The Falkland Islands serve one important purpose in the economy of the nautical world. They are a resting-place between two great confluent oceans. Here ships in want of water can find it bubbling up as freshly as if it had never felt the chain of winter. Wild cattle are leaping among its rocks free and unfettered as goats among Alpine crags. Wild geese and ducks swarm in the bays; snipe are so tame, you can knock them over with your gun if you have not skill to shoot them, a circumstance that would suit me. The eggs of the penguin, albatros, and gull, as they return from the sea to rear a new generation, cover acres, as thick as hailstones; while the teaplant, unlike its delicate Chinese sister, blooms out amid eternal frost.
Sunday, Feb. 1. Lat. 53° 56′ S., long. 64° 49′ W. We are now within forty miles of Staten Land, that huge barrier-rock of the American continent, around which raves the Antarctic sea. It is the very throne of Eolus, the centre of storms which never slumber. One of them struck us a few hours since, and carried away our fore-topsail. It was an old sail, and we bent another in its place, which will prove true to its trust. We have sent down our top-gallant yards, and set our try-sails. Sleet and hail are falling, and the night has closed over us in starless gloom.
Against the night-storm, you who dwell on the land can close your shutters, and retire in safety to repose. That storm summons the sailor from his hammock to the yards. There, on that giddy elevation, with his masts sweeping from sea to sea, the tempest roaring through his shrouds, the thunder bursting overhead, the waves howling beneath, and the quick lightning scorching the eyeballs that meet its glare, the poor sailor attempts to reef sail. One false balance, one parting of that life line, and he is precipitated into the rushing sea. A shriek is heard; but who in such a night of tumult and terror can save? A bubbling groan ascends: the billows close over their victim, and he sinks to his deep watery bier. His poor mother will long wait and watch for the return of her orphan boy; and his infant sister, unacquainted with death, will still speak his name in gladness. But they will see his face no more! He has gone to that dim bourne—
From which nor wave, nor sail, nor mariner
Have e’er returned, nor one fond, farewell word
Traversed the waters back.
Monday, Feb. 2. As we were close hauled, with Staten Land on our lee-bow, we carried during the night only sail enough to steady the ship. But as day began to glimmer, we shook a reef or two out of our topsails, and set our courses. The sun came up with a cold beam out of an horizon of heavy haze. Light clouds, in the southwest, began to shoot up into the zenith, and were followed by a fierce blow, accompanied with dashes of sleet and hail. Our courses were hauled up, and we were soon under close-reefed topsails, main spencer, and fore-staysail.
2 o’clock, P. M. The indications of a still severer blow are gathering around us. The scud drives over the sky with lightning speed, throwing out here and there its wild black flukes. The sea is running high, and our ship is plunging into it like a mad leviathan. We have bent our storm-sails for the worst that may come. Among small matters, my books, in a heavy roll of the ship, have just fetched away, and lie in every possible position in my state-room. I have more literature under my feet than I shall ever have in my head.
7 o’clock, P. M. The sun has just burst through the heavy clouds that hang on the horizon, and thrown into light a bark on our weather-quarter. She is visible only as she comes over the combing summit of a mountain wave, and is then lost in the hollow of the sea. So long indeed she disappears, you half believe she is gone forever, when up she comes, hanging upon the plunging verge of another wave. The sun has set, and night is on the deep.
Tuesday, Feb. 3. Lat. by alt. near noon, 55° 17′ S. Long, by dead reckoning, 61° 32′ W. Distance from Staten Land, 85 miles, bearing N. W. by W. ½ W. (true) heading W. by S., and making no better than W. N. W., allowing two points variation, and one for the heave of the sea. Such is our position, such our prospect for doubling Cape Horn: a head wind, a high sea, and dashes of rain and hail. Still we take matters very quietly. Our dead-lights are in, our hatches hooded, and our ship under close-reefed topsails. When the wind has blown its blow out, where it now is, we expect it will change its quarters like a spendthrift without cash or credit left.