“Cast loose!” said the man at the wheel to the men holding the rope.
“Ay! Ay! sir!” they replied.
“Good-by, Billie,” called the pilots.
“So long, boys,” he cried back.
Our schooner was moving swiftly away before the wind. The man in the yawl pulled out toward where the steamer must pass. Already her engines had stopped, and the foam at her prow was dying away. One could see that a pilot was expected. Quite a crowd of people, even at that early hour, was gathered at the rail. A ladder of rope was hanging over the side, almost at the water’s edge.
The little yawl bearing the pilot pulled square across the steamer’s course. When the vessel drifted slowly up, the yawl nosed the great black side and drifted back by the ladder. One of the steamer’s crew threw down a rope, which the oarsman of the yawl caught. This held the yawl still, close to the ladder, and the pilot, jumping for a good hold, began slowly to climb upward. No sooner had he seized the rope ladder than the engines started and the steamer moved off. The little yawl, left alone like a cork on a thrashing sea, headed toward us. The schooner tacked and came round in a half circle to pick it up, which was done with safety.
This was a busy morning. Before breakfast another ship had appeared, a tramp steamer, and a pilot was dressing to board her. Down the fore hatch could be seen the cook, frying potatoes and meat, and boiling coffee. The change in weather was pleasing to him, too, for he was singing as he clattered the dishes and set the table. In the cabin the pipes of the pilots were on, and the two old salts were at pinochle harder than ever.
Another pilot left before breakfast, and after he was gone another steamer appeared, this time the Paris. It looked as though we would soon lose all our pilots and have to return to New York. After the pilot had gone aboard the Paris, however, the wind died down and we sailed no more. Gradually the sea grew smoother, and we experienced a day of perfect idleness. Hour after hour the boat rocked like a cradle. Seagulls gathered around and dipped their wings in charming circles. Flocks of ducks passed northward in orderly flight, honking as they went. A little land-bird, a poor, bedraggled sparrow, evidently blown to sea by adverse winds, found rest and salvation in our rigging. Now it was perched upon the main boom, and now upon the guy of the gaff-topsail, but ever and anon, on this and the following day it could be seen, sometimes attempting to fly shoreward, but always returning after a fruitless quest for land. No vessel appeared, however. We merely rocked and waited.
The sailors in the forecastle told stories. The pilots in the rear talked New York politics and criminal mysteries. The cook brewed and baked. Night fell upon one of the fairest skies that it is given us earthlings to behold. Stars came out and blinked. The lightship at Sandy Hook cast a far beacon, but no steamer took another pilot that day.
Once during the watch that night it seemed that a steamer far off to the southeastward was burning a blue light, the signal for a pilot. The man at the wheel scanned the point closely, then took a lighted torch made of cotton and alcohol and circled it slowly three times in the air. No answering blue light rewarded him. Another time there grew upon the stillness the far-off muffled sound of a steamer’s engine. You could hear it distinctly, a faint “Pump, pump, pump, pump, pump.” But no light could be seen. The signal torch was again waved, but without result. The distinct throb grew less and less, and finally died away. Some of the pilots commented as to this but could not explain it. They could not say why a vessel should travel without lights at night.