A Chapter of Adventures

by G. A. Henty

OLD JOE'S YARN.

At seven o'clock the three lads gathered round the old sailor forward. Joe having got his pipe to draw to his satisfaction, proceeded to relate the story of his shipwreck.

"It happened," he said, "on the very first v'yage I made as an A.B.; and proud I was, as you may guess, that I had done at last with being ordered here and ordered there, and kicked here and cuffed there. I was just twenty-one then, and as active and hearty a young chap as you would want to see; not over big, you know, and spare in flesh, but as strong and active as any on board a ship. Well, it came on to blow just about the same latitude where the storm struck us the other day, but much heavier. I never saw a worse sky in all my v'yges, and when the blow came it seemed to me there was an end of everything at once. I need not tell you about the storm; you just take the last one and pile it up about ten times, and you have got it.

"Although we were ready and prepared for it, and had snugged down till we scarce showed a rag of sail, over she went at the first blow, till we all thought as she was going to turn turtle. We cut away her main and mizzen, and at last got her before it and run. That gale blew for ten days right on end. The sea was tremendous. Over and over again we were pooped, our bulwarks were carried away, the boats smashed, the caboose and pretty nigh everything else on deck swept clean off. Five of the hands had been washed overboard, another three men were down below badly hurt, and the first-mate had his leg broke. We were all pretty well exhausted, as you may guess. Where we'd got to none knew, for we had never had a glimpse of the sun since the gale began; and it would not have made much difference if we had, because, you see, we could do nothing but just run before the wind wherever it liked to take us. But we knew anyhow we had got down into high latitudes, for the gale had been blowing pretty steady from the north-west.

"The air got bitterly cold all of a sudden; and though we could not see above a mile anywhere round us, we were pretty sure we were in the neighbourhood of ice. Towards the afternoon of the tenth day the weather cleared just a little, though the wind seemed as high as ever, and we caught sight of some big bergs. The captain, who was as good a sort as ever sailed, had done his best all along to keep up our spirits. The cook had been washed overboard in his caboose; but the skipper had kept his steward at work boiling water over a little spirit-stove he had aft, and kept a supply of hot coffee there at all hours for us; and with that and biscuits we had got on fairly well. Now he told us that he thought the gale would soon blow itself out, and that as soon as it abated enough to set a rag or two of sail he would try and bring us up under the lee of a berg.

"But it wasn't to be. It had just struck four bells, and there was a gleam of daylight; I was at the helm, with the captain, who had never lain down for above an hour at a time since the gale began, beside me. Suddenly I saw it become lighter ahead, just like a gray shadow against the blackness. I had but just noticed it when the skipper cried out, 'Good God! there is a berg straight ahead, it is all over with us!' and then he gave a shout, 'All hands on deck!'

"There was nothing to do. We could not have changed our course a point if we had tried ever so much, and the berg, as we could see in another minute, stretched right away on both sides of us.

"'You can leave the helm, Joe,' says the skipper; 'we have done all that men could do, we are in God's hands now.' I went forward with the rest, for I knew well that the only chance was to get on to the berg when she struck. It did not seem much of a chance, but it is wonderful how one clings to the hope of a few hours' more life.

"It was not five minutes from the time when we first saw the gray shadow ahead that we struck. The crash was tremendous. The mast snapped off as if it was a pipe-stem. The whole front of the ship seemed stove in, and I believe that more than half of those gathered forward were killed, either by the fall of the mast or by the breaking up of the bows. The bowsprit was driven aft, through the bits against the stump of the foremast, and did its share in the work. I was standing in the fore-chains, having got over there to avoid the fall of the mast. Though I was holding tight to the shrouds I was well-nigh wrenched from my hold. There was one terrible cry, and then the ship seemed to break up as if she were glass, and I was in the water. A great wave came thundering down on me; it seemed to me as if I was being carried right up into the air, then I felt a shock, and it was sometime before I knew anything more.

"When I came to myself it was daylight. For a bit I could not move, and I thought my ribs were staved in; but at last, after much trouble, I made a shift to work myself out and found that I was about fifty feet above the water. The wave had carried me upon its crest as it swept up the face of the berg, and just as it was at its highest had, by God's mercy, jammed me in between two pinnacles of ice, and though I daresay others had swept up as high, none of them had moved me. I sat for a time dazed and stupid, and then began to take a view of my position. The ship was gone. There was not a sign of a bit of floating timber or any of my messmates. I suppose all the wreckage had been swept away by the current.