July 5. Another attempt has been made to induce Captain J. to substitute a more decent bill of fare in place of the disgusting dishes upon which he has starved us during the voyage. As we are approaching Talcahuana, where a supply of such necessaries as we may need can be obtained, it was thought proper to hold a formal meeting for the purpose in the main cabin. A chairman, secretary and a committee to report a bill of fare for the consideration of Captain J., were chosen. Mr. Grant, the chief steward, was called in, who stated that in supplying the table in the after cabin with better food than those in the other parts of the ship, he had acted in compliance with the orders of Captain J., and that the captain had also directed him to reduce the allowance of soft-tack to the passengers. The committee on the bill of fare reported to recommend for dinners, on Monday, beef and rice; on Tuesday, beans and pork; on Wednesday, fish and potatoes, or rice; on Thursday, beef and potatoes and duff; on Friday, beans and pork; on Saturday, fish and potatoes, and on Sunday, beef and duff, with soft-tack and apple-sauce once a day. This report was accepted. The committee immediately waited upon the captain, whom they found in a more amiable mood than they had anticipated, and obtained from him some general promises of improvement, which gave us a slight degree of encouragement.
It is not a little provoking under all our privations to know that we have on board the bark a sufficient quantity of wholesome food to make us comfortable. In addition to good beef, pork, codfish, beans, potatoes and hard-bread, we have a quantity of flour, sufficient to give us a reasonable supply of soft-tack, besides rice, dried apples, raisins and sugar. We have no reason to complain of the owners of the vessel, but charge our discomforts to the surly brutality of the captain, and the execrable filthiness of the cooks. A portion of our supply of water is impure, having been put into bad casks. But when one of these casks is tapped, however disgusting it may be, we are allowed no other until it is used up.
[CHAPTER VIII.]
Captain Jackson—A Drifting Spar—Approaching Talcahuana—Washing-day—Landscapes—Harbor of Talcahuana—Pelicans—A Visit from Officials—Description of the Town—American Houses—Tremont House—A Dinner.
Captain J. seems to be actuated by only one object, namely, to make a profitable voyage for his employers, regardless of the rights or comforts of his passengers. And any little concessions he makes to the demands of his passengers,—and these concessions are few and far between,—any little change he makes for the better in our fare, any thing he does to alleviate the discomforts of our voyage, is done with extreme reluctance, and seldom without a dispute or a serious quarrel. Let me finish the picture I have begun of the man. He has the frame of a giant, six feet two inches high. His fist is brawny as the paw of a grizzly bear, and his foot is a terror to shoe-makers. He is ungainly in his figure, and awkward and ungraceful in every movement and gesture. He has a coarse, vulgar, morose cast of countenance, is distant and repulsive in his manners, gross and vulgar in his tastes and conversation, and fond of repeating profane and obscene jests and anecdotes. He is exceedingly obstinate, wilful and unyielding, which qualities he mistakes for independence of mind. He boasts of his indifference as to what is said of him, and yet manifests an extreme sensitiveness when he is made the subject of a jest. Notwithstanding his long continued intercourse with the world, he has learned nothing of human nature, and he thinks to govern men by fear and brute force, rather than by reason, persuasion or kindness. There is nothing conciliating in his disposition, but in all his discussions with his passengers, he talks in a spirit of rude dictation and of defiance. He seldom speaks a kind word to his sailors, and has acquired the hearty hatred of them all. He hates Dana and his "Two years before the Mast," because Dana's sympathies are enlisted on the side of the oppressed seamen, and against tyrannical ship-masters. He hates Edward Kent, our Consul at Rio, for the same reason. He is strongly tinctured with those superstitions that characterize the ignorant portion of his class. In politics he is a rabid loco-foco, a blind worshiper of Andrew Jackson, whom he has been taught to call a second Washington. But his chief political knowledge consists in a number of slang phrases and slurs, which he threw out with great liberality in the former part of the voyage, but which were answered in a manner that taught him a little circumspection in the use of his favorite weapons. Such is the man, to whose arbitrary will we are bound to submit during this long voyage. But we believe him to be a cautious and skillful navigator; and if we see in him a total absence of every characteristic of a gentleman, of every qualification requisite to make an agreeable commander of a passenger-ship, we are happy to find some compensation for these defects in his watchfulness and care.
July 6. Approaching the harbor of Talcahuana, we saw a large broken yard with several ropes attached to it, floating within a few rods of the ship. From the fresh appearance of the fracture, I perceived that it had recently been broken. A casual remark dropped by one of the passengers, that some vessel had probably been wrecked in one of the storms we had lately encountered, and the spar was passed and forgotten. But what a history of suffering and despair may there be connected with that spar! Perhaps it belonged to our acquaintance at Rio, the North America. She may have been wrecked on this coast, and her five hundred souls have been sunk in the waves or dashed on the rocks. In their efforts to save themselves, may not some of them have been lashed to this very yard? Perhaps, as the vessel went to pieces, and one after another was swallowed up, the lives of a few may have been prolonged beyond those of their fellow sufferers. And oh! what an hour of horror must that have been to them! What thoughts of deep and bitter anguish did they send to the homes they had seen for the last time, and to the wives, daughters, mothers, sisters and friends, to whom they had bidden farewell forever! What ages of intense agony must have been concentrated and endured in the few hours, perhaps minutes, those sufferers lay lashed to that spar, and saw, one after another, their companions expire! May not this vessel have been lost in one of the storms that nearly drove us ashore upon the coast of Patagonia? How near may we have been to sharing the same fate with them? And may we not, even now, after having escaped so many dangers, be reserved for the same or a worse doom? Such or similar reflections naturally arise in one's mind at the sight of a floating mast or spar at sea. I have often seen them, but never before one so new, and bearing such certain indications of a recent shipwreck.