When the grey light rose, there was quite plenty of sea, but the barque was all right, and so was Joe, for he had coolly gone below, and he fell asleep, with a thankful heart, on the cabin bench. The ship was quiet as a cradle, and the smack's boat got up to her easily. The warps were made fast again, and the two vessels once more went away in procession.
This time Joe had English company, and the two men had a good time until the tug picked them up off Lowestoft. Joe Glenn had not changed a stitch for eleven days, but he did not mind the discomfort the lump of salvage made up for much pain and striving.
Joe bought a good cottage with his share, and he was satisfied; but I quite agreed with him when he said that his money was hard earned. No man ever spent a much queerer Christmas.
JACK BROWN.
When I first saw Jack, he had left his vessel at Barking Creek, and he was enjoying a very vigorous spree; but he never lost temper or became stupefied, and his loud merriment was rather pleasant than otherwise. Jack did not look by any means like a rough, for his face had a kind of girlish beauty. His dark cheeks were richly flushed, his throat was round and white, and his blue eyes twinkled with fun. He stood about six feet in height, and he would have made a fine guardsman, for he looked as if he had been carefully drilled all his life long. Men who habitually exercise every muscle and tendon acquire that graceful carriage which belongs to the military gymnast. This fine young fellow was full of high spirits and bodily power; courage was so natural to him that I do not think such a word as "brave" ever entered his vocabulary. He had never been afraid of anything in his life, and it did not occur to him to think of danger. When Jack was a little child he was taken out to sea in his father's vessel, and henceforth a ship was his only home from year's end to year's end. The boy was so daring that he made some of the old hands nervous very often, and there were many doleful prophecies made regarding the ultimate fate of his carcase. On one blowy day when the ships were pitching freely, it happened that Jack's father went with fish to the steam cutter, leaving the urchin on deck. As the old man drew back within a quarter-mile of his smack, he saw a black figure clambering along the gaff, and he knew that it was Jack. Young Hopeful crawled from the throat of the gaff to the very end of the spar, and then proceeded to swarm up the gaff halyards—a most perilous proceeding. The father was aghast; he whispered hurriedly, "Pull, for God's sake; she'll roll him overboard before we get up." But the young monkey did not part with his hold so easily, and he came down by the rings of the mainsail without so much as grazing his shins.
In every vessel the men must have a plaything, and Jack served his bigger comrades admirably in that capacity. Had not his father been on board, the lad might have been ill-used in the horrible way so common in the old days; but the stern skipper allowed no rough play, and the boy was merely set on to perform harmless tricks. Once the men dared him to climb down the bobstay, and he instantly tried; but he gave the crew a scare, for he could not climb back after the vessel had dipped him a few times, and, last of all, the boat was towered to rescue him. In hard weather and amid hard work, Jack grew steadily in strength and skill. I have seen him at work and he made me shudder, although the sight of his amazing agility might have given anybody confidence. On wet nights when the deck was like a rink, he would make a rush as the boat pitched; then he would pick up his rope unerringly in the dark and, in another second, you would see him over the side with one foot on the trawl-beam in an attitude risky enough to make you want to close your eyes.
It was nothing much to see him take a flying spring on to the main boom in the dark, and hang there reefing while the vessel jerked so that you might have fancied she must send his ribs through the skin. I say it was nothing, because he performed this feat nearly every winter night, after the midnight haul, and the spectacle grew common. I never knew him bungle over a rope or make a bad slip, and it was simply a pleasure to see him steer. He never threw away an inch, and his way of stealing foot by foot was worthy of any jockey. Sometimes when I was at the wheel and running a little to leeward of another vessel, he would say, "I reckon I can weather him, sir, if you let me have her a bit;" and then, with delicate touches and catlike watching of every puff and every send of the sea, he would edge his way up, and pass his opponent neatly.
Most wonderful of all it was to see Jack handling the small boat in heavy weather. While the wee cockle-shell was rolling and bungling under our quarter, he would jump on the rail, measure his distance perfectly, spring on to the boat's gunwale and fend her off before she made the return roll. A marvellous performance that was, and the marvel only increased when you saw the young fellow pitching heavy boxes of fish on to the deck of the great steam cutter.