The wind still continued a brisk gale and the sea very heavy. Yet overhead it was a glorious night, and as the glass had risen steadily, I was surprised to find the wild weather holding on so long.
I busied my head with all kinds of schemes to save the ship, and believed it would be no hard matter to do so if the water did not come into her more quickly than she was now making it.
Unfortunately, there were only two parts of the ship's hold which we could get into: namely, right forward in the fore peak, and right aft down in the lazarette. If she hadstrained a butt, or started any part of her planking or outer skin, amidships or anywhere in her bottom between these two points, there would be no chance of getting at the leak unless the cargo were slung out of her.
But the leak could not be considered very serious that did not run a greater depth of water into the ship than under a foot an hour; and with the Bermudas close at hand and the weather promising fair, I could still dare to think it possible, despite the hopes and fears which alternately depressed and elevated me, to bring the vessel to port, all crippled and under-manned as she was.
These speculations kept me busily thinking until half-past eleven, on which I bawled to the steward, who got up and called the boatswain and Cornish, though I only wanted the boatswain. Cornishthought it was midnight and his turn to take the wheel, so he came aft. I resigned my post, being anxious to get on the main-deck, where I found the bo'sun in the act of sounding the well, he having lost some time in re-lighting the lamp, which had burnt out.
He dropped the rod carefully and found the water thirteen inches deep,—that was, nine inches high in the pumps.
"Just what I thought," said he; "she's takin' of it at a foot an hour, no better and no worse."
"Well, we must turn to," I exclaimed. "We mustn't let it rise above a foot, as every inch will make our work longer and harder."
"If it stops at that, good and well," said the boatswain. "But there's always a hif in these here sinkin' cases. However, there's time enough to croak when the worst happens."
He called to the steward, and we all three went to work and pumped vigorously, and kept the handles grinding and clanking, with now and again a spell of a couple of minutes' rest between, until the pumps gave out the throaty sound which told us that the water was exhausted.
Though this proved beyond a doubt that, providing the leak remained as it was, we should be able to keep the water under, the prospect before us of having to work the pumps every hour was extremely disheartening; all four of us required sleep to put us right, and already our bones were aching with weariness. Yet it was certain that we should be able to obtain at the very best but brief snatches of rest; and I for one did not even promise myself so much, for I had strong misgivings as to the condition of the ship's bottom, and was prepared, at any moment, to find the water gaining morerapidly upon us than we could pump it out, though I kept my fears to myself.
I had been on deck now for four hours at one stretch; so, leaving Cornish at the wheel, I lay down on the steward's mattress in the cuddy, whilst he seated himself on the bench with his head upon the cuddy table, and snored in that posture.
But we were all aroused again within the hour by Cornish, who called to us down the companion, and away we floundered, with our eyes gummed up with sleep, to the pumps, and wearily worked them like miserable automatons.
The dawn found me again at the wheel, having been there half an hour.
I scanned the broken desolate horizon in the pale light creeping over it, but no ship was in sight. The sea, though not nearly so dangerous as it had been, was terribly sloppy, short, and quick, and tumbled veryoften over the ship's sides, making the decks, with the raffle that encumbered them, look wretched.
I had not had my clothes off me for some days, and the sense of personal discomfort in no small degree aggravated the profound feeling of weariness which ached like rheumatism in my body and absolutely stung in my legs. The skin of my face was hard and dry with long exposure to the terrible wind and the salt water it had blown and dried upon it; and though my underclothing was dry, yet it produced all the sensation of dampness upon my skin, and never in all my life had I felt so uncomfortable, weary, and spiritless as I did standing at the wheel when the dawn broke and I looked abroad upon the rugged fields of water, and found no vessel in sight to inspire me with a moment's emotion of hope.
I was replaced at the wheel by the boatswain, and took another turn at the pumps. When this harassing job was ended, I went into the forecastle, making my way thither with much difficulty.
I had a sacred duty to perform, and now that the daylight was come it was proper I should go to work.
On entering the forecastle I looked around me on the empty hammocks swinging from the deck, and finding one that looked new and clean, took it down and threw the mattress and blankets out of it and folded it up as a piece of canvas.
I then searched the carpenter's berth for a sail needle, twine, and palm, which things, together with the hammock, I took aft.
On reaching the cuddy I called Cornish, whose services in this matter I preferred to the steward's, and bid him follow me into the cabin where the old man's body lay.
When there, I closed the door and informed him that we should bury the poor old gentleman when the morning was more advanced, and that I wished him to help me to sew up the body in the hammock.
God knows I had rather that any man should have undertaken this job than I; but it was a duty I was bound to perform, and I desired, for Miss Robertson's sake, that it should be carried out with all the reverence and tenderness that so rude and simple a burial was susceptible of, and nothing done to cause the least violence to her feelings.
We spread the hammock open on the deck, and lifted the body and placed it on the hammock, and rolled a blanket over it. A very great change had come over the face of the corpse since death, and I do not think I should have known it as the kindly, dignified countenance, reverent withits white hair and beard, that had smiled at me from the bunk and thanked me for what I had done.
For what I had done!—alas! how mocking was this memory now!—with what painful cynicism did that lonely face illustrate the power of man over the great issues of life and death!
I brought the sides of the hammock to meet over the corpse and held them while Cornish passed the stitches. I then sent him to find me a big holystone or any pieces of iron, so as to sink the body, and he brought some pieces of the stone, which I secured in the clues at the foot of the hammock.
We left the face exposed and raised the body on to the bunk and covered it over; after which I despatched Cornish for a carpenter's short-stage I had noticed forward, and which was in use for slinging the menover the ship's side for scraping or painting her. A grating would have answered our purpose better, but the hatches were battened down, the tarpaulins over them, and there was no grating to be got at without leaving the hatchway exposed.
I dressed this short-stage in the big ensign, and placed it on the upper bunk ready to be used, and then told Cornish to stand by with the steward, and went aft and knocked at Miss Robertson's door.
My heart was in my throat, for this mission was even more ungrateful to me than the sewing up of the body had been, and I was afraid that I should not be able to address her tenderly enough, and show her how truly I mourned for and with her.
As I got no answer, I was leaving, wishing her to obtain all the sleep she could, butwhen I had gone a few paces she came out and followed me.
"Did you knock just now, Mr. Royle?" she asked.
I told her yes, but could not immediately summon up courage enough to tell her why I had knocked.
She looked at me inquiringly, and I began to reproach myself for my weakness, and still I could not address her; but seeing me glance towards her father's cabin she understood all on a sudden, and covered her face with her hands.
"I have left his face uncovered for you to kiss," I said, gently laying my hand on her arm.
She went at once into his cabin, and I closed the door upon her and waited outside.
She did not keep me long waiting. I think, brave girl that she was, even amidall her desolating sorrow, that she knew I would wish the burial over so that we might address ourselves again to the ship.
"I leave him to you now," she said.
I thought she meant that she would not witness the funeral, and was glad that she had so resolved, and I accordingly took her hand to lead her away to her cabin.
"Let me be with you!" she exclaimed. "Indeed, indeed, I am strong enough to bear it. I should not be happy if I did not know the moment when he left me, that I might pray to God for him then."
"Be it so," I answered. "I will call you when we are ready."
She left me; and Cornish and the steward and I went into the cabin to complete the mournful preparations.
I cased the body completely in the hammock, and we then raised it up and laid it upon the stage, which we had made toanswer for a stretcher, and over it I threw a sheet, so that only the sheet and the ensign were visible.
This done, I consulted with Cornish as to what part of the deck we should choose in order to tilt the body overboard. It is generally the custom to rest the body near the gangway, but the ship was rolling too heavily to enable us to do this now, and the main-deck was afloat, so we decided on carrying the body right aft, and thither we transported it, lodging the foot of the stretcher on the rail abaft the port quarter-boat.
The boatswain removed his hat when he saw the body, and the others imitated him.
I went below and told Miss Robertson that all was ready, and took from among the books belonging to the captain an old thin volume containing the Office for the Burial of Dead at Sea, printed in very largetype. It was fortunate that I had noticed this slip of a book when overhauling Captain Coxon's effects, for my own Prayer-Book did not contain the office, and there was no Church Service among the captain's books.
I entreated Miss Robertson to reflect before resolving to witness the burial. I told her that her presence could do no good, and faithfully assured her that prayers would be read, and the sad little service conducted as reverently and tenderly as my deep sympathy and the respect which the others felt for her could dictate.
She only answered that it would comfort her to pray for him and herself at the moment he was leaving her, and put her hand into mine, and gently and with tearless eyes, though with a world of sorrow in her beautiful pale face, asked me to take her on deck.
Such grief was not to be argued with—indeed, I felt it would be cruel to oppose any fancy, however strange it seemed to me, which might really solace her.
She started and stopped when she saw the stretcher and the white sheet and the outline beneath it, and her hand clasped mine tightly; but she recovered herself and we advanced, and then resolving that she should not see the body leave the stretcher, I procured a flag and placed it near the after skylight and said she could kneel there; which she did with her back turned upon us.
I then whispered Cornish to watch me and take note of the sign I should give him to tilt the stretcher and to do it quickly; after which I placed myself near the body and began to read the service.
It was altogether a strange, impressive scene, one that in a picture would, Iam sure, hold the eye for a long time; but in the reality create an ineffaceable memory.
The insecurity—the peril, I should prefer to say—of our situation, heightened my own feelings, and made me behold in the corpse we were about to commit to the deep a sad type and melancholy forerunner of our own end. The ship, with her broken masts, her streaming decks, her jib-boom gone, her one sail swollen by the hoarse gale, plunging and rolling amid the tumultuous seas that foamed around and over her; the strong man at the wheel, bareheaded, his hair blown about by the wind, looking downwards with a face full of blunt and honest sorrow, and his lips moving as they repeated the words I read; the motionless, kneeling girl; the three of us standing near the corpse; the still, dead burden on the stretcher, waiting to be launched; the bluesky, and sun kindling into glory as it soared above the eastern horizon: all these were details which formed a picture the wildness and strangeness of which no pen could describe. They are all, as a vision, before me as I write; but they make me know how poor are words, and eloquence how weak, when great realities and things which have befallen many men are to be described.
When I came to that part of the office wherein it is directed that the body shall be let fall into the sea, my heart beat anxiously, for I feared that the girl would look around and see what was done.
I gave the sign, and instantly Cornish obeyed, and I thank God that the sullen splash of the corpse was lost in the roar of a sea bursting under the ship's counter.
Now that it was gone, the worst was over; and in a short time I brought theservice to an end, omitting many portions which assuredly I had not skipped had not time been precious to us.
I motioned to Cornish and the steward to carry the stretcher away, and waited for Miss Robertson to rise; but she remained for some minutes on her knees, and when she rose, the deck was clear.
She gave me her hand, and smiled softly, though with a heart-broken expression in her eyes, at the boatswain by way of thanking him for his sympathy, and I then conducted her below and left her at the door of the cabin,saying—
"I have no words to tell you how I feel for you. Pray God that those who are still living may be spared, and be sure that in His own good time He will comfort you."
All that morning the gale continued fresh and the sea dangerous. We found that the ship was regularly making nine to ten inches of water an hour; and after the funeral we turned to and pumped her out again.
But this heavy work, coupled with our extreme anxiety and the perils and labour we had gone through, was beginning to tell heavily upon us. The steward showed signs of what strength he had coming to an end, and Cornish's face had a worn and wasted look as of a man who has fasted long. The boatswain supported this fatiguebest, and always went cheerfully to work, and had encouraging words for us all. As for me, what I suffered most from was, strange to say, the eternal rolling of the ship. At times it completely nauseated me. Also it gave me a racking headache, and occasionally the motion so bewildered me that I was obliged to sit down and hold my head in my hands until the dizziness had passed.
I believe this feeling was the result of over-work, long wakefulness, and preying anxiety, which was hourly sapping my constitution. Yet I was generally relieved by even a quarter of an hour's sleep, but presently was troubled again, and I grew to dread the time when I should take the wheel, for right aft the motion of the ship was intensely felt by me, so much so that on that morning, the vessel's stern falling heavily into a hollow, I nearly fainted,and only saved myself from rolling on the deck by clinging convulsively to the wheel.
At a quarter-past eleven I had just gone into the cuddy, after having had an hour's spell at the pumps with the boatswain and the steward, when I heard Cornish's voice shouting down the companion, "A sail! a sail!"
But a minute before I had felt so utterly prostrated, that I should not have believed myself capable of taking half-a-dozen steps without a long rest between each. Yet these magical words sent me rushing up the companion ladder with as much speed and energy as I should have been capable of after a long night's refreshing slumber.
The moment Cornish saw me he pointed like a mad man to the horizon on the weather beam, and the ship's stern rising at that moment, I clearly beheld the sailsof a vessel, though in what direction she was going I could not tell by the naked eye.
Both the boatswain and the other had come running aft on hearing Cornish's exclamation, and the steward, in the madness of his eagerness, had swung himself on to the mizzen rigging, and stood there bawling, "Yonder's the ship! yonder's the ship! Come up here, and you'll see her plain enough!"
I got the telescope and pointed it at the vessel, and found that she was heading directly for us, steering due south, with the gale upon her starboard quarter.
On this I cried out: "She's coming slap at us, boys! Hurrah! Cornish, you were the first to see her; thank you! thank you!"
And I grasped his hand and shook it wildly. I then seized the telescope, andinspected the vessel again, and exclaimed, while I held the glass to myeye—
"She's a big ship, bo'sun. She's carrying a main top-gallant sail, and there's a single reef in her fore-topsail. She can't miss us! She's coming right at us, hand over fist, boys! Steward, go and tell Miss Robertson to come on deck. Down with you and belay that squalling. Do you think we're blind?"
The small ensign was still alive, roaring away just as we had hoisted and left it; but in my excitement I did not think the signal importunate enough, though surely it was so; and rushing to the flag-locker, I got out the book of signals, and sang out to the boatswain to help me to bend on the flags which I threw out, and which would represent that we were sinking.
We hauled the ensign down, and ran up the string of flags, and glorious they lookedin our eyes, as they streamed out in a semicircle, showing their brilliant colours against the clear blue sky.
Again I took the telescope, and set it on the rail, and knelt to steady myself.
The hull of the ship was now half risen, and as she came rolling and plunging over the seas I could discern the vast space of froth she was throwing up at her bows. Dead on as she was, we could not tell whether she had hoisted any flag at the peak, and I hoped in mercy to us that she would send up an answering pennant to the royal mast-head, so that we might see it and know that our signal was perceived.
But this was a foolish hope, only such a one as bitter eager anxiety could coin. She was coming right at us; shecouldnot fail to see us; what need to answer us yet when a little patience, only a little patience, and she would be within a biscuit's throw of us?
Miss Robertson came on deck without any covering on her head, and the wind blew her hair away from its fastenings and floated it out like a cloud of gold. She held on to the rail and stared at the coming ship with wild eyes and a frowning forehead, while the steward, who had fallen crazy with the sight of the ship, clambered once more into the mizzen rigging, and shouted and beckoned to the vessel as a little child would.
It did not take me long, however, to recover my own reason, the more especially as I felt that we might require all the sense we had when the ship rounded and hove to. I could not, indeed, hope that they would send a boat through such a sea; they would lie by us and send a boat when the sea moderated, which, to judge by the barometer and the high and beaming sky, we might expect to find that night or next morning;and then we should require our senses, not only to keep the pumps going, but to enter the boat calmly and in an orderly way, and help our rescuers to save our lives.
The boatswain leaned against the companion hatchway with his arms folded, contemplating the approaching ship with a wooden face. Variously and powerfully as the spectacle of the vessel had affected Cornish and Miss Robertson, and myself and the steward, on the boatswain it had scarcely produced any impression.
I know not what kind of misgiving came into my mind as I looked from the coming ship to his stolid face.
I had infinite confidence in this man's judgment and bravery, and his lifelessness on this occasion weighed down upon me like a heavy presentiment, insomuch that the cheery gratulatory words I was aboutto address to Miss Robertson died away on my lips.
I should say that we had sighted this vessel's upper sails when she was about seventeen miles distant, and, therefore, coming down upon us before a strong wind, and helped onwards by the long running seas, in less than half an hour her whole figure was plain to us upon the water.
I examined her carefully through the glass, striving to make out her nationality by the cut of her aloft. I thought she had the look of a Scotch ship, her hull being after the pattern of the Aberdeen clippers, such as I remembered them in the Australian trade, painted green, and she was also rigged with skysail-poles and a great breadth of canvas.
I handed the glass to the boatswain, and asked him what country he took her to be of. After inspecting her, he said he did notthink she was English; the colour of her canvas looked foreign, but it was hard to tell; we should see her colours presently.
As she approached, Miss Robertson's excitement grew very great; not demonstrative—I mean she did not cry out nor gesticulate like the steward in the rigging; it was visible, like a kind of madness, in her eyes, in her swelling bosom, in a strange, wonderful, brilliant smile upon her face, such as a great actress might wear in a play, but which we who observe it know to be forced and unreal.
I ran below for the fur cap and coat, and made her put them on, and then drew her away from the ship's side and kept close to her, even holding her by the hand for some time, for I could not tell what effect the sight of the ship might produce upon her mind, already strung and weakened by privation and cruel sorrow and peril.
The vessel came rolling and plunging down towards us before the wind, carrying a sea on either quarter as high as her main-brace bumpkins, and spreading a great surface of foam before and around her.
When she was about a couple of miles off they let go the main top-gallant halliards and clewed up the sail; and then the helm was starboarded, which brought her bows astern of us and gave her a sheer, by which we saw that she was a fine barque, of at least eight hundred tons burden.
At the same moment she hoisted Russian colours.
I was bitterly disappointed when I saw that flag. I should have been equally disappointed by the sight of any other foreign flag, unless it were the Stripes and Stars, which floats over brave hearts and is a signal to Englishmen as full of welcomeand promise almost as their own loved bit of bunting.
I had hoped, God knows how earnestly, that we should behold the English ensign at the gaff end. Our chances of rescue by a British ship were fifty to one as against our chances of rescue by a foreigner. Cases, indeed, have been known of ships commanded by Englishmen sighting vessels in distress and leaving them to their fate; but, to the honour and glory of our calling, I say that these cases make so brief a list that no impartial-minded man will allow them to weigh with him a moment when he considers the vast number of instances of pluck, humanity, and heroism which illustrate and adorn the story of British naval life.
It is otherwise with foreigners. I write not with any foolish insular prejudice against wooden shoes and continental connexions:we cannot dispute good evidence. Though I believe that the Russians make fair sailors, and fight bravely on sea, why was it that my heart sank when I saw that flag? I say that the British flag is an assurance to all distressed persons that what can be done for them will be done for them, and foreigners know this well, and would sooner sight it when they are in peril than their own colours, be those colours Dutch, or French, or Spanish, or Danish, or Italian, or Russian. But he must be a confident man indeed who hopes anything from a vessel sailing under a foreign flag when life is to be saved at the risk of the lives of the rescuers.
"He's goin' to round to!" exclaimed the boatswain, who watched the movements of ship with an unconcern absolutely phenomenal to me even to recall now, when I consider that the lives of us all might havedepended upon the issue of the stranger's actions.
She went gracefully swooping and swashing along the water, and I saw the hands upon the deck aft standing by at the main-braces to back the yards.
"Bo'sun!" I cried, "she means to heave to—she won't leave us!"
He made no answer, but continued watching her with an immovable face.
She passed under our stern not more than a quarter of a mile distant, perhaps not so far. There was a crowd of persons near the wheel, some looking at us through binocular glasses, others through telescopes. There were a few women and children among them.
Yet I could detect no hurry, no eagerness, no excitement in their movements; they appeared as imperturbable as Turks or Hollanders, contemplating us as though wewere rather an object of curiosity than in miserable, perishing distress.
I jumped upon the grating abaft the wheel and waved my hat to them and pointed to our signals. A man standing near their starboard quarter-boat, whom, by the way he looked aloft, I judged to be the captain, flourished his hand in reply.
I then, at the top of my voice and through my hands, shouted, "We're sinking! for God's sake stand by us!" On which the same person held up his hand again, though I do not believe he understood or even heard what I said.
Meanwhile they had braced up the foreyards, and as the vessel came round parallel with us, at a distance of about two-thirds of a mile, they backed the mainyards, and in a few moments she lay steady, riding finely upon the water and keeping her decksdry, though the seas were still splashing over us freely.
Seeing now, as I believed, that she meant to stand by us, all my excitement broke out afresh. I cried out that we were saved, and fell upon my knees and thanked God for His mercy. Miss Robertson sobbed aloud, and the steward came down out of the rigging, and danced about the deck, exclaiming wildly and extending his arms towards the ship. Cornish retained his grasp of the wheel, but could not remove his eyes from the ship; the boatswain alone remained perfectly tranquil, and even angered me by his hard, unconcerned face.
"Good God!" I cried; "do you not value your life? Have you nothing to say? See, she is lying there, and will wait till the sea moderates, and then fetch us on board!"
"Perhaps she may," he answered, "andit'll be time enough for me to go mad when Iamsaved."
And he then folded his arms afresh, and leaned against the rail, contemplating the ship with the same extraordinary indifference.
They now hauled down the flag, and I waited anxiously to see if they would hoist the answering pennant to let us know they understood our signal; but they made no further sign that way, nor could I be sure, therefore, that they understood the flags we had hoisted; for though in those days Marryatt's Code was in use among ships of all nations, yet it often happened (as it does now), that vessels, both British and foreign, would, through the meanness of their owners, be sent to sea with merely the flags indicating their own number on board, so that speaking one of these vessels was like addressing a dumb person.
The movements of the people on the Russian barque were quite discernible by the naked eye; and we all now, saving the boatswain, watched her with rapt eagerness, the steward stopping his mad antics to grasp the poop rail, and gaze with devouring eyes.
We did not know what they would do, and, indeed, we scarcely knew what we had to expect; for it was plain to us all that a boat would stand but a poor chance in that violent sea, and that we should run a greater risk of losing our lives by quitting the ship than by staying in her.
But would they not give us some sign, some assurance that they meant to stand by us?
The agony of my doubts of their intentions was exquisite.
For some time she held her ground right abreast of us; but our topsail being full,while the Russian was actually hove to, we slowly began to reach ahead of her.
Seeing this, I cried out to Cornish to put the helm hard down, and keep the sail flat at the leech; but he had already anticipated this order, though it was a useless one; for the ship came to and fell off with every sea, though the helm was hard down, and before we could have got her to behave as we wished, we should have been obliged to clap some after sail upon her, which I did not dare do, as we had only choice of the mizzen and crossjack, and either of these sails (both being large), would probably have slewed her round head into the sea, and thrown her dead and useless on our hands.
Seeing that we were slowly bringing the Russian on to our lee quarter, I called out in the hope of encouraging theothers—
"No matter! she will let us draw ahead, and then shorten sail and stand after us."
"Are they goin' to lower that boat?" exclaimed the boatswain, suddenly starting out of his apathetic manner.
There was a crowd of men round the starboard davits where the quarter-boat hung, but it was not until I brought the telescope to bear upon them that I could see they were holding an animated discussion.
The man who had motioned to us, and whom I took to be master of the ship, stood aft, in company with two others and a woman, and gesticulated very vehemently, sometimes pointing at us and sometimes at the sea.
His meaning was intelligible enough to me, but I was not disheartened; for though it was plain that he was representing the waves as too rough to permit them to lower a boat, which was a conclusive sign, at least, that those whom he addressed were urging him to save us; yet his refusal wasno proof that he did not mean to keep by us until it should be safe to send a boat to our ship.
"What will they do, Mr. Royle?" exclaimed Miss Robertson, speaking in a voice sharpened by the terrible excitement under which she laboured.
"They will not leave us," I answered. "They are men—and it is enough that they should have seen you among us to make them stay. Oh!" I cried, "it is hard that those waves do not subside! but patience. The wind is lulling—we have a long spell of daylight before us. Would to God she were an English ship!—I should have no fear then."
I again pointed the glass at the vessel.
The captain was still declaiming and gesticulating; but the men had withdrawn from the quarter-boat, and were watching us over the bulwarks.
Since the boat was not to be lowered, why did he continue arguing?
I watched him intently, watched him until my eyes grew bleared and the metal rim of the telescope seemed to burn into the flesh around my eye.
I put the glass down and turned to glance at the flags streaming over my head.
"There she goes! I knew it. They never shows no pity!" exclaimed the boatswain, in a deep voice.
I looked and saw the figures of the men hauling on the lee main-braces.
The yards swung round; the vessel's head paid off; they squared away forward, and in a few minutes her stern was at us, and she went away solemnly, rolling and plunging; the main top-gallant sail being sheeted home and the yard hoisted as she surged forward on her course.
We remained staring after her—no onespeaking—no one believing in the reality of what he beheld.
Of all the trials that had befallen us, this was the worst.
Of all the terrible, cruel disappointments that can afflict suffering people, none,nonein all the hideous catalogue, is more deadly, more unendurable, more frightful to endure than that which it was our doom then to feel. To witness our salvation at hand and then to miss it; to have been buoyed up with hope unspeakable; to taste in the promise of rescue the joy of renovated life; to believe that our suffering was at an end, and that in a short time we should be among sympathetic rescuers, looking back with shudders upon the perils from which we had been snatched—to have felt all this, and then to be deceived!
I thought my heart would burst. I tried to speak, but my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth.
When the steward saw that we were abandoned, he uttered a loud scream and rushed headlong down into the cuddy.
I took no notice of him.
Cornish ran from the wheel, and springing on to the rail, shook his fist at the departing vessel, raving, and cursing her with horrible, blasphemous words, black in the face with his mad and useless rage.
The boatswain took his place and grasped the wheel, never speaking a word.
I was aroused from the stupor that had come over me, the effect of excessive emotion, by Miss Robertson putting her hand in mine.
"Be brave!" she whispered, with her mouth close to my ear. "God is with us still. My dead father would not deceive me. We shall be saved yet. Have courage, and be your own true self again!"
I looked into her shining eyes, out ofwhich all the excitement that had fired them while the Russian remained hove to, had departed. There was a beautiful tranquillity, there was a courage heaven-inspired, there was a soft and hopeful smile upon her pale face, which fell upon the tempest in my breast and stilled it.
God had given her this influence over me, and I yielded to it as though He Himself had commanded me.
All her own troubles came before me, all her own bitter trials, her miserable bereavement; and as I heard her sweet voice bidding me have courage, and beheld her smiling upon me out of her deep faith in her simple, sacred dream, I caught up both her hands and bent my head over them and wept.
"Cornish!" I cried, recovering myself, and seizing the man by the arm as he stood shouting at the fast-lessening ship, "whatis the use of those oaths? let them go their ways—the pitiless cowards. We are Englishmen, and our lives are still our own. Come, brave companion! we have all undergone too much to permit this trial to break us. See this lady! she swears that we shall be saved yet. Be of her heart and mine and the bo'sun's there, and help us to make another fight for it. Come!"
He suffered me to pull him off his perilous perch, and then sat himself down upon a coil of rope trembling all over, and hid his face in his hands.
But a new trouble awaited me.
At this moment the steward came staggering up the companion ladder, his face purple, his eyes protruding, and talking loudly and incoherently. He clasped the sea-chest belonging to himself, which certainly was of greater weight than he in his enfeebled state would have been able tobear had he not been mad. The chest was corded, and he had no doubt packed it.
He rushed to the ship's side and pitched the chest overboard, and was in the act of springing on to the rail, meaning to fling himself into the sea, when I caught hold of him, and using more force than I was conscious of, dragged him backward so violently that his head struck the deck like a cannon shot, and he lay motionless and insensible.
"That's the best thing that could have happened to him," exclaimed the boatswain. "Let him lie a bit. He'll come to, and maybe leave his craze behind him. It wouldn't be the fust time I've seen a daft man knocked sensible."
And then, coolly biting a chew out of a stick of tobacco, which he very carefully replaced in his breeches pocket, headded—
"Jim, come and lay hold of this herewheel, will yer, while me and Mr. Royle pumps the ship out!"
Cornish got up and took the boatswain's place.
"I can help you to pump, Mr. Royle!" said Miss Robertson.
The boatswain laughed.
"Lor' bless your dear 'art, miss, what next?" he cried. "No, no; you stand by here ready to knock this steward down agin if he shows hisself anxious to swim arter the Roosian. We'll see what water the ship's a-makin', and if she shows herself obstinate, as I rayther think she will, why, we'll all turn to and leave her. For you've got to deal with a bad ship as you would with a bad wife: use every genteel persuasion fust, and if that won't alter her, there's nothen for it but to grease your boots, oil your hair, and po-litely walk out."
There being but two of us now to work the pumps, it was more than we could do to keep them going. We plied them, with a brief spell between, and then my arms fell to my side, and I told the boatswain I could pump no more.
He sounded the well and made six inches.
"There's only two inches left that we can get out of her," said he; "and they'll do no harm."
On which we quitted the main-deck and came into the cuddy.
"Mr. Royle," he said, seating himself on the edge of the table, "we shall have toleave this ship if we aren't taken off her. I reckon it'll require twelve feet o' water to sink her, allowin' for there being a deal o' wood in the cargo; and maybe she won't go down at that. However, we'll say twelve feet, and supposin' we lets her be, she'll give us, if you like, eight or nine hours afore settlin'. I'm not saying as we ought to leave her; but I'm lookin' at you, sir, and see that you're werry nigh knocked up; Cornish is about a quarter o' the man he was; an' as to the bloomin' steward, he's as good as drownded, no better and no worse. We shall take one spell too many at them pumps and fall down under it an' never get up agin. Wot we had best do is to keep a look all around for wessels, get that there quarter-boat ready for lowerin', and stand by to leave the ship when the sea calms. You know how Bermuda bears, don't you, sir?"
"I can find out to-night. It is too late to get sights now."
"I think," he returned, "that our lives 'll be as safe in the boat as they are on board this ship, an' a trifle safer. I've been watching this wessel a good deal, and my belief is that wos another gale to strike her, she'd make one o' her long plunges and go all to pieces like a pack o' cards when she got to the bottom o' the walley o' water. Of course, if this sea don't calm, we must make shift to keep her afloat until it do. You'll excuse me for talkin' as though I wos dictatin'. I'm just givin' you the thoughts that come into my head whilst we wos pumpin'."
"I quite agree with you," I replied; "I am only thinking of the size of the quarter-boat; whether she isn't too small for five persons?"
"Not she! I'll get a bit of a mast riggedup in her and it'll go hard if we don't get four mile an hour out of her somehows. How fur might the Bermuda Islands be off?"
I answered, after reflecting some moments, that they would probably be distant from the ship between 250 and 300 miles.
"We should get pretty near 'em in three days," said he, "if the wind blew that way. Will you go an' tell the young lady what we're thinkin' o' doing while I overhauls the boat an' see what's wantin' in her? One good job is, we shan't have to put off through the ship sinkin' all of a heap. There's a long warning given us, and I can't help thinkin' that the stormy weather's blown hisself out, for the sky looks to me to have a regular set fair blue in it."
He went on to the main-deck. I inspected the glass, which I found had risensince I last looked at it. This, coupled with the brilliant sky and glorious sunshine and the diminishing motion of the ship, cheered me somewhat, though I looked forward with misgiving to leaving the ship, having upon me the memory of the sufferings endured by shipwrecked men in this lonely condition, and remembering that Mary Robertson would be one of us, and have to share in any privations that might befall us.
At the same time, it was quite clear to me that the boatswain, Cornish, and myself would never, with our failing strength, be able to keep the ship afloat; and for Miss Robertson's sake, therefore, it was my duty to put a cheerful face upon the melancholy alternative.
When I reached the poop the first thing I beheld was the Russian barque, now a square of gleaming white upon the southern horizon.
I quickly averted my eyes from the shameful object, and saw that the steward had recovered from his swoon and was squatting against the companion counting his fingers and smiling at them.
Miss Robertson was steering the ship, while Cornish lay extended along the deck, his head pillowed on a flag.
The wind (as by the appearance of the weather I might have anticipated, had my mind been free to speculate on such things) had dropped suddenly, and was now a gentle breeze, and the sea was subsiding rapidly. Indeed, a most golden, glorious afternoon had set in, with a promise of a hot and breathless night.
I approached Miss Robertson, and asked her what was the matter with Cornish.
"I noticed him reeling at the wheel," she answered, "with his face quite white. I put a flag for his head, and told him tolie down. I called to you, but you did not hear me; and I have been waiting to see you that you might get him some brandy."
I found that the boatswain had not yet come aft, and at once went below to procure a dram for Cornish. I returned and knelt by his side, and was startled to perceive that his eyeballs were turned up, and his hands and teeth clenched, as though he were convulsed. Sharp tremors ran through his body, and he made no reply nor appeared to hear me, though I called his name several times.
Believing that he was dying, I shouted to the boatswain, who came immediately.
The moment he looked at Cornish he uttered an exclamation.
"God knows what ails the poor creature!" I cried. "Lift his head, that I may get some brandy into his mouth."
The boatswain raised him by the shoulders, but his head hung back like a dead man's. I drew out my knife and inserted the blade between his teeth, and by this means contrived to introduce some brandy into his mouth, but it bubbled back again, which was a terrible sign, I thought; and still the tremors shook his poor body, and the eyes remained upturned, making the face most ghastly to see.
"It's his heart broke," exclaimed the boatswain, in a tremulous voice. "Jim, what's the matter with 'ee, mate? You're not goin' to let the sight o' that Roosian murderer kill you? Come, come! God Almighty knows we've all had a hard fight for it, but we're not beat yet, lad. 'Tis but another spell o' waitin', and it'll come right presently. Don't let a gale o' wind knock the breath out o' you. What man as goes to sea but meets with reverses like thishere? Swaller the brandy, Jim!... My God! Mr. Royle, he's dyin'!"
As he said this Cornish threw up his arms and stiffened out his body. So strong was his dying action that he knocked the glass of brandy out of my hand and threw me backwards some paces. The pupils of his eyes rolled down, and a film came over them; he uttered something in a hoarse whisper, and lay dead on the boatswain's knee.
I glanced at Miss Robertson. Her lips were tightly compressed, otherwise the heroic girl showed no emotion.
The boatswain drew a deep breath and let the dead man's head fall gently on the flag.
"For Miss Robertson's sake," I whispered, "let us carry him forward."
He acquiesced in silence, and we bore the body off the poop and laid it on the fore-hatch.
"There will be no need to bury him," said I.
"No need and no time, sir. I trust God'll be merciful to the poor sailor when he's called up. He was made bad by them others, sir. His heart wasn't wrong," replied the boatswain.
I procured a blanket from the forecastle and covered the body with it, and we then walked back to the poop slowly and without speaking.
I felt the death of this man keenly. He had worked well, confronted danger cheerfully; he had atoned, in his untutored fashion, for the wrongs he had taken a part in—besides, the fellowship of peril was a tie upon us all, not to be sundered without a pang, which our hearts never would have felt had fate dealt otherwise with us.
I stopped a moment with the boatswain to look at the steward before joining MissRobertson. To many, I believe this spectacle of idiocy would have been more affecting than Cornish's death. He was tracing figures, such as circles and crosses, with his fore finger on the deck, smiling vacantly meanwhile, and now and then looking around him with rolling, unmeaning eyes.
"How is it with you, my man?" I said.
He gazed at me very earnestly, rose to his feet, and, taking my arm, drew me a short distance away from the boatswain.
"A ship passed us just now, sir," he exclaimed in a whisper, and with a profoundly confidential air. "Did you see her?"
"Yes, steward, I saw her."
"A word in your ear, sir—mum!that's the straight tip. Do you see? I was tired of this ship, sir—tired of being afraid of drowning. I put myself on board thatvessel,and there I am now, sir. But hush! do you know I cannot talk to them—they're furriners! Roosians, sir, by the living cock! that's my oath, and it crows every morning in my back garden."
He struck me softly on the waistcoat, and fell back a step, with his finger on his lip.
"Ah," said I, "I understand. Sit down again and go on drawing on the deck, and then they'll think you're lost in study and not trouble you."
"Right, my lord—your lordship's 'umble servant," answered the poor creature, making me a low bow; and with a lofty and dignified air he resumed his place on the deck near the companion.
"Wot was he sayin'?" inquired the boatswain.
"He is quite imbecile. He thinks he is on board the Russian," I replied.
"Well, that's a comfort," said the boatswain. "He'll not be tryin' to swim arter her agin."
"Miss Robertson," I exclaimed, "you need not remain at the wheel. There is so little wind now that the ship may be left to herself."
Saving which I made the wheel fast and led her to one of the skylights.
"Bo'sun," said I, "will you fetch us something to eat and drink out of the pantry? Open a tin of meat, and get some biscuit and wine. This may prove our last meal on board theGrosvenor," I added to Miss Robertson, as the boatswain left us.
She looked at me inquiringly, but did not speak.
"Before we knew," I continued, "that poor Cornish was dying, the boatswain and I resolved that we should all of us leave the ship. We have no longer the strength toman the pumps. The water is coming in at the rate of a foot an hour, and we have found latterly that even three of us cannot pump more at a time out of her than six or seven inches, and every spell at the pumps leaves us more exhausted. But even though we had hesitated to leave her, yet now that Cornish is gone and the steward has fallen imbecile, we have no alternative."
"I understand," she said, glancing at the boat and compressing her lip.
"You are not afraid—you who have shown more heart and courage than all of us put together?"
"No—I am not much afraid. I believe that God is looking down upon us, and that He will preserve us. But," she cried, taking a short breath, and clasping her hands convulsively, "it will be very, very lonely on the great sea in that little boat."
"Why more lonely in that little boat than on this broken and sinking ship? I believe with you that God is looking down upon us, and that He has given us that pure and beautiful sky as an encouragement and a promise. Contrast the sea now with what it was this morning. In a few hours hence it will be calm; and believe me when I say that we shall be a thousandfold safer in that boat than we are in this strained and leaking ship. Even while we talk now the water is creeping into the hold, and every hour will make her sink deeper and deeper until she disappears beneath the surface. On the other hand, we may have many days together of this fine weather. I will steer the boat for the Bermuda Islands, which we cannot miss by heading the boat west, even if I should lack the means of ascertaining our exact whereabouts, which you may trust me will not bethe case. Moreover, the chance of our being rescued by a passing ship will be much greater when we are in the boat than it is while we remain here; for no ship, though she were commanded by a savage, would refuse to pick a boat up and take its occupants on board; whereas vessels, as we have already discovered to our cost, will sight distressed ships and leave them to shift for themselves."
"I do not doubt you are right," she replied, with a plaintive smile. "I should not say or do anything to oppose you. And believe me," she exclaimed earnestly, "that I do not think more of my own life than of that of my companions. Death is not so terrible but that we may meet it, if God wills, calmly. And I would rather die at once, Mr. Royle, than win a few short years of life on hard and bitter terms."
She looked at the steward as she spoke, and an expression of beautiful pity came into her face.
"Miss Robertson," I said, "in my heart I am pledged to save your life. If you die, we both die!—of that be sure."
"I know what I owe you," she answered, in a low and broken voice. "I know that my life is yours, won by you from the very jaws of death, soothed and supported by you afterwards. What my gratitude is only God knows. I have no words to tell you."
"Do you give me the life I have saved?" I asked, wondering at my own breathless voice as I questioned her.
"I do," she replied firmly, lifting up her eyes and looking at me.
"Do you give it to me because your sweet and generous gratitude makes you think it my due?—not knowing I am poor,not remembering that my station in life is humble, without a question as to my past?"
"I give it to you because I love you!" she answered, extending her hand.
I drew her towards me and kissed her forehead.
"God bless you, Mary darling, for your faith in me! God bless you for your priceless gift of your love to me! Living or dead, dearest, we are one!"
And she, as though to seal these words which our danger invested with an entrancing mysteriousness, raised my hand to her spotless lips, and then held it for some moments to her heart.
The boatswain, coming up the poop ladder, saw her holding my hand. He approached us slowly, and in silence; and putting down the tray, which he had heaped with sailor-like profusion with foodenough for a dozen persons, stood looking on us thoughtfully.
"Mr. Royle," he said, in a deliberate voice, "you'll excuse me for sayin' of it, but, sir, you've found her out?"
"I have, bo'sun."
"You've found her out, sir, as the truest-hearted gell as ever did duty as a darter?"
"I have."
"I've watched her, and know her to be British—true oak-seasoned, by God Almighty, as does this sort o' work better nor Time! You've found her out, sir?"
"It is true, bo'sun."
"And you, miss," he exclaimed, in the same deliberate voice, "have foundhimout?"
She looked downwards with a little blush.
"Mr. Royle, and you, miss," he continued, "I'm not goin' to say nothen agin this being the right time to find each otherout in. It's Almighty Providence as brings these here matters to pass, and it's in times o' danger as love speaks out strongest, turnin' the heart into a speakin' trumpet and hailin' with a loud and tremendious woice. Wot I wur goin' to say is this: that in Mr. Royle I've seen the love for a long while past burnin' and strugglin', and sometimes hidin' of itself, and then burstin' up afresh, like a flare aboard o' a sinkin' ketch on a windy night; and in you, miss, I've likewise seen tokens as 'ud ha' made me up and speak my joy days an' days ago, had it beenmyconsarn to attend to 'em. I say, that now as we're sinkin' without at all meanin' to drown, with no wun but God Almighty to see us, this is the properest time for you to have found each other out in. Mr. Royle, your hand, sir; miss, yours. I say, God bless you! Whilst we have breath we'll keep the boat afloat; andif it's not to be, still I'll say, God bless you!"
He shook us heartily by the hand, looked hard at the poor steward, as though he would shake hands with him too; then walked aft, hauled down the signals, stepped into the cuddy, returned with the large ensign, bent it on to the halliards, and ran it up to the gaff-end.
"That," said he, returning and looking up proudly at the flag, "is to let them as it may consarn know that we're not dead yet. Now, sir, shall I pipe to dinner?"
I think the boatswain was right.
It was no season for love-making; but it was surely a fitting moment "for finding each other out in."
I can say this—and God knows never was there less bombast in such a thought than there was in mine: that when I looked round upon the sea and then upon my beloved companion, I felt that I would rather have chosen death with her love to bless me in the end, than life without knowledge of her.
I put food before the steward and induced him to eat; but it was pitiful to see his silly, instinctive ways, no reason in them,nothing but a mechanical guiding, with foolish fleeting smiles upon his pale face.
I thought of that wife of his whose letter he had wept over, and his child, and scarcely knew whether it had not been better for him and them that he should have died than return to them a broken-down, puling imbecile.
I said as much to Mary, but the tender heart would not agree with me.
"Whilst there is life there is hope," she answered softly. "Should God permit us to reach home, I will see that the poor fellow is well cared for. It may be that when all these horrors have passed his mind will recover its strength. Our trials areveryhard. When I saw that Russian ship I thought my own brain would go."
She pressed her hand to her forehead, and an expression of suffering, provoked by memory, came into her face.
We despatched our meal, and I went on to the main-deck to sound the well. I found two feet of water in the hold, and I came back and gave the boatswain the soundings, who recommended that we should at once turn to and get the boat ready.
I said to him, as he clambered into the boat for the purpose of overhauling her, that I fully believed that a special Providence was watching over us, and that we might confidently hope God would not abandon us now.
"If the men had not chased us in this boat," I continued, "what chance should we have to save our lives? The other boat is useless, and we should never have been able to repair her in time to get away from the ship. Then look at the weather! I have predicted a dead calm to-night, and already the wind is gone."
"Yes, everything's happened for the best," he replied. "I only wish poor Jim's life had been saved. It's a'most like leavin' of him to drown to go away without buryin' him; and yet I know there'd be no use in puttin' him overboard. There's been a deal o' precious human life wasted since we left the Channel; and who are the murderers? Wy, the owners. It's all come through their sendin' the ship to sea with rotten stores. A few dirty pounds 'ud ha' saved all this."
We had never yet had the leisure to inspect the stores with which the mutineers had furnished the quarter-boat, and we now found, in spite of their having shifted a lot of the provisions out of her into the long-boat before starting in pursuit of us, that there was still an abundance left: four kegs of water, several tins of cuddy bread, preserved meat and fruits, sugar, flour, and other things, not to mention such items asboxes of lucifer-matches, fishing tackle, a burning-glass, a quantity of tools and nails; in a word, everything which men in the condition they had hoped to find themselves in might stand in need of to support life. Indeed, the foresight illustrated by the provisioning of this boat was truly remarkable, the only things they had omitted being a mast and sail, it having been their intention to keep this boat in tow of the other. I even found that they had furnished the boat with the oars belonging to the disabled quarter-boat in addition to those of her own.
However, the boat was not yet stocked to my satisfaction. I therefore repaired to my cabin and procured the boat's compass, some charts, a sextant, and other necessary articles, such as the "Nautical Almanack," and pencils and paper wherewith to work out my observations, which articles I placedvery carefully in the locker in the stern-sheets of the boat.
I allowed Mary to help me, that the occupation might divert her mind from the overwhelming thoughts which the gradual settling of the ship on which we stood must have excited in the strongest and bravest mind; and, indeed, I worked busily and eagerly to guard myself against any terror that might come upon me. She it was who suggested that we should provide ourselves with lamps and oil; and I shipped a lantern to hoist at our mast-head when the darkness came, and the bull's-eye lamp to enable me to work out observations of the stars, which I intended to make when the night fell. To all these things, which, sounding numerous, in reality occupied but little space, I added a can of oil, meshes for the lamps, top-coats, oilskins, and rugs to protect us at night, so that the afternoonwas well advanced before we had ended our preparations. Meanwhile, the boatswain had stepped a top-gallant stun'sail boom to serve us for a mast, well stayed, with a block and halliards at the mast-head to serve for hoisting a flag or lantern, and a spare top-gallant stun'sail to act as a sail.
By this time the wind had completely died away; a peaceful deep blue sky stretched from horizon to horizon; and the agitation of the sea had subsided into a long and silent swell, which washed up against the ship's sides, scarcely causing her to roll, so deep had she sunk in the water.
I now thought it high time to lower the boat and bring her alongside, as our calculations of the length of time to be occupied by the ship in sinking might be falsified to our destruction by her suddenly going stern down with us on board.
We therefore lowered the boat, and got the gangway ladder over the side.
The boatswain got into the boat first to help Mary into her. I then took the steward by the arms and brought him along smartly, as there was danger in keeping the boat washing against the ship's side. He resisted at first, and only smiled vacantly when I threatened to leave him; but on the boatswain crying out that his wife was waiting for him, the poor idiot got himself together with a scramble, and went so hastily over the gangway that he very narrowly escaped a ducking.
I paused a moment at the gangway and looked around, striving to remember if there was anything we had forgotten which would be of some use to us. Mary watched me anxiously, and called to me by my Christian name, at the same time extending her arms. I would not keep her in suspense a moment,and at once dropped into the boat. She grasped and fondled my hand, and drew me close beside her.
"I should have gone on board again had you delayed coming," she whispered.
The boatswain shoved the boat's head off, and we each shipped an oar and pulled the boat about a quarter of a mile away from the ship; and then, from a strange and wild curiosity to behold the ship sink, and still in our hearts clinging to her, not only as the home wherein we had found shelter for many days past, but as the only visible object in all the stupendous reach of waters, we threw in the oars and sat watching her.
She had now sunk as deep as her main-chains, and was but a little higher out of water than the hull from which we had rescued Mary and her father. It was strange to behold her even from a short distance and note her littleness in comparisonwith the immensity of the deep on which she rested, and recall the terrible seas she had braved and triumphed over.
Few sailors can behold the ship in which they have sailed sinking before their eyes without the same emotion of distress and pity almost which the spectacle of a drowning man excites in them. She has grown a familiar name, a familiar object; thus far she has borne them in safety; she has been rudely beaten, and yet has done her duty; but the tempest has broken her down at last; all the beauty is shorn from her; she is weary with the long and dreadful struggle with the vast forces that Nature arrayed against her; she sinks, a desolate abandoned thing in mid-ocean, carrying with her a thousand memories, which surge up in the heart with the pain of a strong man's tears.
I looked from the ship to realize our ownposition. Perhaps not yet could it be keenly felt, for the ship was still a visible object for us to hold on by; and yet, turning my eyes away to the far reaches of the horizon, at one moment borne high on the summit of the ocean swell, which appeared mountainous when felt in and viewed from the boat, then sinking deep in the hollow, so that the near ship was hidden from us—the supreme loneliness of our situation, our helplessness, and the fragility and diminutiveness of the structure on which our lives depended, came home to me with the pain and wonder of a shock.
Our boat, however, was new this voyage, with a good beam, and showing a tolerably bold side, considering her dimensions and freight. Of the two quarter-boats with which theGrosvenorhad been furnished, this was the larger and the stronger built, and for this reason had been chosen byStevens. I could not hope, indeed, that she would live a moment in anything of a sea; but she was certainly stout enough to carry us to the Bermudas, providing the weather remained moderate.
It was now six o'clock. I said to theboatswain—
"Every hour of this weather is valuable to us. There is no reason why we should stay here."
"I should like to see her sink, Mr. Royle; I should like to know that poor Jim found a regular coffin in her," he answered. "We can't make no headway with the sail, and I don't recommend rowin' for the two or three mile we can fetch with the oars. It 'ud be wurse nor pumpin'!"