Read Ebook: The Cruise of the Dainty; Or Rovings in the Pacific by Kingston William Henry Giles

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Ebook has 514 lines and 47319 words, and 11 pages

I ran back to Dick. The poor fellow was delighted, and burst into tears. "I own, Ned, I've had nothing to eat all day in this land of plenty, for I could not bring myself to beg, and nobody offered me anything," he exclaimed, scarcely able for shame to get out his words.

I fortunately had a shilling in my pocket. "Here, Dick, go and get something to eat," I said, giving it to him. I thought that he would rather have some food first, before he came to talk with Harry. "Then come up to my brother's house--you can easily find it--and I will speak to him in the meantime." Dick promised to come.

While we walked home I told my brother more about Dick.

"It is very clear that the first thing we must do for him is to give him an outfit, or he'll not be presentable on board, and then I hope, from gratitude, that he will behave well," he observed.

On our way we stopped at an outfitter's, and Harry gave an order to the storekeeper to supply whatever I might select for Dick. As we walked on, he told me what things he wished me to get.

Soon after we reached home Dick presented himself at the door, looking somewhat brighter than he did when I first saw him, but rather ashamed of himself and unwilling to come in. Harry, however, came and had a few words with him, and seemed satisfied that he might be made useful on board the schooner.

As we had no place to put him up in the house, he told me to get a lodging for him for the night, and to see that he had plenty of food. "I say, Ned," he added, "just give him a hint to take a bath and get his hair cut before he puts on his clean clothes."

Accordingly, telling Dick to come with me, I took him to the outfitter's. We soon got the necessary clothing for him, and then left him at a lodging with a person who knew my brother.

That evening was to be the last on shore for many a long day. Mary and her sister were in high spirits at the thoughts of their trip, for which they had got everything ready.

The next morning Dick presented himself so changed for the better in appearance, that Harry scarcely knew him. He looked a fine, intelligent sailor lad, and at once began to make himself useful in carrying down our things to the boat: most of our heavier luggage had been sent on board the previous evening. Mr Humby came off in a shore boat.

While our own boat was being hoisted in, my brother gave his last directions.

"I'll do my best, Mr Harry, and I pray that you may have a successful voyage, and when you return find all things going on well," he said, as he shook hands with us all.

The anchor was then hove up, and sail being made, we stood out of the harbour, while Mr Humby returned on shore, waving his last adieus.

The first part of our voyage was uneventful. We had fine weather, a fair wind, and a smooth sea, and the ladies soon got accustomed to their life on board, declaring that it was even more pleasant than they had expected, though they should like occasionally to get sight of some of the beautiful islands of the Pacific, of which they had so often heard.

We left New Caledonia and the Loyalty Islands on our port side, then steered to the north between the New Hebrides and the Fiji Islands, at neither of which my brother wished to touch.

Day after day we sailed on without sighting land, and at last Emily exclaimed, "What has become of the islands we have heard so much about? I thought we should not pass a day without seeing several of them. They appear on the chart to be very close together, like the constellations in the sky."

"But if you will measure off on the chart the distances they are apart, you will easily understand how it is we have sailed so far without seeing them," said Harry.

The very next day, as Fanny was looking over the starboard side, Harry pointed out to her several blue hillocks rising out of the ocean, which he told her were the northern islands of Fiji, the habitation of a dark-skinned race, once the most notorious cannibals in the Pacific.

"I am very glad to keep away from them, then," answered Fanny, "for I shouldn't at all like to run the risk of being captured and eaten."

"Not much chance of that," said Harry. "The larger number of them have given up their bad habits, and promise to become as civilised as any of the people in these seas."

"Still, I would rather not go near their shores," said Fanny.

She little thought at the time that there were many other islands in every direction, the inhabitants of which were quite as savage as those of Fiji had been.

From the first, Tom Platt had taken a fancy to Dick, who had hitherto behaved himself remarkably well.

I always treated Dick in a friendly way, though he was before the mast, and I was glad to find that he did not presume on this, but willingly did whatever he was ordered. Tom had had a hammock slung for Dick near his berth away from the men, whose conversation, he said, was not likely to do him any good.

Our life on board was very regular; Tom and I kept watch and watch, the crew being divided between us, while Harry, as captain, was on deck at all hours whenever he thought it necessary.

The calm which I described at the commencement of my narrative had continued for many hours, and when the sun sank beneath the horizon there was not the slightest sign of a coming breeze. It was my first watch, and before Harry went below he charged me to keep a careful look-out, and to call him should there be any sign of a change of weather. The schooner still floated motionless on the water; scarcely a sound was heard, except the cheeping of the main boom, and the low voices of the men forward, as they passed the watch spinning their oft-told yarns to each other.

I slowly paced the deck, enjoying the comparative coolness of the night, after the intense heat of the day. The stars in the southern hemisphere were shining brilliantly overhead, reflected in the mirror-like ocean. The watch at length were silent, and had apparently dropped off to sleep, though I could see the figure of the man on the look-out as he paced up and down or leaned over the bulwarks. Suddenly, the stillness was broken by a dull splash. I started; it seemed to me as if some one had fallen overboard, but it was only one of the monsters of the deep poking its snout for an instant above the surface, and when I looked over the side it had disappeared. Occasionally I heard similar sounds at various distances. I had some difficulty in keeping myself awake, though by continuing my walk I was able to do so; but I was not sorry when the old mate turned out, without being called, to relieve me.

"We have not got a breeze yet," I observed as he came on deck.

"No, Master Ned, and we shan't get one during my watch either; and maybe not when the sun is up again," he answered.

Tom was right. When I came on deck the next morning the sea was as calm as before. Though it appeared impossible that we could have moved our position, I was greatly surprised, on looking away to the westward, to see what I at first took to be the masts of a vessel rising above the horizon. I pointed them out to my brother who had just come on deck. He told me to go aloft with a telescope and examine them more minutely. I then discovered that they were trees growing on a small island, apparently cocoanuts, or palms of some sort. Beyond, to the south and west, were several islands of greater elevation, some blue and indistinct, but others appeared to be covered with trees like the nearer one, while between us and them extended from north to south a line of white surf distinctly marked on the blue ocean. On reporting to Harry what I had seen, he said that the surf showed the existence of a barrier reef surrounding the islands. "We may find a passage through it, but sometimes these reefs extend for miles without an opening through them. A strong current must be setting from the eastward towards it, or we should not have been drawn so far during the night, for certainly there was no appearance of an island in that direction at sundown."

We soon had convincing proof that Harry was right in his conjecture. There could be no doubt that a current was setting us towards the land, for the trees gradually rose higher and higher above the water, and at length we could see them from the deck, while the white line of surf breaking on the reef became more and more distinct. At the same time a slowly moving, at first scarcely perceptible swell, which Fanny called the breathing of the ocean, passed ever and anon under the vessel, lifting her so gently that the sails remained as motionless as before. It was difficult indeed to discover that there was any movement in the mirror-like surface of the deep, and yet we could feel the deck rise and fall under our feet. The awning was rigged, and Mary and Fanny were seated in their easy-chairs under it, Mary reading aloud while her sister worked. Nat, who had placed himself near them, cross-legged on a grating, to listen, with a marline-spike and a piece of rope, was practising the art of splicing, in which he had made fair progress. "I say, Ned, I wish you would show me how to work a Turk's head," he exclaimed.

I went to him and did as he asked me. This made Mary stop reading; and Fanny, looking out towards the island, remarked, "How near we are getting. I am so glad, for I want to see a real coral island, and that of course is one. I suppose we shall anchor when we get close to it, and be able to go on shore." Harry, who overheard her, made no reply, but looked unusually grave, and told me to bring the chart from below. Spreading it out on the companion-hatch, we again, for the third or fourth time, gave a careful look at it.

"I cannot understand the set of this current," he said. "It probably sweeps round the island. But we are being carried much closer than I like to be in so perfect a calm. If we get a breeze it will be all right, but--"

Just then the sails gave several loud flaps, as if some one had shaken them out, and the schooner rolled now to one side, now to the other. Her head had moved so as to bring the swell abeam. Once having begun, she went on making the same unpleasant movements. It was evident that the swell had increased.

"Is there no way to stop her from doing that?" asked Mary.

"Not till the wind fills her sails," answered Harry. "I hope, however, that we shall get a breeze before long."

Harry did not say this in a very cheerful tone. He soon afterwards beckoned Tom Platt to him, and I saw them talking earnestly together for some minutes. I joined them. They were discussing the probable set of the current, which was at present sweeping us at the rate of at least three knots an hour towards the reef.

"We might keep her off it, at all events, until a breeze springs up," remarked Tom.

"We'll have the boats out, then, and do our best," said my brother, and he gave the order "Out boats."

We carried two boats on the davits, but as they were too light to be of much service, we hoisted out the long-boat, which was stowed amidships. We also lowered one of the gigs. The two boats were at once made fast to the tow-line. The men gave way, and the schooner's head was kept off from the threatening reef, against which the sea was breaking with tremendous force. The men bent to their oars, for they knew the danger as well as we did.

We all watched the reef with anxious eyes. Should the vessel be driven against it, we should, in a few seconds, we well knew, be dashed to pieces; and, though we might escape in the boats before that catastrophe occurred, we should be left to make a long voyage before we could reach any civilised people. All around us were islands, most of them, we had reason to fear, inhabited by treacherous and blood-thirsty savages.

We, of course, did not express our anxiety to the ladies, who, however, I thought, began to suspect that the vessel was in danger, although they said nothing. The men had been pulling fully an hour against the current, and yet, as I looked at the reef, I could not help acknowledging to myself that the vessel was nearer than at first. The swell, at the same time, began to increase, and we could now hear the roar of the breakers as they dashed against the wall of coral which interrupted their progress.

"We'll send the other boat ahead, Platt," said my brother.

"Ay, ay, sir," answered Tom; and he and I with the two remaining men lowered her, and, jumping in, joined our shipmates in towing, leaving only my brother with Dick and Nat to take charge of the vessel. He now ordered us to pull across the current, in the hopes of thus in time getting out of it. We all pulled away with a will, making the schooner move faster through the water than she had done for many hours.

"We must manage it somehow," shouted Tom to the other boats. "Give way, lads--give way. We shall soon be clear of the current."

It was of little use urging the men, as they were already straining every nerve. My brother walked the deck, stopping every now and then, casting his eyes frequently around the horizon in the hopes of discovering signs of a coming breeze. Then he would look towards the reef, but there was nothing encouraging to be seen in that direction. Still Tom shouted every now and then, "Pull away, lads--pull away!"

"We are pulling, mate, as hard as we can," answered the men from the other boats.

If we had any doubts of it before it was now clear enough that an unusually strong current was setting us towards the reef, even faster than we could pull away from it. Whenever the men showed any signs of relaxing their efforts Harry came to the bows and cheered them on, leaving Dick to steer. It was somewhat trying work for all of us, for the hot sun was beating down on our heads, the perspiration streaming from every pore; but our lives depended upon our exertions, and pull we must to the last moment. I heard some of the men talking of going alongside the schooner and asking the captain for a glass of grog apiece.

"Don't be thinking of that, lads," cried Tom. "It would be so much precious time lost. We can pull well enough if we have the will. The grog would not give you any real strength, and you'd be as thirsty as before a few minutes afterwards. Can't one of you strike up a tune, and see if that don't help us along."

There was no response to this appeal, so Tom himself at once began shouting a no very melodious ditty. First one man joined in, then another and another, until the whole of the boats' crews were singing at the top of their voices. It appeared to me that the vessel was moving somewhat faster than before through the water, but looking towards the wall of foam that seemed no further off. Still we knew that our efforts were of use, as we thus considerably delayed the destruction which awaited our vessel should she once get within the power of the breakers. Hour after hour passed by. The swell had increased, and, combined with the current, made our task still more difficult, but Harry had too much at stake to let any consideration for our fatigue induce him to allow us to rest for a moment. "Pull on, lads, pull on," he shouted. "We shall have the breeze before long, and we'll not let the schooner be cast away."

At last Harry shouted out, "Mr Platt, in the second gig, come alongside and help trim sails." We at once obeyed him.

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