the ship lay motionless as a rock on the smooth water off gravesend; nevertheless, owing to the strong fumes of the tobacco, probably coupled with the close atmosphere of the berth, and its warm flavouring of lamp oil, water-proof clothes, pickled onions, and black tea, i felt somewhat sick and crept quietly out of the cabin, trusting that the fresh air on deck might revive me. just outside our berth, in the open space of ’tween-decks, which was entered from above by means of the booby-hatch, were the emigrants’ quarters. we carried about thirty of these poor people, and here they now were all of a jumble, using mine as well as the chests of the other midshipmen for seats and tables, the women talking vehemently, some of them still crying, here and there a man smoking in a sullen posture, others sitting over greasy packs of cards, whilst a few children played at hide-and-seek in and out of the sleeping-places, and amongst the emigrant’s bundles; three or four quite young babies meanwhile setting the whole picture to music with shrill, melancholy cries. a single lamp of the same pattern as ours illuminated this grimy grotesque scene.
i pushed my way on deck, but on my arrival found that it was raining hard, which accounted for the emigrants being crowded below. there[33] was shelter to be had under the break of the poop, as the ledge of deck is called that overhangs the entrance to the cuddy; and there i stood awhile, gazing along the dark length of gleaming, streaming deck that was deserted, and listening to the complaining of the wind, amid the stirless shadow of the spars and rigging on high, or watching the damp and dusky winking of the lamps ashore, or of the lights of ships at anchor round about us. ah! thought i, this is not so comfortable as being in my father’s snug parlour at home, with a sweet and airy bedroom all to myself to pass the night in, and a kind mother at the fresh and fragrant breakfast table next morning to help me to a plateful of eggs and bacon, and a cup of fine aromatic coffee and cream! maybe i shed a tear or two; i was but a little boy fresh from home, and amidst a great strange scene, with the darkness and the sobbing of the rain and the deserted deck, and the cold noise of the running waters of the river washing along[34] the ship’s side to bitterly increase the sense of loneliness in my childish heart.
it was not long before i went below. most of the midshipmen were turned in, that is to say, they were lying down in their clothes and shoes with nothing but their jackets removed. i thought i could not do better than follow their example and how wearied i was i could not have imagined till i put my head down upon the bolster at the end of my bunk, when i almost instantly fell asleep.
being a very green, raw, quite young hand, i could be of no use on deck for the present, and it was for this reason, i suppose, they let me sleep in the morning, for when i woke i was the only midshipman in the cabin. there was a queer noise of scraping overhead, sounds as of the flinging down of coils of rope, the noises of water being swooshed along the planks; and the sunlight that shone through the portholes was tremulous with the play of glittering, moving waters. i went on deck and found the ship in tow of the tug, with the land a long way past gravesend gliding astern, and the river so wide that over the bows it looked like the ocean. there were jibs and staysails hoisted, and the ship appeared to be sailing along. it was a fresh, windy morning; there were great white clouds rolling from off the distant land over our mast-heads, and the dark brown smoke of the tug ahead fled in a wild scattering low down upon the[35] waters. the decks were being “washed down” as it is called at sea; sailors on legs naked to the knees were scrubbing and pounding away with brushes, buckets of water were being emptied over the planks, and a sturdy mariner with a whistle round his neck and great whiskers standing out from his cheeks, went about amongst the seamen, directing them in a voice that sounded like a roll of thunder. he was the boatswain. i was not a little surprised to find the midshipmen with scrubbing brushes in their hands washing down the poop. i mounted the ladder and stood a moment looking on. one of them worked a pump just before the mizzen-mast, whilst another filled buckets at it, the third mate threw the water about, and the middies plied their brooms with the energy of a crossing-sweeper. the youth with a great nose who spoke with a lisp was polishing the brass-rail that ran athwartship in front of the poop. a man in a long coat and a tall rusty hat paced the deck alone. his face might have been carved out of a large piece of mottled soap. i afterwards found out that he was the pilot. there was another man standing near the wheel. he had a ginger-coloured beard that forked out from under his chin, pleasant dark-blue eyes and a copper-coloured face. it was not long before i discovered that he was mr. johnson, the chief officer. he came along in a pleasant way to where i stood staring.
[36]
“how is it you’re not at work, youngster?” said he.
“i’ve just woke up,” said i.
“look here,” said he, “if you don’t call me sir, i shall have to call you sir, and i am sure it’s easier for you to say it than for me. pull your boots and stockings off like a man, put them in that coil of rope there upon the hencoop, tuck your trousers up, lay hold of that scrubbing brush yonder and see what sort of job you’re going to make at whitening these decks.”
in a minute i was scrubbing with the rest of them, and it made me feel as if i was on the margate sands to be trotting about with bare feet, with the salt brine sparkling and flashing about my ankles.
my memory at this point grows dim again, for i was rapidly approaching the unpleasant experience of sea-sickness. i recollect that i helped to dry the decks with a swab that was so heavy i could scarcely flourish it, and that i was shown by the third mate how to coil away a rope over a pin, also that i dragged with the others upon some gear which caused a staysail between the mainmast and the mizzen-mast to ascend; i then went below to breakfast, at which there was served up a dish of hissing brown steaks, each of them wide enough to have served as a garment for my young ribs. but by this time something of the weight of the wide sea beyond was in the river, the ship was faintly pitching,[37] much too faintly perhaps to be taken notice of by anything but a delicate young stomach like mine. i felt that i was pale, and the sight of the heap of great brown steaks floating handsomely in grease, which took a caking of white, even as the eye watched, added not a little to the uncomfortable sensation that possessed me. the others plunged their knives and forks into the layers of meat and ate with avidity; but for my part i could only look on.
“take and turn in, my lad,” said the third mate kindly; “it’s bound to occupy you a day or two to get rid of your longshore swash, and then we’ll be having you jockeying the weather mizzen-topsail yard-arm, and bawling ‘haul out to leeward’ in a voice loud enough to be heard at blackwall.”
i was glad to take his advice, and was presently at my length in the bunk, too ill to speak, yet with a glimmering enough of mind in me to bitterly deplore that i had not heeded my mother’s counsel and remained at home.
the wind hardened as the river widened, and much dismal creaking and groaning rose out of the hold and sides, the bulkheads, strong fastenings and freight of the lofty fabric as she went rolling stately in the wake of the tug that was thrashing through the hard green channel ridges in a smother of foam. the wind was south-east, i heard some of our fellows say, with a lot of loose black scud flying[38] along the marble face of the sky, and a gloomy thickness to windward, that was promise of tough weather, ere we should have settled the south foreland well down upon the quarter. one of the lads said that if the wind headed us yet more, we should bring up in the downs, and lie there till it blew a fair breeze, which might signify a fortnight’s waiting.
“if so,” says he, “i shall put on a clean shirt and go straight ashore, then button my ears behind me, and never stop running till i get to london town; for twenty miles of salt water’s enough for me; and here we are bound away for six thousand leagues of it, with all the way back again on top!”
in this fashion the lads would talk as they came below from the deck, and sick as i was i managed to heed enough of their conversation to pick up what was going forward. i cannot express how i envied their freedom from sea-sickness. some were making their third voyage, others their second. i was the only “first-voyager” as they call it. it sometimes rained on deck, and the fellows would come below gleaming in oilskins, the sight of which made me feel pitifully girlish, insomuch that on three several occasions i made a desperate effort to get up and act my part of a sailor as they did theirs; but the oppression of nausea was too violent, and down i lay again, saving the third time when, contriving to feel my feet, the ship at the instant[39] gave a lurch which sent me headlong into one of the fore and aft bunks where i lay half stunned, and so miserably sick that the third mate had to lift me in his arms to enable me to return to my own bed.
sea-nausea is at all times distressing, and i do not know that one is easier for suffering in a fine saloon, with looking-glasses and flowers and the electric-light, and the fresh breezes of heaven blowing through the open skylights to keep the place sweet. but if this mal de mer, as the french call it, is more unendurable in one interior than in another it must be so i think in a midshipmen’s berth—at least such a berth as ours was:—twelve sleeping shelves and nine lads to sleep in them, with a huge giant of a third mate to fill the tenth; a sort of twilight draining in through the three scuttles, the immensely thick glass of which was often eclipsed by the roaring wash of a green sea sweeping along the sides; a lamp burning night and day, from whose untrimmed flame there arose to the ceiling of the cabin a pestilential coil of smoke.
in these narrow gloomy quarters we lived and moved, and had our being. here we ate our meals, here we slept, here we washed ourselves, here the youngsters smoked. hardest part of all were the confusing noises made by the emigrants just outside our berth. unlashed chests slided to and fro;[40] children were incessantly falling down and squealing; many heart-disturbing lamentations arose from such of the poor wretches as lay sick and helpless in their dark bulkheaded compartments. they had to fetch their meals from the galley, and not yet having acquired the art of walking on a tumbling deck, those who had to bring the rations of beef or pork along, would repeatedly come with a run through the booby-hatch, and lie at the bottom of the ladder badly scalded in a little lake of pease-soup, or with the beef rolling away among the chests, whilst the air resounded with execrations, scarcely stifled by the complaining sounds of the ship’s fabric.
the third mate was very kind to me; told me there was no hurry; i was welcome to lie in my bunk till i felt equal to coming on deck.
“i was sick for a fortnight when i first went to sea,” i heard him say. “i was one of four apprentices. those shipmates of mine were brutes, and the very first night we were out they hauled me from my hammock and ran me to the mizzen shrouds, up which they forced me to go, saying that the topgallant sail would be clewing up shortly, and i must be in the cross-trees in readiness to help furl it. a ratline carried away, and i fell through the rigging on to the deck. i broke no bones, but i lay senseless, which so terrified the young bullies that when i was taken to my hammock[41] they never more offered to trouble me. i was ill for a fortnight, i say, and the memory of it makes me sorry for every youngster when he first comes to the life and is sea-sick.”
however, on the morning of the third day from our quitting gravesend, though i was still very ill, i could stand no longer the miseries of my confinement to the cabin. since i was bound to suffer, i thought it was better to feel wretched in the open air than amid the smells and noise and gloom of the midshipmen’s berth.
“i fell through the rigging.”
it was the forenoon watch, as the hours from[42] eight to twelve are called. the fellows who had been on deck since four o’clock had come below at eight bells, and after breakfasting had turned in to smoke a pipe and then get some sleep. they were in the port or chief mate’s watch, to which division of the ship’s company i was supposed to belong, though i don’t remember how i came to know this. we were still in “soundings” as it is termed—that is to say, not yet out of the channel, though we were a long way down it.
on this morning there was a strong sea running on the bow, but not so much wind as the motion of the ship would have led one to suppose. the mids, when they came below, had told the others who were to relieve them that the vessel was under all plain sail saving the flying jib and fore and mizzen royals, and that the “old man” as they termed the captain, was driving her; that they had heard the mate say that he expected it would be an “all hands” job before four bells had gone—ten o’clock. i caught all this, scarce comprehending it, and lay drowsily and stupidly watching the lads get their breakfast and then vault into their bunks with all their clothes on—“all standing” as the sea saying is—ready to rush on deck to the first summons. the ship was lying over at a sharp angle, and there was a great roaring and seething along her sides of swollen waters smitten into yeast, and the cabin portholes came and went like the winking of eyes[43] to the shrouding of the glass by the liftings and leapings of the green billows. presently there were certain sounds on deck which unmistakably denoted that sail was being shortened.
“it’s ‘in main royal’ now, i suppose,” said one of the middies, sleepily, “and about time too. what’s the hurry all this side of sydney, new south wales?”
presently more hoarse songs resounded on deck, along with the echo of tramping feet and of rigging dropped hastily from the hand.
“old man’th growing alarmed, i reckon!” exclaimed the lisping long-nosed midshipman, whose name was kennet. “oh, how i do with,” he cried, feigning to speak in a voice as though he wept, “that i had thtoptht at home to bottle vinegar for my poor deah mamma. eh, rockafellar? better to bottle vinegar athore, my beauty, than to lie thick and hungry in a nathty cabin.”
as he spoke, the third mate’s voice was to be heard ringing like the roar of a bull down through the booby-hatch—“all hands reef topsails! up you come, all you young gentlemen bee-low there! lively, now! before the ship falls overboard!”
the youngsters sprang from their bunks, and were out of the cabin in a breath. then it was that i made up my mind to linger no longer sea-sick in this dismal, straining cabin. i pulled on my shoes, plunged into my jacket, and, setting my cap[44] firmly upon my head, went clawing my way to the steps of the hatch, up which i staggered, feeling exceedingly ill and weak, but determined now to push on even to perishing sooner than suffer in darkness and loneliness below.