the "gridiron."

Her stern "flared" a great deal; that is, its outline formed a very acute angle with the horizon, which was the fas.h.i.+on of building s.h.i.+ps forty years since. It was ornamented with a great profusion of carved work, some of which was hieroglyphical, to a degree that would have puzzled Champollion; but over the centre were two figures in bas-relief, that could not well be mistaken, inasmuch as the sword and scales plainly indicated that the one on the starboard side was Justice, while the cap on the point of a lance "seemed to fructify" that her companion was no other than Miss Liberty.

Liberty goes bare-headed now--our rulers, wisely reflecting that she is upwards of fifty years old, and has arrived at years of discretion, have ordered her to leave off her child's cap. There are among us those who think that the stripping will go further, and that, in a short time, she will be as bare as Eve.

The noses of both G.o.ddesses had been knocked off shortly after they condescended to mount guard on the stern of the good s.h.i.+p Albatross, in consequence of coming into frequent collision with the gunwale of the jolly-boat, as she ascended and descended to and from her station at the stern davits. At her quarter davits, on each side, hung one of those light, swift, and somewhat singularly shaped boats, called whale-boats.

Eight iron nine-pounders on each side, thrust their black muzzles through their respective ports, and gave her, in spite of her bright-varnished sides, a warlike appearance.

The upper part of her cut-water was fas.h.i.+oned into a scroll, like the volute of an Ionic pillar, forming what is called, by naval architects, a "billet head;" and which, for its neatness and beauty, is very generally adopted, both in national vessels and merchantmen. Nor was the bow without its share of hieroglyphics; on one side were displayed a bee-hive, a bale of cotton, and a crate of crockery; and on the other, a globe, an anchor, a quadrant, and a chart partly unrolled.

Her royals were set flying, a technicality that I shall not attempt to explain; she had no flying-jib, nor any of those pipe-stem spars that are got aloft only in port, to make a s.h.i.+p look more like the devil than she otherwise would, and are always sent down and stored away when she goes to sea. s.h.i.+ps, forty years since, carried no spars aloft but such as were stout enough to carry sail upon, in fair weather or foul--sliding-gunter sky-sail masts, and other useless sticks, were as much unknown to s.h.i.+p-builders and riggers, as railroads and steam-boats.

Sitting upon the weather hen-coop, attached to the companion, or entrance to the cabin, with spectacles on nose, and a well-worn bible on his knees, sat an elderly man, the commander of the s.h.i.+p. He was tall, and very strongly built; long exposure to the weather, in every variety of climate, had bronzed his countenance, and given him an older look than his real years would have done under other circ.u.mstances; but at the same time, long exposure to the weather had hardened his frame, and strengthened his const.i.tution, points of some importance forty years since; so that his chances for a long life were much better than those of a man of forty, especially one of modern date, who had never allowed "the winds of heaven to visit his face too roughly." His age was, in short, about sixty. His countenance, notwithstanding the rude and ungenteel manner with which the winds and the weather had treated it, was indicative of much good-nature and benevolence of disposition. He raised his head from time to time, looked aloft at the sails, occasionally addressed a word or two to the mate of the watch, who was walking fore and aft the quarter-deck, and then resumed his reading.

In the weather mizen-shrouds was a remarkably handsome young man, of four or five and twenty, busily engaged in hanging out to air his "go-ash.o.r.e" clothes; a very common Sunday morning occupation at sea, when the weather is fine. Apparently the sight of his gay garments had called up a train of ideas of a very varied and checkered hue, to judge from the different expressions that flitted across his fine manly countenance, at one moment shaded with anxiety and doubt, at another bright with hope and joy. In height he was about five feet eight or nine inches, strongly and compactly built, but far too stout and athletic, too broad-shouldered and thin-flanked, to pa.s.s muster as an exquisite in Broadway; as his form, though anatomically perfect, a model for a statuary, and considered very fine by the ladies of his acquaintance forty years since, would be altogether out of date at the present day.

His countenance, of an oval form, and shaded by rich, curling, chesnut hair, from exposure to the weather, had acquired that healthy brown that ladies do not dislike in a young man's face, though they carefully eschew any thing that will in reality or imagination produce it in their own lovely physiognomies.

It may be a mere old bachelor's whim of mine, but it always has appeared to me that ladies who have had the advantage of mixing much in society, and seeing something of human nature, are _not_ peculiarly partial to that effeminate fairness of complexion that many fas.h.i.+onable gentlemen are so careful to preserve, when they have it by nature, or, when nature has been unkind, to obtain by artificial means; so that Dogberry's axiom, that "to be a well-favored man is the gift of fortune," is not altogether absurd. At any rate, I have seen many a "cherry ripe" lip curled with an expression of irrepressible scorn when the owner of the lip was accosted by one of these very fair, delicate-skinned gentlemen.

Girls just let out of a boarding-school generally run mad after these animals; but ladies who have gone through one or two husband-hunting campaigns, are not to be taken in by such painted b.u.t.terflies: they very wisely conclude that a man who takes such a reverend care of his complexion wors.h.i.+ps none but himself, and of course he will have no devotion to spare to his wife.

But to return to the gentleman we have left dangling in the starboard mizzen-rigging of the s.h.i.+p Albatross: his countenance was indeed somewhat tanned, but his forehead was as clear and white as ivory; its breadth and openness gave an expression of frankness and candor to his face,--so that, taken altogether, his physiognomy, though not regularly perfect, was exceedingly prepossessing.