There She Blows! Or, The Log of the Arethusa

by William Hussey Macy

"Well," said Father Grafton, "that's much better than fifteen hundred, for it's a kind of labor that seamen abominate, and no wonder at it. There's a sameness about it that is not at all agreeable. I must say that I dislike such jobs as pumping, sawing wood, and turning grindstones."

Of course I agreed with him entirely in this antipathy.

"I don't think," continued the mate, "that there is any other leak in her beside that one under the counter. It's likely that the copper and sheathing are much torn up under the bows, but the ledge appeared to be pretty smooth, and the pumps threw no water, up to just before the time we hauled her afloat."

"I suppose," said I, "the cooper will admit now that she leaks enough to keep her sweet. Ah! here he is, on deck, and his pipe loaded, too. Say, Cooper, have you seen any flying fish come from the pump yet?"

"No," answered the cooper, gruffly. "She don't leak much, now, that is, comparatively speaking. She's tight, compared to the old Harbinger. But we didn't mind it so much in those days, as we should now."

"No, that's true," said the mate, "and, to go twenty or thirty years still further back, they minded it still less, and seemed to look upon pumping as a matter of course, a part of the regular routine of ship's duty. I recollect a case in point. When I was a young fellow, I happened to be present in court when a case was being tried involving the insurance on the ship Tarquin, sunk at sea on her homeward passage. It appeared that the Tarquin, when off Cape Horn, leaked a smart thousand strokes an hour; that after getting down into the trades on the Atlantic side, they had tinkered some of their leaks, and also, being in lighter weather, she made less water, so that they pumped only three or four hundred strokes an hour when off Cape St. Augustine. Well, they held on their course, and, between there and home, she gave out entirely, and sunk from under 'em. The underwriters refused to pay, and the ground taken by them was, that the captain ought to have gone into a port in Brazil, and overhauled his ship. Well, several old sea-captains were called on the stand to give their opinions. I remember one in particular, who is still living. The question was put to him, whether, in his judgment, it was prudent for the captain of the Tarquin, with his ship leaking some three or four hundred strokes, and Pernambuco under his lee, to continue on towards home? 'Prudent!' said the old gentleman. 'Yes, why not? Why,' said he, proudly, 'I sailed out of New Bedford in a ship leaking five hundred strokes an hour to start on a voyage!'"

"Yes, that was in what they call, 'the good old times,'" said the cooper. "And that reminds me of a circumstance that happened many years ago in which an uncle of mine was one of the parties concerned. He was homeward bound in an old ship, I think it was the Criterion. They got in on the coast, made Block Island, and took a pilot. It came on to blow very heavily from the northward, and they were blown off the coast and the ship leaked so that they found it impossible to free her, and decided that the only safety for them was to put her off before it and run her—somewhat. Well, they let her slide to leeward with both pumps going, and when the weather moderated, they found themselves so far to the southward that they kept on, and made a port at the French island of Martinique. Here they discharged the oil, hove the ship out, stopped the leaks, and took in their cargo again. In those days, you will remember, communications with the West Indies was not an every-day thing as it is now, and nothing was heard from that particular island for a long time. Well, in the mean time the pilot-boat reported putting a pilot on board ship Criterion, off Block island, such a date. Of course, it was supposed she had foundered in the gale, and all had perished. Well, four months afterwards, away along in the summer, the Criterion came down to the bar, and when my uncle went ashore he found his wife in mourning, having given him up for dead long before."

"I believe that's a true yarn, Cooper, if you did tell it," said the mate—"This way the watch! Pump ship!"

We still held on our course to the westward, to make a port at one of the Carolines or Ladrones, and made good progress with the trade winds in our favor. Our men soon recovered from their injuries, and resumed their duties, rather priding themselves upon the ugly scars received in the conflict. Whether the old man ever said anything in the way of reprimand to the second mate, I never knew. If he did, the whole matter was kept to themselves; and, indeed, it was not his habit to find fault with an officer in the presence or hearing of any subordinate. Perhaps he thought it best to overlook his almost fatal want of vigilance, in view of his gallant conduct afterwards in charge of the forlorn hope on the point, and trusted that the peril through which he had just passed would prove a salutary lesson to him for the future. If so, he judged correctly, for the young officer's eyes were opened to his own carelessness; and, in a literal sense, he kept them open the remainder of the voyage. As I learned from others in his watch, he never was known, after this affair, to sit down during his hours of duty at night.