The slack arrived some little time before the pale, cheerless dawn, and with it a small breeze fair for their passage down. Unwillingly enough Peedee aroused his masters from their fetid hole, getting by way of reward for his vigilant obedience of orders a perfectly tropical squall of curses. Nevertheless they were soon on deck, having turned in like horses, “all standing.” Without speaking a word to each other, they proceeded to get the anchor, but so out of humour were they that Peedee had much more than his usual allowance of fresh cuts and bruises before the barge was fairly aweigh. Gradually the wind freshened as if assisted by the oncoming light, so that before the red disc of the sun peeped over the edge of London’s great gloom behind them, the Sarah Jane was making grand progress. Again Peedee took the wheel, while the skipper and mate retired to the cabin for a drink. Suddenly sounds of woe arose therefrom. The agonising discovery had been made that the precious jar was empty. It had been capsized during the night, and the bung, being but loosely inserted, had fallen out. Its contents now lay in a sticky pool behind the stove, mixed with the accumulated filth of two or three days. It was a sight too harrowing for ordinary speech. They glared at one another for a few seconds in silence, until Trabby with a vicious set of his ugly mouth growled, “Thet—— young mudlawk.” “Ar,” said the mate, with an air of having found what he wanted, “I’ll—— well skin ’im w’en I goo on deck.” But though the thought was pleasant and some relief to their feelings, they remembered, being sober, that if they were not a little less demonstrative in their attentions to the boy they would certainly have to do his work themselves. That gave them pause, and they discussed with much gravity how they might deal with him without inconvenience to themselves, until breakfast time. When they had in hoggish fashion satisfied their hunger (their thirst no amount of coffee could quench) they lit their pipes and lay back to get such solace as tobacco could afford, and ruminate also upon the possibility of replenishing the stone jar. Peedee steered on steadily, breakfastless, and likely to remain so. Swiftly the barge sped down the reaches in company with a whole fleet of her fellows “cluttering up the river,” as an angry Geordie skipper, who had just shaved close by one of them, remarked, “like a school o’ fat swine in a tatty field.” So they fared for the whole forenoon without incident, until with a savage curse and a blow Trabby took the wheel from the hungry lad, bidding him go and get their dinner ready. While he was thus engaged a thick mist gradually closed in upon the crowded river, reducing its vivid panorama to an unreal expanse of white cloudiness through which phantom shapes slowly glided to an accompaniment of unearthly sounds. Suddenly to Peedee’s amazement the big sail overhead began to flap, the jib-sheet rattled on the “traveller,” and Skee Goss, striding forward, let go the anchor. Then the two men brailed in the mainsail, allowed the jib to run down, and without saying a word to the wondering boy, shoved the boat over the side, jumped into her, and were swallowed up in the fog. The instant they disappeared Peedee stood motionless, his ears acutely strained for the measured play of the oars as the skipper and mate pulled lustily shorewards. When at last he could hear them no longer, he rushed to the scuttle forward, and dropping on his knees by its side, called down, “Below there! ’r y’ sleep? On deck with ye ’s quick ’s the devil’ll let ye.” Up they came, looking scared to death. Without wasting a word, under Peedee’s direction the three hove the anchor up, although Peedee was artful enough to lift the solitary pawl so that it could make no noise. By the time they got the anchor they were all three streaming with sweat, but without a moment’s pause Peedee dropped the pawl, and taking a turn with the chain round the windlass end in case of accidents, cast off the brails, letting the great brown sail belly out to the fresh breeze. Having got the sheet aft with a tremendous struggle, he took the wheel, saying, “Now you two fellers, git forrard ’n histe thet jib up, ’n look lively too ’less you want ter be dam well murdered.” In utter bewilderment as to what was happening the two lads blundered forward, and guided by the energetic directions of their self-appointed commander, soon got the sail set. Fully under control at last, the Sarah Jane sped away seaward before a breeze that, freshening every minute, bade fair to be blowing a gale before night.
But Peedee, transformed into a man by his sudden resolve and its successful execution, called his crew to him, and while he skilfully guided the barge down the strangely quiet river, endeavoured to explain to them what he had done and why; together with his plans for the future. He was utterly contemptuous of their seafaring abilities, telling them that “he’d teach ’em more in two days than they’d learn aboard that ugly old hulk in a year,” and although they were each quite a head and shoulders taller than himself, he treated them as if they were mere infants and he was an old salt. And there was a light in his eye, an elasticity in his movements that impressed them more than all his words. Woe betide them had they dared to cross him! For in that small body was bubbling and fermenting the sweet must of satisfied revenge, strengthened by conscious power and utterly unadulterated by any sense of future difficulty or responsibility. Higher rose the wind, driving the mist before it and revealing the broad mouth of the river all white with foam as the conflicting forces of storm and tide battled over the labyrinth of banks. Obviously the first thing to do was the instruction of his crew in steering, for as soon as he found time to think of it he felt faint with hunger. Fortunately one of the runaways had been coxswain of a boat, and very little sufficed to show him the difference between a tiller and a wheel. And all untroubled by the rising sea, the deeply-laden barge ploughed on far steadier than many a vessel ten times her size would have done. Relieved from the wheel, Peedee hastened to the caboose and found some of the dinner he had been preparing still eatable. Supplementing it by such provisions as he could easily lay hands on in the cabin, the trio made a hearty meal, winding up with a smoke all round in genuine sailor fashion.
With hunger appeased and perfect freedom lapping them around, who shall say that they were not happy? Occasionally a queer little tremor, a premonition of a price by-and-by to be paid for their present adventure, thrilled up the spine of each of the two runaways, but when they stole a glance at the calm features of their commander they were comforted. So onward they sailed, through the tortuous channels of the Thames’ estuary, scudding before a stress of wind under whole canvas at a rate that made Peedee rejoice exceedingly, although every few minutes a green comber of a sea swept diagonally across the whole of the low deck, but never invaded the cabin top. Night fell, the side-lights were exhibited, and like any thousand-ton ship the Sarah Jane stood boldly out into mid-channel, Peedee shaping a course which would carry them down well clear of all the banks. Morning saw them off the Varne shoal, the objects of eager curiosity to the gaping crew of a huge four-masted barque that passed them within a cable’s length. And as the sun rose the weather cleared, the sky smiled down upon them, the keen wind and bright sea gave them a delicious sense of freedom, while the grand speed of their ship stirred them to almost delirious delight. This ecstatic condition lasted for two days until, no definite land being in sight, and passing vessels becoming fewer, the two new hands began to feel that dread of the unknown that might have been expected of them. Timidly they appealed to Peedee to tell them what he was going to do. But with bitter scorn of their fears, all the fiercer because he didn’t in the least know what was going to happen, he railed upon them for a pair of cowardly milksops, and suggested hauling up for some West-country port and dumping them on the beach. Truth to tell he was becoming somewhat anxious himself as to his whereabouts, for the stock of water was getting very low, although there was enough food in the hold to have lasted them round the world. Fate, however, served them better than design. When night fell a heavy bank of clouds which had been lowering in the west all day suddenly began to rise, and soon after dark, in a sudden squall, the wind shifted to that quarter with mist and rain. Under these new conditions Peedee lost his bearings and allowed his command to run away with him into the darkness to leeward. At about four o’clock in the morning he heard a dreadful sound, well known to him from experience, the hungry growl of breakers. But before he had time to get too frightened there was a sudden turmoil of foaming sea around them in place of the dark hollows and white summits of the deep water, and with a tipsy lurch or so the Sarah Jane came to a standstill. She lay so quietly that Peedee actually called his crew to brail up the mainsail and haul down the jib in sailor fashion. Daylight revealed the fact that she was high and dry, having run in past all sorts of dangers until she grounded under the lee of a beetling mass of rock and there remained unscathed. While they were having a last meal they were startled by seeing some uncouth-looking men coming at top speed over the rugged shore. But they lowered themselves down over the side and ran to meet them, finding them foreigners indeed. Before long the whole scanty population was down and busy with the spoil thus providentially provided, while the three boys were hailed as benefactors to their species, and made welcome to the best that the village contained. And two tides after the Sarah Jane was as though she had never been, while the wanderers, well provided with necessaries, were off for an autumn tour on foot through Southern Brittany.
SEA-SUPERSTITIONS
Not the least of the mighty changes wrought by the advent of steam as a motive-power at sea is the alteration it has made in the superstitious notions current among seamen from the earliest days of sea-faring. In the hurry and stress of the steamboat-man’s life there is little scope for the indulgence of any fancies whatever, and the old sea-traditions have mostly died out for lack of suitable environment. Indeed, a new genus of seafarers have arisen to whom the name of sailors hardly applies; they themselves scornfully accept the designation of “sea-navvies”; and many instances are on record where, it having become necessary to make sail in heavy weather to aid the lumbering tramp in her struggle to claw off a lee-shore, or keep ahead of a following sea, the master has found to his dismay that he had not a man in his crew capable of tackling such a job.
Perhaps the first old belief to go was that sailing on a Friday was to court certain disaster. All old sailors dwell with unholy gusto upon the legend of the ship that was commenced on a Friday, finished on a Friday, named the Friday, commanded by Captain Friday, sailed on a Friday, and—foundered on the same luckless day with all hands, as a warning to all reckless shipowners and skippers never again to run counter to the eternal decrees ordaining that the day upon which the Saviour of the world was crucified should be henceforth accursed or kept holy, according to the bent of the considering mind. But steam has changed all that. When a steamer’s time for loading or discharging began to be reckoned not in days but in hours, the notion of detaining her in port for a whole day in deference to an idea became too ridiculous for entertainment, and it almost immediately died a natural death. This, of course, had its effect upon the less hastily worked sailing vessels, although there are still to be found in British sailing ships masters who would use a good deal of artifice to avoid sailing on that day. Among the Spanish, Italian, Austrian, and Greek sailing vessels, however, Friday is still held in most superstitious awe. And on Good Friday there is always a regular carnival held on board these vessels, the yards being allowed to hang at all sorts of angles, the gear flung dishevelled and loose, while an effigy of Judas is subjected to all the abuse and indignity that the lively imaginations of the seamen can devise. Finally, the effigy is besmeared with tar, a rope attached to it which is then rove through a block at the main yard-arm, it is set alight, and amid the frantic yells and execrations of the seamen it is slowly swung aloft to dangle and blaze, while the excited mariners use up their remaining energies in a wild dance.
Another superstition that still survives in sailing vessels everywhere is, strangely enough, connected with the recalcitrant prophet Jonah. It is, however, confined to his bringing misfortune upon the ship in which he sailed, and seldom is any allusion made to his miraculous engulphing by the specially prepared great fish. It does not take a long series of misfortunes overtaking a ship to convince her crew that a lineal descendant of Jonah and an inheritor of his disagreeable disqualifications is a passenger. So deeply rooted is this idea that when once it has been aroused with respect to any member of a ship’s company, that person is in evil case, and, given fitting opportunity, would actually be in danger of his life. This tinge of religious fanaticism, cropping up among a class of men who, to put it mildly, are not remarkable for their knowledge of Scripture, also shows itself in connection with the paper upon which “good words” are printed. It is an unheard-of misdemeanour on board ship to destroy or put to common use such paper. The man guilty of such an action would be looked upon with horror by his shipmates, although their current speech is usually vile and blasphemous beyond belief. And herein is to be found a curious distinction between seamen of Teutonic and Latin race, excluding Frenchmen. Despite the superstitious reverence the former pay to the written word, none of them would in time of peril dream of rushing to the opposite extreme, and after madly abusing their Bibles, throw them overboard. But the excitable Latins, after beseeching their patron saint to aid them in the most agonising tones, repeating with frenzied haste such prayers as they can remember, and promising the most costly gifts in the event of their safely reaching port again, often turn furiously upon all they have previously been worshipping, and with the most horrid blasphemies, vent their rage upon the whilom objects of their adoration. Nothing is too sacred for insult, no name too reverend for abuse, and should there be, as there often is, an image of a saint on board, it will probably be cast into the sea.