Chapter I: Part 1

BY WAY OF CAPE HORN

_FOURTH EDITION_

BY WAY OF CAPE HORN

FOUR MONTHS IN A
YANKEE CLIPPER

BY

PAUL EVE STEVENSON

AUTHOR OF “A DEEP-WATER VOYAGE”

ILLUSTRATED FROM PHOTOGRAPHS TAKEN BY THE AUTHOR

PHILADELPHIA

J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

1908

+Copyright, 1898+

BY

+J. B. Lippincott Company+

TO

MY MOTHER

PREFACE

As in the case of our first “Deep-Water Voyage” to Calcutta, the present one was undertaken with the sole idea of enjoyment. The pleasure which such a voyage affords the fortunate few in whom there is a real affection for the sea is quite indescribable. To such there is no monotony, for there is always something interesting and amusing going on aboard ship, if one’s eyes are open; the men themselves present an inexhaustible field for study and reflection, and it is well known that a more jovial and witty fraternity does not exist.

But there is also a sombre, tragic side to a voyage in a Yankee deep-water ship, and that is the cruel and brutal treatment accorded that most popular individual just now,--the American sailor; by which is meant the men who sail before the mast under our flag. The merchant service has ever been regarded as the navy’s nursery, and a faithful account by an impartial observer will be found in these pages, showing the manner in which our seamen are treated,--the brothers, as it were, of those who won our victories at Manila and Santiago.

P. E. S.

+New York+, October 10, 1898.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Cape Horn bearing northwest, distant fifteen miles _Frontispiece_

PAGE
The course of the “Hosea Higgins” 13

The companion-way 18

Plan of cabin 28

Forty to the minute 48

Mending sails in fine weather 53

Overhauling the “Venturer” 84

“Blow, my bully boys, blow” 104

“Eight bells” 127

A fifty-foot Cape Horn gray-beard 212

The ablest seaman in the ship 303

The four-masted British ship “Loch Torridon” 333

Tarring down 358

Hauling taut the braces 387

BY WAY OF CAPE HORN

It would have been reasonable to suppose that, having made one long voyage in a sailing ship, my wife and I would have been content to stop ashore for the rest of our lives, or at least to limit the length of our voyages to the distance which separates the United States and Europe. For a while, indeed, after our return to America from India, we were contented enough on land, and were kept busy answering the innumerable questions of interested relatives and friends concerning the voyage just ended. But restlessness presently attacked us again; and it was not hard to perceive by the avidity with which my wife searched the _Herald’s_ ship-news columns every morning for tidings of deep-water vessels that no persuasion on my part would be necessary in the event of our undertaking another voyage. Therefore, when two years had passed away, we began to discuss the advisability of once more tempting the elements in another sea-journey to far-distant lands. Japan loomed up before us in a particularly rosy light as a destination for this voyage; but there was one great objection to it: a voyage to Yokohama would have taken us around the Cape of Good Hope a second time, and it was our cherished desire to double Cape Horn, and thus overcome the two most celebrated and tempestuous promontories on the globe. Indeed, as far back as I can remember, I have always wanted to accomplish the westerly passage around the southernmost extremity of the earth’s continents. The very name of Cape Horn is enough to fire the imagination of a true lover of the sea, and fills the mind with pictures of ships battling with gales of wind and giant seas and visions of bleak, iron-bound shores wrapped in the gloom which enshrouds that desolate region. After much discussion, then, we decided on the voyage from New York to San Francisco. It was January when we first broached the matter, and, after arguing the pros and cons of the subject, concluded to try and get away in May, as that would take us to the Horn in July, the middle of the antarctic winter. At this our friends stood aghast. “It is quite bad enough,” they said, “to tempt Providence at all on so foolhardy an excursion, but to double Cape Horn in midwinter is going beyond the limits of reason.” But we stood our ground in spite of the hurricane of objections (and it required some moral courage to do it), and forthwith commenced systematic preparations for the journey. We were making the voyage to a great extent for the purpose of experiencing the weather and seas off Cape Horn, and as the latter would, no doubt, be larger and grander in winter than in summer, I don’t think that our idea was so very preposterous after all.

Naturally, our first thought was of the vessel in which we were to sail, and we looked forward with much interest to a voyage in an American ship, having all our lives heard that our ships were run in a splendid manner, that the discipline on board was perfect, etc.; and it would also be interesting to compare this vessel with those of another nation, as our first voyage was made in the British ship “Mandalore.” Now, it happened that all of our largest deep-watermen were away from New York, and we were at a loss what to do, for, as a general rule, the larger the vessel the more comfortable she is in bad weather. There are many who will, no doubt, take exception to this, as being by no means true; yet it would be absurd to argue that the “Germanic,” for instance, is as easy in heavy weather as the “Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse,” or a twelve-hundred-ton sailing ship as the “Potosi.” At length, one morning appeared the announcement in the marine news that the ship “Hosea Higgins,” Abner Scruggs, master, had arrived from San Francisco. She was not as large as the “Roanoke” by a thousand tons or more; but she was well known to us by name, and we went over to Brooklyn one day, where she was discharging a cargo of wine, canned salmon, and whale-oil, and introduced ourselves to the captain. Although gruff in the extreme at first, he subsequently thawed out sufficiently to warrant the belief that he was really quite an amiable individual, and we parted with his assurance that if the owners were willing he would take us around to San Francisco, and even went to the length of offering us his own room, which was very large and well ventilated. The owners raised no objections to our going, so we paid the passage-money of six hundred dollars and took possession of the captain’s room. I might remark parenthetically that this seemed to be a pretty good round sum to pay as passage-money, in view of the fact that we paid only three hundred dollars to Calcutta on the first voyage; however, in the latter case the money went to the captain, while in the present instance it went to the owners; besides, this passage would probably be somewhat longer. The captain received no recompense whatever, unless we should choose to make him a present.

The ship was advertised to sail on May 1, but there was the usual delay incident to the departure of a sailing ship taking out a general cargo, and it was nearly a fortnight after that date before we finally departed.

Under any conditions it is interesting to watch the loading of a large sailing ship, and when you are going to sea in that ship, a certain degree of interest seems to attach itself to each article, and the assortment of freight was bewildering. In a couple of hours, one morning when I was on board, there came down in rapid succession two large boilers for Spreckles’s sugar refinery in Honolulu, several hundred cases of starch, ditto kegs of nails, two wagon-loads of sewing-machines, two hundred bales of oakum, and four very large whale-boats, about thirty-five feet long, going out to Sitka. Strange that they can not or do not build good whale-boats on the Pacific coast; the best boats used by our whalers are all built in New Bedford, even down to the present time, and sent out to Alaska round the Horn.

It will be easily perceived how difficult it must be to stow a cargo of this sort so that in the heaviest of weather it will not shift. Imagine packing away four clumsy boats in a ship’s hold so that they will not be crushed by heavier objects, and yet in such a way as to prevent these very objects from shifting. If the various articles could be delivered on the pier to suit the stevedores, it would be plain sailing; but everything must be taken as it comes, and it calls for the greatest skill from the most experienced men. There is said to be only a single firm of this sort in New York whose men understand perfectly the art of stowing the cargo of a deep-water ship.

For several days we were tortured on the rack of expectation; but after the most aggravating delays and daily messages from the owners that the ship “would positively go to sea to-morrow,” we learned one Monday morning that the ship would be cleared that day and would sail the next morning, which was

+May 11+

Oh, the riot attendant upon the departure of a ship on a long voyage! The distraction and tumult are at some moments terrific, in spite of everything that has been written about a vessel’s being in perfect order to a sailor’s eye when leaving port. We have been on two large ships now when getting under way, and all I have to say on the subject is, that it is wonderful how much disturbance and disorder can be gathered into so small a space as a ship’s deck. We were told to be on board by nine o’clock, as the tide would serve soon afterward, and we would haul out about ten. At the stipulated hour, then, we went over the side and found that the crew had just come down. They were collected together in the waist, and in the centre of the group stood a hard-looking individual whom I took for the shipping-master. He was haranguing the men, who seemed to listen intently, though I couldn’t hear what was said; and when I strolled to the break of the poop to be nearer to him, he gruffly commanded me to “go way from there, will you.” Why he did so it is impossible to say, unless he was engaged in some unlawful transaction. This was, no doubt, the reason, as there is no attempt made by the United States authorities to enforce the laws relating to the shipping of seamen. By and by this creature took his disagreeable countenance over the side, and immediately those who were not too drunk were turned to at various odd jobs about the decks. Some of the men, however, were too far gone to even stand upright alone, so the two mates seized half a dozen of them and drove them forward and into the forecastle, the door of which was then locked, and the men were left to themselves to sleep off some of the effects of South Street grog. Those who come aboard in this condition generally have a bottle or two each of rum concealed about them, and after a vigorous search the mate found himself possessed of several quarts of very bad grog, which he hove into the river.

Several of our relatives and friends had come down to see us off, and, seated aft by the wheel-house, they seemed to take deep interest in the rakish fellows who were to be our companions, as it were, for four or five months. On the whole, they were a very decent-looking crowd; but when the second mate sung out, “Come up here a couple of you, and give us a hand with this tow line,” and all hands came stumbling up the poop ladders and lumbered aft with that fixed, idiotic stare of half-intoxicated men trying to show how very sober they are, we observed that our relatives shuddered as they thought of our being imprisoned for maybe half a year with this company of ruffians, as they, no doubt, supposed the men to be.

A remarkable feature of the departure of our ship was the crowd that had gathered to see us off. A body of men and boys to the number of at least two hundred were ranged along the pier, minutely criticising the ship and the way in which she was sparred, as well as the probable length of voyage. “It’ll be Cape Horn in July,” said one, “and she’ll never do it in less than a hundred and fifty.” “Guess you don’t know the old man, or you wouldn’t say that,” said his neighbor. “If Scruggs don’t take her out under a hundred and twenty, I’m a farmer.” Here a movement was perceptible among the crowd; somebody seemed to be elbowing his way through the midst, and in another moment we recognized the fierce whiskers of Abner Scruggs himself. With him was one of the agents, and they both seemed angry about something; but the captain greeted us very amiably, imparting to us at the same time the unwelcome news that he must now clear the ship of all who were not going along. Sad farewells were said, relatives and friends were handed over the gangway, which was instantly drawn on board, the powerful tow-boat “C. E. Evarts” started ahead, and we began to move slowly out, stern first, into the rapid current of the East River. So imperceptibly did we gather way that it was a minute or so before any one on the pier saw that we had started; some one in the crowd suddenly perceived it and shouted “she’s off;” and as our long, slender jib-boom glided out past the string-piece, we were saluted with a series of hearty cheers, which lasted until the tugs (for another joined us) had slued the ship around and headed her for Governor’s Island. On the way down the river we passed two splendid iron sailing vessels,--the German ship “H. Bischoff,” which had just arrived after an extraordinarily long passage of two hundred and eighteen days from Hong Kong; and the British ship “Walter H. Wilson,” being one of only a few English vessels named after individuals.

The second tow-boat left us at Governor’s Island, and afterward it was extremely slow work, as the speed at no time was greater than four knots an hour. Off Tompkinsville we passed the battle-ship “Indiana” and the cruiser “New York,” each of which we saluted with three dips of the ensign, which were returned in kind. We could see the sailors on the men-of-war gather in crowds to watch us drag slowly by, for it is not so very frequently nowadays that a large ship flying the stars and stripes is seen on her way to sea.

In the lower bay we found a very light southerly wind blowing, and a German iron bark with painted ports that had passed us outward bound, returned and anchored in the Horseshoe, not caring to continue under conditions somewhat unfavorable. However, we kept on, and commenced to make sail off the point of the Hook; and I must here assert that I never saw such confusion as reigned during this operation. The disorder when hauling into the stream was bad enough, but when the command was given to cast off the gaskets the ship was in a perfect whirl till the mizzen sky-sail had been swayed aloft, and as it takes several hours to make sail when first leaving port, the mates were almost out of their minds when the job had been finished. All hands began with the customary blackguarding of the men who had bent the sails, and the second mate passed the afternoon taking his oath that he “never did see quite the like of the mess them riggers had made aloft,” while the men were jumping about the decks like headless chickens, trying to find where the various ropes led to, for no two ships are rigged alike. It may be imagined how confusing it is for a man to come aboard of a ship and find that some of the sheets and clew-lines are not belayed in the same place as in the vessel that he left only a week ago. Indeed an intelligent second mate will often be two or three days getting the “hang” of a sailing vessel.

Before dark, though, everything had been straightened out, and the ropes coiled away over the pins, and the decks at length began to assume that well-ordered appearance so attractive in a large square-rigger.

The men are a far better lot than we expected to find in a Cape-Horner, and most of them are on the sunny side of thirty-five, though there are two or three old hulks among them. About three o’clock the drunken sailors were hauled out of the forecastle, and they were a sight as they yawed around, falling over ropes and capstan-bars. As the foretop-gallant-sail was being sheeted home, the captain went down on the main deck to have a look about the ship, when to our intense astonishment a young tow-headed sailor, the drunkest of the lot, lurched up to him, and, leaning against the skipper’s shoulder, poured some tale of woe into his ear. Now, Captain Scruggs doesn’t look like a particularly mild-tempered person, and when the man held out a ponderous fist to shake hands with him, we didn’t know what was going to happen. But the captain gravely gave him his hand and nodded his head, while the man lurched forward to his companions. At six o’clock Captain Scruggs said, “I don’t believe in giving grog to sailors at any time, but some of the men are feeling pretty well used up from the hard work after a long drunk ashore, so I’m going to give ’em a bracer.” Forthwith a bucketful of diluted Jamaica rum was served out at the cabin door, each man as his pannikin was filled nodding his thanks to the steward. One of them, however, a very sinister-looking man, tried to snatch the bucket away from the little steward; but the skipper caught him at the moment, and then for the first time we heard Captain Scruggs’s deep-sea voice. The man was so scared by the hurricane of words hurled at him that he dropped the bucket, which luckily didn’t capsize, and, pulling his front hair to the skipper, insisted that it wasn’t he “who was doin’ the funny business.”

Our first night on board began silently and peacefully, and we turned in early after the turmoil of the day.

+May 12+

“The ship was cheered, the harbor cleared,
Merrily did we drop,
Below the kirk, below the hill, below the
Light-house top.”

When we reached the deck this morning, the lofty Navesink highlands had vanished beyond the horizon and we floated alone upon the ocean. The day came on with a fresh southerly wind and a lively sea. My wife went to bed last night sea-sick, and this morning she was very ill and wholly given over to dismal reflections. The motion was quite severe, and I myself felt far happier on deck than below. Indeed, it generally takes me three or four days to grow fully accustomed to being at sea. The captain evidently saw that I wasn’t feeling particularly robust, so he instilled life into me by asking whether I wouldn’t like to keep the meteorological record during the voyage, the ship being provided with blanks for the purpose by the Hydrographic Office at Washington. This will be very interesting work for me, and I feel quite important.

If a man commenced guessing what we in the cabin had for breakfast to-day, he might keep on indefinitely without hitting the mark, for we had broiled sweet-breads! Ponder on this, ye landsmen; a week hence, though, will see the end of our ice and therefore of the fresh meat. To our surprise, one hundred pounds of prime beef, mutton, and chickens for broiling came down about an hour before we sailed, beautifully packed in a cask in alternate layers of meat and ice, and now repose under the forecastle head in a cool place. No doubt, by exercising a little care, much, for us aft, may be accomplished in the way of prolonging our Lucullian banquets. Imagine a fresh, juicy roast of beef off Cape Horn!

Before proceeding with the history of our voyage, there may be some readers who would like to know what sort of a ship this is in which we are journeying, and the following is a description of the vessel.

The “Hosea Higgins” is a powerful wooden ship, a fraction over two thousand tons net, with a length over all of two hundred and sixty feet, a beam of forty-four feet, and a draught of twenty-five; she was built at Waldoboro, Maine, in 1885, and is of course classed A 1. She is a three-master, very loftily rigged, as nearly all Yankee ships are, crossing three sky-sail-yards, and her mainyard is ninety-five feet long. There is but one house on the main-deck, but it is a very large one and contains the forecastle, sail-room, galley, and carpenter-shop, in which there is a twenty horse-power donkey engine. So many persons have asked us at various times about the cabins of sailing ships, that we have made a plan of the saloon and staterooms, which appears on the opposite page.

1, captain’s room (ours); 2, spare room; 3, office; 4, steward; 5, pantry; 6, second mate; 7, bath-room; 8, spare room (captain’s); 9, chart-room; 10, store-room; 11, carpenter; 12, mate. A, harmonium; B, table; C, chairs; D, sofa; E, exits; F, companion-way to poop; G, mizzen-mast; H, dining-table; I, stove; J, vestibules; K, exits on main-deck.

]

So much for the ship; now for the monarch who commands her. Abner Scruggs is one of a very large family of sea-faring men, and hails from Rockland, Maine; in stature he is not exalted, but is very massive, and before he grew stout was no doubt a powerful man, his age being about fifty years. He is fierce of aspect, with bristling whiskers and dark eyes that snap like electric sparks when angry; and I have never known a man who could utter his commands in so determined, severe, and brittle a voice.

The mate’s name is Leander Goggins. By the way, on a sailing ship the man who holds that position is never called the chief mate, first officer, or anything except simply “the mate,” even if there are four of them. Mr. Goggins was born in Chichester, England, about fifty years ago, but left that country when a lad and became a citizen of the United States, an unusual performance for an Englishman, who seldom renounces his native land. He is short and small generally, talks with a terrific cockney accent, in spite of his thirty-five years in and about America, and possesses one of those countenances which you can’t tell anything about; but his looks are not in his favor. One of his most objectionable points is his fawning servility, which is never prominent in a man who amounts to much, however humble his station.

The second mate, Thomas Rarx, is a Nova Scotian, and is a large, raw-boned, hearty man with a fresh complexion, and is therefore the mate’s antithesis. You would never suppose that he was addicted to the thumping of sailors, yet this is one of the most important duties of the second mate of an American ship; on some of our sailing vessels it seems to be the most important. Then there are two bosuns; one of them, a Brooklyn youth, is a weak-looking creature, and has more the appearance of an American District Messenger boy than that of bosun of a Cape-Horner; perhaps his name has crushed his spirit,--it is Jimmie Rumps. But the other bosun is a brawny Scot, David MacFoy, of Troon; he is a splendid man, beautifully built, tall, straight, very good-looking, and is somewhat conceited, handles the men well, and has a cyclonic voice.

The cook and steward are both natives of the East. The latter is from Singapore, and is therefore a true Malay; blandness seems to be his chief attribute, and his bashfulness allows him to do nothing but smile and back out of sight. What there is of the cook seems to be unexceptionable; he is a Cantonite, about four feet and a half high, weighs possibly ninety pounds, and is a tip-top sea-cook.

Next comes the carpenter, whose only name aboard ship is “Chips.” Instead of a neat, clean person, redolent of pine shavings and saw-dust, our carpenter is a very dirty, fat individual, who appears to have been steeped for an indefinite period in a solution of kerosene and lamp-black. Most Finns (why Russian Finn? The man who says that will say hop-toad) seem to be dirty, however, so that he is no exception; in weight he would go well over two hundred and thirty pounds, and, as a whole, is the most objectionable-looking person whom I have ever seen. You could never call him Chips. As for Sammie, the boy, he is a short, thick, young Jew, not prepossessing in appearance, and with an apparently wonderful capacity for doing nothing; like Peter Simple, he looks as though he could stand a great deal of sleep. We have seen so little of the sailors as yet that, of course, no notion of any of them can be formed.

We did fairly well as to distance sailed in the twenty-four hours, and at noon we were one hundred and seventy-five miles from Sandy Hook.

+May 13+

This was a glorious morning, with a fresh breeze from the southward. Last night the wind came whistling along in strong puffs, and we had to stow both sky-sails and royals for it; and when I went on deck at 7.30, quite a hummocky sea was running from the southwest. My wife was exceedingly sea-sick all night long, and clung tenaciously to the theory that she would perish within twenty-four hours. At about ten this morning, though, both wind and sea having gone down somewhat, my wife consented to go on deck, so we arranged chairs on the cabin-house, and she stayed there all day, improving every minute. By supper-time she had a hearty longing for food, and we have no more misgivings as to sea-sickness for the rest of the voyage.

I rather like the way in which the second mate goes to work; he appears to be a very fine seaman, and this is perhaps the most desirable and necessary of all the acquirements of a second mate. He has also considerable quiet humor; yesterday afternoon he caught sight of one of the men who had not yet recovered the full use of his faculties, fussing about on the mainyard; and after watching him for a few moments he sung out, “Mainyard there, what the h---- are you gapin’ at! Cast off that yard-arm gasket; d’ye think yer messperized?” After which, he rolled forward, and we could see him chuckling and shaking at his own conceit.

Our fresh breeze wafted us across two hundred and twenty miles of the North Atlantic yesterday, and at noon we were in latitude 39° 22′ north; longitude, 65° 8′ west.

+May 14+

Another fine day with the same fresh breeze from the southward, and the captain is busy shaking hands with himself on his good offing; remembering the German who turned back and anchored in the Horseshoe, he mutters from time to time, “Oh, I wish I was under Sandy Hook, I don’t think.” We couldn’t carry the sky-sails last night, but they were set this forenoon, and we are now doing fully ten knots. My wife has entirely recovered, and is amusing herself with the three cats on board. One of them is a splendid animal, a pure Maltese, whose companion is a so-called coon cat; both of them belong to the captain. The third beast is the mate’s, an unfortunate, weird, black-and-white alley-cat, tall and lank, and as hideous as a nightmare.

It is remarkable how good the eating is on board; for although on many ships the meat, flour, etc., are often the best that can be bought, everything is frequently spoiled by villainous cookery; even our coffee is as good as people generally have ashore. Captain Scruggs told us before we sailed that he was a dyspeptic, and said that he had to be very particular about what he ate. On this we somewhat callously congratulated ourselves; and, sure enough, the skipper’s stomachic infirmities have insured us none but the best of everything. It might be here remarked that we brought absolutely nothing with us in the way of provisions. It is customary for captains to ascertain what their prospective passengers’ preferences are before storing the ship; and, as I knew the company who had the vitualling of the ship, it was certain that nothing better could be bought. Indeed, the average ship in these days carries such an abundance and variety of wholesome food, that unless one cared to take along such absurd edibles as patés and the like, the food question can very well take care of itself.

The mate, Leander Goggins, entertained us at breakfast this morning with some more or less remarkable conversation. It really seems impossible that a man can hate his native country as he does; and he gave an affirmative reply to Scott’s famous question,--

“Breathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
‘This is my own, my native land?’”

The skipper jollies him up constantly about his still being an Englishman in spite of his citizen’s papers, and this morning the mate couldn’t withstand it any longer, and delivered himself as follows, with great intensity: “Cap’n Scruggs, sir, I thank God I left Hengland w’en I were eleven year hold, sir. I tell you, cap’n, and you too, sir, it ain’t no fit country for a man to call himself a native of. A pore man carn’t take off ’is ’at to a lord, sir; ho, no; ’e’s got to bow and sheer and pull ’is front ’air; and if hit’s a lady, why ’e mustn’t look at all.” This was enough to disgust any one with him; and he made so strange an appearance with his weather-stained face, bleary little eyes, and heavily veined temples, that I almost shouted when he finished. A great slashing scar on his chin, when his stubby beard permits it to be seen, doesn’t add much to his personal charms. Later on he began to talk about Captain Bob Waterman, perhaps the most unpleasantly notorious ship-master in the old New York-California trade. The mate averred that he had sailed with “Cap’n Bob,” and he added that the yarn about Cap’n Bob’s having cast off the lee main-brace in a Cape Horn squall one night, jerking half a dozen men into the sea just because he didn’t like them, he had always considered as probable. “’E shot ’is own child, you know,” pleasantly added Mr. Goggins, as though he were mentioning the killing of a chicken.

At noon we were six hundred and fifty miles from Sandy Hook, in latitude 38° 58′ north; longitude, 60° 14′ west.

+May 15+

Glorious weather, with southwest winds as fresh as ever; it is growing much warmer, and the temperature of the water has risen to 71°, making it possible to bathe in it without much gasping.

Shortly after breakfast the captain asked us if we wouldn’t like to go forward and see him catch a bonito, as there were several playing about the forefoot. So we went up on the forecastle head, sat down on the gammoning-iron, and watched the skipper creep out on the bowsprit with a cod-line and a hook baited with a bit of rag in his hand. Then he went through various manœuvres necessary in the capture of these deep-sea fish, and incidentally nearly manœuvred himself off the jib-boom. The scheme consisted in dropping the rag swiftly down till it touched the water, and instantly jerking it upward again, to excite the imagination of the fish, I suppose. They looked very fine darting about at great speed several feet beneath the surface, being of a brilliant hue, and at first we thought that they were young dolphins,--that is, the dolphin of sailors. At length, after innumerable vain efforts, accompanied with much hard breathing and damning of the fish’s eyes, the captain hooked one and hauled him up, snapping and fighting till he was dropped into a gunny sack held by one of the men. He looked like a plump mackerel, weighed six pounds, and will afford a little variety to our evening repast.

This afternoon the skipper said that I ought to have a pair of sea-slippers; so he vanished into the slop-chest (the technical name for the apartment where all sorts of wearing apparel for the crew is kept) and emerged with the most uncomfortable looking foot-gear that I ever beheld. The slippers (?) were made of immensely thick red grain-leather, with heavy, pegged soles, as inflexible as plate armor and as easy-looking as Belgian sabots. The captain said that they were as tight as sea-boots, if I kept the water from flowing over the tops, adding, “I’ll tell you what I do: in cold, wet weather I just haul a pair of heavy socks right over the outside of the slippers and make boots of ’em.”

At a quarter to five this afternoon we sighted a steamer on the lee bow, and as there was a chance of signalling her, and she was bound to the westward, we put our helm up a little and kept away a couple of points. At 5.30 she was abreast of us, and we hoisted our number and “report me all well,” to which she hoisted her answering pennant. She was a very large English cargo-boat, one of that new style of tramp freighters with one funnel, two pole-masts, and a great sheer. She seemed to be making more than ten knots (though the snow-drift under her bows indicated about twenty-five), and should therefore reach New York in time to be reported in next Wednesday’s papers. Latitude at noon, 38° 31′ north; longitude, 55° 2′ west.

+May 16+

Our first Sabbath at sea broke calm and warm. When we went on deck at seven bells not a breath of air was stirring, the ship had no steerage-way, and an oily calm lay upon the face of the deep, recalling memories of our previous voyage, when, in this very part of the ocean in the month of July, we averaged twenty miles a day for twenty-one days. Four hundred and twenty miles in three weeks wouldn’t burn a ship’s copper off; it is about three-quarters of one day’s run of the fastest express steamers.

It was truly hot this afternoon, for the calm prevailed all day; but fortunately there was quite a swell present, in which we rolled about, creating pleasant draughts from the slatting sails. How orderly and quiet a ship is on a Sunday afternoon when the weather is mild and clear! Every rope, every implement, is in its place, the decks have been washed as clean as hard scrubbing can make them, and the brass mountings shine like mirrors. Coiled away in shady nooks lie the watch, each with a book or paper in his hand, deep buried in its contents. Some recline in the waterways under shadow of the bulwarks, others in the shade of the deck-house; some on the forecastle-head, where cool airs circulate from the swinging of the big foresail and jibs. The only audible sounds are the flapping of the sails, the somnolent cheeping of the blocks, and the working of the rudder-head as the ship rolls about in the swell, with perhaps the low tones of a man’s voice humming an air to himself on the main-hatch. A more peaceful scene it would be impossible to find than that presented by a large ship thus becalmed,--more tranquil and solemn than the little country hamlet dozing in the drowsiness of a mid-summer, Sabbath afternoon.

Let a breeze come along, though, from an unexpected quarter, and in an instant everything starts into life. “Square the crojjick-yard!” comes with startling suddenness from the officer of the watch. In a moment the half-hidden forms of the men spring with a bound from their cool retreats, and the forward part of the ship resounds with their deep voices as they come rolling aft, each repeating the order, “Square the crojjick-yard, sir.” Aft they come in a shuffling trot,--not slovenly, but in a cheerful way,--and the ponderous yards creak slowly round to the hoarse tones of the bosun.

It is during such scenes as this that the magic of the sea takes hold of the imaginative mind. The remembrance of gales of wind, and of hail and sleet and snow fade utterly from the memory, and the mind is conscious only of the inexpressible charm which the mighty deep exerts over those who truly love the sea and go down to it in ships.

After breakfast this morning the mate told me how oranges are loaded at Tahiti, by hauling the vessels up under the trees which overhang the water and shaking the fruit into the hold. Already Mr. Goggins is beginning to growl at the weather. What he wants all the time is “just enough to show the sky-sails to, sir.” We had a little more wind after breakfast, it is true, but it came from the southeast and let go at ten. Last night, just before we turned in, some Mother Cary’s chickens which were flying around the ship began to utter their quaint, plaintive cries, at which Captain Scruggs and the mate shuddered and looked grave. I asked Mr. Goggins what was wrong, and he replied, “Whenever the blarsted birds cry, there’s sure to be a long spell o’ light weather.”

It is strange what disdain merchant skippers have for yachting, nor can they ever understand why a man should expend so much on a vessel without trying to derive some income from the same. I happened to mention to the skipper last evening that I once chartered a pine-apple schooner at Nassau and took a party of friends on a cruise through the Bahamas. “After shells, I suppose,” quoth the worthy man, thinking that my scheme was to load up with the beautiful shells found in those islands and take them across to the mainland and sell them. Again I told him that my most cherished scheme was to navigate the South Seas in an auxiliary yacht. “Yes,” he answered, “it’s a good notion; trading ain’t dead there yet.” Perhaps the most amusing incident of this sort happened once when I was on board a yacht lying at Vineyard Haven. A large three-masted schooner came in, having lost her mizzentop-mast. The owner of the yacht pulled aboard of the schooner and looked her over, and then asked her captain and mate back to the yacht. Of course they admired her exceedingly, and as she was quite a large boat, they observed that it must cost a sight to run her. Finally, when they were about to return to their own vessel, the skipper asked, gravely and in perfect good faith, “What I don’t understand is, how do you make her pay?” Latitude, 37° 50′ north; longitude, 53° 40′ west.

+May 17+

Perhaps we may change our opinion before the voyage is over. Perhaps we may not. I have seen enough of the skipper to know that this voyage is not going to be exquisitely pleasant for ourselves, the mates, or the men. A little disturbance started this forenoon in the following manner: A barrel of carrots, onions, and parsnips had been rolled under the forecastle-head by the mate, who then forgot all about it; so that, instead of giving it to the cook, he allowed the green stuff to wilt and wither in the heat of the past forty-eight hours. The captain heard of this for the first time to-day, and ever since not a single thing has gone right for him. We first noticed that something was amiss with the skipper by the tone he used to the helmsman at eleven o’clock, when he told him to “hold her up a little more.” The man obeyed instantly, but made an inexcusable mistake: he forgot to answer, and in this he was, of course, wrong, for he should have either repeated the order or said, “Ay, ay, sir.” The captain then told him in forcible language what would happen to men who failed to answer. We thought that the matter was settled, when the mate came aft from the break of the poop on a run, thrust his fist through the wheel-house window in the man’s face and snarled, “Now, luk ud ’ere, ain’t I told yer to answer w’en yer spoken to, eh? Well, you just do it, or _I’ll_ teach yer to open yer mouth; I’ll _fix_ yer.” Innocent words, comparatively speaking, but no one can imagine the intensity of emphasis on the “fix,” or the malignant, hazing tone which the mate threw into his threat. The skipper had just “jumped on” the mate, and, of course, the latter must find some one to retaliate on, and here was an opportunity. The boy Sammie, too, came in for his share of attention, but it must be said that this slothful youth deserved it; and, finally, the skipper and mate came to words at dinner about a barrel of hard bread. Captain Scruggs graduated years ago with high honors in the art of nagging, and at last he provoked Mr. Goggins beyond endurance. “Goddlemighty, Cap’n Scruggs, if I ain’t seen no ship-bread, ’ow could I break it out?” We expected an explosion from the old man, but he only tugged fiercely at his whiskers and shut the mate up with, “All right, sir; all right. We won’t continue the argument.” As the day wore on his temper grew worse and worse; and when I called his attention to a school of fish playing alongside, supposing that he would like to see them, he answered tartly, “Very well, sir; you’d better jump overboard and catch ’em.” I thought it best not to reply; but it was very annoying, for some of the men hard by smiled broadly.

It must be acknowledged that the thought of being obliged to sit opposite to this man at table three times a day for at least four months is a disagreeable one, and this is not a cheerful meditation at the very beginning of a voyage. Yet, the captain has proved that in some ways he is very kind and considerate; but he has that hard, flinty voice and overbearing manner, an instance of which the reader can doubtless recall among his seafaring friends.

Throughout nearly the entire day we had an almost perfect calm; this, of course, aggravated the old man’s temper, for he seems to be a most intolerant individual. So little headway did we make that at noon we were in latitude 37° 22′ north; longitude, 52° 39′ west.

+May 18+

We had another sample of American ship “discipline” this morning. We went on deck at 7.30 to eat some fruit before breakfast, and as soon as the skipper hove in sight it was plain that he was looking for trouble. Presently the mate appeared, and it was evident from his countenance that he had found the trouble the captain was looking for. In a little while two of the men came aft, each with a case of oil in his arms, which they deposited on deck by the wheel-house, preparatory to passing them down into the lazarette. One of the hands, Brün, an inoffensive, quiet Norwegian (the most peaceable sailors in the world), happened to put his case down with the lettered side underneath, which displeased the skipper, who asked him, in his ogre’s voice, if he hadn’t told him the way to handle case-oil. Now, the man was evidently doing the very best he could, which was evident from his great desire to please, and also from the way in which his hands shook. Finally he grew so nervous that when he picked up the case to turn it over, it slipped and fell with a loud noise on the deck. At this the poor fellow jumped back several feet and put up his arm to ward off the expected blow; but the skipper saw plainly that it was an accident and was going to let the matter pass, when the mate jumped in between them and, catching a firm hold of Brün’s right ear, gave it a terrific wrench, that slued him round and brought him to his knees, while he yelled, “Ain’t _I_ told yer how to lay them cases down?”

Such scenes as this are extremely unpleasant, particularly as they are always accompanied with boisterous language; and, as we saw the whole affair, I can say with certainty that it was absolutely unprovoked and unnecessary. If the man had been of a surly or ugly disposition, and intentionally put the case down wrongly, some excuse might be in order for the mate’s conduct; but this fellow has always been unobtrusive, and actually jumps in his desire to please. It is generally men of a certain temperament that mates pick out to haze,--men with no appearance of “sand.” I have never known a man of Mr. Goggins’s sort to try it on a determined-looking, deliberate seaman.

How calm it was until five o’clock yesterday afternoon! The sea was as if oiled and of a rich blue, fascinating to contemplate and deeper in color than usual. No stream that ever cascaded down a mountain-side could approach in transparency the sea-water as found in the remote solitudes of the ocean. We had a strange sunset, too, the horizon being apparently at an immense distance, with whole chains of ragged, golden-tipped clouds, like jagged mountain rocks, seemingly a hundred miles away. We had a fine breeze all day from east-northeast, which, it is true, jammed us on the wind, but it was fresh enough to blow us along at seven knots. Latitude at noon, 36° 5′ north; longitude, 50° 36′ west.

+May 19+

This was perhaps the finest day which we have had yet. It broke with the heavens obscured; but during the forenoon the clouds melted under the influence of the sun and an afternoon of dazzling brilliancy followed. A fresh breeze whistled out of the east-northeast, giving us as much as we could show the sky-sails to; and the ocean was covered with foam-topped waves like immense snow flakes, the crests of which often came tumbling in glee over the weather side.

Yesterday afternoon at two o’clock we rose the upper canvas of a bark on the port bow, bound in the same direction as ourselves; at 4.30 she was abeam, and at seven in the evening, her trucks had vanished below the horizon astern! In truth this ship is a flyer on a wind, for, in order to pass the other vessel in so short a time, we must have sailed almost, if not quite, two miles to her one. Again, this morning at daylight, we made out the sails of a ship hull down to leeward; she was then abeam, steering about southeast, but during the afternoon we ran her out of sight, too. For the past twenty-four hours we have certainly done splendidly, logging one hundred and ninety-eight miles, hauled as close to the wind as possible. Captain Scruggs even went so far as to say that he thought that there were only two other American ships afloat that could have made more than two hundred miles to-day by the wind,--the “Henry B. Hyde” and the “A. G. Ropes.” Later I asked the skipper which he considered was the finest all-round wooden ship under the flag to-day; his answer instantly was, “the ’Hyde’ by all odds; and not only that, but she’s one of the finest ships that ever came out of a Maine ship-yard.” She was built about ten years ago in Bath, by John McDonald, a Nova Scotian and a pupil of the famous Donald Mackay of Boston, who turned out so many celebrated clippers thirty or forty years ago. The “Hyde” is a large ship, registering twenty-five hundred tons; but in spite of her size she is a three-master, being, I believe, the second largest ship of this rig at the present time, the British ship “Ditton” heading the roll of three-masters with a net tonnage of about twenty-eight hundred. Almost all sailing vessels of over two thousand tons register are now built with four masts.

Last night I was talking with the mate about sea-birds, and he was giving me considerable information of the birds on the Pacific coast, when he said, suddenly, “I see a ’awk at sea once, sir.” “Indeed,” said I, “that is very interesting, for the bird is almost extinct; it must have been a long time ago, for even the eggs now are quite valuable.” He looked very hard at me then for a few moments, when the captain called him away; and for some time I wondered why he had stared at me so fixedly; when all at once I realized that he meant hawk, not auk! Latitude, 34° 4′ north; longitude, 47° 15′ west.

+May 20+

Light showers prevailed this morning early, but at ten the clouds disappeared, leaving a sky of deep cobalt and a glorious, sparkling sea. Fresh winds from east-northeast blew all day, giving us frequently ten knots, the ship driving along with the even, modulated swing of a pendulum. The mate says that Captain Scruggs is so lucky in making fast passages that in New York they say that he carries a fair wind in his pocket and spills it out when necessary. However true this may be, the direction of the wind could be easily improved at the present time, by hauling more to the northward, so that we could come up a little; our position, too, would be a far better one if we were five or six degrees more to the eastward, as it is a little too soon to make so much southing. _Nolens volens_, though, southeast has been our course for some time, and the skipper jocosely remarks that he expects to see San Roque this time.

We are now in the approximate position of the American iron ship “May Flint” (late steamer “Persian Monarch”), one of the largest sailing vessels under our flag, when she was hove down and dismasted about a year ago in a cyclone. Captain Nickels subsequently accomplished so fine a piece of seamanship that a short account of the whole affair might not prove uninteresting. The vessel left Philadelphia bound to Hiogo with a cargo of case-oil on August 21, and on September 8, about four hundred miles from the Azores, she encountered a gale which gradually increased to a tremendous hurricane, in the centre of which she became involved; and shortly afterward she was hove on her beam ends and the fore and maintop-masts and mizzentop-gallant-masts, together with all standing gear above the lower mast-heads went by the board. Her condition was really terrible, as all hands were in momentary expectation of seeing some of the broken spars alongside stave in the hull, as the wreckage was battering and thumping furiously against the ship. A steamer was sighted later on,--the “Craftsman,”--which stood by the “Flint” till the weather moderated, and then offered to tow her to New York. This offer Captain Nickels refused, though at their request he transshipped his two passengers, one a Boston and the other a Chicago man, and they returned to New York on the “Craftsman.” It is reasonable to presume that neither of these individuals will ever step over the side of another sailing ship.