Part 1 (1/2)

My First Cruise.

by W.H.G. Kingston.

STORY ONE

CHAPTER 1.

NOTES FROM PRINGLE RUSHFORTH'S SEA LOG.

A LETTER TO BROTHER HARRY, AT ETON.

It has become a reality, dear Harry. I feel very strange--a curious sensation in the throat, just as if I was going to cry, and yet it is exactly what I have been longing for. You know better than any one how I had set my heart on going to sea, and yet I thought that I should never manage it. But, after all, here I am, really and truly a mids.h.i.+pman; at least a volunteer of the first cla.s.s, as we are called now. The first time I put on my uniform, with my gold-band cap and dirk, I could not help every now and then looking at the gold lace on my collar and the b.u.t.tons with the anchor and crown, and very pretty and nice they looked; and I do believe that this half-reconciled poor mamma, and f.a.n.n.y, and Mary, and dear little Emily to my going when they saw me with them on. I'll tell you how it all happened. Uncle Tom came to stay with us. He had been at the Hall a week when, the very day before I was to go back to school, while we were all at breakfast, he got a long official-looking letter. No sooner had he torn it open and glanced at its contents, than he jumped up and shook papa by the hand, then kissed mamma, exclaiming, ”They do acknowledge my services, and in a handsome way too, and they have appointed me to the Juno intended for the South American station; the very s.h.i.+p I should have chosen! I must have Pringle with me. No nonsense, Mary. He wants to be a sailor, and a sailor he shall be. He's well fitted for it. I'll have no denial.

It's settled--that's all right.” (I had been telling him the day before how much I wanted to go to sea.) He carried his point, and set all the household preparing my kit, and then posted off for London, and rattled down to Portsmouth to hoist his flag. He is not a man to do things by halves. In three days I followed him. The s.h.i.+p was nearly ready for sea. Most of the officers had joined. There was only one vacancy, which I got. Another captain had been appointed, who had been superseded, and he had selected most of the officers. Many of my messmates are good fellows, but of others the less said about them the better, at least as far as I could judge from the way they behaved when I first went into the berth. We carry thirty-six guns. There is the main deck, on which most of them are placed, and the upper deck, which is open to the sky, and where all the ropes lead, and where some guns are, and the lower deck, where we sleep in hammocks slung to the beams, and where our berth is; that is the place where we live--our drawing-room, and parlour, and study, and anything else you please.

There is a table in the centre, and lockers all round, and if you want to move about you have to get behind the other fellows' backs or over the table. Under it are cases and hampers of all sorts, which the caterer has not unpacked. He is an old mate, and keeps us all in order.

His name is Gregson. I don't know whether I shall like him. He has been a great many years a mids.h.i.+pman; for a mate is only a pa.s.sed mids.h.i.+pman who wants to be a lieutenant, but can't. He has no interest--n.o.body to help him on--so there he is growling and grumbling from morning to night, declaring that he'll cut the service, and go and join the Russians, and make his country rue the day; but he doesn't, and I believe he wouldn't, if they would make him an admiral and a count off-hand. My chief friend they call d.i.c.ky Snookes. His real name, though, is Algernon G.o.dolphin Stafford, on which he rather prides himself. This was found out, so it was voted that he should be re-christened, and not be allowed under dreadful pains and penalties to a.s.sume his proper appellation in the berth; so no one thinks of calling him anything but Snookes. He is getting not to mind it, which I am glad of, as he does not seem a bad fellow, and is up to fun of all sorts.

There is another fellow who is always called Lord Jones or My Lord, because he is as unlike what you would suppose a n.o.bleman to be as possible. Then there is Polly. His real name is Skeffington Scoulding, which was voted too long, so, as poor fellow he has lost an eye, he was dubbed Polyphemus, which was soon turned into Polly. I haven't got a new name yet, so I hope to stick to my own. I have picked up a good many more bits of information during the three days I have been on board, but I have not time to tell them now. I will though, don't fear.

I hope to be put in a watch when we get to sea. I don't mean inside a silver case, to go on tick!--ha!--ha!--ha! but to keep watch under a lieutenant, to see what the s.h.i.+p is about, and to keep her out of sc.r.a.pes. Good-bye, dear old fellow, I'll tell you more when I can.-- Your affect brother, Pringle Rushforth.

STORY ONE, CHAPTER 2.

NOTES FROM MY LOG.

The capstern went round with a merry tune--the boatswain's whistle sounded shrilly along the decks with a magic effect--the anchor was hove up--the sails were let fall and but a few minutes had pa.s.sed, after the captain gave the word of command, before the s.h.i.+p, under a wide spread of snowy canvas, was standing down the Solent towards the Needle pa.s.sage. It was a lovely summer's day, the sky was blue and so was the water, and the land looked green and bright, and the paint was so fresh, and the deck so white, and the officers in their glittering uniform had so polished an appearance, and the men in their white trousers and s.h.i.+rts with worked collars and natty hats, looked so neat and active as they sprang nimbly aloft, or flew about the decks, that I felt very proud of the frigate and everything about her, and very glad that I had come to sea. To be sure matters below were not quite in the same order just then. Still prouder was I when we saluted the Queen, who was at Osborne--firing away first on one side and then on the other, with a flash and a roar, and a huge puff of smoke. We pa.s.sed out at the Needles with the cheese-like castle of Hurst and its red ninepin-looking lighthouses on our right, and a little further to the west on our right with the high cliffs of Alum Bay striped curiously with coloured sand and three high-pointed rocks, wading out into the sea, as if wanting to get across to the north sh.o.r.e. These are the Needle rocks. We had run the high white cliff at the west end of the island out of sight before dark, and that, except a thin blue tint of land away to the north-east, was the last I saw of the sh.o.r.es of dear old happy England. I daresay others felt as I did, but we all had so much to do that we hadn't time to talk about it. d.i.c.key Snookes had been to sea already for a few months, and of course knew a great deal more than I could--at least he said that he did, and on the strength of it offered to tell me all about everything. I thought I saw a twinkle in his eye, but his eyes always are twinkling, so I did not suspect him of intending mischief. We had some vegetables for dinner--some carrots and turnips--and he asked me if I knew where they grew? I said in some garden, I supposed. ”Of course, young 'un,” he answered. But you wouldn't suppose we had a garden up in our foretop, where we grow all sorts of greens and other things. You have not found your way there, I suspect. I told him that I had not, and he said that I must go up there that very afternoon with him, and that he would introduce me to the head-gardener, who was always up there looking after the gooseberry bushes. I knew that this was a joke, but still I wanted to see what he meant. I said that I was ready at once, but he kept putting me off; and whenever he saw me going up the rigging he always got some one to send for me or to call me, so that it was quite late in the day before I succeeded in getting into the shrouds.

The sun had now gone down, the sky was overcast, and the sea had a leaden gloomy look--there was a swell also, and the s.h.i.+p rolled so much from side to side, that, as I looked up and saw the mastheads forming arches in the sky, I could not help fancying that I should be sent off when I got up there like a stone from a sling, or an ancient catapult, right into the water. The idea made me hold on very tight, let me tell you; yet, as it would never do to give it up, on I went with my teeth pretty closely clenched, and my eyes fixed on the top, which seemed to grow farther and farther away from me, like Jack's bean-stalk. At last I got up just under the top. There are two ways of getting on to it.

One is by going along some ropes, called the futtock shrouds, when one hangs very much as a fly does crawling along the ceiling. I didn't like it, being up there all alone in the gloom, for it was very different to climbing an apple-tree or the oak-tree at the bottom of the lawn, with our nest on the top of it, where you and I used to sit and smoke cane cigars, and fancy ourselves Istelson and Collingwood. It wasn't pleasant going along the futtock shrouds, and still less getting round them outside into the top, for as the s.h.i.+p rolled it felt as if the mast was coming right down on the top of me. I waited, however, holding on as a cat does to a bough when you shake it, till the s.h.i.+p rolled over the other way, and then up I sprang easily enough, and there I saw d.i.c.key Snookes and Polly and My Lord all standing by the side of the captain of the top, and grinning from ear to ear, as if they had some very good joke in hand. At first I thought that the captain of the top was a very important person, but I soon found that he was only one of the seamen who is more active and smarter than the rest, and takes command of those aloft. ”Here comes Mids.h.i.+pman Green,” they all exclaimed, as they saw my head appearing between the topmast shrouds.

When I stood in the top they all insisted on shaking hands with me, pinching my fingers terribly. ”And so you want to see our garden up here,” said Snookes; ”you're the greenest thing we've got in it just now, let me tell you--ha! ha! ha!”

I didn't see anything to laugh at; but I laughed just to keep them company, thinking the joke was over. However, before I knew what they were about they caught hold of me, and while one blinded my eyes with a handkerchief, I found myself lashed up to the rigging with my arms and legs spread out just like the eagle on a Russian flag. Presently all was silent. The s.h.i.+p kept rolling backwards and forwards as before, and I began to feel somewhat queer in the region of my waistband and right up to my throat, still I wouldn't cry out. Suddenly I found the bandage whisked off my eyes, and then I could see only one top man standing on the other side of the top, but my messmates had disappeared. I called to the man. He touched his hat with the greatest respect. I told him to cast me loose. ”My orders were, sir, not to touch you,” he answered.

I argued the point. ”Well, sir, if as how you pays your footing, I'll do it,” he replied; ”but, sir, you'll take care that I'm not tied up and get two dozen for disobeying orders.” I was ready to promise anything, for it was very unpleasant rolling about up there in the dark. After some hesitation and further talk, Tom Hansard, that was the topman's name, cut off the las.h.i.+ngs. I gave him five s.h.i.+llings, all the money I had in my pocket. ”You'll keep it secret, sir,” said he. ”You'll say nothing against a poor fellow like me, sir; that you won't, I know.” I promised him, and he then helped me down through the lubber's hole, for as to going down outside, I couldn't just then have done it to save my life. When I got back to the berth, there were all my three messmates seated round the table, taking their tea, and pretending to be very much astonished at hearing all which had happened to me. Of course, I said nothing about Tom Hansard, and they pretended that they could not make out how I had got loose. I found out, however, that the whole plan was arranged beforehand by d.i.c.ky Snookes and my other messmates with the captain of the top, just to see what I was made of, and what I would do, it being understood that he was to keep whatever he could get out of me.

Had I cried or made a fuss about the matter, or said that I would complain to my uncle, I should have been looked upon as a regular sneak.

The fellows hate telling of one another here just as much as we did at school. From the way I took the trick I believe they liked me better than they did before. Of course, all about the garden and the vegetables was nonsense, and I should have been green to have believed it, which I didn't. Away we went rolling along with a westerly swell and a northerly wind, while many of the fellows in the berth were singing: ”There we lay, all the day, in the Bay of Biscay, O;” and others ”Rule Britannia,” old Gregson not forgetting his standing joke of ”Bless the old girl; I wish, while she was about it, that she had ruled them straighter.” The very next morning the gale, of which the swell was the forerunner, came down upon us with a sudden gust. ”All hands shorten sail,” was shouted along the decks. The men flew aloft, that is, they climbed up so nimbly that they looked as if they were flying, and they lay out on the yards to reef the sail. Snookes had to go also, as he was stationed in the foretop. ”Any greens up there to-day?” I asked as he pa.s.sed me, not looking happy, for the s.h.i.+p was tumbling about, the spray was flying over us, and the wind was howling terrifically in the rigging. It was altogether very different to what it had been on the previous evening. Still poor Snookes had to go up.

The boatswain's whistle and the voices of the officers sounded loud above the gale, and so did the cries of the mids.h.i.+pmen. I contrived to make myself heard, though, of course, I only sung out what I was told to say, and wasn't always certain what would happen after I had said it, any more than does a person in a fairy tale, who has got hold of some magic words and doesn't know what effect they will produce. The topgallantsails and royals were quickly furled--those are the sails highest up, you know; and then the huge topsails came rattling down the masts, and the men lay out on the yards and caught hold of them, as they were bulging out and flapping fearfully about, to reef them. One of the topmen, Tom Hansard, was at the weather yardarm, and had hold of the earing, which isn't a bit like those gold things our sisters wear in their ears, but is a long rope which helps to reef the sails. Suddenly the s.h.i.+p gave a tremendous lurch, I heard a cry, I looked up, and there was Tom Hansard hanging by one hand to the earing from the yard-arm, right over the foaming ocean. I felt as if I had swallowed a bucket full of snow. I thought the poor fellow must be dropped overboard, and so did everybody else, and some were running to one of the boats to lower her to pick him up. He swung fearfully about from side to side.

No human power could save him. I was watching to see him drop, when he made a great effort, and springing up, he caught the rope with his other hand. Still he was only a degree better off. Fancy dangling away at the end of a thin rope, jerked backwards and forwards high up in the air, with certain death were he to fall on board, and very small prospect of escape if he fell into the foaming, tumbling sea, through which the s.h.i.+p was flying at the rate of some ten knots an hour. I felt inclined to shriek out in sympathy, for I am sure that I should have shrieked out, and very loudly too, had I been up there in his place. I felt sure that he would come down when I saw two of the topmen going out to the end of the yard-arm and stretching out their arms towards him to help him. He saw them, and began to climb up the thin rope till they could catch hold of his jacket, then up they pulled him, though the sails flapping about very nearly tore him out of their hands. They held him on to the yard for a minute till he could recover himself, and then he scrambled in on to the top. There was a general shout fore and aft when he was safe. Another man went to the weather earing, and three reefs were taken in the topsails. I heard the first lieutenant observe to Uncle Tom that he was very glad to get the s.h.i.+p snug at last; but I cannot say that I thought her snug, or anything snug about her, for there we were among clouds of sleet and spray, tumbling and rolling about in that undignified way in which I had not thought it possible so fine a frigate could have been tumbled and rolled about. It brought down the s.h.i.+p a peg or two in my estimation, and took the s.h.i.+ne out of many of us, let me tell you. That fellow Snookes was continually offering me a lump of fat bacon, and at dinner he contrived to slip all the most greasy bits into my plate. I held out manfully, and tried to look very heroic, or, at all events, indifferent; but, oh Harry, I did feel very wretched, and began to reflect that I might possibly have been rather happier on sh.o.r.e. I suspect that the way my lips curled, and the yellow look of my eyes, betrayed me. The gale lasted for three days. I was very glad when it was over; so you understand it is not all suns.h.i.+ne at sea.

STORY ONE, CHAPTER 3.

THE SLAVER.

It was reported that we were to touch at one or two places on the coast of Africa, and then to stand across to the Brazils. The first land we made was that near Sierra Leone. I always thought that negroes lived in thatched huts, and wore bits of white cloth round their loins. We brought up before Free Town, the capital of the colony, when what was my surprise to see really a very handsome place, containing between fifteen and twenty thousand inhabitants, the greater number black or brown men, and as well-dressed and comfortable-looking as any white people could be. What is more, they have schools and colleges where they are capitally taught, and all the little black children go to school; so that the truth is, that they are far better educated than are the children of the working cla.s.ses in many parts of England, and are all just as good Christians as we are. Sommers told me all this, and a great deal more. I haven't spoken about him before. He's a mate--such a good-natured, kind fellow, and is very merry, though he can be very serious; and do you know, when he's in the berth, none of the others, big or little, swear and talk about things they oughtn't to. I like Sommers, and so even does Snookes and My Lord; and he never lets anybody bully Polly when he's near. I think that I should have been bullied a good deal, but I took everything that was said or done in good part, or pretended to be unconscious of it, and lost no opportunity of retorting--good-naturedly of course--it would not have done otherwise.

And now, the rest only play the same tricks with me that they do with each other. No one makes any difference with me because I am the captain's nephew, any more than Uncle Tom does himself. Uncle Tom is very kind, but he makes no difference that I can see between the rest of the mids.h.i.+pmen and me. He does the best that he can for all of us, that is the truth: he punishes all alike if we do wrong, and has us all into the cabin and gives us good advice, and talks to us frequently. Still we do, somehow or other, manage to get into sc.r.a.pes. I have been mastheaded twice, and d.i.c.key Snookes five times, since we came to sea; once for dressing up the sheep in some of the men's clothes just before the crew were mustered, and then letting them out on the deck; and another time for cutting poor Polly's hammock down by the head, and very nearly cracking his skull--luckily it's rather thick. After leaving Free Town we touched at Monrovia, the capital of Liberia. Have you ever read about that settlement? It was established by the people of the United States, and colonised by men of colour, or blacks, who had been once slaves and had obtained their freedom. It is a republic, and the chief magistrate as well as all the officers are brown or black men. It is not nearly so large nor so flouris.h.i.+ng a place as Sierra Leone. In the latter, you see, there are a great many intelligent white men who set the blacks an example of industry and perseverance, in which qualities they are somewhat wanting generally. Still it is wonderful to see what black men can do when left free with a good example before them. Monrovia is really a very respectable-looking city. There are a number of stone warehouses full of goods near the water, and a good many dwelling-houses of brick, nicely furnished, and of two storeys high, but the greater number of the habitations are of wood, on brick foundations.

There are several churches, four or five at least, with black or coloured preachers. The greater part of the princ.i.p.al inhabitants are engaged in trade, exchanging palm oil, ivory, cam-wood, which is a valuable dye, for European or American manufactures. They have also a number of vessels manned by Liberian sailors, which sail along the coast to collect the produce of the country. Uncle Tom took me on sh.o.r.e, but we remained only a very short time, so that I cannot give you a more particular account of the place. Leaving the coast of Africa, we stood across the Atlantic towards that of America. We had left the land some four or five days when the wind fell, and we lay becalmed, one side and then the other dipping provokingly into the smooth, gla.s.sy, and s.h.i.+ning water, and very nearly rolling our masts out. It was so hot, too, that the pitch bubbled up through the seams in the deck, and d.i.c.key Snookes declared we could have roasted our dinners on the capstern-head. I believe, indeed, that we could. I was very glad when the sun went down, and the night came, but it was not so very much cooler even then, and most of the watch below remained on deck to swallow some fresh air, but very little any one of us benefited by it. The next day, at all events, I thought that we should get a breeze, but it was much the same. Hot!

oh, how hot it was! We all went gasping about the decks, not knowing what to do with ourselves, and the sea shone so brightly that it was positively painful to look at it. I daresay that it would have been much worse on sh.o.r.e, for, at all events, the air we breathed was pure and clear, though it was pretty well roasted. It was curious to see the same chips of wood and empty hampers, and all the odds and ends thrown overboard, floating around us day after day. We had been a week thus becalmed when I was sent aloft, as the mids.h.i.+pmen occasionally are, to see what was to be seen. I did not expect to see anything, but I did, and that was a long, thin, dark blue line away to the north-east. I reported it to the officer of the watch. He said it was all right, and that we should have a breeze before long, and ordered the watch to trim sails. The blue line increased in width till it could be seen from the deck, and on it came, growing broader and broader every instant. Sure enough it was a breeze stirring up the surface of the ocean. In a little time the upper sails felt its influence, and then the topsails began to bulge out, and the courses moved, and away we glided through the still smooth water faster than we had done for many a day. For some hours we ran on till a sail was reported right ahead still becalmed. As we drew near we discovered her to be a large topsail schooner, with a very rakish appearance. She was still becalmed, but as we brought the breeze up with us her sails bulged out, and she began to glide through the water. There were many discussions as to what she was; some thought her an honest trader, others a slaver; some said she was American, and others Spanish or Portuguese. ”One thing is in her favour,” observed old Gregson, ”she does not attempt to run away.” ”Good reason, Greggy,”

said d.i.c.key Snookes aside to me, ”she can't--just see what she will do when she gets the wind!” Though I had never seen a slaver, the stranger came exactly up to my idea of what a slaver was like. We always at sea call a vessel, whose name and country we don't know, a stranger. Still she did not run away even when she got the breeze, but hove her topsail to the mast, and kept bobbing gracefully away at us as we came up, while the stars and stripes of the United States flew out at her peak. All doubts as to the honesty of her character were dissipated when an officer standing at her gangway hailed and asked what frigate we were.

The reply was given, and he was asked what schooner that was. ”'The Wide Awake,' from New Orleans, bound in for Sierra Leone. Shall be happy to take any letters or packages you have to send for that settlement, captain,” exclaimed the speaker through his trumpet. This was all very polite. Still more so was it when the American skipper offered to send his boat aboard us to receive our despatches. As it happened, the captain had been wis.h.i.+ng to send a letter back to Sierra Leone, and several of the officers wished to write, and as the delay would not be great, we told the polite American that we would trouble him. He seemed well pleased, and said that he would get his boat ready, and drop aboard us. I remained on deck watching the schooner, for there is something very attractive to my eye in the movements of another vessel at sea. A boat was after some time lowered from the schooner and pulled towards us, when she filled her fore-topsail, stood a little way on, tacked, and then steered so as to get to windward of us. I saw our first lieutenant watching her very narrowly when she did this, and then looking at her boat. Presently he went into the captain's cabin. He was not there long. When he came out he ordered a boat to be manned, with the crew all armed, and directed the crews of three or four guns on either side to go quietly to their quarters. I saw, meantime, that the American's boat, instead of pulling up alongside, was pa.s.sing astern of us, so as to meet the schooner, now rapidly approaching our weather quarter. She was still within hearing when the first lieutenant shouted, ”Our despatches are ready--come on board!” But the people in the boat pretended not to hear, and pulled on towards the schooner. On this Sommers was ordered to take command of the boat, and to proceed on board the stranger. To my great delight I got leave from Uncle Tom to accompany him. It was very kind--it was the first piece of favouritism he had shown me. d.i.c.key Snookes was quite jealous when he saw me jump into the boat. ”Ah, Pringle, you'll get knocked on the head, my boy, depend on that!” was his encouraging observation. Away we pulled towards the schooner. Her boat had reached her, and was hoisted up. We had before not observed more than a dozen or fifteen men at the utmost.

There were now more than double that number on her deck, or about her rigging. Every st.i.tch of canvas she could carry was set; her yards were braced sharp up, and away she went like a shot on a bowline. ”Give way, my lads, give way!” cried Sommers, and the men did give way, pulling with all their might; but the schooner went through the water much faster than we did, and in spite of all our efforts soon left us far behind. ”That was the meaning of all his politeness about the letters-- he expected to hoodwink us, did he? the rogue!” exclaimed Sommers. ”But though we do not catch him, the frigate will; there is no fear of that!”