Personal Reminiscences in Book Making, and Some Short Stories

One might imagine that there was rest for the fishermen now. Far from it. The fish had to be “cleaned”—i.e. gutted and the superfluous portions cut off and packed in boxes for the London market. The grey light of a bleak winter morning dawned before the work was finished. During the operation the third hand, Lively Dick, ran a fish-bone deeply into his hand, and laid a foundation for future trouble.

It was noon before the trunks, or fish-boxes, were packed. Then the little boat had to be launched over the side, loaded with fish, and ferried to one of the steamers which ply daily and regularly between Billingsgate and the fleets. Three men jumped into it and pushed off—a mere cockle-shell on a heaving flood, now dancing on a wave-crest, now lost to view in a water-valley.

“What’s that?” said Whistler, as they pulled towards the steamer. “Looks bigger than the or’nary mission-ships.”

“Why, that must be the noo hospital-ship, the Queen Victoria,” answered Lively Dick, glancing over his shoulder at a large vessel, smack-rigged, which loomed up through the haze to leeward.

They had no time for further remark, for the great side of the steamer was by that time frowning over them. It was dangerous work they had to do. The steamer rolled heavily in the rough sea. The boat, among a dozen other boats, was soon attached to her by a strong rope. Men had to be athletes and acrobats in order to pass their fish-boxes from the leaping and plunging boats to the deck of the rolling steamer. The shouting and noise and bumping were tremendous. An awkward heave occasionally sent a box into the sea amid oaths and laughter. Jim’s cargo was put safely on board, and the boat was about to cast off when a heavier lurch than usual caused Black Whistler to stagger. To save himself from plunging overboard he laid both hands on the gunwale of the boat—a dangerous thing to do at any time when alongside of a vessel. Before he could recover himself the boat went crashing against the steamer’s iron side and the fisherman’s hands were crushed. He fell back into the boat almost fainting with agony. No cry escaped him, however. Lively Dick saw the blood streaming, and while his mate shoved off the boat he wrapped a piece of canvas in a rough-and-ready fashion round the quivering hands.

“I’m done for this trip,” groaned Whistler, “for this means go ashore—weeks in hospital—wages stopped, and wife and chicks starving.”

“Never a bit, mate,” said Dick; “didn’t you know that the noo mission-ship does hospital work afloat and that they’ll keep you aboard of her, and lend us one o’ their hands till you’re fit for work again?”

Whether poor Whistler believed, or understood, or was comforted by this we cannot say, for he made no reply and appeared to be almost overcome with pain. On reaching the Dolphin a signal of distress was made to the floating hospital, which at once bore down to them. The injured man was transferred to it, and there, in the pleasant airy cabin, Black Whistler made acquaintance with men who were anxious to cure his soul as well as his body. Up to this time he had resolutely declined to visit the mission-ships, but now, when a skilled medical man tenderly dressed his terrible wounds and a sympathetic skipper led him to a berth and supplied him with some warm coffee, telling him that he would be free to remain there without charge as long as was needed, and that meanwhile one of the mission hands would take his place in the Dolphin till he was able to resume work, his opinion of mission-ships and work underwent modification, and he began to think that mission crews were not such a bad lot after all.

Meanwhile Skipper Greely, leaving his man in the Queen Victoria, returned to his smack accompanied by George King, the new hand.

King’s position was by no means an enviable one, for he found himself thus suddenly in the midst of a set of men who had no sympathy with him in religious matters, and whose ordinary habits and conversation rendered remonstrance almost unavoidable. Unwilling to render himself obnoxious at first, the man resolved to try the effect of music on his new shipmates. He happened to possess a beautiful tenor voice, and the first night—a calm bright one—while taking his turn at the helm, he sang in a soft sweet voice one after another of those hymns which Mr Sankey has rendered so popular. He began with “Come to the Saviour, make no delay,” and the first effect on his mates, most of whom were below, was to arouse a feeling of contempt. But they could not resist the sweetness of the voice. In a few minutes they were perfectly silent, and listening with a species of fascination—each being wafted, both by words and music, to scenes on shore and to times when his spirit had not been so demoralised by sin.

Greely, in particular, was transported back to the sunny home in Yarmouth, and to the days of first-love, before the demon had gained the mastery and clouded the sunshine.

As the night wore on, a fog settled down over the North Sea, and the smacks of the Short Blue fleet began to blow their fog-horns, while the crews became more on the alert and kept a bright look-out.

Suddenly, and without warning, a dull beating sound was heard by the look-out on the Dolphin. Next moment a dark object like a phantom ship loomed out of the fog, and a wild cry arose as the men saw the bows of a huge ocean steamer coming apparently straight at them. The smack was absolutely helpless, without steering way. For an instant there was shouting on board the steamer, and she fell off slightly as she rushed into the small circle of the Dolphin’s light. A tremendous crash followed, but the change of direction had been sufficient to prevent a fatal collision. Another moment and the great steamer was gone, while the little smack rocked violently from the blow as well as from the swell left in the steamer’s wake.

This was but the beginning of a night of disaster. Skipper Greely and his men had scarcely recovered from the surprise of this incident when the fog lifted and quickly cleared away, revealing the Short Blue fleet floating all round with flapping sails, but it was observed also that a very dark cloud rested on the north-western horizon. Soon a stiffish breeze sprang up, and the scattered fleet drew together, lay on the same tack, and followed the lead of their admiral, to whom they looked for the signal to shoot the trawls. But instead of giving this order the admiral signalled to “lay-to.”

Being disgusted as well as surprised that their leader was not going to fish, Jim Greely, being also exhausted by long watching, went below and turned in to have a sleep. He had not been long asleep when fair-haired Charlie came to tell him that Lively Dick, who acted as mate in Whistler’s absence, wanted him on deck. He ran up at once.

“Looks like dirty weather, skipper,” said Dick, pointing to windward.

“Right you are, lad,” said Jim, and called all hands to close-reef.

This being done and everything made snug, the skipper again turned in, with orders to call him if things should get worse.

Soon after, Dick, who was at the helm, saw a squall bearing down on them, but did not think it worth while to call the skipper. It broke on them with a clap like thunder, but the good Dolphin stood the shock well, and Dick was congratulating himself when he saw a sea coming towards them, but sufficiently astern, he thought, to clear them. He was wrong. It broke aboard, right into the mainsail, cleared the deck, and hove the smack on her beam-ends.

This effectually aroused the skipper, who made desperate but at first ineffectual efforts to get out of his berth, for the water, which poured down the hatchway, washed gear, tackles, turpentine-tins, paint-pots, and nearly everything moveable from the iron locker on the weather-side down to leeward, and blocked up the openings. Making another effort he cleared all this away, and sprang out of the berth, which was half full of water. Pitchy darkness enshrouded him, for the water had put out the lights as well as the fire. Just then the vessel righted a little.

“Are you all right on deck?” shouted Jim, as he scrambled up the hatchway.

“All right, as far as I can see,” answered Dick.

“Hold on, I’ve a bottle o’ matches in my bunk,” cried the skipper, returning to the flooded cabin. Fortunately the matches were dry; a light was struck, and a candle and lamp lighted. The scene revealed was not re-assuring. The water in the cabin was knee-deep. A flare, made of a woollen scarf soaked in paraffin, was lighted on deck, and showed that the mainsail had been split, the boat hopelessly damaged, and part of the lee bulwarks broken. The mast also was leaning aft, the forestay having been carried away. A few minutes later Lively Dick went tumbling down into the cabin all of a heap, to avoid the mast as it went crashing over the side in such a way as to prevent the use of the pumps, and carrying the mizzenmast along with it.

“Go to work with buckets, boys, or she’ll sink,” shouted the skipper, himself setting the example, for the ballast had shifted and the danger was great. Meanwhile George King seized an axe and cut away the rigging that held on to the wrecked masts, and fair-haired Charlie laboured like a hero to clear the pumps. The rays of the cabin lights did not reach the deck, so that much of the work had to be done in what may be styled darkness visible, while the little vessel kicked about like a wild thing in the raging sea, and the torn canvas flapped with a horrible noise. Pitiless wind, laden with sleet, howled over them as if thirsting impatiently for the fishermen’s lives. At last they succeeded in clearing the pumps, and worked them with untiring energy for hours, but could not tell how many, for the thick end of a marline-spike had been driven through the clock-face and stopped it.

It was still dark when they managed to rig up a jury-mast on the stump of the old one and hoist a shred of sail. George King was ordered to the tiller. As he passed Greely he said in a cheerful voice, “Trust in the Lord, skipper, He can bring us out o’ worse than this.”

It might have been half an hour later when another sea swept the deck. Jim took shelter under the stump of the mast and held on for dear life. Charlie got inside the coil of the derrick-fall and so was saved, while the others dived into the cabin. When that sea had passed they found no one at the tiller. Poor King had been washed overboard. Nothing whatever could be done for him, even if he had been seen, but the greedy sea had swallowed him, and he was taken to swell with his tuneful voice the company of those who sing on high the praises of redeeming love.

The sea which swept him into eternity also carried away the jury-mast, and as the smack was now a mere wreck, liable to drift on shore if the gale should continue long, Jim let down an anchor, after removing its stock so that it might drag on the bottom and retard the drifting while it kept the vessel’s head to the sea.

A watch was then set, and the rest of the crew went below to wait and wish for daybreak! It was a dreary vigil under appalling circumstances, for although the smack had not actually sprung a leak there was always the danger of another sea overwhelming and altogether sinking her. Her crew sat there for hours utterly helpless and literally facing death. Fortunately their matches had escaped the water, so that they were able to kindle a fire in the stove and obtain a little warmth as well as make a pot of tea and eat some of their sea-soaked biscuit.

It is wonderful how man can accommodate himself to circumstances. No sooner had the crew in this wreck felt the stimulating warmth of the hot tea than they began to spin yarns! not indeed of a fanciful kind—they were too much solemnised for that—but yarns of their experience of gales in former times.

“It minds me o’ this wery night last year,” said Lively Dick, endeavouring to light his damp pipe. “I was mate o’ the Beauty at the time. We was workin’ wi’ the Short Blues on the Dogger, when a tremendous squall struck us, an’ it began to snow that thick we could scarce see the end o’ the jib-boom. Well, the gale came on in real arnest before long, so we had to lay-to all that night. When it came day we got some sail set and I went below to have a hot pot o’ tea when the skipper suddenly sang out ‘Jump up here, Dick!’ an’ I did jump up, double quick, to find that we was a’most runnin’ slap into a dismasted craft. We shoved the tiller hard a-starboard and swung round as if we was on a swivel, goin’ crash through the rackage alongside an’ shavin’ her by a hair. We could just see through the snow one of her hands choppin’ away at the riggin’, and made out that her name was the Henry and Thomas.”

“An’ did ye see nothin’ more of ’er arter that?” asked the boy Charlie with an eager look.

“Nothin’ more. She was never heard of arter that mornin’.”

While the men were thus talking, the watch on deck shouted that one of the mission-ships was close alongside. Every one ran on deck to hail her, for they stood much in need of assistance, two of their water-casks having been stove in and everything in the hold turned topsy-turvy—beef, potatoes, flour, all mixed up in horrible confusion. Just then another sea came on board, and the crew had to dive again to the cabin for safety. That sea carried away the boat and the rest of the starboard bulwarks, besides starting a plank, and letting the water in at a rate which the pumps could not keep down.

Quickly the mission-ship loomed up out of the grey snow-cloud and ran past.

“You’ll want help!” shouted the mission skipper.

“Ay, we do,” shouted Jim Greely in reply. “We’re sinkin’, and our boat’s gone.”

An arm thrown up indicated that the words were understood. A few minutes later and the crew of the Dolphin saw the mission crew launching their little boat. With, such a sea running the venture was perilous in the extreme, but when the mission skipper said “Who’ll go?” he had no lack of volunteers. The boat was manned at once, and the crew of the Dolphin were rescued a few minutes before the Dolphin herself went head-foremost to the bottom. Just as they got safely on deck the mission-ship herself shipped a heavy sea, which washed several of the men into the lee scuppers. They jumped up immediately—some with “Thank God” on their lips, others with a laugh—but James Greely did not rise. He lay stunned and rolling about in the water. It was found on raising him that his right leg was broken at the thigh.

When Jim recovered consciousness he did not complain. He was a man of stern mould, and neither groaned nor spoke; but he was not the less impressed with the kindness and apparent skill with which the mission skipper treated him.

Having received a certain amount of surgical training, the skipper—although unlearned and a fisherman—knew well how to put the leg in splints and otherwise to treat the patient.

“It’s pretty bad, I fear,” he said soothingly, observing that Jim’s lips were compressed, and that beads of perspiration were standing on his brow.

Jim did not reply, but smiled grimly and nodded, for the rolling of the ship caused him increasing agony as the injured parts began to inflame.

“I’m not very good at this sort o’ work,” said the mission skipper modestly, “but thank God the new hospital-ship is cruisin’ wi’ the Short Blue just now. I saw her only yesterday, so we’ll put you aboard of her and there you’ll find a reg’lar shore-goin’ surgeon, up to everything, and with all the gimcracks and arrangements of a reg’lar shore-goin’ hospital. They’ve got a new contrivance too—a sort o’ patent stretcher, invented by a Mr Dark o’ the head office in London—which’ll take you out o’ the boat into the ship without movin’ a bone or muscle, so keep your mind easy, skipper, for you’ll be aboard the Queen Victoria before many hours go by.”

Poor Greely appreciated the statement about the stretcher more than all the rest that was said, for he was keenly alive to the difficulty of passing a broken-boned man out of a little boat into a smack or steamer in a heavy sea, having often had to do it.

The mission skipper was right, for early the next day Jim was strapped to a wonderful frame and passed into the hospital-ship without shake or shock, and his comrades were retained in the mission smack until they could be sent on shore. Greely and his men learned many lessons which they never afterwards forgot on board of the Queen Victoria—the foundation lesson being that they were lost sinners and that Jesus Christ came “to seek and to save the lost.”

Slowly, and at first unwillingly, Skipper Greely took the great truths in. Several weeks passed, and he began to move about with some of his wonted energy. Much to his surprise he found himself one morning signing the temperance pledge-books, persuaded thereto by the skipper of the Queen Victoria. Still more to his surprise he found himself one Sunday afternoon listening, with unwonted tears in his eyes, to some of his mates as they told their spiritual experiences to an assembly of some hundred or so of weather-beaten fishermen. Before quitting that vessel he discovered that he possessed a powerful and tuneful voice, admirably adapted for singing hymns, and that he was capable of publicly stating the fact that he was an unworthy sinner saved by grace.

When at last he returned ashore and unexpectedly entered the Yarmouth home, Nellie could scarcely believe her senses, so great was the change.

“Jim!” she cried, with opening eyes and beating heart, “you’re like your old self again.”

“Thank God,” said Jim, clasping her in his strong arms. But he could say no more for some time. Then he turned suddenly on curly-headed Jimmie, who had been fiercely embracing one of his enormous sea-boots, and began an incoherent conversation and a riotous romp with that juvenile fisherman.

A brighter sunshine than had ever been there before enlightened that Yarmouth home, for God had entered it and the hearts of its occupants.

Example is well-known to be infectious. In course of time a number of brother fishermen began to think as Jim Greely thought and feel as he felt. His house also became the centre, or headquarters, of an informal association got up for the purpose of introducing warmth and sunshine into poor homes in all weathers, and there were frequently such large meetings of the members of that association that it taxed Nellie’s ingenuity to supply seats and stow them all away. She managed it, however; for, as Jim was wont to remark, “Nellie had a powerful intellec’ for her size.”

Among the frequenters of this Yarmouth home were several of the men who had once been staunch supporters of the Green Dragon, and of these the most enthusiastic, perhaps, if not the most noisy, were Black Whistler, Lively Dick, and fair-haired Charlie.