The Little Savage

by Frederick Marryat

I showed her, by taking little trips out to sea, that I could manage the boat either with the sail or the oars, and assured her that by keeping close to the island, we could run ashore before danger could reach us; and that nothing could be easier than our keeping out of the reach of both rocks and sharks.

I do not think I quite convinced her that her fears were groundless; but my repeated entreaties, the fineness of the weather, and her dislike to be again left on the island, whilst I was risking my life at sea, prevailed, and she promised to join me in this second experiment.

Her forethought, however, was here as fully demonstrated as on other occasions, for she did not suffer the boat to leave the shore till she had provided for any accident that might prevent our return the anticipated time.

A finer day for such a voyage we could not have selected. The sky was without a cloud, and there was just wind enough for the purpose I wanted, without any apprehensions of this being increased. I got up the awning, and spread the sail, and handing Mrs Reichardt to her appointed seat, we bid farewell to our four-footed and two-footed friends ashore, that were gazing at us as if they knew they were parting from their only protectors. I then pushed the boat off, the wind caught the sail, and she glided rapidly through the deep water.

I let her proceed in this way about a quarter of mile from the island, and then tacked; the boat, obedient to the position of the sail, altered her course, and we proceeded at about the same rate, for a considerable distance.

Mrs Reichardt, notwithstanding her previous fears, could not help feeling the exhilarating effect of this adventurous voyage. We were floating, safely and gracefully, upon the billows, with nothing but sea and sky in every direction but one, where the rugged shores of our island home gave a bold, yet menacing feature to the view.

My heart seemed to expand with the majestic prospect before me. Never had mariner, when discovering some prodigious continent, felt a greater degree of exultation than I experienced when directing my little vessel over the immense wilderness of waters that spread out before me, till it joined the line of the horizon.

I sat down by the side of Mrs Reichardt, and allowed the boat to proceed on its course, either as if it required no directing hand, or that its present direction was so agreeable, I felt no inclination to alter it.

“I can easily imagine,” said I, “the enthusiasm of such men as Columbus, whose discovery of America you were relating to me the other day. The vocation of these early navigators was a glorious one, and, when they had tracked their way over so many thousand miles of pathless water, and found themselves in strange seas, expecting the appearance of land, hitherto unknown to the civilised world, they must have felt the importance of their mission as discoverers.”

“No doubt, Frank,” she replied; “and probably, it was this that supported the great man you have just named, in the severe trials he was obliged to endure, on the very eve of the discovery that was to render his name famous to all generations. He had endured intolerable hardships, the ship had been so long without sight of land, that no one thought it worth while to look out for it, and he expected that his crew would mutiny, and insist on returning. At this critical period of his existence, first one indication of land, and then another, made itself manifest; the curiosity of the disheartened sailors became excited; hope revived in the breast of their immortal captain; a man was now induced to ascend the main-top, and his joyful cry of land woke up the slumbering spirit of the crew. In this way, a new world was first presented to the attention of the inhabitants of the old.”