A Jolly Fellowship

by Frank R. Stockton

Again she came plowing along before us, the same group on her bow; again the life-preserver was thrown, and this time the captain seized it.

In a moment the line was made fast to the raft. But there was no sudden tug. The men on the bark knew better than that. They let out some two or three hundred feet of line and lay to, with their sails fluttering in the wind.

Then they began to haul us in. I don't remember much more of what happened just about this time. It was all a daze of high black hull and tossing waves, and men overhead, and ropes coming down, and seeing Corny hauled up into the air. After a while, I was hauled up, and Rectus went before me. I was told afterward that some of the stoutest men could scarcely help themselves, they were so cramped and stiff, and had to be hoisted on board like sheep.

I know that when I put my feet on the deck, my knees were so stiff that I could not stand. Two women had Corny between them, and were carrying her below. I was so delighted to see that there were women on board. Rectus and I were carried below, too, and three or four rough looking fellows, who didn't speak a word that we could understand, set to work at us and took off our clothes, and rubbed us with warm stuff, and gave us some hot tea and gruel, and I don't know what else, and put us into hammocks, and stuffed blankets around us, and made me feel warmer, and happier, and more grateful and sleepy than I thought it was in me to feel. I expect Rectus felt the same. In about five minutes, I was fast asleep.

I don't know how long it was before I woke up. When I opened my eyes, I just lay and looked about me. I did not care for times and seasons. I knew I was all right. I wondered when they would come around again with gruel. I had an idea they lived on gruel in that ship, and I remembered that it was very good. After a while, a man did come around, and he looked into my hammock. I think from his cap that he was an officer,—probably a doctor. When he saw that I was awake, he said something to me. I had seen some Russian words in print, and the letters all seemed upside down, or lying sideways on the page. And that was about the way he spoke. But he went and got me a cup of tea, and some soup, and some bread, and I understood his food very well.

After a while, our captain came around to my hammock. He looked a great deal better than when I saw him last, and said he had had a good sleep. He told me that Corny was all right, and was sleeping again, and that the mate's wife had her in charge. Rectus was in a hammock near me, and I could hear him snore, as if he were perfectly happy. The captain said that these Russian people were just as kind as they could be; that the master of the bark, who could speak English, had put his vessel under his—our captain's—command, and told him to cruise around wherever he chose in search of the two boats.

"And did you find them?" I asked.

"No," said he. "We have been on the search now for twenty-four hours, and can see nothing of them. But I feel quite sure they have been picked up. They could row, and they could get further into the course of vessels than we were. We'll find them when we get ashore."

The captain was a hopeful man, but I could not feel as cheerfully as he spoke. All that I could say was: "Poor Corny!"

He did not answer me, but went away; and soon, in spite of all my doubts and fears, I fell asleep.