“There she gives! Heave away again, lads, and keep a steady strain on the hawser. It wants half an hour yet to high-water.”
The men again threw their weight alternately upon the levers, and once more the great pawl clanked once, twice, thrice; then a long pause and another clank, then a further pause. But my foot was still on the hawser, and I felt that it was steadily, although very slowly, yielding, and there was a moment when I could almost have sworn that I felt the ship jerk ever so slightly sternward. So I ventured to stimulate the men a little further.
“Hurrah, lads,” I cried, “there she moves! Hang to her! One complete turn of the windlass and she’s all your own! Heave again.”
“Heave!” responded the men hoarsely, flinging their whole weight upon the elevated lever, while those opposite grasped the corresponding depressed handle, and, gripping the deck with their naked toes, bent their backs and bore upward until every muscle in their straining bodies cracked again; and “clank-clank” spoke the pawl again, and yet again “clank”. Then, after another long, heaving and straining pause, “clank” again, a shorter pause and again “clank—clank—clank”; and then, as the men struggled and fought desperately with the stubborn windlass, the ship jerked perceptibly twice, the pawls spoke in quicker succession, the ship surged again, and with a wild hurrah from the men, as the levers suddenly yielded to them and began to leap rapidly up and down, the Indian Queen gathered way and slid off into deep-water.
“Well there with the windlass!” cried Carter delightedly. “Let go your to’gallant and topsail halyards and sheets; man your clewlines; fore and main clew-garnets. Stand by to let go the anchor!”
“Ay, ay, sir!” was the response from the topgallant forecastle. “All ready with the anchor. Stand clear of the cable!”
Meanwhile the merchant crew were clewing up and hauling down to the accompaniment of the usual cries. What, therefore, with Carter’s commands, the seaman’s calls, and the violent flinging down of ropes upon the deck, there was a very considerable uproar going on upon deck, and I was not at all surprised when the general, clad in a dressing-gown, emerged from below with his sword in one hand and his pistol in the other, to enquire what all the racket was about.
I explained the situation to him, and he was expressing his great gratification at the fact that the ship had been got afloat again, when Carter gave the order to let go the anchor.
“All gone, sir,” answered Jones as a heavy splash sounded under the ship’s bows, instantly followed by a yell of: