Frank Brown, Sea Apprentice

by Frank Thomas Bullen

Unfortunately it was necessary to get aloft and furl those sails—they could not be allowed to blow away, or breaking loose from the confining gear to endanger the masts, so, “Up you go, boys, and tie ’em up.”

Frank and Johnson kept together in the assault upon the fore lower-topsail, and, as there were eleven of them at it, and it isn’t a bad sail to handle after all, they soon got it snugged in and secured. But the foresail! It tore at its gear like a raving demon, and when they had got it partly in, she would lurch up into the wind on the scend of a sea, and away from their stiffened fingers it would go with a roar as if of triumph. During this conflict Frank was hardly conscious except of the necessity of keeping on until that sail was fast. His very intelligence became mechanical, and physical pain and weariness did not count as long as they did not disable him. And at last the great sail was furled.

Calling up all his energies, he descended to the deck and crept along until he reached the house, for he was parched with thirst, and felt that he must have a drink of water. There in the feeble flame of the lamp, after quenching his thirst, he had a sort of languid curiosity to see what ailed his fingers that they were so sore. And as he looked at them a sense of self-pity came over him like a wave—whoso has never felt it may legitimately be thankful—for all his finger-nails had been torn off by the desperate energy with which he had dug them into that obdurate sail. Then, with a fine gesture of contempt for bodily pain, he shook the slowly oozing blood from them and lit his pipe.

When a ship is snugged down to the limit the heart of the sailorman is freed from much care, because whatever happens there is little more “branching” possible, and that is what makes sailors unhappy. So every one was fairly content until the cold, grey dawn broke and revealed a scene that was enough to daunt the most hardy of them, not being whalers or accustomed to such sights. For all around as far as the eye could reach the sea surface was covered with massy heaps of ice, some raising their grim heads to a height of three or four hundred feet, others only just showing above the sea surface, but all tossing and heaving about in appalling confusion upon the stormy sea, and every one of them threatening destruction to the frail intruder upon their terrible conclave. The flying clouds seemed to reach down and tear themselves upon the summits of the heaving bergs, streaming off in long black lines like mourning weeds. And the furious waves dashed themselves frantically upon those icy masses as if outraged by their presence, and craving to destroy them. While in the midst of it all tossed the helpless ship, all unfitted for any such stern contact as now threatened her.

All that long weary day the seamen looked on at those heaving mountains, waited hopelessly for any sign of relief, and saw the gloomy day pass into night so black that all the horrors seen during the day were intensified by inability to see them at all. Yet men slept during their watch below as they always do, if the conditions will permit, all except the skipper, who never left the deck, so great was his anxiety for the safety of his crew. But even had he possessed the accumulated wisdom and seamanship and courage of a thousand sailors, under those circumstances he was powerless to do aught but wait and hope, and if one of those masses had collided with the ship, and penetrated her side so that she sank, the chances of saving one life would have been almost nil.

Nothing happened. The long, long night wore away, and the dawn broke with a brisk gale and a somewhat lightened sky, while to the wondering eyes of the watchers not a hummock of ice was visible anywhere. How joyfully the watch obeyed the call to loose the fore lower-topsail and foresail, and having set them, squared the yards and kept her away before the wind and sea for Cape Horn. So great was the change that all hands felt as if the weather had suddenly become fine and almost calm, the watch below turning in their sleep, and wondering at the cessation of their troubled dreams. And when the watch came on deck at eight bells, all hands were set to work to “pile the rags on her,” as we say, until she was speeding away again at her utmost gait for the turning-point of the voyage.

The good breeze held by day and night, and no further trouble was experienced from ice or sudden squalls. To the delight of everybody on board she passed the Diego Ramirez Islands without losing a ropeyarn, and almost immediately afterwards the hearts of everybody were gladdened by hearing the order given to haul up three points. “Starboard fore-brace,” shouted the skipper, and right cheerfully was he answered, while as the big ropes were drawn through the blocks, and the yards canted forward, the glad whisper went around the ship, “Homeward bound indeed at last.”

For that is another definition of being homeward bound which I omitted in my previous chapter. When a ship is on her homeward passage either from the Far East or Far West, whichever of the Capes she must double, she is not considered by her crew to be really homeward bound until having rounded it she begins to head northward, and the reason is so obvious that I shall not add further in unnecessary explanation. Then all hands agree tacitly that they will consider the worst of the passage over, ignoring entirely what the stormy North Atlantic may have in store for them at the close of their long journey. For have they not now the sweet amenities of the Trades before them, the long genial stretch across the depth of the South Atlantic, when for a week on end you need never touch a brace nor a halyard save to freshen the nip, and may devote all energies to making your ship look as spruce and trim as paint and varnish will make her after her long, long ocean journey?

All this Frank heard with quiet appreciation, although it was outside the range of his experience. But he was altogether happy at the change from the cold stern exercises of ship-handling, of wet clothes and heavy strivings with battering sails, to the softening pursuits of smartening up the rigging, rattling down, painting and varnishing. And to crown all he felt a growing delight in the thought that each placid day’s run was bringing him nearer the home which became daily a more distinct object to his mental vision, while the sense of having accomplished his first voyage with credit to himself grew with each closing day. Occasionally he felt impatient, wished that the sweet following wind would blow stronger instead of taking off as it was doing, and when at last after crossing the line the wind died away altogether, and left her rolling languidly upon the glassy surface of the ocean, he could hardly restrain his discontent. Johnson annoyed him, too, by his lugubrious forebodings of long-continued calms, of waiting about here, as he put it, until all the beautiful new paint which they had put on with so much pains should be washed off again.

The hindrance of the Doldrums, however, did not prevent their northern passage for a longer period than usual, and presently, with yards braced up on the starboard tack, the Sealark was stretching across the North Atlantic towards the brave west winds of the north, the last helpers on the homeward road. It was all very humdrum now to Frank, who felt quite a contemptuous indifference to weather, and forgetting, as youth will, the hard past, turned a deaf ear to the warnings of Williams and Johnson, who began to recall incidents of the last voyage wherein it seemed they had suffered more at the end than during all the previous months of the voyage.