The handle of the annunciator connected with the engine-room is jammed to “hard astern;” “ding! ding!” rings the signal from below; the water gushes in a turbulent torrent from the outboard deliveries, the engines throb fiercely, backing with all their strength, and as the lines are rendered, slacked, eased, let go, the steamer clears the pier-end with a rush, shoots far into midstream, and thus begins, wrong end foremost, her voyage westward. In the optimism of the moment the chief officer and the bo’s’n grow garrulous upon the recondite subject of anchor gear; the junior officers feel they quite deserve the good luck which makes them the hustling, bustling mates of a crack racer; and maritime Jack, still a little groggy and very much unwashed, blesses the stars that have let begin another “v’yage with an ’arf crown left of his hadvance,” and the prospects of “some bloomin’ American tobaccy” as soon as he’s clear of the tideway.
“Not a bad job, sir,” said the pilot, as the anchor takes the bottom and the ship straightens astern from her cable; “seemed ticklish a bit for a minute when they ’eld onto the spring so long, sir; but ’ere we are, bung up and bilge free, and with the looks of a good run, barrin’ the fog per’aps, for the morrer.”
The captain answers smilingly, for these two are old friends, and, what is more, the hauling out has been a joint enterprise, though the senior gets the credit, as he should. After a careful survey of the anchorage and a word with the chief officer, the captain enters his cabin and buckles down to the routine work, and there is always plenty of that awaiting him. He glows pleasurably over the handy, seamanlike way they have left the dock, for nautical critics are plenty and keen, and if he had not taken up his berth in the river so cleverly, the ill news would have grown apace, till, with unfair variations, it reached the ears of their high nobilities—the directors.
Clear-headed, brainy, driving men, are these master-mariners, and bearing patiently a responsibility that needs an iron will and a courage faltering at nothing. There is no royal road to their station, nor can willing hands make them what they must be. They cannot crawl through cabin windows, nor, for that matter, come flying in a pier-head jump through the gangway with one leg forward and the other aft. They have to fight their way over the bows, and struggle out of the ruck and smother in the fo’ks’le, by sturdy buffeting and hard knocks, by the persistent edging of stout shoulders backed by strong hearts and steady brains. If it is in them they will make their way in the end surely, and may set the course and stump to windward as they please, while others haul the weather-ear-rings, and drink their grog protestingly. No; master-mariners are made, not born, and, unlike many of their brothers in the government service, have to rise by energy, pluck, merit—why enumerate them?—by a hundred qualities the world is better for owning.
Old Pepys knew how this sea-kissing goes, and tells us of his favors in this wise: “That,” he writes, “which puts me in a good humor both at noon and night, is the fancy that I am this day (March 13, 1669) made a captain of one of the King’s ships, Mr. Wren having sent me the Duke of York’s commission to be captain of the Jerzy, … which doth give me the occasion of much mirth and may be of some use to me.” Think of that, you venturesome die-hards, who linger all your lives at the lower sheerpole, a post-captain by the scratch of a pen, and above all men given to a lubberly scrivener and an Admiralty clerk at that.
All these elder merchant-masters are sailor-men, some so deep and dyed in it that if you scratch them they ooze tar, and this briny saturation has been invariably acquired under sail. After they have had their ships and made many a voyage, deep water and home, round both Capes, east and west, wherever winds may blow and freight, the mother of wages, may linger, they shift into steam, but always in a subordinate place. Should they stick by one employ they are sent from ship to ship, working their way upward until they become chief officers of the choicest vessels in the line. Here they must wait for dead men’s shoes, or resignation, or forced retirement; but when the chance comes they are given the command of the smaller and less important steamers upon some subsidiary route. Then they enter a new line of promotion, and weary are the years of waiting, and bitter sometimes the disappointment, before they reach the high-water mark of their service. And, with this hardly earned promotion, do not come, as in other professions, ease, comfort, and proper recompense for duty well done, but heavier responsibilities, harder work, and greater self-sacrifice; what is worse, and this to the shame of the great steamship corporations, these gallant men, even at their prime, receive the most inadequate pecuniary recognition for the burden imposed, for the mental and physical qualities exercised, for the experience brought to bear; indeed, in no other trade or profession is equal ability so badly paid.
The junior officers belong to all sorts and conditions of men. Most of them have had to fight their way, though some have parents who could well afford to pay a handsome premium for their sea education in the training-ships stationed off the principal ports. Here they are given a strict man-of-war tuition, though the routine of studies and drills is, of course, modified to suit the results expected. After their apprenticeship is served they go to sea, usually in sailing ships; and when later they choose steam, they join as fourth or fifth officers, and enter upon a career where their future is a hard but an assured one. In the large employs they are encouraged to enter the Naval Reserve, and are given time for their drills and opportunities to qualify for the higher certificates of the merchant service; and so much are these privileges esteemed that you often find on the best steamers of the transatlantic liners one-half of the officers holding masters’ certificates and junior commissions in the auxiliary government service. Under the new regulations some of these officers have, besides the guard-ship drill, taken a regular tour of duty as lieutenants and sub-lieutenants on board sea-going men-of-war, and so far this has proved a capital plan for both services. The nationality of the officers is British, naturally, though English and Irish predominate, the Scotch, somehow, taking more kindly to the engineering part of the business, and the Welshmen staying at home.
There is a well-founded belief that the deck people are not sailor-men; nor, indeed, are they in the majority of ships, that is, not sailors in the true meaning of the word; but, on the other hand, neither are they the mere swabbers of decks, scrubbers of paint-work, handlers of the forward and after ends of trunks, or reefers of hat-boxes and travelling-rugs their critics would have us believe. They belong to a special class, not a very high one from the maritime point of view, and are reasonably well fitted for the work expected. This you may see at fire quarters, for example, a drill which, in these times, is always held before the passengers come on board. As the alarm is sounded by the rapid ringing of the ship’s bell, and the commands are hoarsely shouted along the decks, you may notice, as the men rush to their stations, the absence of the alertness, neatness, forehandedness which characterize the man-of-war’s men; but they are sturdy and strong and willing, and the echoes of the orders, “Fire forward! Main deck. Quick’s your play,” have scarcely ceased, before a dozen hose are coupled and run out, bucket and fire-extinguisher lines are formed, axemen and smotherers are gathered, and hand and steam pumps started with an energy promising a world of water. Grimy greasers and stokers rush from below; stewards hop about as none but a steward can; and butchers, bakers, and electric-light-makers rally in their appointed places, eager for work, but in the motley of Falstaff’s draft. The captain, watch in hand, receives the reports that all the departments have assembled and that abundant streams have been in operation (overboard, of course, but in the neighborhood of the fire) in blank minutes—let us say three, as a fair average—from the time the alarm was first given. Do you wonder if he smiles and says to his chief officer, “Very creditable, sir; very well done. You may secure, sir?” Very well done it is, and when you remember this is the first drill and many of the hands are new, you may feel reasonably assured, should any ordinary fire break out, that it is all Lombard Street to a Tahiti orange it will be subdued most promptly.
The pumps stop, the hose are uncoupled, under-run, and reeled, and, everything being secured, the ship returns to its normal condition. But not to rest, for there is no rest fore and aft when a voyage is begun. Cargo and stores have to be hoisted out of the lighters, holds have to be stowed, gear secured. All day long the cargo winches rattle, and the tackles rise and fall complainingly. Alongside a double bank of lighters cling, and through cargo-ports and over the rails the freight pours ceaselessly. The twilight deepens with stars; ashore the roar and traffic of the busy town are hushed; the river banks are deserted. But under the dazzling arc-lights on shipboard, and far into the night, toiling men and swaying bales and boxes cast fantastic shadows on the breezy water, and about the decks, and in the cavernous holds gaping unsatisfied for the fruits of trade and barter.
The next day the passengers come on board, and the company’s servants in the tenders and lighters gleefully escape, after banging about and muddling the baggage so mercilessly that state-room trunks yawn bruisedly in the holds, and huge chests, bursting with useless trophies of travel, lumber up your narrow quarters below—this, to the despair and tears of forlorn women who pursue the hapless purser with unrelenting fury when they learn that nothing can be unearthed until after the ship has left Queenstown, and that until then they must hopelessly shift for themselves. Steam is spluttering and flickering in little curls at the escape-pipes, the officers—every button of their best coats on duty—are at their stations, the pilot is looking wiser than ever pilot could be, and on the bridge with the impatient captain lingers a representative of the company. By and by, after the final instructions are given, this person departs, and as he goes over the side the captain waves his hand in salute and then gives a quiet order to the chief officer.