Will Weatherhelm: The Yarn of an Old Sailor

by William Henry Giles Kingston

“Well,” thinks I to myself, “‘in for a penny, in for a pound,’ though there is a difference between the shilling my friend in the crowd said I should have to pay and the twelve shillings the doctor demands. But then, to be sure, the stuff can’t be unpleasant, and the grog, at all events, is no bad thing. ‘Well, doctor,’ says I, ‘I’ll take the twelve bottles, but I should like to know what the stuff you give me is made of?’

“‘What!’ he sings out, drawing himself up and looking as proud as a prince. ‘What! Do you just imagine for one quarter of a moment that I would tell you, or any man like you, alive on this terrestrial sphere, what my infallible Obfucastementi-scoposis is composed of? No; not to satisfy the gaping curiosity of twenty such wretched creatures as you are would I reveal that golden, all-important, mysterious secret. If you are not content, go! Give me back my invaluable ’lixier and cut.’

“‘Yes, doctor,’ says I, going to give him the twelve bottles, ‘and just do you in return hand me out my twelve shillings.’

“‘Your twelve shillings! you audacious rascal. Here’s a man asks me for twelve shillings in exchange for my ’lixier, which is worth twelve pounds at least. Ladies and gentlemen, he ain’t fit to be among such as you. Hoot him—hoot him—hiss him—kick him out from among you.’

“On this my friend in the crowd, who advised me to buy the stuff, began to hoot and to hiss and to shove me about, and others followed his example, till I saw that there was no use of attempting to hold my own, and I wasn’t sorry to be able to get clear of them, and to bolt with a whole skin on my body, though two of the bottles were broken in the row.

“I got home at last, not over well pleased with Doctor Gulliman and the way I had been treated. However, as I had paid for my whistle, I thought I might as well try if the stuff would do me any good. As soon as I got into Portsmouth I bought a bottle of old rum; for, thinks I to myself, if I am to take the stuff, the sooner I begin the better.

“When I reached my boat, I recollected that I was engaged to go out to Spithead to bring on shore an officer from one of the ships lying there, so I stowed away a glass and a can of water, not forgetting the rum and ’lixier, and shoved off. I just paddled down the harbour, for I was in no hurry, and the ebb was making strong. At last says I to myself, just as I got off the kickers, ‘I’ll just take a bottle of the ’lixier and see how I feel after it.’ So I got a bottle, and poured it out, and put in some old rum, just on the top of it, to take the taste away, and then I took the can of water, but I found that there was a hole at the bottom of it, and that most of the water had leaked out. So, do you see, I was obliged to be very careful of the water, and couldn’t put much of it at a time in the glass. If I had, you see, I shouldn’t have had any of the precious fluid, as they calls it, left for another glass. Well, I tossed off the liquid, and when I had smacked my lips, I began to think much better of the doctor. His stuff, you see, wasn’t so bad after all. Thinks I to myself, ‘If one glass is good, two must be better; so, before I take to the oars again, I’ll have another.’ Somehow the second was even better than the first. Then it struck me all of a heap like, that the doctor said I should take three bottles of his stuff in a day; so, as it was now getting towards sundown, thinks I, ‘The sooner I takes the third the better.’

“Howsomedever, when I came to look at the can, I found that every drop of water had leaked out, so I had no help for it but to fill the tumbler up with the rum. I can’t say it tasted bad, though it was, maybe, rather stiffish. Well, as the tide was sending me along nicely, I didn’t get out the oars again, but sat in the boat meditating like, when all of a sudden I felt myself very queer in the inside, and pains came on just for all the world as if I had swallowed a score or two of big mackerel, and they were all kicking and wriggling about in my bread-basket. ‘They are the smoke-worms the doctor told me about,’ thinks I. ‘They don’t like the taste of his stuff, that’s the truth of it.’ Well, I felt queerer and queerer, and Southsea Castle began to spin round and round, and the kickers went dancing up and down, and the ships in the harbour were all turning summersets, and every sort of circumvolution and devilment you could think of took place. Thinks I to myself, ‘There’s something in that doctor’s stuff, there’s no doubt about that, though whether its worth a shilling a bottle is another matter.’ Just then I felt more queer than ever. ‘Heugh! heugh!’ There was a rattling and a kicking, and such commotion in my inside, and up came what I soon knew was the smoke-worms right out of my mouth, and overboard they went as I put my head over the gunwale. There was a bushel of them if there was one.

“Never afore nor since have I seen such things, for every mother’s son had hairy backs and forked tails. Yes, gentlemen and ladies, forked tails and hairy backs. Believe Jerry Vincent for the truth of what he says. The moment they got into the water they began to frisk and frolic about as if it was natural to them, and to grow bigger and bigger and bigger, till the first which came up was as big as a frigate’s jolly-boat. I made short work of it, and threw them all up till I felt there wasn’t another morsel of any one of them in my locker. Then thinks I to myself, ‘It’s time to look out sharp, or some of these merry chaps with forked tails will be playing me a trick;’ for you see that they’d already begun to open their mouths very wide, and to splash the water right over me as they whisked about round the boat, just like sharks in the West Indies. So I got out my oars pretty sharp, and began to pull away towards Spithead, thinking to get clear of them, and to carry my freight ashore as I’d engaged to do. But I soon found that the smoke-worms weren’t quite so ready to part company with me, and as my boat began to gather way, they began to swim after her. The big fellow led, and all the others followed. There was hundreds of them, of all sizes, and one little chap, who brought up the rear, was no bigger than a sprat. After me they came with open months and big red eyes, all the hair on their backs standing up, and their tails whisking about like the flukes of a whale in a flurry. Didn’t I just pull for dear life, for I knew what they’d be after if they once grappled me. They would have swallowed me, every one of them. I soon gave up all thoughts of fetching up the ship I was bound for. It would never have done to have gone alongside one of his Majesty’s crack frigates with such a train after me. I should have lost my character, you know. On I pulled; I didn’t spare the oars, depend upon it; but, somehow or other, the way in which the tide set, and the manner in which the brutes dodged me, made me go right out to Spithead, and there I found myself pulling among a whole fleet of men-of-war and Indiamen. The officers and ships’ companies crowded into the hammock nettings and rigging to see me pass, and never have I heard such shouts of laughter as they raised as I pulled by. Neither to the one side nor to the other could I turn; for if I did, as surely one of the beasts would instantly swim up, with open mouth, and make a grab at my oar to keep me going straight ahead. I sung out to the people aboard the ships in mercy’s name to take a shot at some of the bigger brutes, for I thought that I could grapple with the little ones; but either they didn’t or wouldn’t hear me; so away I pulled right out towards the Nab. Thinks I to myself, ‘Perhaps the people in the lightship will lend a helping hand to an old seaman;’ but not a bit of it. When they saw me coming with my train of forked-tailed brutes after me, they sung out that I must sheer off, or they would let fly at me. So there I was fairly at sea, followed by as disagreeable a set of customers as a man ever had astern of him.

“I didn’t bless Doctor Gulliman exactly, for I could not help thinking that somehow or other he had had a hand in the mystification. I now pulled up my larboard oar a little, and found that I was going right round by the Culver cliffs. ‘Well, I’ll get on shore at the back of the Wight anyhow, and do them,’ I thought to myself. But what do ye think; the moment I tried the dodge, the cunning brutes kept edging me off the land, till I saw that there was no hope for me but to go on. All the time they made such a tremendous hissing and splashing and whisking, that you’d have thought a whole ship’s company was washing decks above your head, and heaving water about in bucketsful. It was now night, but there was light enough and to spare to enable me to see the beasts as they kept way with me. I passed Sandown and Ventnor and Steephill, and could see the lights in the houses all along the shore; but as to being able to land, the wriggling brutes in my wake, as I said, took good care that I shouldn’t do that. By the time I got off Saint Catherine’s my arms began to ache a bit, and I felt as if I couldn’t pull another stroke; but when I just lay on my oars to take breath and to knock the drops off my brow, which were falling down heavy enough to swamp the boat, the look of their wicked eyes and big mouths, as they came hissing up open-jawed alongside, set me off again pretty fast. I passed Blackgang Chine, and caught a sight of Brooke, and then I thought I would try to pull into Freshwater Gate, when I would beach the boat, and have a run for my life on shore, for I didn’t think they would come out of the water after me. The truth was that I couldn’t bear the look of them any longer; but the wriggling beasts were up to me, and before I had so much as turned the boat’s head towards the Gate, three or four of the biggest fellows ranged up on my starboard side, and cut me off. I sung out in my rage and disappointment, but this only made matters worse, and my eyes if they didn’t begin to laugh at me, and such a laugh I never did hear before, and hope I never may again. It was like ten thousand donkeys troubled with sore throats trying which would sing out the loudest, and twice as many jackals mocking them, all joined in chorus. At last I got to Scratchell’s Bay. ‘Now’s my time,’ thinks I, ‘if they once get me on a course down Channel, they may drive me right round the world, or over to the coast of America at shortest.’ I knew well the passage through the Needle rocks. The flood was about making. There might be just water for the boat, but none to spare. ‘No odds,’ thinks I. So, while I pretended to be steering for Portland, I shoved the boat round, and then gave way with a will. ‘If I knock the boat to pieces against the rocks, I shall not be worse off than I am now,’ I said to myself, as I pulled for the passage. I just hit it. The keel of the boat grazed over a rock below water; but the tide was running strong, and I shot through like an arrow, and there I was in Alum Bay. Now the passage was too narrow, you see, for the forked-tailed beasts to get through, and they had a good chance of hurting themselves on the rocks if they attempted it; so, if they had been as wise as I took them for, I knew that they would go all the way round the outer Needle rock, and that this would give me a great start. Instead of that, in their eagerness to follow me, what should they do but bolt right at the passage. The big fellow stuck fast, and the little ones couldn’t get by him, and there they were, to my great delight, all knocking their noses against the rocks, and wriggling and hissing and struggling and kicking up such a row, that I thought the people at Milford and Yarmouth, and all along the coast, would be awoke up out of their quiet sleep to wonder what it was all about. However, it would never have done for me to lay on my oars to watch the fun, because I thought it just as likely as not, when the tide rose, that the noisy brutes might shove through and be after me again, so I pulled away as hard as ever right up the Solent, till I got safe back again into Portsmouth harbour. Luckily, I had the whole of the flood with me, or I never could have done it. My arms ached as it was not a little. I moored my boat securely, and as it wasn’t yet daybreak, I lay down in the bottom of the boat, and fell asleep. I never slept so soundly in my life, and no wonder, after the pull I had had.