The actual experiences of intelligent sailors, or voyagers, written by themselves, have, of course, a greater practical value than the sea-stories of clever novelists, while the latter, as a class, confine themselves very much to the quarter-deck. Dana’s “Two Years Before the Mast” is so well known that few of our readers need to be told that it is the story of an American student, who had undermined his health by over-application, and who took a voyage, viâ Cape Horn, to California in order to recover it. But the old brig Pilgrim, bound to the northern Pacific coast for a cargo of hides, was hardly a fair example, in some respects, of an ordinary merchant-vessel, to say nothing of a fine clipper or modern steam-ship. Dana’s experiences were of the roughest type, and may be read by boys, anxious to go to sea, with advantage, if taken in conjunction with those of others; many of them are common to all grades of sea service. A little work by a “Sailor-boy,”[39] published some years ago, gives a very fair idea of a seaman’s lot in the Royal Navy, and the two stories in conjunction present a fair average view of sea-life and its duties.
Passing over the young sailor-boy’s admission to the training-ship—the “Guardho,” as he terms it—we find his first days on board devoted to the mysteries of knots and hitch-making, in learning to lash hammocks, and in rowing, and in acquiring the arts of “feathering” and “tossing” an oar. Incidentally he gives us some information on the etiquette observed in boats passing with an officer on board. “For a lieutenant, the coxswain only gets up and takes his cap off; for a captain, the boat’s crew lay on their oars, and the coxswain takes his cap off; and for an admiral the oars are tossed (i.e., raised perpendicularly, not thrown in the air!), and all caps go off.” Who would not be an admiral? While in this “instruction” he received his sailor’s clothes—a pair of blue cloth trousers, two pairs of white duck ditto, two blue serge and two white frocks, two pairs of white “jumpers,” two caps, two pairs of stockings, a knife, and a marking-type. As soon as he is “made a sailor” by these means, he was ordered to the mast-head, and tells with glee how he was able to go up outside by the futtock shrouds, and not through “lubber’s hole.” The reader doubtless knows that the lubber’s hole is an open space between the head of the lower mast and the edge of the top; it is so named from the supposition that a “land-lubber” would prefer that route. The French call it the trou du chat—the hole through which the cat would climb. Next he commenced cutlass-drill, followed by rifle-drill, big-gun practice, instruction in splicing, and all useful knots, and in using the compass and lead-line. He was afterwards sent on a brig for a short sea cruise. “Having,” says he, “to run aloft without shoes was a heavy trial to me, and my feet often were so sore and blistered that I have sat down in the ‘tops’ and cried with the pain; yet up I had to go, and furl and loose my sails; and up I did go, blisters and all. Sometimes the pain was so bad I could not move smartly, and then the unmerited rebuke from a thoughtless officer was as gall and wormwood to me.”
Dana, in speaking of the incessant work on board any vessel, says, “A ship is like a lady’s [pg 49]watch—always out of repair.” When, for example, in a calm, the sails hanging loosely, the hot sun pouring down on deck, and no way on the vessel, which lies
“As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean,”
there is always sufficient work for the men, in “setting up” the rigging, which constantly requires lightening and repairing, in picking oakum for caulking, in brightening up the metal-work, and in holystoning the deck. The holystone is a large piece of porous stone,[40] which is dragged in alternate ways by two sailors over the deck, sand being used to increase its effect. It obtains its name from the fact that Sunday morning is a very common time on many merchant-vessels for cleaning up generally.
INSTRUCTION ON BOARD A MAN-OF-WAR.
The daily routine of our young sailor on the experimental cruises gave him plenty of employment. In his own words it was as follows:—Commencing at five a.m.—“Turn hands up; holystone or scrub upper deck; coil down ropes. Half-past six—breakfast, half an [pg 50]hour; call the watch, watch below, clean the upper deck; watch on deck, clean wood and brass-work; put the upper decks to rights. Eight a.m.—hands to quarters; clean guns and arms; division for inspection; prayers; make sail, reef topsails, furl top-sails, top-gallant sails, royals; reef courses, down top-gallant and royal yards. This continued till eight bells, twelve o’clock, dinner one hour. ‘All hands again; cutlass, rifle, and big-gun drill till four o’clock; clear up decks, coil up ropes;’ and then our day’s work is done.” Then they would make little trips to sea, many of them to experience the woes of sea-sickness for the first time.
But the boys on the clean and well-kept training-brig were better off in all respects than poor Dana. When first ordered aloft, he tells us, “I had not got my ‘sea-legs’ on, was dreadfully sea-sick, with hardly strength to hold on to anything, and it was ‘pitch-dark’ * * * How I got along I cannot now remember. I ‘laid out’ on the yards, and held on with all my strength. I could not have been of much service; for I remember having been sick several times before I left the top-sail yard. Soon all was snug aloft, and we were again allowed to go below. This I did not consider much of a favour; for the confusion of everything below, and that inexpressibly sickening smell, caused by the shaking up of bilge-water in the hold, made the steerage but an indifferent refuge to the cold, wet decks. I had often read of the nautical experiences of others, but I felt as though there could be none worse than mine; for, in addition to every other evil, I could not but remember that this was only the first night of a two years’ voyage. When we were all on deck, we were not much better off, for we were continually ordered about by the officer, who said that it was good for us to be in motion. Yet anything was better than the horrible state of things below. I remember very well going to the hatchway and putting my head down, when I was oppressed by nausea, and felt like being relieved immediately.” We can fully recommend the example of Dana, who, acting on the advice of the black cook on board, munched away at a good half-pound of salt beef and hard biscuit, which, washed down with cold water, soon, he says, made a man of him.