When these two seas came together, the "Wampa" would rise and poise on them as if on a pivot. In this position, and with the gale blowing on the starboard quarter, her head would be thrown into the beam sea. It looked as if we could not survive. There was constant danger of our being broken up into small pieces. We dropped the peak of the spanker that formed the goose-wing sail, put it into gaskets, and ran with a three-reefed foresail.
We then put the oil-bags over the stern in the hope of quieting these angry seas. But this was useless. While we were fastening the lines that held the oil-bags in the water, a crushing comber came whistling along and filled our stanch little ship again from stem to stern. When she shook herself clear of the boiling foam I noticed that our oil-bags were gone, and with them the Captain's boat which hung from davits over the stern.
Old Charlie and Dago Joe were steering. Old Charlie had a faraway look in his watery eyes as he spoke and said:
"I am afraid, sir, this will be my last trick at this wheel."
I spoke harshly to this old sailor, saying, "To Hell with sentiment, this is no place for it. Watch your steering and don't feel sorry for yourself." Had I known what was so soon to happen I should not have so upbraided this poor harmless old soul. I have often regretted it.
Riley, who was taking no chances, was seemingly not all handicapped by his one eye. Always alert and as agile as a tiger, he went about the decks as if nothing were out of the ordinary, although to hear him talking to himself one would think that he expected to be extinguished by every sea that came. He had about twenty feet of manila rope tied about his waist with the end held in his hand. When a sea would hit us Riley would see it coming, and would pass the rope end around a belaying-pin or anything that he thought would hold his weight.
It was while she cleared herself from the sea that carried away the Captain's boat that I found Riley twisted around the spanker sheet like an eel. It took him some time to extricate himself, always watching the progress of the stern sea, and not seeming to notice his number ten brogans, which had woven themselves into the spanker-sheet falls. The hurricane was raising havoc with Riley's mustache. Having blown all over his face, it looked as if the only way to quiet it would be to put it into a plaster of Paris cast. He finally pulled himself clear of the sheet, exclaiming:
"Be Hivins, and wasn't that a close call—"
Just then Swanson came running aft and reported that the martingale guy had carried away on the flying-jibboom. It was then that my heart sank within me. I knew what to expect. Dismantled,—then to perish at sea!