Peter Trawl; Or, The Adventures of a Whaler

by William Henry Giles Kingston

I cannot stop to explain how we accomplished all this; we could not have done it without employing tackles, which we brought to the windlass, and thus gained twenty times as much power as we by ourselves possessed.

We were now pretty well tired and hungry, for, except some bread and cheese and a jug of cold water, we had taken nothing all day.

It was with a feeling of awe that we went down into the cabin where the old captain lay. Jim, however, closed the door of the state-room, so that we could not see him. We then lighted the fire and cooked some dinner—or rather supper, for evening was drawing on. Anxious to be again at work, we hurried over the meal.

“I say, Peter, don’t you think we ought to bury the skipper?” asked Jim, after a long silence.

“Not for some days to come,” I answered; “I hope that we may get into port first, so as to lay him in a grave on shore.”

“I don’t think it will make much odds to him; and, to say the truth, now he’s dead, I’d rather he were out of the ship,” said Jim; “they say it’s unlucky to have a dead man on board.”

I had some difficulty in persuading Jim of the folly of such a notion, but we finally agreed that we would try to carry the captain’s body to land.

Before bending sails we took a look down forward to see the condition of the leaks. The handspikes were in their places, and, except a slight moisture round the holes, we could not discover that any water was getting in. Still there was a great deal too much in the brig for safety, so we took another spell at the pumps before going on with the rigging.

Darkness found us hard at work. We were too tired and sleepy to attempt keeping a look-out, but I bethought me of hoisting a lantern at each masthead, which would save us from being run down should a breeze spring up during the night Jim thought the idea capital, and promised to get up and trim the lamps.

Fortunately, the nights were short, so that there was not much necessity for that. Our chief wish now was that the calm would continue for a few hours during the next day, that we might get the brig to rights.