Читать книгу The Wreck of the Nancy Bell; Or, Cast Away on Kerguelen Land - John C. Hutcheson - Страница 14

It was a lovely dawn the morning after the storm in the Bay of Biscay.

Even Mr. Adams, plain, matter-of-fact, simple, and unsympathetic sailor as he was, without a particle of poetry or imagination about him, could not but gaze with admiration at the glory of God’s handiwork, as he noticed the grand panorama of change that marked the progress from darkness to light, from night to day!

Soon after his watch began, the twinkling stars had gone to rest, putting out their tiny lanterns, as they had arisen, one be one; and now, the violet blue of the firmament paled gradually into sea-green and grey, soft neutral tints mixed on the great palette of Nature to receive the roseate hue that presently illumined the whole eastern sky, heralding the approach of the glorious orb of day. Next, streaks of light salmon-coloured clouds shot across the horizon, their edges decorated with a fringe of gold that gleamed brighter and more intense each moment, the water glowing beneath the reflection as if wakening into life: and then, the majestic sun stepping up from his ocean bed—all radiant—“like a bridegroom out of his chamber,” and moving with giant strides higher and higher up the heavens, as if “anxious to run his course,” and make up for the lost time of the night—shone through the transparent purple mist of the morning like a blush rose behind a glittering veil of dewdrops!

By the time the breakfast hour arrived—“eight bells”—the blue sea was dancing merrily in the sunshine, the waves calming down to only a crisping curl of their foam-flecked summits, and the Nancy Bell was speeding along under a pile of canvas fore and aft from deck to truck, Mr. Adams having made good use of his time while others were sleeping to get up the spare topgallant-mast forward and set all the upper sail he could; so the passengers, roused up to new life by the cheery influence of the bright summer day, coming after all the gloom and misery and storm and tempest of the past, mustered round the cuddy table in full force.

Mr. Meldrum and the American were there as a matter of course; but, by the side of her father, on the right of the skipper, appeared now for the first time at the table since the ship had left port, the graceful form of Kate Meldrum accompanied by the slighter figure of Florry, supported on the other side of the table by Mrs. Major Negus and her young hopeful; while Mr. Adams faced Captain Dinks—it being the chief mate’s turn of duty on deck—having brave Frank Harness close alongside.

They formed a very joyous coterie altogether, and enjoyed themselves all the more from their natural revulsion of spirits after all the discomfort and misery they had passed through, Captain Dinks himself setting an example and provoking the merry laughter of the girls with his absurd jokes, although the young ladies seemed brimful of fun, especially Miss Florry, who the skipper said might make a good match for mischievousness with Master Negus—whereat a grim smile was seen to steal across the face of “the Major,” lightening up her sallow countenance and making her “come out in new colours.”

As for Mr. Zachariah Lathrope, he was too busy with the ham and eggs to do much talking; although, like the monkeys, he probably thought the more, for ever and anon he would pass encomiums on the viands and pass up his plate for a fresh helping, the steward having enough to do in supplying his wants quickly enough.

After breakfast, a visit was paid to “Snowball,” the darkey Stowaway, who was found much better and progressing so favourably that the captain ordered his removal to the “fokesail,” to complete his convalescence; which it may be here added he satisfactorily accomplished in a few days, when he was installed in the galley as cook, in the place of a Maltese sailor who was glad to get forward again before the mast. The negro had slept continually from the time he had been released from durance vile in the after-hold, neither the racket below nor the turmoil on deck during the storm having disturbed his slumbers. This, no doubt, had hastened his recovery, for Mr. McCarthy was positive that three of his ribs at least had been broken.

“Why is Snowball like a worm, Miss Meldrum?” said Captain Dinks to Kate, after telling her that he intended installing the darkey in the galley as cook; “do you know, eh!”

“Oh, if that’s a conundrum, captain,” replied she with a piquant laugh that lit up her whole face, making it quite beautiful, Frank Harness thought, “I give it up at once. I’m a bad hand at guessing riddles.”

“Well, you see,” said Captain Dinks, with that cheery “ho, ho!” of a laugh of his, which always preceded any of his good things, “the worm or grub develops into the butterfly; but Snowball made the butter fly when he tumbled over that cask in the steerage, and now he is going to develop into the grub line and turn cook!”

“That’s too bad!” said Kate laughing. “I never heard a worse sort of pun in my life.”

“Then it’s all the better, my dear,” replied he; and as everybody else laughed too, they possibly shared the captain’s opinion.

After this, there was a move on deck—not before it was needed perhaps!

At noon, Captain Dinks, after manipulating his sextant and adjusting the sights, seemed to be much longer taking his observation than usual; and when he went below to his cabin to work out the reckoning he certainly remained a most unconscionable time.

By and by, however, he came up the companion again, his face beaming with delight.

“What do you think, Mr. Meldrum?” said he, somewhat excitedly, to that gentleman, who, along with the remainder of the saloon party, was standing on the poop leaning over the taffrail to windward, looking over the apparently limit less expanse of water, that stretched away to the horizon, and basking in the sunshine, which was tempered by a mellow breeze that seemed just sufficient to keep the sails of the Nancy Bell full—and that was all.

“I’m sure I can’t say,” replied Mr. Meldrum good-humouredly. “Found another ghost in the cabin, eh?”

“No, no; couldn’t have two in one voyage,” said the skipper.

“Made another conundrum?” again inquired the other slily, poking fun at the captain’s previous attempt in the riddle line.

“Oh, no,” said Captain Dinks, laughing out at this. “That was too good to be repeated: I’ve got better news than that, Mr. Meldrum—something really to surprise you!”

“I’m all attention,” said Mr. Meldrum, “but pray do not keep us long in suspense. Don’t you see we’re all anxious!”

“Why,” exclaimed Captain Dinks triumphantly, “the Nancy Bell has made nearly five degrees of latitude since I last took the sun, there!”

“Oh dear!” said Florry ruefully; “I thought you were going to tell us something funny!” and she looked so disappointed that Kate laughed at her and Master Maurice Negus grinned; whereupon Florry, in a pet, smacked the young gentleman’s face, for which she was reproved by her father and ordered below, although the sentence of banishment was remitted later on at Mrs. Major Negus’s especial request.

This little interlude over, the captain proceeded with his explanation.

“Yes,” said he, “we’re now in latitude 44 degrees 56 minutes north, and longitude 9 degrees 42 minutes west; so that we’ve run pretty close on four hundred miles since yesterday at noon. Just think of that, now!”

“A pretty good distance,” said Mr. Meldrum; “but, you must recollect we had the gale to drive us on.”

“Aye, sorr,” said Mr. McCarthy, joining in the conversation, “and didn’t it droive us too! Begorrah, there was some times that the wind tuck the ship clane out of the wather and carried us along in the air like one of them flying-fish you’ll say when we gits down to the line!”

“It was fortunate it was in our favour,” observed the captain reflectively. “We couldn’t have tried to beat against it; and, heavily-laden as we are, it would have been madness to have tried to lay-to!”

“You’re right,” said Mr. Meldrum, “and it was equally fortunate that the gale carried us so far and no further! Another twelve hours of it and we would have been high and dry ashore on the Spanish coast.”

“I think you’re not far out,” replied the captain, scratching his head and pondering over the matter, “for we’ll only just shave past Cape Finisterre now keeping our course; and if we hadn’t made so much westing when we got out of the Channel I don’t know where we should have been!”

“Faix and it was grumbling at it you were all the toime, cap’en!” said McCarthy with a knowing wink; “though you do now say it was all for the best, as the man said when they buried his wife’s grandmother!”

“Aye, you’re right,” said Captain Dinks more seriously, “all is for the best, if we could only know it at the time!”

Thenceforward, the weather kept fine; and the fates seemed favourable to the Nancy Bell in her pilgrimage across the sea.

There was no lack of incident in the voyage, however.

One day, about a week after they had bidden farewell to the Bay of Biscay with all its terrors and troubled waters, as the ship was approaching that region of calms which lies adjacent to the Tropic of Cancer, her rate of progression had grown so “small by degrees and beautifully less,” that she barely drifted southward with the current, until at length she came to a dead stop, so far as those on board could judge, lying motionless on the surface of the water “like a painted ship upon a painted ocean,” as the situation is described in Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner.

Round about the vessel, dolphins disported themselves, and “Portuguese men-of-war” floated over the sea with their gelatinous sails unfurled, and everything seemed lazy and enjoyable to the passengers—although the captain and crew did not evidently relish the state of inaction which the calm brought about, for they were looking out in all quarters for the wished-for wind.

Not a ship was in sight—nothing happening to break the peaceful repose of the deep for hours.

The captain was “having a stretch” below; the men snoozing away on the deck forwards in all sorts of odd corners; the officer of the watch blinking as he squinted aloft to see if the dog-vane stirred with any passing breath of air; even the steersman was nodding over the helm, as the wheel rotated round to port or starboard as it listed, according as the ship rose or fell on the long heavy rolling swell that undulated over the bosom of the deep; and most of the passengers were in the same somnolent state—when all at once an event occurred that soon broke the monotony of the afternoon, waking up the sleepy ones to fresh vitality, for an object of interest had at last arisen in the uneventful day sufficient for the moment to enchain their attention.

The listless lotus eaters had to thank Master Negus for the excitement, in the first instance.

That young gentleman was possessed of a keen desire for knowledge, which his more prosaic seniors were in the habit of misconstruing, deeming it to arise, as they said, from an insatiable and impertinent curiosity combined with an inherent love of mischief. Be that as it may, this desire for knowledge on Master Maurice’s part frequently led him into places where, to put it delicately, his presence was undesirable in many ways; his love for investigation taking him especially to certain dangerous localities whither he was peremptorily forbidden to go both by his mother and the captain.

Among such tabooed spots in the ship was the forecastle; and here, consequently, as a matter of course, Master Maurice most delighted to steal away when neither the maternal eye of Mrs. Major Negus was upon him nor any of the other people aft were watching him. He did not mind the sailors, for they made a point of encouraging him forward and took much pleasure in developing his propensities for mischief.

This afternoon, he was enjoying himself after the desire of his heart-climbing about the rigging in a way that would have made his mother faint, when, in one of his scrambles up to the foretop, he saw something in the water which was hidden from the sight of the others on board, through the head-sails of the ship shutting out their line of view.

“Oh, crickey,” shouted out Master Negus at the top of his voice, at once betraying his whereabouts in his excitement, “there’s a fight going on in the water, and two whales are leathering each other like fun!”