Читать книгу Perseverance Island - Frazar Douglas - Страница 4

Boyhood and youth of the author. Sailor's life. The "Good Luck." South Pacific Island scheme. Loss of crew off Cape Horn.

I was born in the year 1833, in the State of Vermont, United States of America, and at an early age lost both parents by that fearful scourge, the small-pox. I was an only child, and upon the death of my parents, which happened when I was about six years of age, I was taken charge of by a friendly farmer of a neighboring town, who put me to school for several years in the winter, and at work upon the farm in the summer. I had no known relatives in the wide world, and often felt the bitter pangs of orphanhood. My master was not, however, unkind, and I grew up strong, robust, and with rather a retiring, quiet disposition, with a great love of mechanics and tools. Under all this quietness, however, lurked, I well knew myself, an unappeasable love of adventure and enterprise. I loved to lie in the open fields at night under the full moon; to explore swamps and brooks; and I soon learned to swim in the pond near by. At the age of fourteen I left my master, with his consent, and went to work in a neighboring machine-shop, where castings, etc., were made. I loved all manner of mechanical tools and instruments, and evidently had a taste in that direction. At the age of eighteen I became restless, and, having read during leisure hours many books of adventure and discovery, I took it into my silly head to become a sailor, and upon the inspiration of a moment I packed up my small bundle of clothes, and, bidding good-by to my workmates, started out on foot for Portsmouth, N. H. I arrived there and shipped as green hand in the schooner "Rosa Belle" for Boston, at which port we in due season arrived. From thence I shipped again before the mast in a large, square-rigged vessel for a voyage round the world. It is not my intention here to give a detailed account of my adventurous life till I joined the "Good Luck;" suffice it to say that during fourteen years at sea I passed through all the grades of boy, seaman, able seaman, boatswain, third mate, second mate, and first mate. It was after my discharge from a large clipper ship in Liverpool, lately arrived from China, in the latter capacity, that, having some few hundred dollars by me, I began to look about to see if I could not gain a livelihood in some easier way than by going to sea, being by this time heartily tired of the life, and for want of friends and relations with little chance of rising higher in the profession; it was at this time, I say, that this cursed project of the "Good Luck" was brought to my attention. As fate would have it, the schooner lay in the same dock with ourselves, and I became interested in her by hearing the talk upon the dock that she was bound to the South Pacific Islands to seek for pearls, sandal wood, tortoiseshell, etc., and to establish a colony of which the persons who were going out on this trip were the advance guard and projectors. I remember now, oh! how sadly, the Utopian ideas that were advanced, and although I, as a sailor in those seas, knew many of them to be false, yet imagination proclaimed them true. I could not resist the impulse to join my fortune to theirs. Having made up my mind, I called upon the chief movers in the matter and offered my services. It was first a question with them whether I could subscribe any money to the project, and secondly, what position I desired in the adventure?

I satisfied them upon the former, by stating that if I was pleased with their plans I could subscribe four hundred dollars in cash, and my services as a seaman and navigator in those seas. This seemed very satisfactory, and I was then asked, more pointedly, what position I demanded. I said that I should be satisfied with the position of chief officer, and second in command on board of the schooner, and fourth in command on the island as concerned the colony, – that is to say, if their plans suited me, which I demanded to know fully before signing any papers and bound myself by oath not to disclose if, after hearing and seeing everything, I declined to join them.

This straightforward course seemed to please the managers, and I was put in full possession of all their plans, and immediately after signed the papers.

It is sufficient for me to give an outline of this plan simply, which, through the act of God, came to naught, and left me, a second Robinson Crusoe, on my lonely island.

The company was formed of one hundred persons, who each put in one hundred pounds to make a general capital, – except a few like myself, who were allowed a full paid-up share for eighty pounds, on account of being of the advance guard, and wages for our services according to our station, with our proportionate part of the dividends to be hereafter made.

With this fund paid in, amounting to about nine thousand eight hundred pounds, the managing committee purchased the schooner "Good Luck." She was a fore-topsail schooner, of one hundred and fifty-four tons measurement, built in Bath, Maine, and about seven years old, – strong, well built, sharp, and with a flush deck fore and aft. She cost two thousand four hundred pounds. The remainder of the money was used in purchasing the following outfit for the scheme we were engaged in: —

Four breech-loading Armstrong cannon, nine pounders, four old-fashioned nine-pounders, twenty-five Sharpe's breech-loading rifles, and twenty-five navy Colt's revolvers, with plenty of ammunition for all. These, in conjunction with boarding-pikes, cutlasses, hand-grenades, and a howitzer for the launch, comprised our armament. The hold was stored with a little of everything generally taken on such adventures, – knives, hatchets, and calico for the natives, and seeds, canned meats, and appliances for pearl fishing, house-building, etc., for ourselves. To these were added a sawmill, an upright steam-engine, a turning-lathe, blacksmith tools, etc.

Our plan was to find an island uninhabited, that would form a good centre from which to prosecute our purpose of pearl gathering, and to there establish a colony, sending home the "Good Luck" for the rest of our companions and their families.

Ten of us were chosen as the advance guard (all but three being sailors), to make the first venture, establish the colony, load the schooner, leave part of our force upon the island selected, and the remainder to bring back the schooner to Liverpool. "Man proposes, but God disposes."

On July 31, 1865, we set sail upon this disastrous voyage, and from that day to this have I never seen the faces of civilized beings except those on board of the schooner, and not those for many months. Our captain was a fine, manly fellow, of about eight and thirty years of age, and we all liked him. Duty on board was of course different than it would have been in a common vessel; and although we had watches and regular discipline, each was familiar with the other, having, as we had, an equal stake in the adventure.

We had a tough time off Cape Horn, and, although the "Good Luck" behaved well, it was here that we met with our first misfortune. In stowing the jib, in a gale of wind, preparatory to laying-to, three men were swept overboard, and we never saw them more. This cast a damper upon the remaining seven, and was but a precursor of what was yet to happen. We rounded Cape Horn the first part of October, and, steering northwest, soon reached more pleasant weather. Our course was towards the group of islands, so well known in the South Pacific, called the Society Islands.