Now, as I had often to begin work by first frying at one or two o’clock in the moonlight, and as it would have a greedy sound if the next attack on eatables were to be called “second breakfast,” the only true way of settling this point was to consider the first meal to be in fact a late supper of yesterday, or at any rate to regard it as belonging to the bygone, and therefore beyond inquiry, and so to ignore this first breakfast altogether in one’s arrangements. The stomach quite approved of this decision, and was always ready for the usual breakfast at six or seven o’clock, whatever had been discussed a few hours before.
The matter as to Etretat was decided then. We two were to go on, and to hope the wind would do so to. Then away sped we merrily singing, with the new and unexpected prospect of possibly reaching Havre that very day. From thence a month was to be passed in going up and down the Seine and at Paris; and what was to come after that? How come back to England? Why that problem must now be “blinked,” as a future if not an insoluble question, at any rate just as easy to solve a month hence as it is now.
For a long time the wind was favourable, and precisely as strong as was desirable, and the formidable looking Cape Antifer, which at mid-day seemed only a dark blue stripe on the distant horizon, gradually neared us till we could see the foam eddying round its weather-wasted base. Then came the steep high wall of flint cliff with shingle débris at its foot, but no one approach from top to bottom, if any bad thing happened,—no, not for miles.
This was a time of alternate hope and fear, as the wind gradually lulled away to nothing, and fog arose in the hot sun; the waves were tossing the Rob Roy up and down, and flapping the sails in an angry petulant way, very distressing if you are sleepy. For four hours this hapless state of things continued, yet we were already within five miles of Cape de la Hève, and, once round that, on the other side was Havre. How tantalizing to be so near, and yet still out of reach! If this calm ends in a west wind, we may be driven back anywhere by that and the tide. If it ends in a thunderstorm we shall have to put off to sea at once.
See there the lighthouses up aloft on the crag—two of them are lighted. Soon it will be dark around, and we shall at this rate have to enter Havre by night. All this time we were close to the cliffs, but the sounding-lead showed plenty of water, and when the anchor was thrown out the cable did not pull at all; we were not drifting but only rocked by the incessant tumble and dash of the sea, which, though of all things glorious when careering in the breeze, is of all most tiresome when rolling in a calm.
At this time I felt lonely, exceedingly lonely and helpless, also sleepy, feverish, discontented, and miserable. The lonely feeling came only twice more in the voyage; the other bad feelings never again.
Now, there are one or two sensations which after experience at sea seldom deceive you as to what they prognosticate, though it is impossible to give reasons for their hold upon the mind. One is the feeling, “I am drifting,” another, “The water is shoaling,” and the third, “Here comes a breeze.” Each of these may be felt and recognised even with your eyes shut. It does not come in through one sense or another, but it seems to grasp the whole system; and it is a very great convenience to have this faculty alive in these three directions, and to know when to trust it as a true impression.
On the unmistakable sensation that a breeze was coming, the rebound from inaction and grumbling, lying full-length on deck, to alert excitement was instantaneous and most pleasing. The anchor was rattled up in a minute, and it was scarcely stowed away before the genial air arrived, with ripples curling under its soft breath, once more exactly favourable.
Slowly the two lights above on the cliff seemed to wheel round as we doubled the Cape. Slowly two little dots in the distance swelled up into big vessels in full sail, and others rose from the far-off waters, all converging to the same port with myself; their very presence being companionship, and their community of purpose begetting a mutual interest. For these craft deep in the water the navigation here is rather intricate, though the excellent and uniform system of buoys employed in France does all that is possible to make the course clear; but my little boat, drawing less than three feet of water, could run safely even over the shallows, though, as a rule, I navigated her by the regular channels, as this gave me much additional interest in the bearings about every port.
When the lights at Havre hove in sight the welcome flashing was a happy reward to a long day’s toil, and as the yawl sped forward cheerily through the intervening gloom, the kettle hummed over the lamp, and a bumper of hot grog was served out to the crew. Soon we rounded into the harbour, quiet and calm, with everybody asleep at that late hour; and it was some time more before the Rob Roy could settle into a comfortable berth, and her sails were all made up, and bed unrolled, and the weary sailor was snoring in his blanket.