The Sea Lions; Or, The Lost Sealers

by James Fenimore Cooper

"We have other matters on our hands, Captain Daggett," was the answer; "they must be looked to first. If we can get off the island at all and return safe to those who, I much fear, are now mourning us as dead, we shall have great reason to thank God."

"A few skins would do no great harm, Gar'ner, even to a craft cut down and reduced."

"We have more cargo now than we shall be able to take with us. Quite one half of all our skins must be left behind us, and all of the oil. The hold of the schooner is too shallow to carry enough of anything to make out a voyage. I shall ballast with water and provisions, and fill up all the spare room with the best of our skins. The rest of the property must be abandoned."

"Why abandoned? Leave a hand or two to take care of it, and send a craft out to look for it, as soon as you get home. Leave me, Gar'ner, I am willing to stay."

Roswell thought that the poor man would be left, whether he wished to remain or not, for the symptoms that are known to be so fatal in cases like that of Daggett's, were making themselves so apparent as to leave little doubt of the result. What rendered this display of the master-passion somewhat remarkable, was the fact that our hero had, on several occasions, conversed with the invalid, concealing no material feature of his case, and the latter had expressed his expectation of a fatal termination, if not an absolute willingness to die. Stimson had frequently prayed with Daggett, and Roswell had often read particular chapters of the bible to him, at his own request, creating an impression that the Vineyarder was thinking more of his end than of any interests connected with this life. Such might have been, probably was, the case, until the seeming return of what had once been deemed good luck awakened old desires, and brought out traits of character that were about to be lost in the near views of a future world. All this Roswell saw and noted, and the reflections produced by his own perilous condition, the certain loss of so many companions, the probable death of Daggett, and the humble but impressive example and sympathy of Stimson, were such as would have delighted the tender spirit of Mary Pratt, could she have known of their existence.

But the great consideration of the moment, the centre of all the hopes and fears of our sealers, was the rebuilding of the mutilated Sea Lion. Although the long thaw did so much for them, the reader is not to regard it as such a spell of warm weather as one enjoys in May within the temperate zone. There were no flowers, no signs of vegetation, and whenever the wind ceased to blow smartly from the northward, there was frost. At two or three intervals cold snaps set in that looked seriously like a return to winter, and, at the end of the third week of pleasant weather mentioned, it began to blow a gale from the southward, to snow, and to freeze. The storm commenced about ten in the forenoon; ere the sun went down, the days then being of great length, every passage around the dwelling was already blocked up with banks of snow. Several times had the men asked permission to remove the sails from the house, to admit air and light; but it was now found that the tent-like verandah they formed was of as much use as it had been at any time during the season. Without it, indeed, it would not have been possible for the people to quit their dwelling during three entire days. Everything like work was, of course, suspended during this tempest, which seriously menaced the unfortunate sealers with the necessity of again breaking up their schooner, now nearly completed, with a view again to keep themselves from freezing. The weather was not so intensely cold as it had been, continuously, for months during the past winter; but, coming as it did, after so long a spell of what might be considered as a balmy atmosphere in that region, it found the people unbraced and little prepared for it. At no time was the thermometer lower than twenty degrees below zero; this was near morning, after a sharp and stinging night; nor was it for any succession of hours much below zero. But zero was now hard to bear, and fires, and good fires too, were absolutely necessary to keep the men from suffering, as well as from despondency. Perhaps the spectacle of Daggett, dying from the effects of frost before their eyes, served to increase the uneasiness of the people, and to cause them to be less sparing of the fuel than persons in their situation ought to have been. It is certain that a report was brought to Roswell, in the height of the tempest, and when the thermometer was at the lowest, that there was not wood enough left from the plunder of the two vessels, exclusively of that which had been worked up in the repairs, to keep the fires going eight-and-forty hours longer! It was true, a little wood, intended to be used in the homeward passage, enough to last as far as Rio possibly, had been used in stowing the hold; and that might be got at first, if it ever ceased to snow. Without that addition to the stock in the house, it would not be within the limits of probability to suppose the people could hold out against the severity of such weather a great while longer. Every expedient that could be devised to save wood, and to obtain warmth from other sources, was resorted to, of course, by Roswell's orders. Lamps were burned with great freedom; not little vessels invented to give light, but such torches as one sees at the lighting up of a princely court-yard on the occasion of a fête, in which wicks are made by the pound, and unctuous matter is used by the gallon. Old canvass and elephants' oil supplied the materials; and the spare camboose, which had been brought over to the house to be set up there, while the other galley was being placed on board, very well answered the purpose of a lamp. Some warmth was obtained by these means, but much more of a glaring and unpleasant light.

It was during the height of this tempest that the soul of Daggett took its flight towards the place of departed spirits, in preparation for the hour when it was to be summoned before the judgment-seat of God. Previously to his death, the unfortunate Vineyarder held a frank and confidential discourse with Roswell. As his last hour approached, his errors and mistakes became more distinctly apparent, as is usual with men, while his sins of omission seemed to crowd the vista of by-gone days. Then it was that the whole earth did not contain that which, in his dying eyes, would prove an equivalent for one hour passed in a sincere, devout, and humble service of the Deity!

"I'm afraid that I've loved money most too well," he said to Roswell, not an hour before he drew his last breath; "but I hope it was not so much for myself, as for others. A wife and children, Gar'ner, tie a man to 'arth in a most unaccountable manner. Sealers' companions are used to hearing of misfortunes, and the Vineyard women know that few on 'em live to see a husband at their side in old age. Still, it is hard on a mother and wife, to l'arn that her chosen friend has been cut off in the pride of his days and in a distant land. Poor Betsey! It would have been better for us both, had we been satisfied with the little we had; for now the good woman will have to look to all matters for herself."

Daggett now remained silent for some time, though his lips moved, most probably in prayer. It was a melancholy sight to see a man in the vigour of his manhood, whose voice was strong, and whose heart was still beating with vigour and vitality, standing, as it were, on the brink of a precipice, down which all knew he was to be so speedily hurled. But the decree had gone forth, and no human skill could arrest it. Shortly after the confession and lamentation we have recorded, the decay reached the vitals, and the machine of clay stopped. To avoid the unpleasant consequences of keeping the body in so warm a place, it was buried in the snow at a short distance from the house, within an hour after it had ceased to breathe.

When Roswell Gardiner saw this man, who had so long adhered to him, like a leech, in the pursuit of gold, laid a senseless corpse among the frozen flakes of the antarctic seas, he felt that a lively admonition of the vanity of the world was administered to himself. How little had he been able to foresee all that had happened, and how mistaken had been his own calculations and hopes! What, then, was that intellect of which he had been so proud, and what reason had he to rely on himself in those matters that lay equally beyond the cradle and the grave--that incomprehensible past, and the unforeseen future, towards which all those in existence were hastening! Roswell had received many lessons in humility, the most useful of all the lessons that man can receive in connection with the relation that really exists between the Deity and himself. Often had he wondered, while reading the Bible Mary Pratt had put into his hand, at the stubborn manner in which the chosen people of God had returned to their "idols," and their "groves," and their "high places;" but he was now made to understand that others still erred in this great particular, and that of all the idols men worship, that of self was perhaps the most objectionable.