Original Penny Readings: A Series of Short Sketches

by George Manville Fenn

Chapter Eighteen.

On the Great Deep.

The creaking and groaning of the timbers, the tossing and plunging of the ship, and the heavy beating of the waves upon her sides, tended to drive away sleep, without the accessories of pale and anxious faces, wringing hands, and here and there a kneeling form and supplicating murmur. Now and then came a heavy crash, and the good ship shook and quivered beneath the tons of water poured sweeping along the deck; and once the news was somehow circulated among the helpless passengers, that three of the sailors had been swept overboard, and that the life-buoy, with its blazing light, had been cut adrift, when as it floated away, a man was seen clinging to it, with the glare shining upon his pale and agonised face. And we knew that it was but to prolong his torture, for in such a storm no boat could go to his aid—that he would cling there for a while, and then would come the end.

It was a fearful night, and, one and all, we thought of the words of the Psalmist. We who had come down to the sea were seeing His wonders; and now we thought of the utter insignificance—the littleness—the helplessness of man in the grand strife of the elements. With all man’s skill, with all his ingenuity in building, our barque seemed frail, and but a few slight planks to save us from death—from being cast away upon the further shore; and but for the knowledge of One mighty to save, who held the seas in the hollow of His hand, at such a time despair would have swept over us as a flood. Homeward bound, we had left the sunny shores of the Austral land, with a fair wind, and for the past fortnight the thoughts of the old country had grown stronger in us day by day. I saw again the sweet old hills of Surrey, and looked in fancy, as I had in reality, half a score years before, over many a rounded knoll glowing with the golden blossoms of the furze; then at the hill-side and hollow, brown and purple with the heath; and then again at fir-crowned sandy heights, relieved by verdant patches of cultivated land.

Home, sweet home; dearer than ever when distant, and in spite of success, and the prodigality of my adopted land, it was with swelling heart, and even tear-dimmed eyes, that I thought of the old country that I had left in poverty, but was returning to in wealth.

Over the bright dancing waters we sped, night and day, ever onward across the trackless waste. Seeing the watch set night by night, and then seeking my cot with the feeling stronger and stronger upon me of how completely we are in the hands of our Maker, and how slight a barrier is all our care and watchfulness against the power of the elements.

Farther south we sailed, and the weather grew colder, and at last, one night, with a howl and a roar, as if raging at us for daring to intrude upon its domains, the storm came down and shrieked in the rigging. But we had a staunch man for captain, and he had made his arrangements in time, for he had seen the enemy coming, and prepared to battle with him. I stood holding on by the bulwarks, and watched the masts bend, and the shrouds upon one side tighten as upon the other they bellied out beneath the fury of the gale. There was not a cloud to be seen overhead, but all keen and bright starlight; while instead of burning brightly and clearly, the various orbs seemed to quiver and tremble as the tremendously agitated atmosphere swept between earth and sky. As for the waves, they were changed in a moment from inky blackness to white churned foam, as the gale swept over them, tearing away the spray, and drenching all upon deck.

“Are we in danger?” I said to the captain, as he came and stood close by me.

“Well,” he said, almost shouting, so great was the force of the wind, “I always consider we’re in danger from the day we leave port till we cast anchor again, but I do my best, and hope for the best.”