When I told Harry, he said that he would consider what was right to be done. “I think it best, however, that Dick should remain in his present position for a time,” he added. “He is learning the details of seamanship from old Tom and the rudiments of navigation from you, and as he does not mix much with the crew he will gain no harm from them.”
We were standing on that evening close hauled to the south-east when, just as the sun went down, dark clouds began to gather to windward.
“We’ll shorten sail at once,” said Harry. “It may not come on to blow, but it looks like it and we cannot be too cautious.” He issued the order to Tom, and we soon had the schooner under snug canvas. It was fortunate that she was. Not ten minutes afterwards, just as Harry had gone below, a squall struck her.
“Luff! Luff!” shouted Tom, but before Jack Lizard, who was at the helm, could do so, over the schooner heeled, till the water rushed through the scuppers high up her deck. Lower and lower she went, until I thought she was going to capsize. Harry sprang up from below. Tom had rushed forward, and with the hands stationed there let fly the jib-sheets, and was hauling down the forestay-sail—the foresail had been stowed. Suddenly she rose, and I heard a loud crack, like the report of a musket fired close to my ear.
“We’ve sprung the mainmast, I fear,” exclaimed Harry, and he called the men aft to lower the mainsail, while he and I sprang to the peak and throat halliards to let them go. On examining the mast we found that it was so badly sprung that it would be impossible again to set sail on it without the risk of carrying it away. It seemed a wonder that it had not gone altogether.
“We must bear up for Samoa,” said Harry. “It is very provoking, but there is no place nearer where we can hope to obtain a fresh spar.”
Accordingly the headsails were again hoisted, the fore-topsail was set, and the helm being put up, away we ran before the wind on a course for Upalu, the centre island of the group, in which Apia, the chief port, is situated. The wind increased, and we soon had to close-reef the fore-topsail, the only sail we could carry; then down came the rain in huge drops, or rather in sheets which wetted us as thoroughly as if we had jumped overboard, and so deluged the deck that had it not run out at the scuppers as the vessel rolled from side to side the water would have been up to our ankles in a few minutes. What with the pattering of the rain, the howling of the wind and the dashing of the sea, we could scarcely hear each other’s voices. Though we had no sail set on the mainmast, and had secured it with spars lashed round the injured part, and additional stays, I frequently, as the schooner pitched into the fast rising seas, expected to see it carried away altogether. Old Tom, who seemed to have the same fear, told us to look out and stand from under, in case it should go, but the difficulty was to know in what direction it would fall, should it come down.
On we ran day after day, the gale apparently following us, though Harry said that as storms were generally circular we should in time run out of it. Each time, however, that I turned out to keep my watch, there we were, running on; the seas leaping and hissing and foaming around us; the dark clouds flying overhead; the vessel rolling and pitching in the same uncomfortable fashion as before. Harry did his best to keep up the spirits of his wife and Fanny, who behaved like heroines, though they agreed that they little expected to meet with such weather in the Pacific.
“It is as well to get it over, and we may hope to have finer for the rest of the voyage,” answered Harry, to console them.