A Chapter of Adventures
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"You would scarcely believe, lads, what we went through on that 'ere journey. Many a time Tom and I made up our minds to bolt for it; and we would have done it if we had had the least idea which way to go or how we were to keep alive on the journey. We had agreed when we started that we would do our best, and that we would not put up with any flogging. We didn't much care whether they killed us or not, for we would just as leave have died as passed our lives in that country with all its beastly ways. Well, a couple of days after we had started, a big nigger driver who had been laying on his stick freely on the backs of the slaves came along, and let Tom and me have one apiece. Tom, who was nearest to him, chucked down his load and went right at him, and knocked him over like a ninepin.
"Well, some of the other drivers or guards, or whatever they call them, ran up, and there was a tidy skrimage, I can tell you. It was ten minutes, I should say, before they got the best of us; and there was not one among them but was badly damaged about the figure-head. When they had got us down they laid it on to rights, and I believe they would have finished us if the Arab had not come up and stopped it.
"'Look here,' said I, when I was able to get up on to my feet again; 'we are ready to work just as far as men can work, but if one of those niggers lays a finger on us we will do for him. You may cut us in pieces afterwards, but we will do for him.'
"I don't know whether the Arab understood just what I said, but I think he got the gist of it. He spoke sharp to his men, and they never touched us afterwards. I could not quite make out what they were taking us for, because I can say honestly we were not much good at carrying – not half as good as one of the slaves. The first day or two we carried a good manful load. Then our shoes went to pieces, and we got that footsore and bad we could scarcely crawl along, let alone carrying loads. Tom said he thought that the Arab was a-taking us to sell as curios to some fellow who had never seen white men before, and it turned out as he was right. After we had been travelling for nigh a month we came to a big village; and there was great excitement over our coming, and for two days there were feastings, while the Arab sold part of his goods to the people for gold dust and ivory.
"The chief had come to look at us the day we arrived, and we had been packed away together in a little hut. The third day he came again with the Arab, and made signs that I was his property now, while the Arab told Tom to go out and start with his caravan. It was a big wrench for us, but it were no good struggling against what was to be. So we shook hands and parted on it quietly, and what became of Tom I have never heard from that day to this; but like enough he is dead years ago.
"Well, it would be too long a story to tell you all that happened in the nine months I stopped in that village. The chief was very proud of me, and used to show me off to his visitors. I had not such a very bad time of it. I used to make myself as useful as I could. I had been a handy sort of chap, and fond of carpentry, and I made a shift with what native tools I could get to turn out tables and chairs, and cupboards, and such like. All this time I was wondering how I was ever to get back again. I used to share a hut with another slave who had been captured in war. They generally sell them to the Arab slave-dealers to take down to the coast, but this man was the son of a chief who had gone to war with the fellow who owned me, and had been killed; and he kept this chap as his slave as a sort of brag, I think.
"We got on very well together, and of course by the time we had been there six months I got to talk their lingo, and we agreed at last that we would try to make a bolt of it together. So one night – when it happened that there was a great feast in the village – we slipped away as soon as it got dark, and made south, our object being to strike one of the Portuguese stations. We armed ourselves with bows and arrows, and spears; and as many yams as we could carry. It would make a book, lads, if I was to tell you all we went through before we got there. We travelled chiefly by nights; sometimes killing a deer, sometimes getting a few yams or heads of corn from the fields of the villages we passed. We had one or two skrimages, but fortunately never ran against any strong bodies of natives. By myself I should have died before I had been gone a fortnight but Mwango was up to every dodge. He knew what roots were good to eat, and what fruit and berries were safe. He could steal up to a herd of deer without frightening them, and was a first-rate hand in making pitfalls for game.
"I didn't keep no account of time, but it was somewhere about six weeks after we had started when we came down on the banks of a biggish river. We followed it down until, two or three days later, we came on a village. There we stole a canoe, and paddling at night and lying up in the day, we came after about a week to a Portuguese post. There we were kindly received, and stopped for a month; and then I went down the river with some traders to the coast, while Mwango took service with the Portuguese. Six weeks later I was lucky enough to get a ship bound for the Cape, and there shifted into another for England. So that, young gentlemen, was the second time as I was off the books of Godstone & Son."
"Thank you very much, Joe. Some day you must give us some more yarns about it, and tell us something of your life in the village and your journey."
"I will think it over, Master Jim. It is a long time ago now, for I was not above six-and-twenty when it happened. But I will think it over, and see if I can call back something worth telling."
From that time onwards the boys had no reason to complain of dulness.
If the old man's memory ever played him false, his imagination never failed him. Story followed story in almost unbroken sequence, so that between old Joe's yarns and the ordinary duties of sea life the time passed swiftly and pleasantly. After rounding the Cape they had a spell of fine weather, until one morning when Jack came on deck he saw land away on the port beam.
"There is Ceylon," Jim Tucker said.
"I should like to land and have a day's ramble on shore there, Jim. There would be something to see there with all that rich vegetation. A very different thing from the sands of Egypt!"
"Yes, and all sorts of adventures, Jack. There are snakes and elephants and all sorts of things."
"I certainly should not care to meet snakes, Jim, and I don't know that I should like wild elephants. Still, I should like a ramble on shore. I suppose there is no chance of our getting nearer to the land."
"Not a bit, Jack. I heard Mr. Hoare tell Arthur that it was very seldom we passed within sight of the island at all. Sailors are not fond of land except when they are actually going to make a port. The further they keep away from it the better they are pleased."
"Such splendid weather as this I should have thought it would have made no difference," Jack said. "I should be glad if we were going to coast up the whole way. Why, we have had nothing but a gentle regular wind ever since that storm off the Cape."
"Yes, but it may not last all the way, Jack," Mr. Timmins, as he walked past and overheard the lad's words, said. "There is no place in the world where they have more furious cyclones than in the Bay of Bengal. Happily they don't come very often. Perhaps there is only one really very bad one in four or five years; but when there is one the destruction is awful. Islands are submerged, and sometimes, hundreds of square miles of low country flooded, the villages washed away, and a frightful loss of life. I have been in one or two sharp blows up the bay, but never in a cyclone; though I have been in one in the China Seas. That was bad enough in all conscience."
The wind fell lighter as they made their way up the coast. They kept well out from the land, and had not sighted it since leaving Ceylon. So light were the winds that it was some days before Mr. Timmins told them that they were now abreast of Madras.
"How much longer shall we be before we are at the mouth of the Hoogley, sir?"
"It depends upon the wind, lad. With a strong breeze aft we shall be there in three or four days. If we have calms we may be as many weeks."
Another week of light baffling winds, and then the breeze died away altogether and there was a dead calm. The sun poured down with great force, but the sky was less blue and clear than usual. At night it was stiflingly hot, and the next morning the sun again rose over a sea as smooth as a sheet of glass.
"I wonder what the captain and the two mates are talking about so seriously," Jack said as the three lads leant against the bulwarks in the shadow of the mainsail.
"I expect they are wondering whether the pitch won't melt off her bottom," Jim Tucker said with a laugh; "or what will happen if all the crew are baked alive. I am sure it is pretty well as hot as an oven."
"The sky looks rather a queer colour," Jack said, looking up. "You can hardly call it blue at all."
"No, it is more like a dull gray than blue," Arthur Hill said. "Hallo! What is up, I wonder?"
The captain had disappeared in his cabin, and on coming out had said a few words to Mr. Timmins, who at once went to the edge of the quarter-deck and shouted "all hands to shorten sail." The vessel was under a cloud of canvas, for every sail that could draw had been set upon her to make the most of the light puffs of wind. Some of the young seamen looked as if they could hardly believe their ears at the order; but Jack heard one of the older sailors say to a mate as they ran up the ratlines, "What did I tell you half an hour since, Bob: that like enough we should have scarce a rag on her by sunset."
The lads sprang up the ratlines with the men, for they took their share of duty aloft. Arthur's place was in the mizzen, Jim's in the main, and Jack's in the fore-top. The stunsails were first got in, then the royals and topgallant-sails. The men were working well, but the captain's voice came up loud from the quarter-deck, "Work steady, lads, but work all you can! Every minute is of consequence!"
Jack looked round the horizon, but could see nothing to account for this urgency. The sun was nearly overhead – a ball of glowing fire, and yet, Jack thought, less bright than usual, for he could look at it steadily, and its circle was clear and well defined. From that point right away down to the horizon the dull heavy-looking sky stretched away unbroken by a single cloud.
As soon as the topgallant-sails were furled the upper spars were sent down, then the courses were clewed up and two of her jibs taken off her. "Close reef the topsails!" was the next order, and when this was done, and the men after more than an hour's work descended to the decks drenched with perspiration, the ship was under the easiest possible canvas – nothing but the three closely-reefed topsails, the fore-staysail, and a small jib. Mr. Hoare and the third mate had been aloft with the men, and as soon as all were on deck the work of coiling away ropes, ranging the light spars, and tidying up began.
CHAPTER XVIII.
A CYCLONE
"What on earth is it all about?" Arthur Hill asked his comrades as the three boys gathered together after the work was done. "Why, there is not a breath of wind. Is it all done for practice, do you think?"
Jim shook his head. "I expect we are going to have one of those cyclones Mr. Timmins was speaking about the other day, though I don't see any signs of it, except the queer colour of the sky. I expect the glass must have been going down very fast. There is the captain popping into his cabin again. Well, he is not long about it," he added, as Captain Murchison hurried out again and spoke to Mr. Timmins, who immediately gave the order, "Furl mizzen and main topsails! Lower down the fore-staysail!"
"Well, there can't be more to do now," Jack said, when the order was carried out, "unless we set to work to set them all again."
"Look, Jack!" Arthur Hill said, grasping his arm and pointing away on the starboard beam.
A wall of black mist seemed to hang upon the horizon, rising momentarily higher and higher.
"The squall is coming, lads!" the captain shouted. "When it strikes her hold on for your lives. Carpenter, put a man with an axe at each of the weather-shrouds. We may have to cut away before we have done with it."
All eyes were now turned towards the bank of cloud, which was rising with extraordinary rapidity. Small portions of the upper line seemed at times to be torn off and to rush ahead of the main body, and then to disappear, suddenly blown into fragments. A low moaning sound was heard, and a line of white could be made out at the foot of the cloud-bank. The water around the ship was still as smooth as glass, though there was a slight swell, which swayed her to and fro, and caused the shrouds and blocks to rattle.
Louder and louder grew the murmur. Again the captain's voice was heard: "Hold on for your lives, lads!" and then with a scream and roar, as of a thousand railway whistles, the gale struck the ship. So tremendous was the force, that although the closely-reefed fore-topsail was the only sail that the Wild Wave was showing aloft – for the jib blew from the bolt-ropes the instant the squall struck her – the vessel heeled over and over until her lee-rail was under water. Further and further she went, until the ends of the yards were under water, and the sea seemed to Jack, who was holding on by the weather bulwark, as if it were directly under his feet.
He thought that the ship was going to capsize, and had not her cargo been well stowed she must have done so. She was now almost on her beam ends, pressed down by the action of the wind upon her hull rather than her masts, and had it not been that the boys had each at the last moment twisted a rope round his body, they must have dropped into the water, for the deck afforded no hold whatever to their feet. Jack felt completely bewildered at the noise and fury of the wind. He had thought that after the gale they had passed through south of the Cape, he knew what bad weather was; but this was beyond anything of which he had the slightest conception.
Looking round he saw Mr. Timmins clinging to the bulwarks, and making his way along with the greatest difficulty until he reached the sailor stationed with the axe at the mizzen-shrouds, he saw the man rise from his crouching position, and, holding on to the bulwarks, strike three blows on the lanyards. Then there was a crash, and the mizzen-mast broke suddenly off four feet above the deck and fell into the sea.
Jack thought that the vessel lifted a little, for he could see one more streak of the deck planking. Mr. Timmins looked round towards the captain, who was clinging to the wheel. The latter waved his hand, and the mate again began to make his way forward. He passed the boys without a word, for the loudest shout would have been inaudible in the howling of the wind. He stopped at the main-shrouds again, the axe descended and the mainmast went over the side. The relief from the weight of the mast and the pressure of the wind upon it was immediate; the Wild Wave rose with a surge and her lee-rail appeared above the surface, then she rose no further.
Mr. Timmins looked back again at the captain, but the latter made no sign. He could see that the pressure of the wind upon the foremast was beginning to pay the vessel's head off before it; as it did so she slowly righted until, when fairly before the wind, she was upon a level keel. Then there was a dull explosion heard even above the gale, and the fore-topsail split into ribbons. But the ship was now before the gale, and was scudding, from the effect of the wind on the bare pole and hull alone, at great speed through the water. As soon as she had righted the lads threw off their lashings, but still clung tight to the rail, and struggled aft till they stood under shelter of the poop.
"This is something like!" Jim roared at the top of his voice into Jack's ear. Even then his words could scarcely be heard.
Jack nodded. At present, even had conversation been possible, he would have had no inclination for it, for he felt stunned and bewildered. It had all taken place in ten minutes. It was but that time since the ship had been lying motionless on a still ocean. Now she was rushing, with one mast only standing, before a furious gale, and had had the narrowest possible escape from destruction. As yet the sea had scarce begun to rise, but seemed flattened under the terrific pressure of the wind, which scooped hollows in it and drove the water before it in fine spray.
Jack had read in the papers about tornadoes in America, and how houses were sometimes bodily lifted with their contents and carried long distances, and how everything above the surface was swept away as if a scythe had passed over it. He had heard these accounts discussed by the fishermen, and the general opinion in Leigh was that there was mighty little truth in them. The Leigh men thought they knew what a gale was, and what it could do. They knew that chimney-pots and tiles could be carried some distance with the wind, that arms of trees could be twisted off, and that an empty boat could be carried a considerable distance; but that a house could be bodily whirled away, was going so far beyond anything that came within their experiences as to be wholly disbelieved.
But Jack knew now as he looked round that this and more was possible. He felt the whole vessel leap and quiver as the gust struck her, and this with only one bare pole standing, and he would have been scarce surprised now had the ship herself been lifted bodily from the water. As to walking along the deck, it would have been impossible. No man could have forced his way against the wind, and Jack felt that were he to attempt to move from the sheltered spot where he was standing he would be taken up and carried away as if he were but a figure of straw. Presently Mr. Hoare came down from the poop and dived into the cabin, making a sign to the lads to follow him. He stood there for a minute panting with his exertions.
"The captain has sent me down for a spell," he said. "He and the first and Jack Moore are all lashed to the wheel. Sometimes I thought that all four of us, wheel and all, would have been blown right away. Well, lads, this is a cyclone, and you may live a hundred years and never see such another. You had better stop in here, for you might get blown right away, and can be of no good on deck. There is nothing to do. The wind has got her and will take her where it likes; we can do nothing but keep her straight. There will be a tremendous sea up before long. The water at the upper part of the bay is shallow, and we shall have a sea like yours at the mouth of the Thames, Jack, – only on a big scale.
"Our lives are in God's hands, boys; don't forget to ask for help where alone it can be obtained. Now I must be going up again. Steward, give me a glass of weak grog and a biscuit. Do you know, lads, my sides fairly ache. Once or twice I was pressed against the wheel with such force that I could scarcely breathe, and if I had been pinned there by an elephant butting me I could not have been more powerless. That is right, steward, get me my oil-skin and sou'-wester from the cabin. You had better get a kettle on over the spirit-stove, so that we can have a cup of hot cocoa when we like. Now then, I am ready for the fray again!" and buttoning himself closely up Mr. Hoare went on deck again.
Jack Moore was the next to come down. "Captain's orders, steward. I am to have a glass of grog. Well, young gentlemen, this is a gale and no mistake. I have been at sea over thirty years, and have never seen anything to be compared with it. If you get through this you need never be afraid of another; not if you live to be white-headed!"
After Jack Moore had gone up Mr. Timmins and the captain came down by turns. Each took a cup of cocoa. They said but few words to the boys, and were indeed almost too much exhausted by the struggle through which they had gone to be able to speak. The boys gathered again under the lee of the poop and watched the scene. It had changed considerably; the wind seemed as violent as ever, but the sea was no longer kept in subjection to it, and was now tossing itself in a wild and confused manner.
Another half hour and it had settled in some sort of regularity, and was sweeping before the wind in deep trough-like waves with steep sides, resembling those to which Jack had been accustomed in Sea Reach, on a gigantic scale. Soon again these were broken up, and were succeeded by a wild tumultuous sea like a boiling cauldron. The vessel was thrown violently from side to side, taking water over, now on one beam now on the other, and at times shaking from blows as if she had struck upon a rock. So sharp and sudden were her movements that the lads could not keep their feet, and again made their way into the cabin. Even here it was necessary to shout in order to be heard.
"What an extraordinary sea, Jim! I never saw anything like it before."
"That is what it's from," Jim replied, pointing to the tell-tale compass hanging from the beams overhead.
Jack glanced at it. "Why, we are running due south!"
"Aye; and I expect we have been two or three times round the compass already. That is what makes this frightful broken sea."
"Well, as long as we keep on running round and round," Jack said, "there is no fear of our running against the land anywhere."
Jim was further advanced in the study of navigation. "You forget," he said, "the centre of the cyclone is moving along all the time, and though we may go round and round the centre we are moving in the same direction as the cyclone is going, whatever that may be."
For hours the storm raged without the slightest signs of abatement. The sea was now terrific; the waist of the ship was full of water. Green seas swept over the vessel's bows, carrying everything before them, and pouring aft burst open the cabin door and deluged the cabin. By turns the boys made their way to the door and looked out.
"Come out, you fellows!" Jim Tucker shouted after one of these trips of investigation. "The men are coming out from the fo'castle. There is something to be done."
The boys came out and crawled a few steps up the poop-ladder, holding on for life as they did so. They did not attempt to get on to the poop, for they felt they would be blown away if they exposed themselves there to the full force of the wind. Looking round, the scene was terrible. The surface of the sea was almost hidden by the clouds of spray blown from the heads of the waves; a sky that was inky black hung overhead. The sea, save for the white heads, was of similar hue, but ahead there seemed a gleam of light. Jim Tucker, holding on by the rail, raised himself two or three feet higher to have a better view. A moment was sufficient.
He sprang down again and shouted in his comrades' ears, "Breakers ahead!" It needed no further words. The light ahead was the gleam of a sea of white foam towards which the vessel was hurrying. Nothing could be done to check or change her course. Had the mizzen been standing an effort might have been made to show a little sail upon it, and bring her head up into the wind to anchor; but even could this have been done the cables would have snapped like pack-threads. There was nothing for it but destruction. Jack followed Jim's example – crawled to the top of the gangway, and holding on by the poop-rail raised himself to his feet and looked forward.
Right across their bows stretched a band of white breakers, and beyond through the mist he could make out the line of a low shore. The lads descended again into the waist, and with great difficulty made their way forward to where the men were huddled together round the entrance to the fo'castle. They too had kept a look-out, and knew of the danger into which they were running and the impossibility of avoiding it.
"Is there anything to be done?" Jim Tucker shouted.
A silent shake of the head was a sufficient answer. The vessel and all in her were doomed. The officers were now seen leaving the helm and coming forward. It was a proof in itself of the hopelessness of the prospect. The vessel was indeed steering herself straight before the gale, and as there were no regular following waves there was no fear of her broaching to. The boats, that had at the commencement of the storm been hanging from the davits, were all gone or useless. One or two had been smashed to pieces by heavy seas striking them; others had been torn from their fastenings and blown clean away.