Frenchy often drove us to the verge of distraction with his stories of the cooks at home in Dunkirk, until we finally had to put the ban on that sort of discourse. Again, we landed several bonitas teeming with energy, and, after the silver coin test, all hands fell to with a will, myself included. We also hooked a shark and hauled him on board by a "handy billy" snatched to the fore rigging.
The regular routine of setting up shrouds and stays preparatory to entering the heavy weather off the Horn, now began in earnest. We had left New York with a full set of new hemp lanyards in our lower rigging. The lanyard knots were turned in in a slovenly manner, with a lubberly disregard for appearances, that proved an eyesore to Captain Nichols. We cast new knots in these, and set up all standing rigging anew; a long, interesting job that initiated us into the mysteries of "rackings" and the "Spanish windlass," and the practical workings of the various "purchases" and "burtons"; the "luff tackles," and the "gun tackles."
The mate was the leading spirit in these proceedings, staying on deck practically all day to supervise the work. As we would set up one pair of shrouds to port and another to starboard, bringing them to a "full due," the mate was always there to say when to clap on the racking and "come up" on the rigging luffs.
How the mate stood it often amazed me, for he was very lively at night, but toward the end of this work the second mate would stand his last dog watch for him, giving our first officer a six hour spell of sleep every other day. What this means on a watch and watch racket, sailors who have traveled the long voyage route will know.
The real sailors came to the fore during this time in both watches, and Frenchy, Brenden, and Marshall, of our side, with Smith, Axel, and Hitchen of the starboard watch, proved their rightful claim to the full rating of A. B. Mr. Stoddard, who was a bit weak on his marline spike seamanship, though a good watch officer, made up for things by the way he bawled about and hurried and scurried his watch during the time the mate was on deck. His men hated him thoroughly and we were glad that he had very little to do with us.
Aboard a real shipshape and Bristol fashion deepwaterman of the old school, if there be any such left today, everything is done according to the custom of the sea. From the main truck to the keel, from the outermost end of the flying jibboom to the last band on the spanker, the ancient art of seamanship has decreed the exact way in which certain things shall be done. The deadeyes carry their knots inboard, forward to starboard, and aft to port. The lanyard lengths are justly proportioned to the length of the stay they extend, so the required "give" will be right, and the shroud pairs, stays, and backstays, are passed over the mast heads and rest upon the trestle trees, in due and proper form; the same in all ships worthy of the name.
Nations differ in their customs, and likewise in their rigs. No Italian ship can sail the sea with a straight martingale, and no other ship would venture forth with one that was anything but true.
For weeks at a time, after our entry into the southern trades, it was hardly necessary to touch a brace except for the sweating up each night in the last dog watch, when a swig or two on the ropes would bring back any slack that had worked around the pins. The job of setting up standing rigging completed, we turned our attention to the running gear. We rove off new whips on all the braces, using an eye splice that was a favorite with the mate, being tucked after the manner of a sailmaker's splice, that is, the continuity of the strands of the rope was preserved, the appearance of the whips being very trim.
The tops'l downhauls were rove off with new rope, and the gear of all the lower stays'ls, lower tops'ls and courses was overhauled and replaced where needed.
As we began to lift the Southern Cross and the trades left us, we again shifted sail, an all day job that this time fell on a Sunday, and when completed found us under our best suit of canvas ready for that storm corner of the voyage, Cape Horn. We overhauled the rudder tackles, reeving new purchases "with the sun," as indeed all purchases are rove. Oil bags were made, shaped like beech nuts, bound with ratline stuff, and fitted with a stout becket. By filling these with heavy non-freezing animal or vegetable oil and puncturing them with a sail needle, they afforded the best means for spreading oil on the waters in time of storm.