“That is exactly my idea, captain, and I hope you won’t laugh at me when I tell you that I am going to take in sail and prepare for it!”
“Not a bit of it, my dear fellow. An ounce of prevention may be worth tons of after care. With such a low barometer as that, you are justified in doing anything for the safety of your ship.”
I went on deck at once. “Mr. Ireson,” said I to the chief mate, “call all hands, send down all three of those royal yards, and house the masts. Take in the main-topgallant sail, close-reef the topsails, and put a reef in both the courses. And don’t waste any time about it, sir. The glass is very low and still falling, and I believe that we shall have some heavy weather before morning.”
The mate looked rather surprised at these orders, but he saw that I was in earnest and proceeded to carry them out. The wind soon commenced freshening, but with our double crew the work was speedily accomplished, and by the time that all was snug the wind had chopped round and came out howling from the southward and eastward. In consequence of our timely preparation, however, we were ready for it.
The gale continued to increase, and on the third day we hove to under close-reefed main-topsail and reefed foresail, under which sail the ship made good weather, although the sea was running very heavily indeed.
Just before midnight the wind suddenly fell, and for a few minutes it was almost calm. It was intensely dark, the sky was as black as night, not a star was seen through the dense clouds, and the sails flapped in an ominous manner.
Then, in a moment, as though all the powers of the wind-god had been loosed, the gale struck us with infernal force, accompanied with torrents of rain and the most vivid chain lightning, which played about the ship till it seemed as though she must be on fire; the thunder pealing like a park of artillery!
The two sails we had set bellied, and with one flap fairly blew out of the bolt ropes. For a moment I thought the ship would surely founder, for she went almost on her beam ends, trembled like a live thing, and then, relieved by the loss of the sails, slowly recovered herself and came up again to the wind.
I had been in many severe gales in these latitudes, but I had never experienced anything like the tremendous power of this wind: the waves were fairly beaten down, which had been running half mast high after the three days’ heavy gale.
With the aid of a dozen men we succeeded with great difficulty in getting a stout tarpaulin in the weather mizzen rigging, and this was quite sufficient to keep the ship’s head to the wind.