CHAPTER IX.
FOR a time no one in the cutter moved or said a word. I remember that the boatswain chewed at his quid of tobacco as though he was starving; but he did not speak a word.
It was Jack Baldwin’s voice that broke the silence.
“The old ship’s gone, boys,” roared he. “We can’t do her any good, so drop her, and mind what you’re about, or you’ll be with her before you know it.” And he was right, for the cutter was heavily loaded, there being nineteen aboard of her—the right number of her crew was twelve.
I am bound to say, that I believe if any one of the crew of the Nancy Hazlewood had been seen clinging to the loose gear that was floating about the place where the ship foundered they would have been taken into the cutter; but no one was seen, nor was it likely that a man could keep afloat for any length of time, for the spray was flying.
Such was the loss of the good ship Nancy Hazlewood, the story of which I have tried to tell you just as it happened, adding nothing and keeping nothing back that might give you a clear idea of how she foundered on that Thursday, the 26th of April, 1813.
It was judged that she went down in latitude 27° North, by longitude 77° West, and about one hundred or one hundred and ten miles north of the Little Bahama Banks.
The cutter was a fine, light boat, about twenty-five feet in length, by six feet in breadth at the widest part—a small craft to carry nineteen souls one hundred miles through a stormy sea.
Ten minutes after the Nancy Hazlewood foundered the crew of the cutter were pulling away to the southward. After a little while Tom looked up and saw that Jack Baldwin was gazing very earnestly at him.
“Tom,” said he, suddenly, “if I loose the lashings on your arms and legs, will you promise to be quiet, and do your fair share of work?”