Part 2 (1/2)

I may mention that there was not another of our fellow-pa.s.sengers who took the trouble to come on deck and give a glance at this strange cl.u.s.ter of islands. Miss Herbey, it is true, was making an attempt to join us, but she had barely reached the p.o.o.p, when Mrs. Kear's languid voice was heard recalling her for some trifling service to her side.

CHAPTER VI

THE SARGa.s.sO SEA

OCTOBER 8 to October 13.--The wind is blowing hard from the northeast, and the Chancellor, under low-reefed top-sail and fore-sail, and laboring against a heavy sea, has been obliged to be brought ahull. The joists and girders all creak again until one's teeth are set on edge. I am the only pa.s.senger not remaining below; but I prefer being on deck notwithstanding the driving rain, fine as dust, which penetrates to the very skin. We have been driven along in this fas.h.i.+on for the best part of two days; the ”stiffish breeze” has gradually freshened into ”a gale”; the topgallants have been lowered, and, as I write, the wind is blowing with a velocity of fifty or sixty miles an hour. Although the Chancellor has many good points, her drift is considerable, and we have been carried far to the south; we can only guess at our precise position, as the cloudy atmosphere entirely precludes us from taking the sun's alt.i.tude.

All along, throughout this period, my fellow-pa.s.sengers are totally ignorant of the extraordinary course that we are taking. England lies to the northeast, yet we are sailing directly southeast, and Robert Curtis owns that he is quite bewildered; he cannot comprehend why the captain, ever since this northeasterly gale has been blowing, should persist in allowing the s.h.i.+p to drive to the south, instead of tacking to the northwest until she gets into better quarters.

I was alone with Robert Curtis to-day upon the p.o.o.p, and could not help saying to him, ”Curtis, is your captain mad?”

”Perhaps, sir, I might be allowed to ask what YOU think upon that matter,” was his cautious reply.

”Well, to say the truth,” I answered. ”I can hardly tell; but I confess there is every now and then a wandering in his eye, and an odd look on his face that I do not like. Have you ever sailed with him before?”

”No; this is our first voyage together. Again last night I spoke to him about the route we were taking, but he only said he knew all about it, and that it was all right.”

”What do Lieutenant Walter and your boatswain think of it all?” I inquired.

”Think; why, they think just the same as I do,” replied the mate; ”but if the captain chooses to take the s.h.i.+p to China we should obey his orders.”

”But surely,” I exclaimed, ”there must be some limit to your obedience!

Suppose the man is actually mad, what then?”

”If he should be mad enough, Mr. Kazallon, to bring the vessel into any real danger, I shall know what to do.”

With this a.s.surance I am forced to be content. Matters, however, have taken a different turn to what I bargained for when I took my pa.s.sage on board the Chancellor. The weather has become worse and worse. As I have already said, the s.h.i.+p under her large low-reefed top-sail and fore stay-sail has been brought ahull, that is to say, she copes directly with the wind, by presenting her broad bows to the sea; and so we go on still drift, drift, continually to the south.

How southerly our course has been is very apparent; for upon the night of the 11th we fairly entered upon that portion of the Atlantic which is known as the Sarga.s.so Sea. An extensive tract of water is this, inclosed by the warm current of the Gulf Stream, and thickly covered with the wrack, called by the Spaniards ”sarga.s.so,” the abundance of which so seriously impeded the progress of Columbus's vessel on his first voyage.

Each morning at daybreak the Atlantic has presented an aspect so remarkable, that at my solicitation, M. Letourneur and his son have ventured upon deck to witness the unusual spectacle. The squally gusts make the metal shrouds vibrate like harp-strings; and unless we were on our guard to keep our clothes wrapped tightly to us, they would have been torn off our backs in shreds. The scene presented to our eyes is one of strangest interest. The sea, carpeted thickly with ma.s.ses of prolific fucus, is a vast unbroken plain of vegetation, through which the vessel makes her way as a plow. Long strips of seaweed caught up by the wind become entangled in the rigging, and hang between the masts in festoons of verdure; while others, varying from two to three hundred feet in length, twine themselves up to the very mast-head, from whence they float like streaming pennants. For many hours now, the Chancellor has been contending with this formidable acc.u.mulation of algae; her masts are circled with hydrophytes; her rigging is wreathed everywhere with creepers, fantastic as the untrammeled tendrils of a vine, and as she works her arduous course, there are times when I can only compare her to an animated grove of verdure making its mysterious way over some illimitable prairie.

CHAPTER VII

VOICES IN THE NIGHT

OCTOBER 14.--At last we are free from the sea of vegetation, the boisterous gale has moderated into a steady breeze, the sun is s.h.i.+ning brightly, the weather is warm and genial, and thus, two reefs in her top-sails, briskly and merrily sails the Chancellor.

Under conditions so favorable, we have been able to take the s.h.i.+p's bearings: our lat.i.tude, we find, is 21 deg. 33' N., our longitude, 50 deg. 17' W.

Incomprehensible altogether is the conduct of Captain Huntly. Here we are, already more than ten degrees south of the point from which we started, and yet still we are persistently following a southeasterly course! I cannot bring myself to the conclusion that the man is mad. I have had various conversations with him: he has always spoken rationally and sensibly. He shows no tokens of insanity. Perhaps his case is one of those in which insanity is partial, and where the mania is of a character which extends only to the matters connected with his profession. Yet it is unaccountable.

I can get nothing out of Curtis; he listens coldly whenever I allude to the subject, and only repeats what he has said before, that nothing short of an overt act of madness on the part of the captain could induce him to supersede the captain's authority, and that the imminent peril of the s.h.i.+p could alone justify him in taking so decided a measure.