On the 16th of February, after having added three new men to our crew, (two of them Englishmen, the third a Swede,) we hove short, and at 3 P.M. stood out of the bay. On arriving off Cape Naturaliste, some twenty miles from our place of anchorage, we sighted a sail that proved to be the barque Pamelia, which was hovering off this locality, to intercept the barque Eagle, which was to bring her third mate out, and also provisions for her consumption. Esculents she needed very much, as several of her people, the captain amongst the number, were affected by scurvy. We supplied them temporarily, and thus kept off that disease, which occasions so much terror to the seaman. She contemplated returning home in a short time, and several of her crew, whose motives I cannot fathom, not contented with a three-years’ sojourn in these waters, exchanged into the ship Lapwing, that had some twenty months more to remain. They must either have had an overweening desire to acquire money, or else there were but few attractions at home to induce them to return.
After leaving the bay, we steered to the southeast, in hopes of picking up a whale or two; but we met only with strong gales of wind, which put whaling out of the question. We then returned to the northward, and had the like success: nothing occurring to vary the sameness, day after day, but a series of heavy tempests, attended by terrific thunder and lightning. One night (the 12th of March) the scene was absolutely appalling—presenting a perfect war of the elements. In the words of an old song (than which I know of no better description):
“Now the dreadful thunder roaring,
Peal on peal contending clash;
On our heads fierce rain falls pouring,
In our eyes blue lightnings flash.
One wide water all around us,
All above us one dark sky;
Different deaths at once surround us—
Hark! what means that dreadful cry.”
What the words “that dreadful cry” referred to in the song, the reader must imagine; in our case it was that of a shark. A monster of that species, attracted probably by his instinct, which led him to expect prey on such a night as this, swam around and around the ship; the intense darkness of the night and phosphorescent gleam of the ocean made his huge bulk show out in relief, and appear treble his real size. With a swab trailed astern, we soon got him within darting distance, and hove an iron into his carcass, which stopped his marauding forever. He was an enormous sized one, and required the united strength of half a dozen of us, after he was mortally wounded, to drag him part way from the water.
The storm did us no damage—the lightning ran over our yards and the various ironwork of the ship in a manner to terrify the boldest. The reason assigned for so few cases of injury to ships by lightning, is the number of points presented in her structure for the dispersion of the electricity. One precaution is invariably taken, that is, to remove the pump-spears, and fill their place with swabs, to prevent the iron rods acting as conductors for the electric fluid into the hold of the ship.
There is something terrifying in such a scene, that carries with it a sense of danger to the sturdiest: no matter how many such outbreaks have before been viewed by the beholder, still an indefinable fear will pervade his system. The gale is a feature to which, in his routine of life upon the ocean, the seaman becomes accustomed, and only asks for a short warning to battle with it; but there is something in the lightning that makes one feel completely at its mercy, though we know that in this as in all other perilous situations, we are under the protection of the same wise Creator.
On these grounds we were continually meeting merchantmen bound to and from the various Australian and East Indian ports, and it was a matter of congratulation to us to see that all the swiftest and best of these ships carried our own starry flag, maintaining the pre-eminence of our ship-builders in this far-off sea.
We were now thirty months from home, and as our ship was fitted at the outset to remain from home but forty, this was to be our last cruise; and home was the all-engrossing topic on every tongue, from the captain’s to the steerage boys’, all uniting in a sincere wish to return, oil or no oil. Our return, which but a short time previous had been commented upon as a vague and distant termination of a protracted voyage, was now viewed as feasible and not very remote; and we felt ourselves considerably elevated by the mere thought, when we gammoned with ships but a short time from home, of the probation they, poor fellows, would have to go through ere they arrived at the degree of experience we had acquired on this coast. The wildest of those of our crew, who had left home on the impulse of the moment, were the most anxious to return, feeling that they had paid dear enough for their whistles.
We were now the longest out of any ship on the coast. It is an old adage, amongst whalemen, that when a year from home, on gammoning with any ship that has sailed subsequent to your own departure, you have the privilege of begging; when two years out, of stealing; and when three years, of stealing and begging too; so that we now had the right of exercising this privilege, in which there is more reality than romance. Fresh provisions are seized upon by the old residenters without ruth, as if they had the best right to them. This is seldom disputed by the owners, who, in the abundance of their sympathy, do not wait to be asked for such things, but press them for acceptance without thought of remuneration; doing as they would be done by, and setting an example worthy of imitation by more polished ones.
During the latter part of February and the month of March, we were occupied in beating around the south-west coast of New Holland, occasionally seeing land or sighting a ship to vary the monotony. Early in April we steered to the northward, the strong south-east trades being greatly in our favor. These winds prevail throughout the year in this vicinity, only interrupted by fierce gales from the north-west, which, though severe throughout their duration, seldom last more than from twelve to sixteen hours. During our passage, as we emerged into the warmer latitudes, shoals of flying-fish, bonita, albacore, and dolphin were continually in sight, skipping hither and thither. The bonita and albacore remaining in attendance upon our journey for months, we occasionally caught them. Their prey being flying-fish, they are easily hooked by cutting from solder or tin a shape resembling the little creature, attaching a hook to the lower part of the solder image, and a line to the upper; the angler then perches himself upon the end of the flying jib-boom, and dangles his tackle to and fro, imitating as nearly as possible the aerial flight of the tiny creature it is intended to represent. The voracious skip-jack, or albacore, as the case may be, ever on the alert for its prey, rushes to the bait, seizes it, and is hooked for his pains. It is a pleasant sight to watch these fish whilst about the ship; their agile movements in pursuit of the flying-fish; their instinct teaching them that these are to be found in the greatest number about the vessel’s prow, which, in her onward course, disturbs them in their retreats, and forces them to seek safety in the air, on their descent from which an ever watchful enemy is prepared to meet and devour some of their number. At all times these creatures, apparently with the utmost ease, keep in advance of the ship, leaping from the water and varying their course with the direction of the vessel. As I before said, they are often caught, but are only serviceable for food when cooked with other articles, their flesh being extremely dry and insipid. I have been assured by those who have had experience of it, that long indulgence in eating them, produces scurvy of the most violent type—more than one instance of such a fact being on record.