Читать книгу South Sea Shipmates - John Arthur Barry - Страница 8

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At eight bells the next morning we began to heave up the anchor.

"Start a chanty, bullies," said the mate with a halfsmile as he surveyed the curious crowd that manned the handles of the old-fashioned levers. And, indeed, they looked older than ever in the bright sunshine which poured on them, showing up wrinkles and white hair, and folds of dry, pendulous skin with merciless detail. But they were a hearty lot in spite of all; and when presently one of them struck up the famous "Shenandoah" in a voice that quavered and shook at first, but gradually grew firmer and stronger, and the rest joined in the chorus with a will, the mudhook came home in double quick time, giving the four apprentices all they could do to clear the cable away.

"What's that thing our friends are wearing?" asked Phil. And then I noticed that each man had attached to the breast of his shirt a sort of circular button of blue enamel; and, looking more closely, I saw upon it an albatross in white hovering with outstretched wings over the sea. Around the design ran in red letters the legend "L.A.M."

"Hanged if I know," I replied. "Looks like the badge of some secret soceity. By Gad, Phil, how the poor old chaps are sweating! Give us a song to cheer 'em up a bit." So Phil, who was a good tenor and was also an improviser of no mean order, piped up "Stormalong," and that brought the anchor to the cathead.

The wind was fair for outside, so the skipper determined to save the expense of a tug, and soon the topsails and topgallantsails were sheeted home, and the Zenobia began to move toward the harbour entrance.

Just at this moment a big ferry steamer came nearly alongside, and to our astonishment saluted us with hoarse crowings from her siren, while a crowd of men on board struck up the old chanty, "Blow the Man Down," accompanied by a powerful piano. Bunting flew from stem to stern over temporary masts, and prominent among the flags we noticed a large burgee bearing the same initials in red on a blue ground as those on the buttons worn by our crew.

And the men on the steamer were all more or less physically typical of those on the Zenobia. There were top-hats and frock-coats among them, too, and gold watch-chains slung across comfortable bow-windows; all, in short, a prosperous-seeming crowd, who waved and cheered, and sung chanties vigorously to the utter mystification of the skipper and the mates, and of everybody but the crew.

And the crew, flinging discipline to the winds, clambered on to the Zenobia's rail and into her rigging, and returned the salutes with great energy. They were evidently immensely gratified.

"Hello, I say," remarked the mate in expostulatory tones, "what's all this row about? The Zenobia seems a wonderfully popular ship all at once. But I want the mainsail and foresail set—when you gents can find time."

"All right, sir," said Lord. "It's only the League giving us a bit of a send-off. You'll see every ship we pass will dip to the Zenobia."

"League?" replied the mystified officer. "What league?"

"Why, the League of Ancient Mariners, of course," said Lord. "Only for us you'd lie in Capricorn till a hayfield grew on your ship's bottom."

"Never heard of the League," replied the mate with a grin. "But the 'Ancient' is all right, without a doubt, whatever the 'Mariners' may be. Now let's get that foresheet aft."

Every ferry-boat that passed us saluted us with crowings. All the ships at anchor dipped their ensigns in farewell to us.

"Damn it," said the skipper crossly, as the ferryboat steamed around the Zenobia, now bowing gently to the Pacific swell, and all the Ancient Mariners struck up "Auld Lang Syne" with immense vigour. "Damn it, you'd think we'd got the Governor and the Admiral and the Premier on board!"

But the sea coming in from outside became too heavy for the steamer, and presently she turned round, the Ancient Mariners chanted "God save the Queen," gave three final cheers, and made back up the harbour again, while the Zenobia set all her canvas and stretched away to sea.

The first night out quite half of the crew were incapacitated from duty by sickness.

"'Twill do 'em a world of good," remarked Phil. "Think of all the years they've been ashore without a shake-up. They'll have new livers after this trip, and will find no use for the piles of patent medicines I've seen among their luggage—pills and ointments and cure-alls of every description."

But in a day or so the ancient ones made good recoveries, got their sea-legs on, waddled about the decks as if they had never left them, generally made themselves quite at home, and seemed to enjoy themselves thoroughly. Nevertheless, they were dubious aloft. Their muscles were stiff with disuse, cramps and pains assailed them, and it was no uncommon thing to see one, more agile than the others, helping a lame duck in from a yard-arm, or giving him a haul up over a difficult spot.

They were, however, immensely willing and cheerful, abounding in queer yarns, bubbling over with laughter, song, and recitation. Some of them, too, had brought musical instruments with them, upon which they played fairly well. Thus in the dogwatches you would find the whole ship's afterguard, bar the skipper, for'ard—cook and steward, carpenter and sailmaker, the four smart apprentices—and not seldom even the first or second mates, listening and applauding.

As for the skipper, although on the whole a decent enough sort, if "starchy" and apt quite mistakenly to consider himself an epitome of all marine virtues in the way of navigation and seamanship, he scarcely appeared to appreciate the presence on the Zenobia of twenty master mariners, some of whom had held command when he was a child in arms, and some long before he was born.

But the mates simply revelled in the old men; as also did the boys, who saved them many a trip aloft, and in return were rewarded with welcome additions to their mess from the "L.A.M.'s" stores.

Crossing the Great Australian Bight, the Zenobia got a good dusting, one that necessitated all hands being called to shorten sail.

I was in the second mate's watch, and when the summons came at about four bells in the morning, the ancients popped night-capped heads over their bunks as Phil, who called us, lit the wildly swinging lamp and remarked: "A nasty night, gentlemen, and I'm sorry to disturb you, but the old hooker's got more than she can carry, and something'll go presently unless you turn out and show a leg pretty smartly."

We could hear the roar of the gale very plainly; hear, too, the slapping of the big seas as they hit the vessel's bows with resounding smacks, while cataracts of water poured incessantly over the break of the fo'c'sle, the floor of which was afloat with a tide that, as she rolled, rushed from one side to the other, half-way up the row of chests lashed to the bunk-stanchions.

The ancients grunted and groaned. But they rose to the occasion like the genuine ocean warriors they once had been. And the flow of language they indulged in as the cold water swirled about their legs, and the ship in her lurches sent them careering to leeward and back again, came as a surprise even to us who had ere now sailed with artists in commination.

Especially notable for their performances in this line were a doctor and a retired miller—ex-mayor of a big suburban borough and a prominent churchwarden—a detail, this last, which was the cause of some chaff as the watch, accoutred to its last soul-and-body lashing, eventually made its way on deck.

As we clambered and groped aft along the sloping, slippery weather-side through the thick darkness, green seas smashed over the rail and pounded us. From aloft came the hoarse shouts of the port watch at work on the topgallantsails and upper topsail. As we started to clew-up on the main, the gale seemed to increase in weight until the Zenobia lay right over to it, with the water coming in sheets over her lee-rail.

How the ancients got aloft that night nobody but themselves can tell. I passed some of them flattened on the almost horizontal main-rigging like black beetles stuck on cardboard. They could be heard encouraging each other with weird cries and shrill oaths, as they clutched and clawed their way over the ratlines. And eventually they reached the yards where the flapping, banging billows of canvas awaited them.

Lord was at the wheel, a splendid helmsman; and it was owing to him as much as anything that we never lost a stitch. But it was a hard contract, and by the time daylight arrived and the Zenobia was under her lower topsails and reefed fore and main courses, all the stiffening was out of the ancients. The watch that went below at eight bells recked nothing of breakfast. They just turned in all standing, sore, and strained in every limb, cut and bruised, and generally shaken up to a very considerable extent.

As for the watch on deck, it merely stood by and dozed in all sorts of odd corners where a little shelter might be found.

But they all soon recovered their spirits, and vied with each other in relating their experiences and escapes while up aloft.

"Damn the Bight!" said the doctor. "I remember when I was mate of the old Caduceus, getting such another blow—only harder. Lost a whole suit of new sails. Lucky they went, too, or the sticks would ha' gone. That was in the year 'sixty. Long passage; one hundred and forty-three days to Kurrachee."

He was a little round man, the doctor, quite bald. He wore gold spectacles; a cheerful soul, always ready with quip and jest. And we gathered that he had left a large practice in Capricorn in order to show his faith in the efficiency of the Ancient Mariners. He had been a Conway boy, and had held command twice ere leaving the sea and taking to medicine. Now, at the age of sixty-five, he found himself engaged on this wild freak—and to all appearance thoroughly enjoying it.

And the yarns they spun about their old ships were a source of never-failing joy to me and Phil. Also, as time passed, and we rounded the Leuwin, and steered north-about to catch the South East Trades, and got into finer weather, the old gentlemen became absolutely frisky; their joints seemed quite limber, their backs straighter, voices deeper, eyes clearer. The ozone of the sea was making itself felt in their veins and arteries; they were rejuvenated.

"I never thought I'd live to see it," remarked the chief officer, one day, "but here's a crew without a growler among 'em."

"They've done their growling, sir," remarked Phil, "years before we were born. Besides, come to think of it, what have they to growl about now? So far as I can make out, they're all well off; and this picnic will do 'em so much good that they'll live as long as the albatross they wear on their medals."

"I think," remarked Lord, one evening as the Zenobia forged along in a phosphorescent sea, steady as a house, and making a comfortable, droning noise at her bows as they clove the milky masses that rose and fell away again in hills and hollows all besprinkled with jewels, "I think I'll take to the sea life again for good. After all, there's nothing like it."

"Yes," remarked another ancient, after the laugh had subsided; "but I say, Cap'en, what about that snug cottage o' yours, and the fine bit o' city property with the terrace of houses and the shops, and the rents all coming in reg'lar?"

"Um!" remarked Lord, "well, I suppose there is a certain amount of responsibility attaching to property. And perhaps, after all, I'd better stop ashore and help you lads to spend that two hundred pounds."

By this time we were all familiar with the terms of the bet—which was as good as won. In another month or so the mariners would be speeding home as fast as steam could carry them with their well-earned discharges in their pockets.

They were only "runners," and, as such, were not by custom compelled or expected to do much more work about the ship than was actually necessary. But, as a matter of fact, they were never idle. They set up all the standing rigging, rattled down, painted, scrubbed, made chafing-gear, and were generally as busy as bees during their watches on deck.

"By the Lord Harry," remarked the mate more than once, "I'll be sorry to lose this crowd—ancient as it is! I expect we'll have to ship the usual piebald mob at the Cape, sour, grumbling, worthless sogers who'll not do a hand's turn unless you drive 'em to it. Yes, I'd like to keep the albatrosses for the round trip, whatever the skipper may think about it."

But evidently Captain Haynes would have preferred a less independent and a more ignorant crew. The Leaguers knew too much for his peace of mind; and he disliked the expert criticism which he was pretty sure went on in the fo'c'sle, as to his seamanship and the handling of his vessel.

Not that there was much to find fault with so far, but the ancient ones were exacting. Some of them had sextants; and, much to the aggravation of the skipper, they used to "shoot the sun" at midday, and "from information received" through sources aft, knew just as much with regard to the ship's position as any of the executive.

"He's keeping her too low down," one would remark. "At this time o' the year it's always best to stretch well away to the no'thard. Then make into the coast and catch the Agulhas current."

"Oh, well," would say another, "we ain't doing so badly, although I must say I've seen better Trades. They don't seem to blow so steady as when I was around these parts afore. I remember, now, in the old Dacia—"and so forth, and so on.