Chapter Thirteen.
Kenneth’s Story (continued)—At the Cave.
“On, on the vessel flies; the land is gone,
And winds are rude in Biscay’s sleepless bay;
Four days are sped, but with the fifth anon,
New shores descried make every bosom gay.”
Byron.
Scene: The Spanish Señor and his two guests, Kenneth and Archie, once more together, not in the mountain cottage to-night, but in a cave, close down by the edge of the sea. It was the sea that was lisping on the sands not far from where they sat on the rocks, but the view beyond was one of moonlight, trees, rocks, and water combined, altogether very beautiful, and in some respects almost English-like.
Yes, now by moonlight it looked thoroughly English, but if by day you had rowed round these rocks, you would soon have been undeceived, for sharks in dozens visited the deep water, and in the cracks beyond were alligators, active and strong, and very hideous-looking crabs often crawled up the wet black cliffs; and among the trees themselves were great snakes, deadly and venomous; but it all looked very quiet and lovely now.
Kenneth was fond of caves, and there were plenty of them about here. He kept his boat in one. That very day, together the two friends had launched it, and spent all the long hours of sunlight in sailing or rowing about among the lovely islands of this sparkling sea, that look on a calm day as if they were actually afloat not in the water, but in the sky itself.
“My life,” said Kenneth, resuming his narrative of the day before, “my life, I thought, was going to be all rose-tinted now.
“Alas! Archie, lad, I soon found it quite the reverse, and it does really seem to me that those writers of books who paint a sailor’s existence as one long picnic do grievous wrong to the young folks who read them.
“A sailor’s life is like the billowy ocean on which he resides, all ups and downs, Archie.”
“I can easily believe that,” said his friend.
“But Captain Pendrey was very good to me, and there was an old boatswain on board who became my friend from the very first. He taught me to reef, to splice, and to steer, ay, and a deal more; in fact, during the two years I sailed in the old Miranda, he made a man of me.
“You see, Archie, I was already so far a seaman that I was not afraid of the ocean; and I was good at an oar.
“I was downright seasick when I first went out of Plymouth Sound. We had a head wind, and being only a sailing craft, had to beat and beat for days. I didn’t care much then what became of me. But the rough old bo’sun came and shook me up—I was lying nearly dead on a sea-chest—‘Pull yourself together, youngster. Go on deck,’ he said, ‘and look at the waves. Ain’t they mountains, just! It won’t do to give in.’
“I did go on deck and look at the waves, just for a moment. A green sea came thundering over the bows, took me off my legs, and washed me away down into the lee-scuppers, where I would have been drowned if the bo’sun hadn’t caught me up.
“‘I’m not going below again, though,’ I said to myself.
“Nor did I.
“The boats were all on board; I got into one of these as night fell, lashed myself to a thwart, and wet though I was, I slept with my head on a coil of ropes all through that stormy night. Stiff in the morning? Yes, a little, but I was better. I got my clothes off, and a man dashed buckets of sea water over me, and this revived me so much that I went below.
“The men in my mess were at breakfast; they were sitting on deck, jammed into corners anyhow, with their sou’wester hats between their legs to steady their coffee mugs.
“‘Salt pork, my lad,’ said the bo’sun. ‘You’re just at that stage that salt pork will turn the scale.’
“I took the hunk of pork he gave me and devoured it.
“Well, the bo’sun was right. It did turn the scale with a vengeance: I went on deck and hove the lead apparently. The steward passed me and said,—
“‘You’re not sick, are you, Sandie?’
“‘No,’ I said, ‘I’m only shamming. Ugh!’
“But by the time we were over the bay I was as sea-fast as any one on board. I got my sea legs, too.
“How blue the sea was now! How white the birds that skimmed over its surface! And the sails of ships that appeared in the distance were like snow when the sun shone over them.
“It wasn’t all sunshine even then, for a smart breeze was blowing, and cloud shadows chasing each other over the sea, just as I had often seen them do over fields of ripening grain in Glen Alva.
“I settled down to sea-life very easily now and very naturally. I soon knew every rope and spar and bolt in her, and was as happy as the sea-gulls. I cannot say more.
“We touched at Madeira, and here the captain took me on shore, and all over the place. What an isle of romance and beauty it is!
“We called in both at Saint Helena and Ascension, the former not the lonely sea-girt rock that old books describe, but a charming island of mountain, strath, and glen. Nor did I find Ascension to be a cinder with a few turtles on its beach. It has been cultivated to a wonderful extent, and I never did see a bluer, brighter ocean than that which laves its shores. The Cape of Good Hope hove in sight at last. I watched its bold and rugged coast as we came nearer and still more near to it.
“It was but like a long irregular cloud lying along the horizon at first. Then this cloud grew higher and darker and more defined. Then it grew bluer in parts, and lines stood boldly out towards us, then it turned blue and purple, oh! so lovely, and last of all it was a cloud no longer, but mountains stern and wild, and braelands covered half-way up with purple heath and wild flowers—geraniums I found afterwards these were—with rocks on the shore and a long white line of surf and sand.
“We did our business at the Cape and bore up for Australia.
“What a stretch of sea we had to cross, and what a length of time it was ere we reached Sydney!
“But I was not idle all these months. It was so good of Captain Pendrey, but he seemed to take a delight in teaching me navigation. He flattered me, too, I fear.
“‘You’re far too good and bright a boy,’ he said, ‘to stick before the mast.’
“So I worked and worked not only to please him, but because there was a prospect of my one day walking on the snowy quarter-deck of some beautiful barque, her proud commander.
“Every one on board loved our captain, although they called him the old man behind his back. From Australia we went to Hong Kong, then to Ceylon, from there to Calcutta, and then back again to Ceylon, and returned to India, lying up for repairs at the city of Bombay. And my kind captain never once went on shore without taking me with him, so that I saw so much that was strange in life, lad, that I could sit and talk in this cave for a month if my good friend here would bring us prog, and then I wouldn’t have half told you all my strange experiences.
“I had been now nearly two years at sea, and had passed one examination, so things were looking up.
“I dearly loved the sea and sea-life now. I would not have changed places with a land-lubber for all the world.
“We had many narrow escapes, of course, for our ship was a clipper, and the captain ‘cracked on.’ He did not mind risk so long as he made good voyages. But somehow I never dreamt of danger, not even while in the centre of a tornado in the Indian Ocean at night, and if there be a more fearful experience than that in the life of a mariner, I have yet to encounter it.
“Nor did I dream of danger even when seated of a night under the bright stars at the fo’c’stle head, while the men spun yarn after yarn of the awful dangers they had come through.
“‘I’ve been wrecked often and often,’ said our old ‘bo’sun’ one night. ‘I was in the Bombay when she was burned; I was a man-o’-war’s man then. Ah! Kennie, lad, it is a fearful thing, a fire at sea. I hope you’ll never see a burning ship. Over seventy of my shipmates were doomed that night, and some of them met worse deaths than drowning.
“‘Another time,’ he went on, ‘I was the only one saved out of a gunboat. I was taken off a bit of wreckage and rigging by the lifeboat after drifting about for twelve wet, cold, weary hours. Strange thing was this. I had been made captain of the foretop only a week before we were wrecked. ’Tis funny, mate, but it was on that same foretop I floated about so long. He! he! I was captain of the foretop then, and no mistake, and monarch of all I surveyed.’
“Just three weeks after this particular evening, Archie, I was away aloft one beautiful day. We were well down over the line, and bearing about South-South-East.
“There was a kind of haze over the ocean that day which made seeing distinctly difficult at any great distance, but I noticed what at first sight I thought was a bird or a shark’s fin. I hailed the deck as soon as I made out it was something afloat with men on it.
“‘Where away?’ came the reply.
“On pointing in the direction, the yards were trimmed, and we soon got nearer.
“The sight that met my eyes I will not forget till my dying day. The survivors of a ship that had foundered they were, half-naked, half-dead, sun-blistered, sinking wretches, five in all.
“They had been afloat on a raft for nine days without food to eat, and with hardly a drop of water to quench their awful thirst.
“From that day, Archie, I began to think that a sailor’s life had its dark as well as its rosy side.
“A year after this grief came. We were homeward bound. We got nearly to the Cape, and there our ship was dashed on a lee-shore, and I lost two of the best friends ever I had at sea, our poor captain and the dear old bo’sun.
“I was landed at Symon’s Town at last, and there, Archie, I got your letter, and found I was an orphan. And all this great grief came to me within a fortnight.
“I had been bound for English shores; my hopes beat high; in a few months longer, at most, I would once again clasp my dear mother in my arms, once more visit my home. Changed I knew the glen would be, but old friends would give me a warm greeting.
“Heigho! the blow fell; I determined not to return, and, Archie, from that day to this I have been a wanderer.
“But bless Providence for all His mercies! Archie, lad, I’m not badly off, and I have you.
“Shake hands, old boy. Now I’ve been doing all the talking, I shall take it out of you next, for I dearly love to hear your voice.
“Señor Gasco, mon ami, suppose we launch our little boat, and be off. I’m longing for supper and longing to sit down and rest in our mountain cottage. I don’t think I’ve been so happy for many and many a long year.
“Come along, Archie. How lovely the moonlight is playing over the water!”