Chapter III: Fire at Sea

After this painful episode was over, amidst a succession of calms, varied by light south-west breezes, changing gradually more and more to the east, the _Pelican of the North_ crossed the line, and proceeded upon her way in pleasant weather.

Ralph would have enjoyed this time much but for the pest of cockroaches which now swarmed over them and their belongings. These disgusting insects were of two sorts, one of which had always been troublesome from the first, but were now supplemented by a second, not seen much except by night, but which crawled about then in such immense numbers, through the hours of darkness, as to do great damage. They ran over the cabin floors, up the walls, were shaken out in showers from the rigging when a sail was unfurled; they honeycombed the biscuit, they were found in the boots and shoes, and made life a burden to young Denham, who entertained a particular aversion to creeping insects.

"How I wish we could find anything which would rid us of these beastly things?" sighed he one day to Mr. Gilchrist, when the vermin had been seized with a literary fureur, and eaten out the ink from some notes which he had been at considerable pains to compile from a book of natural history. "Last night I thought we must have some spiritualist on board, or ghosts, or something uncanny. I was wakened up by the noise as if everything in the cabin had taken to dancing about in a frolic, till I discovered it was nothing but thousands of these horrid creatures crawling and rustling about. Some nights I verily believe that they will eat us up bodily."

Mr. Gilchrist laughed.

"Never mind," said he, "we shall be in cooler latitudes soon, and they will become more torpid, and go back to their holes again. We are nearing the Cape."

"Shall we touch at the Cape? Shall we see the Table Mountain, sir, do you think?"

"I rather fancy not. From what the captain said the other day, I believe that there are currents there which are apt to be trying to a heavily-laden ship such as ours. Squalls are very prevalent in rounding the Cape, and I think he will give it a wide berth. We do not need water, nor have we any particular reason for delaying the voyage by putting in at Cape Town."

"We must be near land, I should think, for there are so many birds about now. Some of them are birds that I never saw before."

"Albatrosses to wit? You do not want to shoot one, do you, and share the fate of the Ancient Mariner?"

"No, not quite that, though if everyone who had done so were to be exposed to a similar fate there would be a good many phantom ships careering about the high-seas. Lots of the ships that come into Liverpool have their skins, or their bills, or something on board. I have an albatross' bill at home that a sailor gave me. I have a lot of things fastened up about the walls of my room. It is easy to get foreign curiosities in Liverpool, but I left all mine as a legacy to my sister Agnes, and promised to look out for more when I got to Rangoon, and met with any chance of sending them home to her."

"It will be a good plan. If you have any ready in time I will take them back for you, and call to see your mother to tell her how you are getting on, what sort of lodgings you have, and all about you."

"That will be very kind, sir. In that case I will try to shoot one of those birds, for they are quite new to me. They are of a blue colour in part, with a black streak across the top of the wings."

"Those are blue petrels, I believe; birds which are only found in southern seas. We will try to preserve the skins of one or two with carbolic powder, though I fear that your friends the cockroaches will get at them."

"Ugh! Don't call them my friends! You should have seen the third mate, Mr. Kershaw, teasing the cook yesterday. Cook came up in the evening for a breath of air, and was leaning over the side looking down at the 'sea on fire' as they call it--it was splendid late last night. Mr. Kershaw came up to him and looked at him very earnestly, first on one side and then on the other, as if he saw something queer about him. Cook began to squirm about uncomfortably.

"'What is it, Mr. Kershaw?' asked he. 'Is there anything wrong about me?'

"'Oh no, my good fellow, no,' said the mate. 'It only struck me that cockroaches are a peculiar kind of pets, but it is every man's own business if he chooses to let them sleep in the folds of his shirt. Do you always keep them there?'

"'Where, where?' called out the cook, all in a hurry. 'Cockroaches on my shirt? Where?'

"He was trying to see over his shoulder in an impossible kind of way; he put his hands up to his neck and down to his waist at the back; he shuddered, and shook himself, but could not find them; and it was not likely that he could, for there were none there to be found.

"Mr. Kershaw was pretending to help him, poking at him up and down his back.

"'Oh, I thought I had them then!--there, under your arm,--no, down your leg. Dear me! how very active they are. What remarkably fine specimens! They seem to be quite tame; how much you must know about them to live with them like this, quite in the style of a happy family. They really seem to love you. I should not like to keep them about myself though, in this manner. Do you _always_ have them upon your own person, my friend?'

"At last the cook twigged the joke, for we were all laughing so, but he was quite cross about it, and flung away muttering something about fools, and wishing to knock Mr. Kershaw's head off for him."

Ralph could not help laughing again at the remembrance of the scene, and Mr. Gilchrist joined in his merriment.

But soon there was no more time for jokes or laughter, stern reality claimed all their attention.

Mr. Gilchrist was sitting one day upon a lounging-chair, beneath the shade of an awning, when the captain approached him with anxiety plainly imprinted on his face.

"How now, Rogers?" said he; "your face is as long as from here to there!"

"And with good reason too," replied the captain; "I fear that a terrible calamity has come upon us."

"Why, my good fellow, what can be going to happen now?" cried Gilchrist, alarmed in his turn.

"Fire," said Rogers laconically, but with grave emphasis.

"Fire!" exclaimed both Gilchrist and Ralph at the same instant, staring around them in perplexity upon the placid sea, the sunny sky, the swelling sails, the pennon idly fluttering on the breeze. "Fire! Where? How?"

For all answer the captain pointed to a few slender spiral coils of smoke, issuing from the seams of the deck where the caulking had worn away.

Mr. Gilchrist looked aghast.

"Do you mean the cargo?" he asked fearfully.

"Even so," said the captain. "It may be only heating from water reaching it during the storm. We are going to open the hatches and see if we can put it out, but I fear that the mischief was done when we loaded the coal. It was such wet weather while we were taking it on board. Gilchrist," said he, lowering his voice, "if there is anything particularly valuable among your things, put it up in small compass, and be ready for the worst in case we have to take to the boats."

"Do you anticipate such a thing?"

"It is always well to be prepared."

Mr. Gilchrist had many things--books, maps, scientific instruments, collecting cases, a costly binocular microscope with all its appliances, and other articles, nothing having been spared for his equipment; but in the shock of this surprise he forgot them all, and, springing from his chair, hurried to the scene of action.

The whole crew gathered hastily around to know the worst, and gazed with blanched faces at each other as the hatches were carefully raised.

A universal cry of horror escaped them, when such a cloud of steam and smoke, with so sulphureous a stench, rushed out, upon vent being given to the hold, that they were driven back gasping for air.

"Good Heavens!" cried Mr. Gilchrist, "there are two thousand tons of coal down there! The Lord have mercy upon us!"

"How far are we from land?" asked Ralph.

"I do not know. I suppose that it depends greatly on the wind for calculating the length of time it will take us to reach it. I believe the captain hoped to make Moulmein in about a week or ten days more."

"Where is that hose?" thundered the captain. "Bring it here at once. Douche the hold well. Mellish, we must try to jettison the cargo, and make room for water enough to reach down the hold."

"Right you are, sir!" cried the first mate. "Who volunteers?"

The hardiest men among the crew pressed forward. Two parties were quickly told off, one to relieve the other. The men flew to the pumps and hose; all was excitement and hurry--not a soul of them flinched.

"Here, give me hold of a bucket," cried Mr. Gilchrist, taking his place in a line of men hauling up sea-water to supplement the volumes from the hose.

Ralph rushed to assist at the pumps. Streams of water poured down the hold; volumes of steam arose, hissing, through the hatchways. It was long before the bravest of the men could descend, no one could have breathed in such an atmosphere; and when two leapt into the chasm at last, they had immediately to be drawn up again, fainting, scorched, choked with the sulphureous fumes.

They were laid on the deck, buckets of water dashed upon them, and they came, gasping, to themselves.

"'Tis of no use, mates," said they. "The mouth of hell itself could be no fiercer."

It was indeed like looking down the crater of a volcano to glance into that awful depth--the fire had got complete hold of the coal.

"We must take to the boats, sir," said Mellish.

"Not yet," replied the captain. "We have no security yet from that cyclone,--did boats fall into its clutches, there is no chance for them. We may skirt it in the barque by God's providence; it blows from the west'ard quarter, and its tail may help us towards the mainland quicker than boats would take us. Batten down the hatches, but leave the hose room for entrance, and keep up the water as much as we can. Provision the boats, and have everything ready to man them quickly when all hope is over; but we stick to the old girl to the last gasp."

There were two large boats, both capable of holding ten or twelve men; two smaller ones, which could accommodate six or eight each; and the captain's gig, usually manned by a similar number.

It would require the whole five to receive all the crew, for it consisted of twenty seamen, an apprentice, Ralph, a cook, sailmaker, carpenter, boatswain, three mates and the captain,--thirty souls besides Mr. Gilchrist. Even with all the five boats there would be but little space to save much of their possessions, but there was the less demand for this as the men, taking fright at the state of the cargo, refused to go below even for their own kits. Indeed, the stench of sulphur, and rapid spread of the smother, justified them in their fears.

The cook's galley and the storehouses were on deck, the latter in the poop, close by the captain's cabin, and the former amidships; it was therefore easy to store the boats with a sufficiency of provision and water, and Captain Rogers proceeded to tell off the men for each.

He himself must be the last to leave the ship; and equally, of course, must Mr. Gilchrist be considered among the first. He must go in the first boat, commanded by Mellish; eight seamen, Kirke, and the carpenter would form its complement. But Mr. Gilchrist refused.

"No," said he. "I am an interloper here, it is right that I should come last, and leave these poor fellows to have first chance of their lives. Put a married man in my place, there is no one dependent upon me at home."

"Nay," said Captain Rogers, "you are my charge, I must see you safe first."

"My good fellow," replied Mr. Gilchrist with determination, "do not waste time in arguing; I go with you."

"And I too, uncle," said Ralph. "Do not ask me to part from you."

"For you, boy," replied the captain, "right and good, you are as my own, and ought to take risks with me; but for you, Gilchrist, think better of it."

"Now, Rogers," said Mr. Gilchrist, "why waste time? Don't you know when a man has made up his mind?"

There was indeed a general perception that time was short, the men worked with all their might, and the boats were stored rapidly. The three mates and the boatswain were each to command one; the coxswains were selected from the best of the seamen, and every man was given his place, to which he was at once to repair upon a given signal.

Was it wise to wait longer before embarking in them? A dead calm had fallen, an ominous stillness pervaded the atmosphere, no breeze, not the faintest sigh, was there to swell the sails, and a brassy sky in the west received the sinking sun.

And the little coils of smoke grew larger, they writhed up from crack and cranny like snakes, and span and twisted, puffed and swelled, with horrible sportiveness.

The men worked in silence, casting fearful glances on this side and that, as they trod those decks which formed so slight a protection for them from the fiery chasm beneath. They gathered in groups as the night fell with the rapidity of those latitudes, but they did not talk.

In the quiet they could hear little slippings of the coal, little reports now and then, and they fancied that a sullen roar might be distinguished, now gathering volume, then dying away.

The night was very dark,--was it the looming storm or the furnace beneath them which made the air so oppressive and close? Nothing could be done without light, and the suspense was horrible. Every now and then the captain, holding a lantern low, swept the decks, examining to see whether the smoke had increased or lessened. There appeared to be but little difference, but such change as there was lay in the direction of increase.

Thicker and thicker grew the gloom, blacker and blacker the night, heavier and heavier the sultry air. Then a faint moaning was heard among the shrouds, a hissing on the surface of the water, and the cyclone broke upon them with a cry as of demons rejoicing over their prey.

The vessel gave a shudder like a living creature, then bounded forwards, heeling over from force of the wind in the most perilous manner; every cord straining, every sail swollen to its utmost tension.

It was but the edge of the cyclone, but even that gave them enough to do. The sea boiled around them; great waves tossed the devoted ship on their crests, and buried it in their trough, driving it onward with fury all but unmanageable.

Then rose up a wall of water above their heads, it dashed down upon the decks, and rushed out from the scuppers in foaming streams; and in the next instant the mainsail was torn from its holdings, the mast gave way with an awful rending and crash, and beat about to this side and that, to the peril of all around.

"The boats! the boats!" shrieked the men.

"Take to the boats!" shouted Rogers.

They sprang to the davits to loosen the boats, and the howling wind took the gear in its teeth and wrenched its supports from their hold, whirling the two first boats away as if they had been feathers.

Floods of water poured over the decks, making their way plentifully down into the hold through a thousand clefts opened by the straining timbers, and the steam rose in thicker and hotter clouds as they washed away.

Then a lull came,--were they out of the line of the cyclone?

"Cut the ropes of the starboard boats," cried the captain. "We can hold out no longer. 'Tis life or death."

Again was the effort made,--again did failure greet the devoted men; the smaller boat was swamped at once. Better fortune served them over the others; the large one and the captain's gig were lowered safely, and the men crowded into them with headlong speed, many throwing themselves into the seething water in their haste, some to be hauled on board by their comrades, and more than one to be swept out of sight for ever.

Hardly could the united efforts of the captain, mates, and Mr. Gilchrist control the panic: they stood, silent and firm, with set teeth and blanched faces, as the seamen crushed past them and dropped over the side, only endeavouring to withhold them so as to give each his fair chance of escape. Minutes were like hours; the crowd lessened,--cries and shouts for haste rose up from the thronged boats. Captain Rogers turned, caught Ralph by the arm and swung him over the side; Mr. Gilchrist slipped down a rope and was hauled in; Mellish leapt; the captain stood alone, the last of all.

He looked hurriedly around--all were gone, his duty done, and he too threw himself into the gig.

So hampered were the rowers by the mass of living creatures crushed into so small a space, that they could hardly manage their oars; the boats were weighted down to the water's edge, and had not the storm spent its fury in that last awful burst, all hope of living in such a sea would have been futile.

But the hand of Providence was over them; they shook down into something like order, and rowed away from the doomed ship with all the expedition they could raise; and not one moment too soon; for, hardly were they at a safe distance, when, with an awful roar,--a splitting and crashing of timbers,--an explosion like the crack of doom itself,--the deck was forced upwards, its planks tossed high in air, as if they were chips, by the pillar of white steam that rose exultingly into the sky; great tongues of flame shot rapidly up through it, crimson and orange among rolling volumes of smoke; and the rising sun paled before the glowing fiery mass that reddened the waters far and wide ere it sank into their bosom, leaving its débris of burnt and blackened wastry floating idly on its surface.

A groan burst from the white lips of the men as the seething ruin that had been their home for so many weeks disappeared slowly from their gaze.