The Phantom Ship.
"P'r'aps most on yer," said he, "has hearn tell on the Phantom Ship, but I'll bet my old boots ag'in' a new tarpaulin and westcut that none on yer ever was aboard o' that craft, as my mother's son was, in the person of myself. Howsomedever that is neither this way nor that, for I must pick up the eend of my yarn at a shorter beginning.
"It happened all along o' the schooner Jolly Admiral. I was a cabin-boy on her. We had been to Hong Kong for a load o' tea and was somewhar atwixt Bombay and the Cape of Good Hope on a bright moonlight night in the month of June when we first see'd the Phantom Ship. We didn't know her true character until we came within a quarter of a mile of her and saw her flimsy, threadbare canvas and the devil's blue-lights burning on her bowsprit and after-jib. We could see the captain and the crew going about on her in a ghostly sort of way. They all looked very melancholy and didn't pay any attention to us whatsoever.
"We could hear their voices, too, and jist let me tell yer, if you had heard them 'ere voices you wouldn't want to do it ag'in in a hurry. Well, all of a sudden, although there warn't no breeze to speak of, the sails of the Phantom Ship bellied out, and away she scudded to the southward like a streak of blue thunder stuffed with lightning, leaving us jist nowhars at all.
"We was somewhat taken aback, but not so much surprised nuther, for, yer see, we had been made acquainted with the fact that them 'ere seas was particularly haunted by the devil's craft, and we was, therefore, sort of prepared for meeting her. But somehow, as soon as the critters faded away from our sight I jist whispers to myself, 'If ever I gits the chance I'm going to board that 'ere craft, or I ain't a Bluefish, but only a blarsted mackerel.'
"It warn't long afore I had the chance. Only two nights arter the one aforesaid, the sea was swept by one of them 'ere orful hurricanes or simooms as is nat'ral to them parts. Although we was pretty well prepared to meet it, the darned thing struck us so suddenly that we was almost throwed on our beam-eends. The night grew as black as pitch. You couldn't 'a'see'd your hand afore your face if you was as white as a snowdrift. I never see'd, afore or since, sich orful waves. You'd go down inter the hollers of 'em and think you'd never come up ag'in. And the wind—well, it's no use tryin' to describe one o' them 'ere simooms. Suffice ter say that it lifted us clean out of the sea more than once, and sometimes carried us, like a Mother Carey's chicken, for a mile or two over the waves, without our keel touchin' a single crest."
"Is this story true?" I here interposed, with a solemn voice, quite aghast at the imagination of the old salt.
"In course it is, yer lubberly son of a sea-cook! Does yer suppose a cove as old as I be would tell yer anything as wasn't right-down genuine?
"As I was a-sayin', the force of the wind was orful. Howsomdever, we had as jolly a little craft as ever cut blue water, and we weathered it bravely. Sometimes, when the wind would sort of sink away a little, we would drive right through the big waves, until even our main-tops were all under water; but, as our hatches were clewed down and our deck was pretty tight, we allers came out of our bath as fresh as ever. Then the gale would start up again, and away we would go over the tops of the waves.
"It was on one of these occasions that our lookout sung out, 'Lights on the starboard bow!' In course, we was all curious enough at first; but, jist as we rose up on a big crest, what should we see but the Phantom Ship, holdin' right across our course, and we jist ready to run inter her larboard bulwarks with the next pitch we made. She had all her blue lights burnin', and there was a sort of yaller haze all around her. Notwithstandin' we was under bare poles, and found it hard work to keep from bein' blown skywards at that, the stranger had every stitch of canvas spread, and didn't seem to suffer anywise nuther. We hadn't time to make many observations, howsomdever, before we struck the cussed thing right in her side, and began to shoot through her, jist as if she was made of smoke. I was standin' in the bows of the Jolly Admiral at the time. 'Now or never!' I sings out to myself; and, simultaneous, I made a jump and caught the ratlin's of the stranger, while the Jolly Admiral passed on her way and left me swingin' like a pendulum in the air.