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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/1465-h.zip b/1465-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1217464 --- /dev/null +++ b/1465-h.zip diff --git a/1465-h/1465-h.htm b/1465-h/1465-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..71c351b --- /dev/null +++ b/1465-h/1465-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1469 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>The Wreck of the Golden Mary</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + H1, H2 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + H3, H4 { + text-align: left; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<h2> +<a href="#startoftext">The Wreck of the Golden Mary, by Charles Dickens</a> +</h2> +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Wreck of the Golden Mary, by Charles +Dickens + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Wreck of the Golden Mary + + +Author: Charles Dickens + +Release Date: April 4, 2005 [eBook #1465] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WRECK OF THE GOLDEN MARY*** +</pre> +<p><a name="startoftext"></a></p> +<p>Transcribed from the 1894 Chapman and Hall edition of “Christmas +Stories” by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk</p> +<h1>THE WRECK OF THE GOLDEN MARY</h1> +<h2>THE WRECK</h2> +<p>I was apprenticed to the Sea when I was twelve years old, and I have +encountered a great deal of rough weather, both literal and metaphorical. +It has always been my opinion since I first possessed such a thing as +an opinion, that the man who knows only one subject is next tiresome +to the man who knows no subject. Therefore, in the course of my +life I have taught myself whatever I could, and although I am not an +educated man, I am able, I am thankful to say, to have an intelligent +interest in most things.</p> +<p>A person might suppose, from reading the above, that I am in the +habit of holding forth about number one. That is not the case. +Just as if I was to come into a room among strangers, and must either +be introduced or introduce myself, so I have taken the liberty of passing +these few remarks, simply and plainly that it may be known who and what +I am. I will add no more of the sort than that my name is William +George Ravender, that I was born at Penrith half a year after my own +father was drowned, and that I am on the second day of this present +blessed Christmas week of one thousand eight hundred and fifty-six, +fifty-six years of age.</p> +<p>When the rumour first went flying up and down that there was gold +in California—which, as most people know, was before it was discovered +in the British colony of Australia—I was in the West Indies, trading +among the Islands. Being in command and likewise part-owner of +a smart schooner, I had my work cut out for me, and I was doing it. +Consequently, gold in California was no business of mine.</p> +<p>But, by the time when I came home to England again, the thing was +as clear as your hand held up before you at noon-day. There was +Californian gold in the museums and in the goldsmiths’ shops, +and the very first time I went upon ’Change, I met a friend of +mine (a seafaring man like myself), with a Californian nugget hanging +to his watch-chain. I handled it. It was as like a peeled +walnut with bits unevenly broken off here and there, and then electrotyped +all over, as ever I saw anything in my life.</p> +<p>I am a single man (she was too good for this world and for me, and +she died six weeks before our marriage-day), so when I am ashore, I +live in my house at Poplar. My house at Poplar is taken care of +and kept ship-shape by an old lady who was my mother’s maid before +I was born. She is as handsome and as upright as any old lady +in the world. She is as fond of me as if she had ever had an only +son, and I was he. Well do I know wherever I sail that she never +lays down her head at night without having said, “Merciful Lord! +bless and preserve William George Ravender, and send him safe home, +through Christ our Saviour!” I have thought of it in many +a dangerous moment, when it has done me no harm, I am sure.</p> +<p>In my house at Poplar, along with this old lady, I lived quiet for +best part of a year: having had a long spell of it among the Islands, +and having (which was very uncommon in me) taken the fever rather badly. +At last, being strong and hearty, and having read every book I could +lay hold of, right out, I was walking down Leadenhall Street in the +City of London, thinking of turning-to again, when I met what I call +Smithick and Watersby of Liverpool. I chanced to lift up my eyes +from looking in at a ship’s chronometer in a window, and I saw +him bearing down upon me, head on.</p> +<p>It is, personally, neither Smithick, nor Watersby, that I here mention, +nor was I ever acquainted with any man of either of those names, nor +do I think that there has been any one of either of those names in that +Liverpool House for years back. But, it is in reality the House +itself that I refer to; and a wiser merchant or a truer gentleman never +stepped.</p> +<p>“My dear Captain Ravender,” says he. “Of +all the men on earth, I wanted to see you most. I was on my way +to you.”</p> +<p>“Well!” says I. “That looks as if you <i>were</i> +to see me, don’t it?” With that I put my arm in his, +and we walked on towards the Royal Exchange, and when we got there, +walked up and down at the back of it where the Clock-Tower is. +We walked an hour and more, for he had much to say to me. He had +a scheme for chartering a new ship of their own to take out cargo to +the diggers and emigrants in California, and to buy and bring back gold. +Into the particulars of that scheme I will not enter, and I have no +right to enter. All I say of it is, that it was a very original +one, a very fine one, a very sound one, and a very lucrative one beyond +doubt.</p> +<p>He imparted it to me as freely as if I had been a part of himself. +After doing so, he made me the handsomest sharing offer that ever was +made to me, boy or man—or I believe to any other captain in the +Merchant Navy—and he took this round turn to finish with:</p> +<p>“Ravender, you are well aware that the lawlessness of that +coast and country at present, is as special as the circumstances in +which it is placed. Crews of vessels outward-bound, desert as +soon as they make the land; crews of vessels homeward-bound, ship at +enormous wages, with the express intention of murdering the captain +and seizing the gold freight; no man can trust another, and the devil +seems let loose. Now,” says he, “you know my opinion +of you, and you know I am only expressing it, and with no singularity, +when I tell you that you are almost the only man on whose integrity, +discretion, and energy—” &c., &c. For, I don’t +want to repeat what he said, though I was and am sensible of it.</p> +<p>Notwithstanding my being, as I have mentioned, quite ready for a +voyage, still I had some doubts of this voyage. Of course I knew, +without being told, that there were peculiar difficulties and dangers +in it, a long way over and above those which attend all voyages. +It must not be supposed that I was afraid to face them; but, in my opinion +a man has no manly motive or sustainment in his own breast for facing +dangers, unless he has well considered what they are, and is able quietly +to say to himself, “None of these perils can now take me by surprise; +I shall know what to do for the best in any of them; all the rest lies +in the higher and greater hands to which I humbly commit myself.” +On this principle I have so attentively considered (regarding it as +my duty) all the hazards I have ever been able to think of, in the ordinary +way of storm, shipwreck, and fire at sea, that I hope I should be prepared +to do, in any of those cases, whatever could be done, to save the lives +intrusted to my charge.</p> +<p>As I was thoughtful, my good friend proposed that he should leave +me to walk there as long as I liked, and that I should dine with him +by-and-by at his club in Pall Mall. I accepted the invitation +and I walked up and down there, quarter-deck fashion, a matter of a +couple of hours; now and then looking up at the weathercock as I might +have looked up aloft; and now and then taking a look into Cornhill, +as I might have taken a look over the side.</p> +<p>All dinner-time, and all after dinner-time, we talked it over again. +I gave him my views of his plan, and he very much approved of the same. +I told him I had nearly decided, but not quite. “Well, well,” +says he, “come down to Liverpool to-morrow with me, and see the +Golden Mary.” I liked the name (her name was Mary, and she +was golden, if golden stands for good), so I began to feel that it was +almost done when I said I would go to Liverpool. On the next morning +but one we were on board the Golden Mary. I might have known, +from his asking me to come down and see her, what she was. I declare +her to have been the completest and most exquisite Beauty that ever +I set my eyes upon.</p> +<p>We had inspected every timber in her, and had come back to the gangway +to go ashore from the dock-basin, when I put out my hand to my friend. +“Touch upon it,” says I, “and touch heartily. +I take command of this ship, and I am hers and yours, if I can get John +Steadiman for my chief mate.”</p> +<p>John Steadiman had sailed with me four voyages. The first voyage +John was third mate out to China, and came home second. The other +three voyages he was my first officer. At this time of chartering +the Golden Mary, he was aged thirty-two. A brisk, bright, blue-eyed +fellow, a very neat figure and rather under the middle size, never out +of the way and never in it, a face that pleased everybody and that all +children took to, a habit of going about singing as cheerily as a blackbird, +and a perfect sailor.</p> +<p>We were in one of those Liverpool hackney-coaches in less than a +minute, and we cruised about in her upwards of three hours, looking +for John. John had come home from Van Diemen’s Land barely +a month before, and I had heard of him as taking a frisk in Liverpool. +We asked after him, among many other places, at the two boarding-houses +he was fondest of, and we found he had had a week’s spell at each +of them; but, he had gone here and gone there, and had set off “to +lay out on the main-to’-gallant-yard of the highest Welsh mountain” +(so he had told the people of the house), and where he might be then, +or when he might come back, nobody could tell us. But it was surprising, +to be sure, to see how every face brightened the moment there was mention +made of the name of Mr. Steadiman.</p> +<p>We were taken aback at meeting with no better luck, and we had wore +ship and put her head for my friends, when as we were jogging through +the streets, I clap my eyes on John himself coming out of a toyshop! +He was carrying a little boy, and conducting two uncommon pretty women +to their coach, and he told me afterwards that he had never in his life +seen one of the three before, but that he was so taken with them on +looking in at the toyshop while they were buying the child a cranky +Noah’s Ark, very much down by the head, that he had gone in and +asked the ladies’ permission to treat him to a tolerably correct +Cutter there was in the window, in order that such a handsome boy might +not grow up with a lubberly idea of naval architecture.</p> +<p>We stood off and on until the ladies’ coachman began to give +way, and then we hailed John. On his coming aboard of us, I told +him, very gravely, what I had said to my friend. It struck him, +as he said himself, amidships. He was quite shaken by it. +“Captain Ravender,” were John Steadiman’s words, “such +an opinion from you is true commendation, and I’ll sail round +the world with you for twenty years if you hoist the signal, and stand +by you for ever!” And now indeed I felt that it was done, +and that the Golden Mary was afloat.</p> +<p>Grass never grew yet under the feet of Smithick and Watersby. +The riggers were out of that ship in a fortnight’s time, and we +had begun taking in cargo. John was always aboard, seeing everything +stowed with his own eyes; and whenever I went aboard myself early or +late, whether he was below in the hold, or on deck at the hatchway, +or overhauling his cabin, nailing up pictures in it of the Blush Roses +of England, the Blue Belles of Scotland, and the female Shamrock of +Ireland: of a certainty I heard John singing like a blackbird.</p> +<p>We had room for twenty passengers. Our sailing advertisement +was no sooner out, than we might have taken these twenty times over. +In entering our men, I and John (both together) picked them, and we +entered none but good hands—as good as were to be found in that +port. And so, in a good ship of the best build, well owned, well +arranged, well officered, well manned, well found in all respects, we +parted with our pilot at a quarter past four o’clock in the afternoon +of the seventh of March, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-one, and +stood with a fair wind out to sea.</p> +<p>It may be easily believed that up to that time I had had no leisure +to be intimate with my passengers. The most of them were then +in their berths sea-sick; however, in going among them, telling them +what was good for them, persuading them not to be there, but to come +up on deck and feel the breeze, and in rousing them with a joke, or +a comfortable word, I made acquaintance with them, perhaps, in a more +friendly and confidential way from the first, than I might have done +at the cabin table.</p> +<p>Of my passengers, I need only particularise, just at present, a bright-eyed +blooming young wife who was going out to join her husband in California, +taking with her their only child, a little girl of three years old, +whom he had never seen; a sedate young woman in black, some five years +older (about thirty as I should say), who was going out to join a brother; +and an old gentleman, a good deal like a hawk if his eyes had been better +and not so red, who was always talking, morning, noon, and night, about +the gold discovery. But, whether he was making the voyage, thinking +his old arms could dig for gold, or whether his speculation was to buy +it, or to barter for it, or to cheat for it, or to snatch it anyhow +from other people, was his secret. He kept his secret.</p> +<p>These three and the child were the soonest well. The child +was a most engaging child, to be sure, and very fond of me: though I +am bound to admit that John Steadiman and I were borne on her pretty +little books in reverse order, and that he was captain there, and I +was mate. It was beautiful to watch her with John, and it was +beautiful to watch John with her. Few would have thought it possible, +to see John playing at bo-peep round the mast, that he was the man who +had caught up an iron bar and struck a Malay and a Maltese dead, as +they were gliding with their knives down the cabin stair aboard the +barque Old England, when the captain lay ill in his cot, off Saugar +Point. But he was; and give him his back against a bulwark, he +would have done the same by half a dozen of them. The name of +the young mother was Mrs. Atherfield, the name of the young lady in +black was Miss Coleshaw, and the name of the old gentleman was Mr. Rarx.</p> +<p>As the child had a quantity of shining fair hair, clustering in curls +all about her face, and as her name was Lucy, Steadiman gave her the +name of the Golden Lucy. So, we had the Golden Lucy and the Golden +Mary; and John kept up the idea to that extent as he and the child went +playing about the decks, that I believe she used to think the ship was +alive somehow—a sister or companion, going to the same place as +herself. She liked to be by the wheel, and in fine weather, I +have often stood by the man whose trick it was at the wheel, only to +hear her, sitting near my feet, talking to the ship. Never had +a child such a doll before, I suppose; but she made a doll of the Golden +Mary, and used to dress her up by tying ribbons and little bits of finery +to the belaying-pins; and nobody ever moved them, unless it was to save +them from being blown away.</p> +<p>Of course I took charge of the two young women, and I called them +“my dear,” and they never minded, knowing that whatever +I said was said in a fatherly and protecting spirit. I gave them +their places on each side of me at dinner, Mrs. Atherfield on my right +and Miss Coleshaw on my left; and I directed the unmarried lady to serve +out the breakfast, and the married lady to serve out the tea. +Likewise I said to my black steward in their presence, “Tom Snow, +these two ladies are equally the mistresses of this house, and do you +obey their orders equally;” at which Tom laughed, and they all +laughed.</p> +<p>Old Mr. Rarx was not a pleasant man to look at, nor yet to talk to, +or to be with, for no one could help seeing that he was a sordid and +selfish character, and that he had warped further and further out of +the straight with time. Not but what he was on his best behaviour +with us, as everybody was; for we had no bickering among us, for’ard +or aft. I only mean to say, he was not the man one would have +chosen for a messmate. If choice there had been, one might even +have gone a few points out of one’s course, to say, “No! +Not him!” But, there was one curious inconsistency in Mr. +Rarx. That was, that he took an astonishing interest in the child. +He looked, and I may add, he was, one of the last of men to care at +all for a child, or to care much for any human creature. Still, +he went so far as to be habitually uneasy, if the child was long on +deck, out of his sight. He was always afraid of her falling overboard, +or falling down a hatchway, or of a block or what not coming down upon +her from the rigging in the working of the ship, or of her getting some +hurt or other. He used to look at her and touch her, as if she +was something precious to him. He was always solicitous about +her not injuring her health, and constantly entreated her mother to +be careful of it. This was so much the more curious, because the +child did not like him, but used to shrink away from him, and would +not even put out her hand to him without coaxing from others. +I believe that every soul on board frequently noticed this, and not +one of us understood it. However, it was such a plain fact, that +John Steadiman said more than once when old Mr. Rarx was not within +earshot, that if the Golden Mary felt a tenderness for the dear old +gentleman she carried in her lap, she must be bitterly jealous of the +Golden Lucy.</p> +<p>Before I go any further with this narrative, I will state that our +ship was a barque of three hundred tons, carrying a crew of eighteen +men, a second mate in addition to John, a carpenter, an armourer or +smith, and two apprentices (one a Scotch boy, poor little fellow). +We had three boats; the Long-boat, capable of carrying twenty-five men; +the Cutter, capable of carrying fifteen; and the Surf-boat, capable +of carrying ten. I put down the capacity of these boats according +to the numbers they were really meant to hold.</p> +<p>We had tastes of bad weather and head-winds, of course; but, on the +whole we had as fine a run as any reasonable man could expect, for sixty +days. I then began to enter two remarks in the ship’s Log +and in my Journal; first, that there was an unusual and amazing quantity +of ice; second, that the nights were most wonderfully dark, in spite +of the ice.</p> +<p>For five days and a half, it seemed quite useless and hopeless to +alter the ship’s course so as to stand out of the way of this +ice. I made what southing I could; but, all that time, we were +beset by it. Mrs. Atherfield after standing by me on deck once, +looking for some time in an awed manner at the great bergs that surrounded +us, said in a whisper, “O! Captain Ravender, it looks as if the +whole solid earth had changed into ice, and broken up!” +I said to her, laughing, “I don’t wonder that it does, to +your inexperienced eyes, my dear.” But I had never seen +a twentieth part of the quantity, and, in reality, I was pretty much +of her opinion.</p> +<p>However, at two p.m. on the afternoon of the sixth day, that is to +say, when we were sixty-six days out, John Steadiman who had gone aloft, +sang out from the top, that the sea was clear ahead. Before four +p.m. a strong breeze springing up right astern, we were in open water +at sunset. The breeze then freshening into half a gale of wind, +and the Golden Mary being a very fast sailer, we went before the wind +merrily, all night.</p> +<p>I had thought it impossible that it could be darker than it had been, +until the sun, moon, and stars should fall out of the Heavens, and Time +should be destroyed; but, it had been next to light, in comparison with +what it was now. The darkness was so profound, that looking into +it was painful and oppressive—like looking, without a ray of light, +into a dense black bandage put as close before the eyes as it could +be, without touching them. I doubled the look-out, and John and +I stood in the bow side-by-side, never leaving it all night. Yet +I should no more have known that he was near me when he was silent, +without putting out my arm and touching him, than I should if he had +turned in and been fast asleep below. We were not so much looking +out, all of us, as listening to the utmost, both with our eyes and ears.</p> +<p>Next day, I found that the mercury in the barometer, which had risen +steadily since we cleared the ice, remained steady. I had had +very good observations, with now and then the interruption of a day +or so, since our departure. I got the sun at noon, and found that +we were in Lat. 58 degrees S., Long. 60 degrees W., off New South Shetland; +in the neighbourhood of Cape Horn. We were sixty-seven days out, +that day. The ship’s reckoning was accurately worked and +made up. The ship did her duty admirably, all on board were well, +and all hands were as smart, efficient, and contented, as it was possible +to be.</p> +<p>When the night came on again as dark as before, it was the eighth +night I had been on deck. Nor had I taken more than a very little +sleep in the day-time, my station being always near the helm, and often +at it, while we were among the ice. Few but those who have tried +it can imagine the difficulty and pain of only keeping the eyes open—physically +open—under such circumstances, in such darkness. They get +struck by the darkness, and blinded by the darkness. They make +patterns in it, and they flash in it, as if they had gone out of your +head to look at you. On the turn of midnight, John Steadiman, +who was alert and fresh (for I had always made him turn in by day), +said to me, “Captain Ravender, I entreat of you to go below. +I am sure you can hardly stand, and your voice is getting weak, sir. +Go below, and take a little rest. I’ll call you if a block +chafes.” I said to John in answer, “Well, well, John! +Let us wait till the turn of one o’clock, before we talk about +that.” I had just had one of the ship’s lanterns held +up, that I might see how the night went by my watch, and it was then +twenty minutes after twelve.</p> +<p>At five minutes before one, John sang out to the boy to bring the +lantern again, and when I told him once more what the time was, entreated +and prayed of me to go below. “Captain Ravender,” +says he, “all’s well; we can’t afford to have you +laid up for a single hour; and I respectfully and earnestly beg of you +to go below.” The end of it was, that I agreed to do so, +on the understanding that if I failed to come up of my own accord within +three hours, I was to be punctually called. Having settled that, +I left John in charge. But I called him to me once afterwards, +to ask him a question. I had been to look at the barometer, and +had seen the mercury still perfectly steady, and had come up the companion +again to take a last look about me—if I can use such a word in +reference to such darkness—when I thought that the waves, as the +Golden Mary parted them and shook them off, had a hollow sound in them; +something that I fancied was a rather unusual reverberation. I +was standing by the quarter-deck rail on the starboard side, when I +called John aft to me, and bade him listen. He did so with the +greatest attention. Turning to me he then said, “Rely upon +it, Captain Ravender, you have been without rest too long, and the novelty +is only in the state of your sense of hearing.” I thought +so too by that time, and I think so now, though I can never know for +absolute certain in this world, whether it was or not.</p> +<p>When I left John Steadiman in charge, the ship was still going at +a great rate through the water. The wind still blew right astern. +Though she was making great way, she was under shortened sail, and had +no more than she could easily carry. All was snug, and nothing +complained. There was a pretty sea running, but not a very high +sea neither, nor at all a confused one.</p> +<p>I turned in, as we seamen say, all standing. The meaning of +that is, I did not pull my clothes off—no, not even so much as +my coat: though I did my shoes, for my feet were badly swelled with +the deck. There was a little swing-lamp alight in my cabin. +I thought, as I looked at it before shutting my eyes, that I was so +tired of darkness, and troubled by darkness, that I could have gone +to sleep best in the midst of a million of flaming gas-lights. +That was the last thought I had before I went off, except the prevailing +thought that I should not be able to get to sleep at all.</p> +<p>I dreamed that I was back at Penrith again, and was trying to get +round the church, which had altered its shape very much since I last +saw it, and was cloven all down the middle of the steeple in a most +singular manner. Why I wanted to get round the church I don’t +know; but I was as anxious to do it as if my life depended on it. +Indeed, I believe it did in the dream. For all that, I could not +get round the church. I was still trying, when I came against +it with a violent shock, and was flung out of my cot against the ship’s +side. Shrieks and a terrific outcry struck me far harder than +the bruising timbers, and amidst sounds of grinding and crashing, and +a heavy rushing and breaking of water—sounds I understood too +well—I made my way on deck. It was not an easy thing to +do, for the ship heeled over frightfully, and was beating in a furious +manner.</p> +<p>I could not see the men as I went forward, but I could hear that +they were hauling in sail, in disorder. I had my trumpet in my +hand, and, after directing and encouraging them in this till it was +done, I hailed first John Steadiman, and then my second mate, Mr. William +Rames. Both answered clearly and steadily. Now, I had practised +them and all my crew, as I have ever made it a custom to practise all +who sail with me, to take certain stations and wait my orders, in case +of any unexpected crisis. When my voice was heard hailing, and +their voices were heard answering, I was aware, through all the noises +of the ship and sea, and all the crying of the passengers below, that +there was a pause. “Are you ready, Rames?”—“Ay, +ay, sir!”—“Then light up, for God’s sake!” +In a moment he and another were burning blue-lights, and the ship and +all on board seemed to be enclosed in a mist of light, under a great +black dome.</p> +<p>The light shone up so high that I could see the huge Iceberg upon +which we had struck, cloven at the top and down the middle, exactly +like Penrith Church in my dream. At the same moment I could see +the watch last relieved, crowding up and down on deck; I could see Mrs. +Atherfield and Miss Coleshaw thrown about on the top of the companion +as they struggled to bring the child up from below; I could see that +the masts were going with the shock and the beating of the ship; I could +see the frightful breach stove in on the starboard side, half the length +of the vessel, and the sheathing and timbers spirting up; I could see +that the Cutter was disabled, in a wreck of broken fragments; and I +could see every eye turned upon me. It is my belief that if there +had been ten thousand eyes there, I should have seen them all, with +their different looks. And all this in a moment. But you +must consider what a moment.</p> +<p>I saw the men, as they looked at me, fall towards their appointed +stations, like good men and true. If she had not righted, they +could have done very little there or anywhere but die—not that +it is little for a man to die at his post—I mean they could have +done nothing to save the passengers and themselves. Happily, however, +the violence of the shock with which we had so determinedly borne down +direct on that fatal Iceberg, as if it had been our destination instead +of our destruction, had so smashed and pounded the ship that she got +off in this same instant and righted. I did not want the carpenter +to tell me she was filling and going down; I could see and hear that. +I gave Rames the word to lower the Long-boat and the Surf-boat, and +I myself told off the men for each duty. Not one hung back, or +came before the other. I now whispered to John Steadiman, “John, +I stand at the gangway here, to see every soul on board safe over the +side. You shall have the next post of honour, and shall be the +last but one to leave the ship. Bring up the passengers, and range +them behind me; and put what provision and water you can got at, in +the boats. Cast your eye for’ard, John, and you’ll +see you have not a moment to lose.”</p> +<p>My noble fellows got the boats over the side as orderly as I ever +saw boats lowered with any sea running, and, when they were launched, +two or three of the nearest men in them as they held on, rising and +falling with the swell, called out, looking up at me, “Captain +Ravender, if anything goes wrong with us, and you are saved, remember +we stood by you!”—“We’ll all stand by one another +ashore, yet, please God, my lads!” says I. “Hold on +bravely, and be tender with the women.”</p> +<p>The women were an example to us. They trembled very much, but +they were quiet and perfectly collected. “Kiss me, Captain +Ravender,” says Mrs. Atherfield, “and God in heaven bless +you, you good man!” “My dear,” says I, “those +words are better for me than a life-boat.” I held her child +in my arms till she was in the boat, and then kissed the child and handed +her safe down. I now said to the people in her, “You have +got your freight, my lads, all but me, and I am not coming yet awhile. +Pull away from the ship, and keep off!”</p> +<p>That was the Long-boat. Old Mr. Rarx was one of her complement, +and he was the only passenger who had greatly misbehaved since the ship +struck. Others had been a little wild, which was not to be wondered +at, and not very blamable; but, he had made a lamentation and uproar +which it was dangerous for the people to hear, as there is always contagion +in weakness and selfishness. His incessant cry had been that he +must not be separated from the child, that he couldn’t see the +child, and that he and the child must go together. He had even +tried to wrest the child out of my arms, that he might keep her in his. +“Mr. Rarx,” said I to him when it came to that, “I +have a loaded pistol in my pocket; and if you don’t stand out +of the gangway, and keep perfectly quiet, I shall shoot you through +the heart, if you have got one.” Says he, “You won’t +do murder, Captain Ravender!” “No, sir,” +says I, “I won’t murder forty-four people to humour you, +but I’ll shoot you to save them.” After that he was +quiet, and stood shivering a little way off, until I named him to go +over the side.</p> +<p>The Long-boat being cast off, the Surf-boat was soon filled. +There only remained aboard the Golden Mary, John Mullion the man who +had kept on burning the blue-lights (and who had lighted every new one +at every old one before it went out, as quietly as if he had been at +an illumination); John Steadiman; and myself. I hurried those +two into the Surf-boat, called to them to keep off, and waited with +a grateful and relieved heart for the Long-boat to come and take me +in, if she could. I looked at my watch, and it showed me, by the +blue-light, ten minutes past two. They lost no time. As +soon as she was near enough, I swung myself into her, and called to +the men, “With a will, lads! She’s reeling!” +We were not an inch too far out of the inner vortex of her going down, +when, by the blue-light which John Mullion still burnt in the bow of +the Surf-boat, we saw her lurch, and plunge to the bottom head-foremost. +The child cried, weeping wildly, “O the dear Golden Mary! +O look at her! Save her! Save the poor Golden Mary!” +And then the light burnt out, and the black dome seemed to come down +upon us.</p> +<p>I suppose if we had all stood a-top of a mountain, and seen the whole +remainder of the world sink away from under us, we could hardly have +felt more shocked and solitary than we did when we knew we were alone +on the wide ocean, and that the beautiful ship in which most of us had +been securely asleep within half an hour was gone for ever. There +was an awful silence in our boat, and such a kind of palsy on the rowers +and the man at the rudder, that I felt they were scarcely keeping her +before the sea. I spoke out then, and said, “Let every one +here thank the Lord for our preservation!” All the voices +answered (even the child’s), “We thank the Lord!” +I then said the Lord’s Prayer, and all hands said it after me +with a solemn murmuring. Then I gave the word “Cheerily, +O men, Cheerily!” and I felt that they were handling the boat +again as a boat ought to be handled.</p> +<p>The Surf-boat now burnt another blue-light to show us where they +were, and we made for her, and laid ourselves as nearly alongside of +her as we dared. I had always kept my boats with a coil or two +of good stout stuff in each of them, so both boats had a rope at hand. +We made a shift, with much labour and trouble, to get near enough to +one another to divide the blue-lights (they were no use after that night, +for the sea-water soon got at them), and to get a tow-rope out between +us. All night long we kept together, sometimes obliged to cast +off the rope, and sometimes getting it out again, and all of us wearying +for the morning—which appeared so long in coming that old Mr. +Rarx screamed out, in spite of his fears of me, “The world is +drawing to an end, and the sun will never rise any more!”</p> +<p>When the day broke, I found that we were all huddled together in +a miserable manner. We were deep in the water; being, as I found +on mustering, thirty-one in number, or at least six too many. +In the Surf-boat they were fourteen in number, being at least four too +many. The first thing I did, was to get myself passed to the rudder—which +I took from that time—and to get Mrs. Atherfield, her child, and +Miss Coleshaw, passed on to sit next me. As to old Mr. Rarx, I +put him in the bow, as far from us as I could. And I put some +of the best men near us in order that if I should drop there might be +a skilful hand ready to take the helm.</p> +<p>The sea moderating as the sun came up, though the sky was cloudy +and wild, we spoke the other boat, to know what stores they had, and +to overhaul what we had. I had a compass in my pocket, a small +telescope, a double-barrelled pistol, a knife, and a fire-box and matches. +Most of my men had knives, and some had a little tobacco: some, a pipe +as well. We had a mug among us, and an iron spoon. As to +provisions, there were in my boat two bags of biscuit, one piece of +raw beef, one piece of raw pork, a bag of coffee, roasted but not ground +(thrown in, I imagine, by mistake, for something else), two small casks +of water, and about half-a-gallon of rum in a keg. The Surf-boat, +having rather more rum than we, and fewer to drink it, gave us, as I +estimated, another quart into our keg. In return, we gave them +three double handfuls of coffee, tied up in a piece of a handkerchief; +they reported that they had aboard besides, a bag of biscuit, a piece +of beef, a small cask of water, a small box of lemons, and a Dutch cheese. +It took a long time to make these exchanges, and they were not made +without risk to both parties; the sea running quite high enough to make +our approaching near to one another very hazardous. In the bundle +with the coffee, I conveyed to John Steadiman (who had a ship’s +compass with him), a paper written in pencil, and torn from my pocket-book, +containing the course I meant to steer, in the hope of making land, +or being picked up by some vessel—I say in the hope, though I +had little hope of either deliverance. I then sang out to him, +so as all might hear, that if we two boats could live or die together, +we would; but, that if we should be parted by the weather, and join +company no more, they should have our prayers and blessings, and we +asked for theirs. We then gave them three cheers, which they returned, +and I saw the men’s heads droop in both boats as they fell to +their oars again.</p> +<p>These arrangements had occupied the general attention advantageously +for all, though (as I expressed in the last sentence) they ended in +a sorrowful feeling. I now said a few words to my fellow-voyagers +on the subject of the small stock of food on which our lives depended +if they were preserved from the great deep, and on the rigid necessity +of our eking it out in the most frugal manner. One and all replied +that whatever allowance I thought best to lay down should be strictly +kept to. We made a pair of scales out of a thin scrap of iron-plating +and some twine, and I got together for weights such of the heaviest +buttons among us as I calculated made up some fraction over two ounces. +This was the allowance of solid food served out once a-day to each, +from that time to the end; with the addition of a coffee-berry, or sometimes +half a one, when the weather was very fair, for breakfast. We +had nothing else whatever, but half a pint of water each per day, and +sometimes, when we were coldest and weakest, a teaspoonful of rum each, +served out as a dram. I know how learnedly it can be shown that +rum is poison, but I also know that in this case, as in all similar +cases I have ever read of—which are numerous—no words can +express the comfort and support derived from it. Nor have I the +least doubt that it saved the lives of far more than half our number. +Having mentioned half a pint of water as our daily allowance, I ought +to observe that sometimes we had less, and sometimes we had more; for +much rain fell, and we caught it in a canvas stretched for the purpose.</p> +<p>Thus, at that tempestuous time of the year, and in that tempestuous +part of the world, we shipwrecked people rose and fell with the waves. +It is not my intention to relate (if I can avoid it) such circumstances +appertaining to our doleful condition as have been better told in many +other narratives of the kind than I can be expected to tell them. +I will only note, in so many passing words, that day after day and night +after night, we received the sea upon our backs to prevent it from swamping +the boat; that one party was always kept baling, and that every hat +and cap among us soon got worn out, though patched up fifty times, as +the only vessels we had for that service; that another party lay down +in the bottom of the boat, while a third rowed; and that we were soon +all in boils and blisters and rags.</p> +<p>The other boat was a source of such anxious interest to all of us +that I used to wonder whether, if we were saved, the time could ever +come when the survivors in this boat of ours could be at all indifferent +to the fortunes of the survivors in that. We got out a tow-rope +whenever the weather permitted, but that did not often happen, and how +we two parties kept within the same horizon, as we did, He, who mercifully +permitted it to be so for our consolation, only knows. I never +shall forget the looks with which, when the morning light came, we used +to gaze about us over the stormy waters, for the other boat. We +once parted company for seventy-two hours, and we believed them to have +gone down, as they did us. The joy on both sides when we came +within view of one another again, had something in a manner Divine in +it; each was so forgetful of individual suffering, in tears of delight +and sympathy for the people in the other boat.</p> +<p>I have been wanting to get round to the individual or personal part +of my subject, as I call it, and the foregoing incident puts me in the +right way. The patience and good disposition aboard of us, was +wonderful. I was not surprised by it in the women; for all men +born of women know what great qualities they will show when men will +fail; but, I own I was a little surprised by it in some of the men. +Among one-and-thirty people assembled at the best of times, there will +usually, I should say, be two or three uncertain tempers. I knew +that I had more than one rough temper with me among my own people, for +I had chosen those for the Long-boat that I might have them under my +eye. But, they softened under their misery, and were as considerate +of the ladies, and as compassionate of the child, as the best among +us, or among men—they could not have been more so. I heard +scarcely any complaining. The party lying down would moan a good +deal in their sleep, and I would often notice a man—not always +the same man, it is to be understood, but nearly all of them at one +time or other—sitting moaning at his oar, or in his place, as +he looked mistily over the sea. When it happened to be long before +I could catch his eye, he would go on moaning all the time in the dismallest +manner; but, when our looks met, he would brighten and leave off. +I almost always got the impression that he did not know what sound he +had been making, but that he thought he had been humming a tune.</p> +<p>Our sufferings from cold and wet were far greater than our sufferings +from hunger. We managed to keep the child warm; but, I doubt if +any one else among us ever was warm for five minutes together; and the +shivering, and the chattering of teeth, were sad to hear. The +child cried a little at first for her lost playfellow, the Golden Mary; +but hardly ever whimpered afterwards; and when the state of the weather +made it possible, she used now and then to be held up in the arms of +some of us, to look over the sea for John Steadiman’s boat. +I see the golden hair and the innocent face now, between me and the +driving clouds, like an angel going to fly away.</p> +<p>It had happened on the second day, towards night, that Mrs. Atherfield, +in getting Little Lucy to sleep, sang her a song. She had a soft, +melodious voice, and, when she had finished it, our people up and begged +for another. She sang them another, and after it had fallen dark +ended with the Evening Hymn. From that time, whenever anything +could be heard above the sea and wind, and while she had any voice left, +nothing would serve the people but that she should sing at sunset. +She always did, and always ended with the Evening Hymn. We mostly +took up the last line, and shed tears when it was done, but not miserably. +We had a prayer night and morning, also, when the weather allowed of +it.</p> +<p>Twelve nights and eleven days we had been driving in the boat, when +old Mr. Rarx began to be delirious, and to cry out to me to throw the +gold overboard or it would sink us, and we should all be lost. +For days past the child had been declining, and that was the great cause +of his wildness. He had been over and over again shrieking out +to me to give her all the remaining meat, to give her all the remaining +rum, to save her at any cost, or we should all be ruined. At this +time, she lay in her mother’s arms at my feet. One of her +little hands was almost always creeping about her mother’s neck +or chin. I had watched the wasting of the little hand, and I knew +it was nearly over.</p> +<p>The old man’s cries were so discordant with the mother’s +love and submission, that I called out to him in an angry voice, unless +he held his peace on the instant, I would order him to be knocked on +the head and thrown overboard. He was mute then, until the child +died, very peacefully, an hour afterwards: which was known to all in +the boat by the mother’s breaking out into lamentations for the +first time since the wreck—for, she had great fortitude and constancy, +though she was a little gentle woman. Old Mr. Rarx then became +quite ungovernable, tearing what rags he had on him, raging in imprecations, +and calling to me that if I had thrown the gold overboard (always the +gold with him!) I might have saved the child. “And now,” +says he, in a terrible voice, “we shall founder, and all go to +the Devil, for our sins will sink us, when we have no innocent child +to bear us up!” We so discovered with amazement, that this +old wretch had only cared for the life of the pretty little creature +dear to all of us, because of the influence he superstitiously hoped +she might have in preserving him! Altogether it was too much for +the smith or armourer, who was sitting next the old man, to bear. +He took him by the throat and rolled him under the thwarts, where he +lay still enough for hours afterwards.</p> +<p>All that thirteenth night, Miss Coleshaw, lying across my knees as +I kept the helm, comforted and supported the poor mother. Her +child, covered with a pea-jacket of mine, lay in her lap. It troubled +me all night to think that there was no Prayer-Book among us, and that +I could remember but very few of the exact words of the burial service. +When I stood up at broad day, all knew what was going to be done, and +I noticed that my poor fellows made the motion of uncovering their heads, +though their heads had been stark bare to the sky and sea for many a +weary hour. There was a long heavy swell on, but otherwise it +was a fair morning, and there were broad fields of sunlight on the waves +in the east. I said no more than this: “I am the Resurrection +and the Life, saith the Lord. He raised the daughter of Jairus +the ruler, and said she was not dead but slept. He raised the +widow’s son. He arose Himself, and was seen of many. +He loved little children, saying, Suffer them to come unto Me and rebuke +them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven. In His name, my +friends, and committed to His merciful goodness!” With those +words I laid my rough face softly on the placid little forehead, and +buried the Golden Lucy in the grave of the Golden Mary.</p> +<p>Having had it on my mind to relate the end of this dear little child, +I have omitted something from its exact place, which I will supply here. +It will come quite as well here as anywhere else.</p> +<p>Foreseeing that if the boat lived through the stormy weather, the +time must come, and soon come, when we should have absolutely no morsel +to eat, I had one momentous point often in my thoughts. Although +I had, years before that, fully satisfied myself that the instances +in which human beings in the last distress have fed upon each other, +are exceedingly few, and have very seldom indeed (if ever) occurred +when the people in distress, however dreadful their extremity, have +been accustomed to moderate forbearance and restraint; I say, though +I had long before quite satisfied my mind on this topic, I felt doubtful +whether there might not have been in former cases some harm and danger +from keeping it out of sight and pretending not to think of it. +I felt doubtful whether some minds, growing weak with fasting and exposure +and having such a terrific idea to dwell upon in secret, might not magnify +it until it got to have an awful attraction about it. This was +not a new thought of mine, for it had grown out of my reading. +However, it came over me stronger than it had ever done before—as +it had reason for doing—in the boat, and on the fourth day I decided +that I would bring out into the light that unformed fear which must +have been more or less darkly in every brain among us. Therefore, +as a means of beguiling the time and inspiring hope, I gave them the +best summary in my power of Bligh’s voyage of more than three +thousand miles, in an open boat, after the Mutiny of the Bounty, and +of the wonderful preservation of that boat’s crew. They +listened throughout with great interest, and I concluded by telling +them, that, in my opinion, the happiest circumstance in the whole narrative +was, that Bligh, who was no delicate man either, had solemnly placed +it on record therein that he was sure and certain that under no conceivable +circumstances whatever would that emaciated party, who had gone through +all the pains of famine, have preyed on one another. I cannot +describe the visible relief which this spread through the boat, and +how the tears stood in every eye. From that time I was as well +convinced as Bligh himself that there was no danger, and that this phantom, +at any rate, did not haunt us.</p> +<p>Now, it was a part of Bligh’s experience that when the people +in his boat were most cast down, nothing did them so much good as hearing +a story told by one of their number. When I mentioned that, I +saw that it struck the general attention as much as it did my own, for +I had not thought of it until I came to it in my summary. This +was on the day after Mrs. Atherfield first sang to us. I proposed +that, whenever the weather would permit, we should have a story two +hours after dinner (I always issued the allowance I have mentioned at +one o’clock, and called it by that name), as well as our song +at sunset. The proposal was received with a cheerful satisfaction +that warmed my heart within me; and I do not say too much when I say +that those two periods in the four-and-twenty hours were expected with +positive pleasure, and were really enjoyed by all hands. Spectres +as we soon were in our bodily wasting, our imaginations did not perish +like the gross flesh upon our bones. Music and Adventure, two +of the great gifts of Providence to mankind, could charm us long after +that was lost.</p> +<p>The wind was almost always against us after the second day; and for +many days together we could not nearly hold our own. We had all +varieties of bad weather. We had rain, hail, snow, wind, mist, +thunder and lightning. Still the boats lived through the heavy +seas, and still we perishing people rose and fell with the great waves.</p> +<p>Sixteen nights and fifteen days, twenty nights and nineteen days, +twenty-four nights and twenty-three days. So the time went on. +Disheartening as I knew that our progress, or want of progress, must +be, I never deceived them as to my calculations of it. In the +first place, I felt that we were all too near eternity for deceit; in +the second place, I knew that if I failed, or died, the man who followed +me must have a knowledge of the true state of things to begin upon. +When I told them at noon, what I reckoned we had made or lost, they +generally received what I said in a tranquil and resigned manner, and +always gratefully towards me. It was not unusual at any time of +the day for some one to burst out weeping loudly without any new cause; +and, when the burst was over, to calm down a little better than before. +I had seen exactly the same thing in a house of mourning.</p> +<p>During the whole of this time, old Mr. Rarx had had his fits of calling +out to me to throw the gold (always the gold!) overboard, and of heaping +violent reproaches upon me for not having saved the child; but now, +the food being all gone, and I having nothing left to serve out but +a bit of coffee-berry now and then, he began to be too weak to do this, +and consequently fell silent. Mrs. Atherfield and Miss Coleshaw +generally lay, each with an arm across one of my knees, and her head +upon it. They never complained at all. Up to the time of +her child’s death, Mrs. Atherfield had bound up her own beautiful +hair every day; and I took particular notice that this was always before +she sang her song at night, when everyone looked at her. But she +never did it after the loss of her darling; and it would have been now +all tangled with dirt and wet, but that Miss Coleshaw was careful of +it long after she was herself, and would sometimes smooth it down with +her weak thin hands.</p> +<p>We were past mustering a story now; but one day, at about this period, +I reverted to the superstition of old Mr. Rarx, concerning the Golden +Lucy, and told them that nothing vanished from the eye of God, though +much might pass away from the eyes of men. “We were all +of us,” says I, “children once; and our baby feet have strolled +in green woods ashore; and our baby hands have gathered flowers in gardens, +where the birds were singing. The children that we were, are not +lost to the great knowledge of our Creator. Those innocent creatures +will appear with us before Him, and plead for us. What we were +in the best time of our generous youth will arise and go with us too. +The purest part of our lives will not desert us at the pass to which +all of us here present are gliding. What we were then, will be +as much in existence before Him, as what we are now.” They +were no less comforted by this consideration, than I was myself; and +Miss Coleshaw, drawing my ear nearer to her lips, said, “Captain +Ravender, I was on my way to marry a disgraced and broken man, whom +I dearly loved when he was honourable and good. Your words seem +to have come out of my own poor heart.” She pressed my hand +upon it, smiling.</p> +<p>Twenty-seven nights and twenty-six days. We were in no want +of rain-water, but we had nothing else. And yet, even now, I never +turned my eyes upon a waking face but it tried to brighten before mine. +O, what a thing it is, in a time of danger and in the presence of death, +the shining of a face upon a face! I have heard it broached that +orders should be given in great new ships by electric telegraph. +I admire machinery as much is any man, and am as thankful to it as any +man can be for what it does for us. But it will never be a substitute +for the face of a man, with his soul in it, encouraging another man +to be brave and true. Never try it for that. It will break +down like a straw.</p> +<p>I now began to remark certain changes in myself which I did not like. +They caused me much disquiet. I often saw the Golden Lucy in the +air above the boat. I often saw her I have spoken of before, sitting +beside me. I saw the Golden Mary go down, as she really had gone +down, twenty times in a day. And yet the sea was mostly, to my +thinking, not sea neither, but moving country and extraordinary mountainous +regions, the like of which have never been beheld. I felt it time +to leave my last words regarding John Steadiman, in case any lips should +last out to repeat them to any living ears. I said that John had +told me (as he had on deck) that he had sung out “Breakers ahead!” +the instant they were audible, and had tried to wear ship, but she struck +before it could be done. (His cry, I dare say, had made my dream.) +I said that the circumstances were altogether without warning, and out +of any course that could have been guarded against; that the same loss +would have happened if I had been in charge; and that John was not to +blame, but from first to last had done his duty nobly, like the man +he was. I tried to write it down in my pocket-book, but could +make no words, though I knew what the words were that I wanted to make. +When it had come to that, her hands—though she was dead so long—laid +me down gently in the bottom of the boat, and she and the Golden Lucy +swung me to sleep.</p> +<p>* * * * *</p> +<p><i>All that follows, was written by John Steadiman, Chief Mate</i>:</p> +<p>On the twenty-sixth day after the foundering of the Golden Mary at +sea, I, John Steadiman, was sitting in my place in the stern-sheets +of the Surf-boat, with just sense enough left in me to steer—that +is to say, with my eyes strained, wide-awake, over the bows of the boat, +and my brains fast asleep and dreaming—when I was roused upon +a sudden by our second mate, Mr. William Rames.</p> +<p>“Let me take a spell in your place,” says he. “And +look you out for the Long-boat astern. The last time she rose +on the crest of a wave, I thought I made out a signal flying aboard +her.”</p> +<p>We shifted our places, clumsily and slowly enough, for we were both +of us weak and dazed with wet, cold, and hunger. I waited some +time, watching the heavy rollers astern, before the Long-boat rose a-top +of one of them at the same time with us. At last, she was heaved +up for a moment well in view, and there, sure enough, was the signal +flying aboard of her—a strip of rag of some sort, rigged to an +oar, and hoisted in her bows.</p> +<p>“What does it mean?” says Rames to me in a quavering, +trembling sort of voice. “Do they signal a sail in sight?”</p> +<p>“Hush, for God’s sake!” says I, clapping my hand +over his mouth. “Don’t let the people hear you. +They’ll all go mad together if we mislead them about that signal. +Wait a bit, till I have another look at it.”</p> +<p>I held on by him, for he had set me all of a tremble with his notion +of a sail in sight, and watched for the Long-boat again. Up she +rose on the top of another roller. I made out the signal clearly, +that second time, and saw that it was rigged half-mast high.</p> +<p>“Rames,” says I, “it’s a signal of distress. +Pass the word forward to keep her before the sea, and no more. +We must get the Long-boat within hailing distance of us, as soon as +possible.”</p> +<p>I dropped down into my old place at the tiller without another word—for +the thought went through me like a knife that something had happened +to Captain Ravender. I should consider myself unworthy to write +another line of this statement, if I had not made up my mind to speak +the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth—and I must, +therefore, confess plainly that now, for the first time, my heart sank +within me. This weakness on my part was produced in some degree, +as I take it, by the exhausting effects of previous anxiety and grief.</p> +<p>Our provisions—if I may give that name to what we had left—were +reduced to the rind of one lemon and about a couple of handsfull of +coffee-berries. Besides these great distresses, caused by the +death, the danger, and the suffering among my crew and passengers, I +had had a little distress of my own to shake me still more, in the death +of the child whom I had got to be very fond of on the voyage out—so +fond that I was secretly a little jealous of her being taken in the +Long-boat instead of mine when the ship foundered. It used to +be a great comfort to me, and I think to those with me also, after we +had seen the last of the Golden Mary, to see the Golden Lucy, held up +by the men in the Long-boat, when the weather allowed it, as the best +and brightest sight they had to show. She looked, at the distance +we saw her from, almost like a little white bird in the air. To +miss her for the first time, when the weather lulled a little again, +and we all looked out for our white bird and looked in vain, was a sore +disappointment. To see the men’s heads bowed down and the +captain’s hand pointing into the sea when we hailed the Long-boat, +a few days after, gave me as heavy a shock and as sharp a pang of heartache +to bear as ever I remember suffering in all my life. I only mention +these things to show that if I did give way a little at first, under +the dread that our captain was lost to us, it was not without having +been a good deal shaken beforehand by more trials of one sort or another +than often fall to one man’s share.</p> +<p>I had got over the choking in my throat with the help of a drop of +water, and had steadied my mind again so as to be prepared against the +worst, when I heard the hail (Lord help the poor fellows, how weak it +sounded!)—</p> +<p>“Surf-boat, ahoy!”</p> +<p>I looked up, and there were our companions in misfortune tossing +abreast of us; not so near that we could make out the features of any +of them, but near enough, with some exertion for people in our condition, +to make their voices heard in the intervals when the wind was weakest.</p> +<p>I answered the hail, and waited a bit, and heard nothing, and then +sung out the captain’s name. The voice that replied did +not sound like his; the words that reached us were:</p> +<p>“Chief-mate wanted on board!”</p> +<p>Every man of my crew knew what that meant as well as I did. +As second officer in command, there could be but one reason for wanting +me on board the Long-boat. A groan went all round us, and my men +looked darkly in each other’s faces, and whispered under their +breaths:</p> +<p>“The captain is dead!”</p> +<p>I commanded them to be silent, and not to make too sure of bad news, +at such a pass as things had now come to with us. Then, hailing +the Long-boat, I signified that I was ready to go on board when the +weather would let me—stopped a bit to draw a good long breath—and +then called out as loud as I could the dreadful question:</p> +<p>“Is the captain dead?”</p> +<p>The black figures of three or four men in the after-part of the Long-boat +all stooped down together as my voice reached them. They were +lost to view for about a minute; then appeared again—one man among +them was held up on his feet by the rest, and he hailed back the blessed +words (a very faint hope went a very long way with people in our desperate +situation): “Not yet!”</p> +<p>The relief felt by me, and by all with me, when we knew that our +captain, though unfitted for duty, was not lost to us, it is not in +words—at least, not in such words as a man like me can command—to +express. I did my best to cheer the men by telling them what a +good sign it was that we were not as badly off yet as we had feared; +and then communicated what instructions I had to give, to William Rames, +who was to be left in command in my place when I took charge of the +Long-boat. After that, there was nothing to be done, but to wait +for the chance of the wind dropping at sunset, and the sea going down +afterwards, so as to enable our weak crews to lay the two boats alongside +of each other, without undue risk—or, to put it plainer, without +saddling ourselves with the necessity for any extraordinary exertion +of strength or skill. Both the one and the other had now been +starved out of us for days and days together.</p> +<p>At sunset the wind suddenly dropped, but the sea, which had been +running high for so long a time past, took hours after that before it +showed any signs of getting to rest. The moon was shining, the +sky was wonderfully clear, and it could not have been, according to +my calculations, far off midnight, when the long, slow, regular swell +of the calming ocean fairly set in, and I took the responsibility of +lessening the distance between the Long-boat and ourselves.</p> +<p>It was, I dare say, a delusion of mine; but I thought I had never +seen the moon shine so white and ghastly anywhere, either on sea or +on land, as she shone that night while we were approaching our companions +in misery. When there was not much more than a boat’s length +between us, and the white light streamed cold and clear over all our +faces, both crews rested on their oars with one great shudder, and stared +over the gunwale of either boat, panic-stricken at the first sight of +each other.</p> +<p>“Any lives lost among you?” I asked, in the midst of +that frightful silence.</p> +<p>The men in the Long-bout huddled together like sheep at the sound +of my voice.</p> +<p>“None yet, but the child, thanks be to God!” answered +one among them.</p> +<p>And at the sound of his voice, all my men shrank together like the +men in the Long-boat. I was afraid to let the horror produced +by our first meeting at close quarters after the dreadful changes that +wet, cold, and famine had produced, last one moment longer than could +be helped; so, without giving time for any more questions and answers, +I commanded the men to lay the two boats close alongside of each other. +When I rose up and committed the tiller to the hands of Rames, all my +poor follows raised their white faces imploringly to mine. “Don’t +leave us, sir,” they said, “don’t leave us.” +“I leave you,” says I, “under the command and the +guidance of Mr. William Rames, as good a sailor as I am, and as trusty +and kind a man as ever stepped. Do your duty by him, as you have +done it by me; and remember to the last, that while there is life there +is hope. God bless and help you all!” With those words +I collected what strength I had left, and caught at two arms that were +held out to me, and so got from the stern-sheets of one boat into the +stern-sheets of the other.</p> +<p>“Mind where you step, sir,” whispered one of the men +who had helped me into the Long-boat. I looked down as he spoke. +Three figures were huddled up below me, with the moonshine falling on +them in ragged streaks through the gaps between the men standing or +sitting above them. The first face I made out was the face of +Miss Coleshaw, her eyes were wide open and fixed on me. She seemed +still to keep her senses, and, by the alternate parting and closing +of her lips, to be trying to speak, but I could not hear that she uttered +a single word. On her shoulder rested the head of Mrs. Atherfield. +The mother of our poor little Golden Lucy must, I think, have been dreaming +of the child she had lost; for there was a faint smile just ruffling +the white stillness of her face, when I first saw it turned upward, +with peaceful closed eyes towards the heavens. From her, I looked +down a little, and there, with his head on her lap, and with one of +her hands resting tenderly on his cheek—there lay the Captain, +to whose help and guidance, up to this miserable time, we had never +looked in vain,—there, worn out at last in our service, and for +our sakes, lay the best and bravest man of all our company. I +stole my hand in gently through his clothes and laid it on his heart, +and felt a little feeble warmth over it, though my cold dulled touch +could not detect even the faintest beating. The two men in the +stern-sheets with me, noticing what I was doing—knowing I loved +him like a brother—and seeing, I suppose, more distress in my +face than I myself was conscious of its showing, lost command over themselves +altogether, and burst into a piteous moaning, sobbing lamentation over +him. One of the two drew aside a jacket from his feet, and showed +me that they were bare, except where a wet, ragged strip of stocking +still clung to one of them. When the ship struck the Iceberg, +he had run on deck leaving his shoes in his cabin. All through +the voyage in the boat his feet had been unprotected; and not a soul +had discovered it until he dropped! As long as he could keep his +eyes open, the very look of them had cheered the men, and comforted +and upheld the women. Not one living creature in the boat, with +any sense about him, but had felt the good influence of that brave man +in one way or another. Not one but had heard him, over and over +again, give the credit to others which was due only to himself; praising +this man for patience, and thanking that man for help, when the patience +and the help had really and truly, as to the best part of both, come +only from him. All this, and much more, I heard pouring confusedly +from the men’s lips while they crouched down, sobbing and crying +over their commander, and wrapping the jacket as warmly and tenderly +as they could over his cold feet. It went to my heart to check +them; but I knew that if this lamenting spirit spread any further, all +chance of keeping alight any last sparks of hope and resolution among +the boat’s company would be lost for ever. Accordingly I +sent them to their places, spoke a few encouraging words to the men +forward, promising to serve out, when the morning came, as much as I +dared, of any eatable thing left in the lockers; called to Rames, in +my old boat, to keep as near us as he safely could; drew the garments +and coverings of the two poor suffering women more closely about them; +and, with a secret prayer to be directed for the best in bearing the +awful responsibility now laid on my shoulders, took my Captain’s +vacant place at the helm of the Long-boat.</p> +<p>This, as well as I can tell it, is the full and true account of how +I came to be placed in charge of the lost passengers and crew of the +Golden Mary, on the morning of the twenty-seventh day after the ship +struck the Iceberg, and foundered at sea.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WRECK OF THE GOLDEN MARY***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 1465-h.htm or 1465-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/4/6/1465 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Wreck of the Golden Mary + + +Author: Charles Dickens + +Release Date: April 4, 2005 [eBook #1465] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WRECK OF THE GOLDEN MARY*** + + + + + +Transcribed from the 1894 Chapman and Hall edition of "Christmas Stories" +by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +THE WRECK OF THE GOLDEN MARY + + +THE WRECK + + +I was apprenticed to the Sea when I was twelve years old, and I have +encountered a great deal of rough weather, both literal and metaphorical. +It has always been my opinion since I first possessed such a thing as an +opinion, that the man who knows only one subject is next tiresome to the +man who knows no subject. Therefore, in the course of my life I have +taught myself whatever I could, and although I am not an educated man, I +am able, I am thankful to say, to have an intelligent interest in most +things. + +A person might suppose, from reading the above, that I am in the habit of +holding forth about number one. That is not the case. Just as if I was +to come into a room among strangers, and must either be introduced or +introduce myself, so I have taken the liberty of passing these few +remarks, simply and plainly that it may be known who and what I am. I +will add no more of the sort than that my name is William George +Ravender, that I was born at Penrith half a year after my own father was +drowned, and that I am on the second day of this present blessed +Christmas week of one thousand eight hundred and fifty-six, fifty-six +years of age. + +When the rumour first went flying up and down that there was gold in +California--which, as most people know, was before it was discovered in +the British colony of Australia--I was in the West Indies, trading among +the Islands. Being in command and likewise part-owner of a smart +schooner, I had my work cut out for me, and I was doing it. Consequently, +gold in California was no business of mine. + +But, by the time when I came home to England again, the thing was as +clear as your hand held up before you at noon-day. There was Californian +gold in the museums and in the goldsmiths' shops, and the very first time +I went upon 'Change, I met a friend of mine (a seafaring man like +myself), with a Californian nugget hanging to his watch-chain. I handled +it. It was as like a peeled walnut with bits unevenly broken off here +and there, and then electrotyped all over, as ever I saw anything in my +life. + +I am a single man (she was too good for this world and for me, and she +died six weeks before our marriage-day), so when I am ashore, I live in +my house at Poplar. My house at Poplar is taken care of and kept ship- +shape by an old lady who was my mother's maid before I was born. She is +as handsome and as upright as any old lady in the world. She is as fond +of me as if she had ever had an only son, and I was he. Well do I know +wherever I sail that she never lays down her head at night without having +said, "Merciful Lord! bless and preserve William George Ravender, and +send him safe home, through Christ our Saviour!" I have thought of it in +many a dangerous moment, when it has done me no harm, I am sure. + +In my house at Poplar, along with this old lady, I lived quiet for best +part of a year: having had a long spell of it among the Islands, and +having (which was very uncommon in me) taken the fever rather badly. At +last, being strong and hearty, and having read every book I could lay +hold of, right out, I was walking down Leadenhall Street in the City of +London, thinking of turning-to again, when I met what I call Smithick and +Watersby of Liverpool. I chanced to lift up my eyes from looking in at a +ship's chronometer in a window, and I saw him bearing down upon me, head +on. + +It is, personally, neither Smithick, nor Watersby, that I here mention, +nor was I ever acquainted with any man of either of those names, nor do I +think that there has been any one of either of those names in that +Liverpool House for years back. But, it is in reality the House itself +that I refer to; and a wiser merchant or a truer gentleman never stepped. + +"My dear Captain Ravender," says he. "Of all the men on earth, I wanted +to see you most. I was on my way to you." + +"Well!" says I. "That looks as if you _were_ to see me, don't it?" With +that I put my arm in his, and we walked on towards the Royal Exchange, +and when we got there, walked up and down at the back of it where the +Clock-Tower is. We walked an hour and more, for he had much to say to +me. He had a scheme for chartering a new ship of their own to take out +cargo to the diggers and emigrants in California, and to buy and bring +back gold. Into the particulars of that scheme I will not enter, and I +have no right to enter. All I say of it is, that it was a very original +one, a very fine one, a very sound one, and a very lucrative one beyond +doubt. + +He imparted it to me as freely as if I had been a part of himself. After +doing so, he made me the handsomest sharing offer that ever was made to +me, boy or man--or I believe to any other captain in the Merchant +Navy--and he took this round turn to finish with: + +"Ravender, you are well aware that the lawlessness of that coast and +country at present, is as special as the circumstances in which it is +placed. Crews of vessels outward-bound, desert as soon as they make the +land; crews of vessels homeward-bound, ship at enormous wages, with the +express intention of murdering the captain and seizing the gold freight; +no man can trust another, and the devil seems let loose. Now," says he, +"you know my opinion of you, and you know I am only expressing it, and +with no singularity, when I tell you that you are almost the only man on +whose integrity, discretion, and energy--" &c., &c. For, I don't want to +repeat what he said, though I was and am sensible of it. + +Notwithstanding my being, as I have mentioned, quite ready for a voyage, +still I had some doubts of this voyage. Of course I knew, without being +told, that there were peculiar difficulties and dangers in it, a long way +over and above those which attend all voyages. It must not be supposed +that I was afraid to face them; but, in my opinion a man has no manly +motive or sustainment in his own breast for facing dangers, unless he has +well considered what they are, and is able quietly to say to himself, +"None of these perils can now take me by surprise; I shall know what to +do for the best in any of them; all the rest lies in the higher and +greater hands to which I humbly commit myself." On this principle I have +so attentively considered (regarding it as my duty) all the hazards I +have ever been able to think of, in the ordinary way of storm, shipwreck, +and fire at sea, that I hope I should be prepared to do, in any of those +cases, whatever could be done, to save the lives intrusted to my charge. + +As I was thoughtful, my good friend proposed that he should leave me to +walk there as long as I liked, and that I should dine with him by-and-by +at his club in Pall Mall. I accepted the invitation and I walked up and +down there, quarter-deck fashion, a matter of a couple of hours; now and +then looking up at the weathercock as I might have looked up aloft; and +now and then taking a look into Cornhill, as I might have taken a look +over the side. + +All dinner-time, and all after dinner-time, we talked it over again. I +gave him my views of his plan, and he very much approved of the same. I +told him I had nearly decided, but not quite. "Well, well," says he, +"come down to Liverpool to-morrow with me, and see the Golden Mary." I +liked the name (her name was Mary, and she was golden, if golden stands +for good), so I began to feel that it was almost done when I said I would +go to Liverpool. On the next morning but one we were on board the Golden +Mary. I might have known, from his asking me to come down and see her, +what she was. I declare her to have been the completest and most +exquisite Beauty that ever I set my eyes upon. + +We had inspected every timber in her, and had come back to the gangway to +go ashore from the dock-basin, when I put out my hand to my friend. +"Touch upon it," says I, "and touch heartily. I take command of this +ship, and I am hers and yours, if I can get John Steadiman for my chief +mate." + +John Steadiman had sailed with me four voyages. The first voyage John +was third mate out to China, and came home second. The other three +voyages he was my first officer. At this time of chartering the Golden +Mary, he was aged thirty-two. A brisk, bright, blue-eyed fellow, a very +neat figure and rather under the middle size, never out of the way and +never in it, a face that pleased everybody and that all children took to, +a habit of going about singing as cheerily as a blackbird, and a perfect +sailor. + +We were in one of those Liverpool hackney-coaches in less than a minute, +and we cruised about in her upwards of three hours, looking for John. +John had come home from Van Diemen's Land barely a month before, and I +had heard of him as taking a frisk in Liverpool. We asked after him, +among many other places, at the two boarding-houses he was fondest of, +and we found he had had a week's spell at each of them; but, he had gone +here and gone there, and had set off "to lay out on the main-to'-gallant- +yard of the highest Welsh mountain" (so he had told the people of the +house), and where he might be then, or when he might come back, nobody +could tell us. But it was surprising, to be sure, to see how every face +brightened the moment there was mention made of the name of Mr. +Steadiman. + +We were taken aback at meeting with no better luck, and we had wore ship +and put her head for my friends, when as we were jogging through the +streets, I clap my eyes on John himself coming out of a toyshop! He was +carrying a little boy, and conducting two uncommon pretty women to their +coach, and he told me afterwards that he had never in his life seen one +of the three before, but that he was so taken with them on looking in at +the toyshop while they were buying the child a cranky Noah's Ark, very +much down by the head, that he had gone in and asked the ladies' +permission to treat him to a tolerably correct Cutter there was in the +window, in order that such a handsome boy might not grow up with a +lubberly idea of naval architecture. + +We stood off and on until the ladies' coachman began to give way, and +then we hailed John. On his coming aboard of us, I told him, very +gravely, what I had said to my friend. It struck him, as he said +himself, amidships. He was quite shaken by it. "Captain Ravender," were +John Steadiman's words, "such an opinion from you is true commendation, +and I'll sail round the world with you for twenty years if you hoist the +signal, and stand by you for ever!" And now indeed I felt that it was +done, and that the Golden Mary was afloat. + +Grass never grew yet under the feet of Smithick and Watersby. The +riggers were out of that ship in a fortnight's time, and we had begun +taking in cargo. John was always aboard, seeing everything stowed with +his own eyes; and whenever I went aboard myself early or late, whether he +was below in the hold, or on deck at the hatchway, or overhauling his +cabin, nailing up pictures in it of the Blush Roses of England, the Blue +Belles of Scotland, and the female Shamrock of Ireland: of a certainty I +heard John singing like a blackbird. + +We had room for twenty passengers. Our sailing advertisement was no +sooner out, than we might have taken these twenty times over. In +entering our men, I and John (both together) picked them, and we entered +none but good hands--as good as were to be found in that port. And so, +in a good ship of the best build, well owned, well arranged, well +officered, well manned, well found in all respects, we parted with our +pilot at a quarter past four o'clock in the afternoon of the seventh of +March, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-one, and stood with a fair +wind out to sea. + +It may be easily believed that up to that time I had had no leisure to be +intimate with my passengers. The most of them were then in their berths +sea-sick; however, in going among them, telling them what was good for +them, persuading them not to be there, but to come up on deck and feel +the breeze, and in rousing them with a joke, or a comfortable word, I +made acquaintance with them, perhaps, in a more friendly and confidential +way from the first, than I might have done at the cabin table. + +Of my passengers, I need only particularise, just at present, a bright- +eyed blooming young wife who was going out to join her husband in +California, taking with her their only child, a little girl of three +years old, whom he had never seen; a sedate young woman in black, some +five years older (about thirty as I should say), who was going out to +join a brother; and an old gentleman, a good deal like a hawk if his eyes +had been better and not so red, who was always talking, morning, noon, +and night, about the gold discovery. But, whether he was making the +voyage, thinking his old arms could dig for gold, or whether his +speculation was to buy it, or to barter for it, or to cheat for it, or to +snatch it anyhow from other people, was his secret. He kept his secret. + +These three and the child were the soonest well. The child was a most +engaging child, to be sure, and very fond of me: though I am bound to +admit that John Steadiman and I were borne on her pretty little books in +reverse order, and that he was captain there, and I was mate. It was +beautiful to watch her with John, and it was beautiful to watch John with +her. Few would have thought it possible, to see John playing at bo-peep +round the mast, that he was the man who had caught up an iron bar and +struck a Malay and a Maltese dead, as they were gliding with their knives +down the cabin stair aboard the barque Old England, when the captain lay +ill in his cot, off Saugar Point. But he was; and give him his back +against a bulwark, he would have done the same by half a dozen of them. +The name of the young mother was Mrs. Atherfield, the name of the young +lady in black was Miss Coleshaw, and the name of the old gentleman was +Mr. Rarx. + +As the child had a quantity of shining fair hair, clustering in curls all +about her face, and as her name was Lucy, Steadiman gave her the name of +the Golden Lucy. So, we had the Golden Lucy and the Golden Mary; and +John kept up the idea to that extent as he and the child went playing +about the decks, that I believe she used to think the ship was alive +somehow--a sister or companion, going to the same place as herself. She +liked to be by the wheel, and in fine weather, I have often stood by the +man whose trick it was at the wheel, only to hear her, sitting near my +feet, talking to the ship. Never had a child such a doll before, I +suppose; but she made a doll of the Golden Mary, and used to dress her up +by tying ribbons and little bits of finery to the belaying-pins; and +nobody ever moved them, unless it was to save them from being blown away. + +Of course I took charge of the two young women, and I called them "my +dear," and they never minded, knowing that whatever I said was said in a +fatherly and protecting spirit. I gave them their places on each side of +me at dinner, Mrs. Atherfield on my right and Miss Coleshaw on my left; +and I directed the unmarried lady to serve out the breakfast, and the +married lady to serve out the tea. Likewise I said to my black steward +in their presence, "Tom Snow, these two ladies are equally the mistresses +of this house, and do you obey their orders equally;" at which Tom +laughed, and they all laughed. + +Old Mr. Rarx was not a pleasant man to look at, nor yet to talk to, or to +be with, for no one could help seeing that he was a sordid and selfish +character, and that he had warped further and further out of the straight +with time. Not but what he was on his best behaviour with us, as +everybody was; for we had no bickering among us, for'ard or aft. I only +mean to say, he was not the man one would have chosen for a messmate. If +choice there had been, one might even have gone a few points out of one's +course, to say, "No! Not him!" But, there was one curious inconsistency +in Mr. Rarx. That was, that he took an astonishing interest in the +child. He looked, and I may add, he was, one of the last of men to care +at all for a child, or to care much for any human creature. Still, he +went so far as to be habitually uneasy, if the child was long on deck, +out of his sight. He was always afraid of her falling overboard, or +falling down a hatchway, or of a block or what not coming down upon her +from the rigging in the working of the ship, or of her getting some hurt +or other. He used to look at her and touch her, as if she was something +precious to him. He was always solicitous about her not injuring her +health, and constantly entreated her mother to be careful of it. This +was so much the more curious, because the child did not like him, but +used to shrink away from him, and would not even put out her hand to him +without coaxing from others. I believe that every soul on board +frequently noticed this, and not one of us understood it. However, it +was such a plain fact, that John Steadiman said more than once when old +Mr. Rarx was not within earshot, that if the Golden Mary felt a +tenderness for the dear old gentleman she carried in her lap, she must be +bitterly jealous of the Golden Lucy. + +Before I go any further with this narrative, I will state that our ship +was a barque of three hundred tons, carrying a crew of eighteen men, a +second mate in addition to John, a carpenter, an armourer or smith, and +two apprentices (one a Scotch boy, poor little fellow). We had three +boats; the Long-boat, capable of carrying twenty-five men; the Cutter, +capable of carrying fifteen; and the Surf-boat, capable of carrying ten. +I put down the capacity of these boats according to the numbers they were +really meant to hold. + +We had tastes of bad weather and head-winds, of course; but, on the whole +we had as fine a run as any reasonable man could expect, for sixty days. +I then began to enter two remarks in the ship's Log and in my Journal; +first, that there was an unusual and amazing quantity of ice; second, +that the nights were most wonderfully dark, in spite of the ice. + +For five days and a half, it seemed quite useless and hopeless to alter +the ship's course so as to stand out of the way of this ice. I made what +southing I could; but, all that time, we were beset by it. Mrs. +Atherfield after standing by me on deck once, looking for some time in an +awed manner at the great bergs that surrounded us, said in a whisper, "O! +Captain Ravender, it looks as if the whole solid earth had changed into +ice, and broken up!" I said to her, laughing, "I don't wonder that it +does, to your inexperienced eyes, my dear." But I had never seen a +twentieth part of the quantity, and, in reality, I was pretty much of her +opinion. + +However, at two p.m. on the afternoon of the sixth day, that is to say, +when we were sixty-six days out, John Steadiman who had gone aloft, sang +out from the top, that the sea was clear ahead. Before four p.m. a +strong breeze springing up right astern, we were in open water at sunset. +The breeze then freshening into half a gale of wind, and the Golden Mary +being a very fast sailer, we went before the wind merrily, all night. + +I had thought it impossible that it could be darker than it had been, +until the sun, moon, and stars should fall out of the Heavens, and Time +should be destroyed; but, it had been next to light, in comparison with +what it was now. The darkness was so profound, that looking into it was +painful and oppressive--like looking, without a ray of light, into a +dense black bandage put as close before the eyes as it could be, without +touching them. I doubled the look-out, and John and I stood in the bow +side-by-side, never leaving it all night. Yet I should no more have +known that he was near me when he was silent, without putting out my arm +and touching him, than I should if he had turned in and been fast asleep +below. We were not so much looking out, all of us, as listening to the +utmost, both with our eyes and ears. + +Next day, I found that the mercury in the barometer, which had risen +steadily since we cleared the ice, remained steady. I had had very good +observations, with now and then the interruption of a day or so, since +our departure. I got the sun at noon, and found that we were in Lat. 58 +degrees S., Long. 60 degrees W., off New South Shetland; in the +neighbourhood of Cape Horn. We were sixty-seven days out, that day. The +ship's reckoning was accurately worked and made up. The ship did her +duty admirably, all on board were well, and all hands were as smart, +efficient, and contented, as it was possible to be. + +When the night came on again as dark as before, it was the eighth night I +had been on deck. Nor had I taken more than a very little sleep in the +day-time, my station being always near the helm, and often at it, while +we were among the ice. Few but those who have tried it can imagine the +difficulty and pain of only keeping the eyes open--physically open--under +such circumstances, in such darkness. They get struck by the darkness, +and blinded by the darkness. They make patterns in it, and they flash in +it, as if they had gone out of your head to look at you. On the turn of +midnight, John Steadiman, who was alert and fresh (for I had always made +him turn in by day), said to me, "Captain Ravender, I entreat of you to +go below. I am sure you can hardly stand, and your voice is getting +weak, sir. Go below, and take a little rest. I'll call you if a block +chafes." I said to John in answer, "Well, well, John! Let us wait till +the turn of one o'clock, before we talk about that." I had just had one +of the ship's lanterns held up, that I might see how the night went by my +watch, and it was then twenty minutes after twelve. + +At five minutes before one, John sang out to the boy to bring the lantern +again, and when I told him once more what the time was, entreated and +prayed of me to go below. "Captain Ravender," says he, "all's well; we +can't afford to have you laid up for a single hour; and I respectfully +and earnestly beg of you to go below." The end of it was, that I agreed +to do so, on the understanding that if I failed to come up of my own +accord within three hours, I was to be punctually called. Having settled +that, I left John in charge. But I called him to me once afterwards, to +ask him a question. I had been to look at the barometer, and had seen +the mercury still perfectly steady, and had come up the companion again +to take a last look about me--if I can use such a word in reference to +such darkness--when I thought that the waves, as the Golden Mary parted +them and shook them off, had a hollow sound in them; something that I +fancied was a rather unusual reverberation. I was standing by the +quarter-deck rail on the starboard side, when I called John aft to me, +and bade him listen. He did so with the greatest attention. Turning to +me he then said, "Rely upon it, Captain Ravender, you have been without +rest too long, and the novelty is only in the state of your sense of +hearing." I thought so too by that time, and I think so now, though I +can never know for absolute certain in this world, whether it was or not. + +When I left John Steadiman in charge, the ship was still going at a great +rate through the water. The wind still blew right astern. Though she +was making great way, she was under shortened sail, and had no more than +she could easily carry. All was snug, and nothing complained. There was +a pretty sea running, but not a very high sea neither, nor at all a +confused one. + +I turned in, as we seamen say, all standing. The meaning of that is, I +did not pull my clothes off--no, not even so much as my coat: though I +did my shoes, for my feet were badly swelled with the deck. There was a +little swing-lamp alight in my cabin. I thought, as I looked at it +before shutting my eyes, that I was so tired of darkness, and troubled by +darkness, that I could have gone to sleep best in the midst of a million +of flaming gas-lights. That was the last thought I had before I went +off, except the prevailing thought that I should not be able to get to +sleep at all. + +I dreamed that I was back at Penrith again, and was trying to get round +the church, which had altered its shape very much since I last saw it, +and was cloven all down the middle of the steeple in a most singular +manner. Why I wanted to get round the church I don't know; but I was as +anxious to do it as if my life depended on it. Indeed, I believe it did +in the dream. For all that, I could not get round the church. I was +still trying, when I came against it with a violent shock, and was flung +out of my cot against the ship's side. Shrieks and a terrific outcry +struck me far harder than the bruising timbers, and amidst sounds of +grinding and crashing, and a heavy rushing and breaking of water--sounds +I understood too well--I made my way on deck. It was not an easy thing +to do, for the ship heeled over frightfully, and was beating in a furious +manner. + +I could not see the men as I went forward, but I could hear that they +were hauling in sail, in disorder. I had my trumpet in my hand, and, +after directing and encouraging them in this till it was done, I hailed +first John Steadiman, and then my second mate, Mr. William Rames. Both +answered clearly and steadily. Now, I had practised them and all my +crew, as I have ever made it a custom to practise all who sail with me, +to take certain stations and wait my orders, in case of any unexpected +crisis. When my voice was heard hailing, and their voices were heard +answering, I was aware, through all the noises of the ship and sea, and +all the crying of the passengers below, that there was a pause. "Are you +ready, Rames?"--"Ay, ay, sir!"--"Then light up, for God's sake!" In a +moment he and another were burning blue-lights, and the ship and all on +board seemed to be enclosed in a mist of light, under a great black dome. + +The light shone up so high that I could see the huge Iceberg upon which +we had struck, cloven at the top and down the middle, exactly like +Penrith Church in my dream. At the same moment I could see the watch +last relieved, crowding up and down on deck; I could see Mrs. Atherfield +and Miss Coleshaw thrown about on the top of the companion as they +struggled to bring the child up from below; I could see that the masts +were going with the shock and the beating of the ship; I could see the +frightful breach stove in on the starboard side, half the length of the +vessel, and the sheathing and timbers spirting up; I could see that the +Cutter was disabled, in a wreck of broken fragments; and I could see +every eye turned upon me. It is my belief that if there had been ten +thousand eyes there, I should have seen them all, with their different +looks. And all this in a moment. But you must consider what a moment. + +I saw the men, as they looked at me, fall towards their appointed +stations, like good men and true. If she had not righted, they could +have done very little there or anywhere but die--not that it is little +for a man to die at his post--I mean they could have done nothing to save +the passengers and themselves. Happily, however, the violence of the +shock with which we had so determinedly borne down direct on that fatal +Iceberg, as if it had been our destination instead of our destruction, +had so smashed and pounded the ship that she got off in this same instant +and righted. I did not want the carpenter to tell me she was filling and +going down; I could see and hear that. I gave Rames the word to lower +the Long-boat and the Surf-boat, and I myself told off the men for each +duty. Not one hung back, or came before the other. I now whispered to +John Steadiman, "John, I stand at the gangway here, to see every soul on +board safe over the side. You shall have the next post of honour, and +shall be the last but one to leave the ship. Bring up the passengers, +and range them behind me; and put what provision and water you can got +at, in the boats. Cast your eye for'ard, John, and you'll see you have +not a moment to lose." + +My noble fellows got the boats over the side as orderly as I ever saw +boats lowered with any sea running, and, when they were launched, two or +three of the nearest men in them as they held on, rising and falling with +the swell, called out, looking up at me, "Captain Ravender, if anything +goes wrong with us, and you are saved, remember we stood by you!"--"We'll +all stand by one another ashore, yet, please God, my lads!" says I. "Hold +on bravely, and be tender with the women." + +The women were an example to us. They trembled very much, but they were +quiet and perfectly collected. "Kiss me, Captain Ravender," says Mrs. +Atherfield, "and God in heaven bless you, you good man!" "My dear," says +I, "those words are better for me than a life-boat." I held her child in +my arms till she was in the boat, and then kissed the child and handed +her safe down. I now said to the people in her, "You have got your +freight, my lads, all but me, and I am not coming yet awhile. Pull away +from the ship, and keep off!" + +That was the Long-boat. Old Mr. Rarx was one of her complement, and he +was the only passenger who had greatly misbehaved since the ship struck. +Others had been a little wild, which was not to be wondered at, and not +very blamable; but, he had made a lamentation and uproar which it was +dangerous for the people to hear, as there is always contagion in +weakness and selfishness. His incessant cry had been that he must not be +separated from the child, that he couldn't see the child, and that he and +the child must go together. He had even tried to wrest the child out of +my arms, that he might keep her in his. "Mr. Rarx," said I to him when +it came to that, "I have a loaded pistol in my pocket; and if you don't +stand out of the gangway, and keep perfectly quiet, I shall shoot you +through the heart, if you have got one." Says he, "You won't do murder, +Captain Ravender!" "No, sir," says I, "I won't murder forty-four people +to humour you, but I'll shoot you to save them." After that he was +quiet, and stood shivering a little way off, until I named him to go over +the side. + +The Long-boat being cast off, the Surf-boat was soon filled. There only +remained aboard the Golden Mary, John Mullion the man who had kept on +burning the blue-lights (and who had lighted every new one at every old +one before it went out, as quietly as if he had been at an illumination); +John Steadiman; and myself. I hurried those two into the Surf-boat, +called to them to keep off, and waited with a grateful and relieved heart +for the Long-boat to come and take me in, if she could. I looked at my +watch, and it showed me, by the blue-light, ten minutes past two. They +lost no time. As soon as she was near enough, I swung myself into her, +and called to the men, "With a will, lads! She's reeling!" We were not +an inch too far out of the inner vortex of her going down, when, by the +blue-light which John Mullion still burnt in the bow of the Surf-boat, we +saw her lurch, and plunge to the bottom head-foremost. The child cried, +weeping wildly, "O the dear Golden Mary! O look at her! Save her! Save +the poor Golden Mary!" And then the light burnt out, and the black dome +seemed to come down upon us. + +I suppose if we had all stood a-top of a mountain, and seen the whole +remainder of the world sink away from under us, we could hardly have felt +more shocked and solitary than we did when we knew we were alone on the +wide ocean, and that the beautiful ship in which most of us had been +securely asleep within half an hour was gone for ever. There was an +awful silence in our boat, and such a kind of palsy on the rowers and the +man at the rudder, that I felt they were scarcely keeping her before the +sea. I spoke out then, and said, "Let every one here thank the Lord for +our preservation!" All the voices answered (even the child's), "We thank +the Lord!" I then said the Lord's Prayer, and all hands said it after me +with a solemn murmuring. Then I gave the word "Cheerily, O men, +Cheerily!" and I felt that they were handling the boat again as a boat +ought to be handled. + +The Surf-boat now burnt another blue-light to show us where they were, +and we made for her, and laid ourselves as nearly alongside of her as we +dared. I had always kept my boats with a coil or two of good stout stuff +in each of them, so both boats had a rope at hand. We made a shift, with +much labour and trouble, to get near enough to one another to divide the +blue-lights (they were no use after that night, for the sea-water soon +got at them), and to get a tow-rope out between us. All night long we +kept together, sometimes obliged to cast off the rope, and sometimes +getting it out again, and all of us wearying for the morning--which +appeared so long in coming that old Mr. Rarx screamed out, in spite of +his fears of me, "The world is drawing to an end, and the sun will never +rise any more!" + +When the day broke, I found that we were all huddled together in a +miserable manner. We were deep in the water; being, as I found on +mustering, thirty-one in number, or at least six too many. In the Surf- +boat they were fourteen in number, being at least four too many. The +first thing I did, was to get myself passed to the rudder--which I took +from that time--and to get Mrs. Atherfield, her child, and Miss Coleshaw, +passed on to sit next me. As to old Mr. Rarx, I put him in the bow, as +far from us as I could. And I put some of the best men near us in order +that if I should drop there might be a skilful hand ready to take the +helm. + +The sea moderating as the sun came up, though the sky was cloudy and +wild, we spoke the other boat, to know what stores they had, and to +overhaul what we had. I had a compass in my pocket, a small telescope, a +double-barrelled pistol, a knife, and a fire-box and matches. Most of my +men had knives, and some had a little tobacco: some, a pipe as well. We +had a mug among us, and an iron spoon. As to provisions, there were in +my boat two bags of biscuit, one piece of raw beef, one piece of raw +pork, a bag of coffee, roasted but not ground (thrown in, I imagine, by +mistake, for something else), two small casks of water, and about half-a- +gallon of rum in a keg. The Surf-boat, having rather more rum than we, +and fewer to drink it, gave us, as I estimated, another quart into our +keg. In return, we gave them three double handfuls of coffee, tied up in +a piece of a handkerchief; they reported that they had aboard besides, a +bag of biscuit, a piece of beef, a small cask of water, a small box of +lemons, and a Dutch cheese. It took a long time to make these exchanges, +and they were not made without risk to both parties; the sea running +quite high enough to make our approaching near to one another very +hazardous. In the bundle with the coffee, I conveyed to John Steadiman +(who had a ship's compass with him), a paper written in pencil, and torn +from my pocket-book, containing the course I meant to steer, in the hope +of making land, or being picked up by some vessel--I say in the hope, +though I had little hope of either deliverance. I then sang out to him, +so as all might hear, that if we two boats could live or die together, we +would; but, that if we should be parted by the weather, and join company +no more, they should have our prayers and blessings, and we asked for +theirs. We then gave them three cheers, which they returned, and I saw +the men's heads droop in both boats as they fell to their oars again. + +These arrangements had occupied the general attention advantageously for +all, though (as I expressed in the last sentence) they ended in a +sorrowful feeling. I now said a few words to my fellow-voyagers on the +subject of the small stock of food on which our lives depended if they +were preserved from the great deep, and on the rigid necessity of our +eking it out in the most frugal manner. One and all replied that +whatever allowance I thought best to lay down should be strictly kept to. +We made a pair of scales out of a thin scrap of iron-plating and some +twine, and I got together for weights such of the heaviest buttons among +us as I calculated made up some fraction over two ounces. This was the +allowance of solid food served out once a-day to each, from that time to +the end; with the addition of a coffee-berry, or sometimes half a one, +when the weather was very fair, for breakfast. We had nothing else +whatever, but half a pint of water each per day, and sometimes, when we +were coldest and weakest, a teaspoonful of rum each, served out as a +dram. I know how learnedly it can be shown that rum is poison, but I +also know that in this case, as in all similar cases I have ever read +of--which are numerous--no words can express the comfort and support +derived from it. Nor have I the least doubt that it saved the lives of +far more than half our number. Having mentioned half a pint of water as +our daily allowance, I ought to observe that sometimes we had less, and +sometimes we had more; for much rain fell, and we caught it in a canvas +stretched for the purpose. + +Thus, at that tempestuous time of the year, and in that tempestuous part +of the world, we shipwrecked people rose and fell with the waves. It is +not my intention to relate (if I can avoid it) such circumstances +appertaining to our doleful condition as have been better told in many +other narratives of the kind than I can be expected to tell them. I will +only note, in so many passing words, that day after day and night after +night, we received the sea upon our backs to prevent it from swamping the +boat; that one party was always kept baling, and that every hat and cap +among us soon got worn out, though patched up fifty times, as the only +vessels we had for that service; that another party lay down in the +bottom of the boat, while a third rowed; and that we were soon all in +boils and blisters and rags. + +The other boat was a source of such anxious interest to all of us that I +used to wonder whether, if we were saved, the time could ever come when +the survivors in this boat of ours could be at all indifferent to the +fortunes of the survivors in that. We got out a tow-rope whenever the +weather permitted, but that did not often happen, and how we two parties +kept within the same horizon, as we did, He, who mercifully permitted it +to be so for our consolation, only knows. I never shall forget the looks +with which, when the morning light came, we used to gaze about us over +the stormy waters, for the other boat. We once parted company for +seventy-two hours, and we believed them to have gone down, as they did +us. The joy on both sides when we came within view of one another again, +had something in a manner Divine in it; each was so forgetful of +individual suffering, in tears of delight and sympathy for the people in +the other boat. + +I have been wanting to get round to the individual or personal part of my +subject, as I call it, and the foregoing incident puts me in the right +way. The patience and good disposition aboard of us, was wonderful. I +was not surprised by it in the women; for all men born of women know what +great qualities they will show when men will fail; but, I own I was a +little surprised by it in some of the men. Among one-and-thirty people +assembled at the best of times, there will usually, I should say, be two +or three uncertain tempers. I knew that I had more than one rough temper +with me among my own people, for I had chosen those for the Long-boat +that I might have them under my eye. But, they softened under their +misery, and were as considerate of the ladies, and as compassionate of +the child, as the best among us, or among men--they could not have been +more so. I heard scarcely any complaining. The party lying down would +moan a good deal in their sleep, and I would often notice a man--not +always the same man, it is to be understood, but nearly all of them at +one time or other--sitting moaning at his oar, or in his place, as he +looked mistily over the sea. When it happened to be long before I could +catch his eye, he would go on moaning all the time in the dismallest +manner; but, when our looks met, he would brighten and leave off. I +almost always got the impression that he did not know what sound he had +been making, but that he thought he had been humming a tune. + +Our sufferings from cold and wet were far greater than our sufferings +from hunger. We managed to keep the child warm; but, I doubt if any one +else among us ever was warm for five minutes together; and the shivering, +and the chattering of teeth, were sad to hear. The child cried a little +at first for her lost playfellow, the Golden Mary; but hardly ever +whimpered afterwards; and when the state of the weather made it possible, +she used now and then to be held up in the arms of some of us, to look +over the sea for John Steadiman's boat. I see the golden hair and the +innocent face now, between me and the driving clouds, like an angel going +to fly away. + +It had happened on the second day, towards night, that Mrs. Atherfield, +in getting Little Lucy to sleep, sang her a song. She had a soft, +melodious voice, and, when she had finished it, our people up and begged +for another. She sang them another, and after it had fallen dark ended +with the Evening Hymn. From that time, whenever anything could be heard +above the sea and wind, and while she had any voice left, nothing would +serve the people but that she should sing at sunset. She always did, and +always ended with the Evening Hymn. We mostly took up the last line, and +shed tears when it was done, but not miserably. We had a prayer night +and morning, also, when the weather allowed of it. + +Twelve nights and eleven days we had been driving in the boat, when old +Mr. Rarx began to be delirious, and to cry out to me to throw the gold +overboard or it would sink us, and we should all be lost. For days past +the child had been declining, and that was the great cause of his +wildness. He had been over and over again shrieking out to me to give +her all the remaining meat, to give her all the remaining rum, to save +her at any cost, or we should all be ruined. At this time, she lay in +her mother's arms at my feet. One of her little hands was almost always +creeping about her mother's neck or chin. I had watched the wasting of +the little hand, and I knew it was nearly over. + +The old man's cries were so discordant with the mother's love and +submission, that I called out to him in an angry voice, unless he held +his peace on the instant, I would order him to be knocked on the head and +thrown overboard. He was mute then, until the child died, very +peacefully, an hour afterwards: which was known to all in the boat by the +mother's breaking out into lamentations for the first time since the +wreck--for, she had great fortitude and constancy, though she was a +little gentle woman. Old Mr. Rarx then became quite ungovernable, +tearing what rags he had on him, raging in imprecations, and calling to +me that if I had thrown the gold overboard (always the gold with him!) I +might have saved the child. "And now," says he, in a terrible voice, "we +shall founder, and all go to the Devil, for our sins will sink us, when +we have no innocent child to bear us up!" We so discovered with +amazement, that this old wretch had only cared for the life of the pretty +little creature dear to all of us, because of the influence he +superstitiously hoped she might have in preserving him! Altogether it +was too much for the smith or armourer, who was sitting next the old man, +to bear. He took him by the throat and rolled him under the thwarts, +where he lay still enough for hours afterwards. + +All that thirteenth night, Miss Coleshaw, lying across my knees as I kept +the helm, comforted and supported the poor mother. Her child, covered +with a pea-jacket of mine, lay in her lap. It troubled me all night to +think that there was no Prayer-Book among us, and that I could remember +but very few of the exact words of the burial service. When I stood up +at broad day, all knew what was going to be done, and I noticed that my +poor fellows made the motion of uncovering their heads, though their +heads had been stark bare to the sky and sea for many a weary hour. There +was a long heavy swell on, but otherwise it was a fair morning, and there +were broad fields of sunlight on the waves in the east. I said no more +than this: "I am the Resurrection and the Life, saith the Lord. He +raised the daughter of Jairus the ruler, and said she was not dead but +slept. He raised the widow's son. He arose Himself, and was seen of +many. He loved little children, saying, Suffer them to come unto Me and +rebuke them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven. In His name, my +friends, and committed to His merciful goodness!" With those words I +laid my rough face softly on the placid little forehead, and buried the +Golden Lucy in the grave of the Golden Mary. + +Having had it on my mind to relate the end of this dear little child, I +have omitted something from its exact place, which I will supply here. It +will come quite as well here as anywhere else. + +Foreseeing that if the boat lived through the stormy weather, the time +must come, and soon come, when we should have absolutely no morsel to +eat, I had one momentous point often in my thoughts. Although I had, +years before that, fully satisfied myself that the instances in which +human beings in the last distress have fed upon each other, are +exceedingly few, and have very seldom indeed (if ever) occurred when the +people in distress, however dreadful their extremity, have been +accustomed to moderate forbearance and restraint; I say, though I had +long before quite satisfied my mind on this topic, I felt doubtful +whether there might not have been in former cases some harm and danger +from keeping it out of sight and pretending not to think of it. I felt +doubtful whether some minds, growing weak with fasting and exposure and +having such a terrific idea to dwell upon in secret, might not magnify it +until it got to have an awful attraction about it. This was not a new +thought of mine, for it had grown out of my reading. However, it came +over me stronger than it had ever done before--as it had reason for +doing--in the boat, and on the fourth day I decided that I would bring +out into the light that unformed fear which must have been more or less +darkly in every brain among us. Therefore, as a means of beguiling the +time and inspiring hope, I gave them the best summary in my power of +Bligh's voyage of more than three thousand miles, in an open boat, after +the Mutiny of the Bounty, and of the wonderful preservation of that +boat's crew. They listened throughout with great interest, and I +concluded by telling them, that, in my opinion, the happiest circumstance +in the whole narrative was, that Bligh, who was no delicate man either, +had solemnly placed it on record therein that he was sure and certain +that under no conceivable circumstances whatever would that emaciated +party, who had gone through all the pains of famine, have preyed on one +another. I cannot describe the visible relief which this spread through +the boat, and how the tears stood in every eye. From that time I was as +well convinced as Bligh himself that there was no danger, and that this +phantom, at any rate, did not haunt us. + +Now, it was a part of Bligh's experience that when the people in his boat +were most cast down, nothing did them so much good as hearing a story +told by one of their number. When I mentioned that, I saw that it struck +the general attention as much as it did my own, for I had not thought of +it until I came to it in my summary. This was on the day after Mrs. +Atherfield first sang to us. I proposed that, whenever the weather would +permit, we should have a story two hours after dinner (I always issued +the allowance I have mentioned at one o'clock, and called it by that +name), as well as our song at sunset. The proposal was received with a +cheerful satisfaction that warmed my heart within me; and I do not say +too much when I say that those two periods in the four-and-twenty hours +were expected with positive pleasure, and were really enjoyed by all +hands. Spectres as we soon were in our bodily wasting, our imaginations +did not perish like the gross flesh upon our bones. Music and Adventure, +two of the great gifts of Providence to mankind, could charm us long +after that was lost. + +The wind was almost always against us after the second day; and for many +days together we could not nearly hold our own. We had all varieties of +bad weather. We had rain, hail, snow, wind, mist, thunder and lightning. +Still the boats lived through the heavy seas, and still we perishing +people rose and fell with the great waves. + +Sixteen nights and fifteen days, twenty nights and nineteen days, twenty- +four nights and twenty-three days. So the time went on. Disheartening +as I knew that our progress, or want of progress, must be, I never +deceived them as to my calculations of it. In the first place, I felt +that we were all too near eternity for deceit; in the second place, I +knew that if I failed, or died, the man who followed me must have a +knowledge of the true state of things to begin upon. When I told them at +noon, what I reckoned we had made or lost, they generally received what I +said in a tranquil and resigned manner, and always gratefully towards me. +It was not unusual at any time of the day for some one to burst out +weeping loudly without any new cause; and, when the burst was over, to +calm down a little better than before. I had seen exactly the same thing +in a house of mourning. + +During the whole of this time, old Mr. Rarx had had his fits of calling +out to me to throw the gold (always the gold!) overboard, and of heaping +violent reproaches upon me for not having saved the child; but now, the +food being all gone, and I having nothing left to serve out but a bit of +coffee-berry now and then, he began to be too weak to do this, and +consequently fell silent. Mrs. Atherfield and Miss Coleshaw generally +lay, each with an arm across one of my knees, and her head upon it. They +never complained at all. Up to the time of her child's death, Mrs. +Atherfield had bound up her own beautiful hair every day; and I took +particular notice that this was always before she sang her song at night, +when everyone looked at her. But she never did it after the loss of her +darling; and it would have been now all tangled with dirt and wet, but +that Miss Coleshaw was careful of it long after she was herself, and +would sometimes smooth it down with her weak thin hands. + +We were past mustering a story now; but one day, at about this period, I +reverted to the superstition of old Mr. Rarx, concerning the Golden Lucy, +and told them that nothing vanished from the eye of God, though much +might pass away from the eyes of men. "We were all of us," says I, +"children once; and our baby feet have strolled in green woods ashore; +and our baby hands have gathered flowers in gardens, where the birds were +singing. The children that we were, are not lost to the great knowledge +of our Creator. Those innocent creatures will appear with us before Him, +and plead for us. What we were in the best time of our generous youth +will arise and go with us too. The purest part of our lives will not +desert us at the pass to which all of us here present are gliding. What +we were then, will be as much in existence before Him, as what we are +now." They were no less comforted by this consideration, than I was +myself; and Miss Coleshaw, drawing my ear nearer to her lips, said, +"Captain Ravender, I was on my way to marry a disgraced and broken man, +whom I dearly loved when he was honourable and good. Your words seem to +have come out of my own poor heart." She pressed my hand upon it, +smiling. + +Twenty-seven nights and twenty-six days. We were in no want of +rain-water, but we had nothing else. And yet, even now, I never turned +my eyes upon a waking face but it tried to brighten before mine. O, what +a thing it is, in a time of danger and in the presence of death, the +shining of a face upon a face! I have heard it broached that orders +should be given in great new ships by electric telegraph. I admire +machinery as much is any man, and am as thankful to it as any man can be +for what it does for us. But it will never be a substitute for the face +of a man, with his soul in it, encouraging another man to be brave and +true. Never try it for that. It will break down like a straw. + +I now began to remark certain changes in myself which I did not like. +They caused me much disquiet. I often saw the Golden Lucy in the air +above the boat. I often saw her I have spoken of before, sitting beside +me. I saw the Golden Mary go down, as she really had gone down, twenty +times in a day. And yet the sea was mostly, to my thinking, not sea +neither, but moving country and extraordinary mountainous regions, the +like of which have never been beheld. I felt it time to leave my last +words regarding John Steadiman, in case any lips should last out to +repeat them to any living ears. I said that John had told me (as he had +on deck) that he had sung out "Breakers ahead!" the instant they were +audible, and had tried to wear ship, but she struck before it could be +done. (His cry, I dare say, had made my dream.) I said that the +circumstances were altogether without warning, and out of any course that +could have been guarded against; that the same loss would have happened +if I had been in charge; and that John was not to blame, but from first +to last had done his duty nobly, like the man he was. I tried to write +it down in my pocket-book, but could make no words, though I knew what +the words were that I wanted to make. When it had come to that, her +hands--though she was dead so long--laid me down gently in the bottom of +the boat, and she and the Golden Lucy swung me to sleep. + +* * * * * + +_All that follows, was written by John Steadiman, Chief Mate_: + +On the twenty-sixth day after the foundering of the Golden Mary at sea, +I, John Steadiman, was sitting in my place in the stern-sheets of the +Surf-boat, with just sense enough left in me to steer--that is to say, +with my eyes strained, wide-awake, over the bows of the boat, and my +brains fast asleep and dreaming--when I was roused upon a sudden by our +second mate, Mr. William Rames. + +"Let me take a spell in your place," says he. "And look you out for the +Long-boat astern. The last time she rose on the crest of a wave, I +thought I made out a signal flying aboard her." + +We shifted our places, clumsily and slowly enough, for we were both of us +weak and dazed with wet, cold, and hunger. I waited some time, watching +the heavy rollers astern, before the Long-boat rose a-top of one of them +at the same time with us. At last, she was heaved up for a moment well +in view, and there, sure enough, was the signal flying aboard of her--a +strip of rag of some sort, rigged to an oar, and hoisted in her bows. + +"What does it mean?" says Rames to me in a quavering, trembling sort of +voice. "Do they signal a sail in sight?" + +"Hush, for God's sake!" says I, clapping my hand over his mouth. "Don't +let the people hear you. They'll all go mad together if we mislead them +about that signal. Wait a bit, till I have another look at it." + +I held on by him, for he had set me all of a tremble with his notion of a +sail in sight, and watched for the Long-boat again. Up she rose on the +top of another roller. I made out the signal clearly, that second time, +and saw that it was rigged half-mast high. + +"Rames," says I, "it's a signal of distress. Pass the word forward to +keep her before the sea, and no more. We must get the Long-boat within +hailing distance of us, as soon as possible." + +I dropped down into my old place at the tiller without another word--for +the thought went through me like a knife that something had happened to +Captain Ravender. I should consider myself unworthy to write another +line of this statement, if I had not made up my mind to speak the truth, +the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--and I must, therefore, +confess plainly that now, for the first time, my heart sank within me. +This weakness on my part was produced in some degree, as I take it, by +the exhausting effects of previous anxiety and grief. + +Our provisions--if I may give that name to what we had left--were reduced +to the rind of one lemon and about a couple of handsfull of +coffee-berries. Besides these great distresses, caused by the death, the +danger, and the suffering among my crew and passengers, I had had a +little distress of my own to shake me still more, in the death of the +child whom I had got to be very fond of on the voyage out--so fond that I +was secretly a little jealous of her being taken in the Long-boat instead +of mine when the ship foundered. It used to be a great comfort to me, +and I think to those with me also, after we had seen the last of the +Golden Mary, to see the Golden Lucy, held up by the men in the Long-boat, +when the weather allowed it, as the best and brightest sight they had to +show. She looked, at the distance we saw her from, almost like a little +white bird in the air. To miss her for the first time, when the weather +lulled a little again, and we all looked out for our white bird and +looked in vain, was a sore disappointment. To see the men's heads bowed +down and the captain's hand pointing into the sea when we hailed the Long- +boat, a few days after, gave me as heavy a shock and as sharp a pang of +heartache to bear as ever I remember suffering in all my life. I only +mention these things to show that if I did give way a little at first, +under the dread that our captain was lost to us, it was not without +having been a good deal shaken beforehand by more trials of one sort or +another than often fall to one man's share. + +I had got over the choking in my throat with the help of a drop of water, +and had steadied my mind again so as to be prepared against the worst, +when I heard the hail (Lord help the poor fellows, how weak it sounded!)-- + +"Surf-boat, ahoy!" + +I looked up, and there were our companions in misfortune tossing abreast +of us; not so near that we could make out the features of any of them, +but near enough, with some exertion for people in our condition, to make +their voices heard in the intervals when the wind was weakest. + +I answered the hail, and waited a bit, and heard nothing, and then sung +out the captain's name. The voice that replied did not sound like his; +the words that reached us were: + +"Chief-mate wanted on board!" + +Every man of my crew knew what that meant as well as I did. As second +officer in command, there could be but one reason for wanting me on board +the Long-boat. A groan went all round us, and my men looked darkly in +each other's faces, and whispered under their breaths: + +"The captain is dead!" + +I commanded them to be silent, and not to make too sure of bad news, at +such a pass as things had now come to with us. Then, hailing the Long- +boat, I signified that I was ready to go on board when the weather would +let me--stopped a bit to draw a good long breath--and then called out as +loud as I could the dreadful question: + +"Is the captain dead?" + +The black figures of three or four men in the after-part of the Long-boat +all stooped down together as my voice reached them. They were lost to +view for about a minute; then appeared again--one man among them was held +up on his feet by the rest, and he hailed back the blessed words (a very +faint hope went a very long way with people in our desperate situation): +"Not yet!" + +The relief felt by me, and by all with me, when we knew that our captain, +though unfitted for duty, was not lost to us, it is not in words--at +least, not in such words as a man like me can command--to express. I did +my best to cheer the men by telling them what a good sign it was that we +were not as badly off yet as we had feared; and then communicated what +instructions I had to give, to William Rames, who was to be left in +command in my place when I took charge of the Long-boat. After that, +there was nothing to be done, but to wait for the chance of the wind +dropping at sunset, and the sea going down afterwards, so as to enable +our weak crews to lay the two boats alongside of each other, without +undue risk--or, to put it plainer, without saddling ourselves with the +necessity for any extraordinary exertion of strength or skill. Both the +one and the other had now been starved out of us for days and days +together. + +At sunset the wind suddenly dropped, but the sea, which had been running +high for so long a time past, took hours after that before it showed any +signs of getting to rest. The moon was shining, the sky was wonderfully +clear, and it could not have been, according to my calculations, far off +midnight, when the long, slow, regular swell of the calming ocean fairly +set in, and I took the responsibility of lessening the distance between +the Long-boat and ourselves. + +It was, I dare say, a delusion of mine; but I thought I had never seen +the moon shine so white and ghastly anywhere, either on sea or on land, +as she shone that night while we were approaching our companions in +misery. When there was not much more than a boat's length between us, +and the white light streamed cold and clear over all our faces, both +crews rested on their oars with one great shudder, and stared over the +gunwale of either boat, panic-stricken at the first sight of each other. + +"Any lives lost among you?" I asked, in the midst of that frightful +silence. + +The men in the Long-bout huddled together like sheep at the sound of my +voice. + +"None yet, but the child, thanks be to God!" answered one among them. + +And at the sound of his voice, all my men shrank together like the men in +the Long-boat. I was afraid to let the horror produced by our first +meeting at close quarters after the dreadful changes that wet, cold, and +famine had produced, last one moment longer than could be helped; so, +without giving time for any more questions and answers, I commanded the +men to lay the two boats close alongside of each other. When I rose up +and committed the tiller to the hands of Rames, all my poor follows +raised their white faces imploringly to mine. "Don't leave us, sir," +they said, "don't leave us." "I leave you," says I, "under the command +and the guidance of Mr. William Rames, as good a sailor as I am, and as +trusty and kind a man as ever stepped. Do your duty by him, as you have +done it by me; and remember to the last, that while there is life there +is hope. God bless and help you all!" With those words I collected what +strength I had left, and caught at two arms that were held out to me, and +so got from the stern-sheets of one boat into the stern-sheets of the +other. + +"Mind where you step, sir," whispered one of the men who had helped me +into the Long-boat. I looked down as he spoke. Three figures were +huddled up below me, with the moonshine falling on them in ragged streaks +through the gaps between the men standing or sitting above them. The +first face I made out was the face of Miss Coleshaw, her eyes were wide +open and fixed on me. She seemed still to keep her senses, and, by the +alternate parting and closing of her lips, to be trying to speak, but I +could not hear that she uttered a single word. On her shoulder rested +the head of Mrs. Atherfield. The mother of our poor little Golden Lucy +must, I think, have been dreaming of the child she had lost; for there +was a faint smile just ruffling the white stillness of her face, when I +first saw it turned upward, with peaceful closed eyes towards the +heavens. From her, I looked down a little, and there, with his head on +her lap, and with one of her hands resting tenderly on his cheek--there +lay the Captain, to whose help and guidance, up to this miserable time, +we had never looked in vain,--there, worn out at last in our service, and +for our sakes, lay the best and bravest man of all our company. I stole +my hand in gently through his clothes and laid it on his heart, and felt +a little feeble warmth over it, though my cold dulled touch could not +detect even the faintest beating. The two men in the stern-sheets with +me, noticing what I was doing--knowing I loved him like a brother--and +seeing, I suppose, more distress in my face than I myself was conscious +of its showing, lost command over themselves altogether, and burst into a +piteous moaning, sobbing lamentation over him. One of the two drew aside +a jacket from his feet, and showed me that they were bare, except where a +wet, ragged strip of stocking still clung to one of them. When the ship +struck the Iceberg, he had run on deck leaving his shoes in his cabin. +All through the voyage in the boat his feet had been unprotected; and not +a soul had discovered it until he dropped! As long as he could keep his +eyes open, the very look of them had cheered the men, and comforted and +upheld the women. Not one living creature in the boat, with any sense +about him, but had felt the good influence of that brave man in one way +or another. Not one but had heard him, over and over again, give the +credit to others which was due only to himself; praising this man for +patience, and thanking that man for help, when the patience and the help +had really and truly, as to the best part of both, come only from him. +All this, and much more, I heard pouring confusedly from the men's lips +while they crouched down, sobbing and crying over their commander, and +wrapping the jacket as warmly and tenderly as they could over his cold +feet. It went to my heart to check them; but I knew that if this +lamenting spirit spread any further, all chance of keeping alight any +last sparks of hope and resolution among the boat's company would be lost +for ever. Accordingly I sent them to their places, spoke a few +encouraging words to the men forward, promising to serve out, when the +morning came, as much as I dared, of any eatable thing left in the +lockers; called to Rames, in my old boat, to keep as near us as he safely +could; drew the garments and coverings of the two poor suffering women +more closely about them; and, with a secret prayer to be directed for the +best in bearing the awful responsibility now laid on my shoulders, took +my Captain's vacant place at the helm of the Long-boat. + +This, as well as I can tell it, is the full and true account of how I +came to be placed in charge of the lost passengers and crew of the Golden +Mary, on the morning of the twenty-seventh day after the ship struck the +Iceberg, and foundered at sea. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WRECK OF THE GOLDEN MARY*** + + +******* This file should be named 1465.txt or 1465.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/4/6/1465 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +This etext was prepared from the 1894 Chapman and Hall "Christmas +Stories" edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +THE WRECK OF THE GOLDEN MARY + + + + +THE WRECK + + + +I was apprenticed to the Sea when I was twelve years old, and I have +encountered a great deal of rough weather, both literal and +metaphorical. It has always been my opinion since I first possessed +such a thing as an opinion, that the man who knows only one subject +is next tiresome to the man who knows no subject. Therefore, in the +course of my life I have taught myself whatever I could, and +although I am not an educated man, I am able, I am thankful to say, +to have an intelligent interest in most things. + +A person might suppose, from reading the above, that I am in the +habit of holding forth about number one. That is not the case. +Just as if I was to come into a room among strangers, and must +either be introduced or introduce myself, so I have taken the +liberty of passing these few remarks, simply and plainly that it may +be known who and what I am. I will add no more of the sort than +that my name is William George Ravender, that I was born at Penrith +half a year after my own father was drowned, and that I am on the +second day of this present blessed Christmas week of one thousand +eight hundred and fifty-six, fifty-six years of age. + +When the rumour first went flying up and down that there was gold in +California--which, as most people know, was before it was discovered +in the British colony of Australia--I was in the West Indies, +trading among the Islands. Being in command and likewise part-owner +of a smart schooner, I had my work cut out for me, and I was doing +it. Consequently, gold in California was no business of mine. + +But, by the time when I came home to England again, the thing was as +clear as your hand held up before you at noon-day. There was +Californian gold in the museums and in the goldsmiths' shops, and +the very first time I went upon 'Change, I met a friend of mine (a +seafaring man like myself), with a Californian nugget hanging to his +watch-chain. I handled it. It was as like a peeled walnut with +bits unevenly broken off here and there, and then electrotyped all +over, as ever I saw anything in my life. + +I am a single man (she was too good for this world and for me, and +she died six weeks before our marriage-day), so when I am ashore, I +live in my house at Poplar. My house at Poplar is taken care of and +kept ship-shape by an old lady who was my mother's maid before I was +born. She is as handsome and as upright as any old lady in the +world. She is as fond of me as if she had ever had an only son, and +I was he. Well do I know wherever I sail that she never lays down +her head at night without having said, "Merciful Lord! bless and +preserve William George Ravender, and send him safe home, through +Christ our Saviour!" I have thought of it in many a dangerous +moment, when it has done me no harm, I am sure. + +In my house at Poplar, along with this old lady, I lived quiet for +best part of a year: having had a long spell of it among the +Islands, and having (which was very uncommon in me) taken the fever +rather badly. At last, being strong and hearty, and having read +every book I could lay hold of, right out, I was walking down +Leadenhall Street in the City of London, thinking of turning-to +again, when I met what I call Smithick and Watersby of Liverpool. I +chanced to lift up my eyes from looking in at a ship's chronometer +in a window, and I saw him bearing down upon me, head on. + +It is, personally, neither Smithick, nor Watersby, that I here +mention, nor was I ever acquainted with any man of either of those +names, nor do I think that there has been any one of either of those +names in that Liverpool House for years back. But, it is in reality +the House itself that I refer to; and a wiser merchant or a truer +gentleman never stepped. + +"My dear Captain Ravender," says he. "Of all the men on earth, I +wanted to see you most. I was on my way to you." + +"Well!" says I. "That looks as if you WERE to see me, don't it?" +With that I put my arm in his, and we walked on towards the Royal +Exchange, and when we got there, walked up and down at the back of +it where the Clock-Tower is. We walked an hour and more, for he had +much to say to me. He had a scheme for chartering a new ship of +their own to take out cargo to the diggers and emigrants in +California, and to buy and bring back gold. Into the particulars of +that scheme I will not enter, and I have no right to enter. All I +say of it is, that it was a very original one, a very fine one, a +very sound one, and a very lucrative one beyond doubt. + +He imparted it to me as freely as if I had been a part of himself. +After doing so, he made me the handsomest sharing offer that ever +was made to me, boy or man--or I believe to any other captain in the +Merchant Navy--and he took this round turn to finish with: + +"Ravender, you are well aware that the lawlessness of that coast and +country at present, is as special as the circumstances in which it +is placed. Crews of vessels outward-bound, desert as soon as they +make the land; crews of vessels homeward-bound, ship at enormous +wages, with the express intention of murdering the captain and +seizing the gold freight; no man can trust another, and the devil +seems let loose. Now," says he, "you know my opinion of you, and +you know I am only expressing it, and with no singularity, when I +tell you that you are almost the only man on whose integrity, +discretion, and energy--" &c., &c. For, I don't want to repeat what +he said, though I was and am sensible of it. + +Notwithstanding my being, as I have mentioned, quite ready for a +voyage, still I had some doubts of this voyage. Of course I knew, +without being told, that there were peculiar difficulties and +dangers in it, a long way over and above those which attend all +voyages. It must not be supposed that I was afraid to face them; +but, in my opinion a man has no manly motive or sustainment in his +own breast for facing dangers, unless he has well considered what +they are, and is able quietly to say to himself, "None of these +perils can now take me by surprise; I shall know what to do for the +best in any of them; all the rest lies in the higher and greater +hands to which I humbly commit myself." On this principle I have so +attentively considered (regarding it as my duty) all the hazards I +have ever been able to think of, in the ordinary way of storm, +shipwreck, and fire at sea, that I hope I should be prepared to do, +in any of those cases, whatever could be done, to save the lives +intrusted to my charge. + +As I was thoughtful, my good friend proposed that he should leave me +to walk there as long as I liked, and that I should dine with him +by-and-by at his club in Pall Mall. I accepted the invitation and I +walked up and down there, quarter-deck fashion, a matter of a couple +of hours; now and then looking up at the weathercock as I might have +looked up aloft; and now and then taking a look into Cornhill, as I +might have taken a look over the side. + +All dinner-time, and all after dinner-time, we talked it over again. +I gave him my views of his plan, and he very much approved of the +same. I told him I had nearly decided, but not quite. "Well, +well," says he, "come down to Liverpool to-morrow with me, and see +the Golden Mary." I liked the name (her name was Mary, and she was +golden, if golden stands for good), so I began to feel that it was +almost done when I said I would go to Liverpool. On the next +morning but one we were on board the Golden Mary. I might have +known, from his asking me to come down and see her, what she was. I +declare her to have been the completest and most exquisite Beauty +that ever I set my eyes upon. + +We had inspected every timber in her, and had come back to the +gangway to go ashore from the dock-basin, when I put out my hand to +my friend. "Touch upon it," says I, "and touch heartily. I take +command of this ship, and I am hers and yours, if I can get John +Steadiman for my chief mate." + +John Steadiman had sailed with me four voyages. The first voyage +John was third mate out to China, and came home second. The other +three voyages he was my first officer. At this time of chartering +the Golden Mary, he was aged thirty-two. A brisk, bright, blue-eyed +fellow, a very neat figure and rather under the middle size, never +out of the way and never in it, a face that pleased everybody and +that all children took to, a habit of going about singing as +cheerily as a blackbird, and a perfect sailor. + +We were in one of those Liverpool hackney-coaches in less than a +minute, and we cruised about in her upwards of three hours, looking +for John. John had come home from Van Diemen's Land barely a month +before, and I had heard of him as taking a frisk in Liverpool. We +asked after him, among many other places, at the two boarding-houses +he was fondest of, and we found he had had a week's spell at each of +them; but, he had gone here and gone there, and had set off "to lay +out on the main-to'-gallant-yard of the highest Welsh mountain" (so +he had told the people of the house), and where he might be then, or +when he might come back, nobody could tell us. But it was +surprising, to be sure, to see how every face brightened the moment +there was mention made of the name of Mr. Steadiman. + +We were taken aback at meeting with no better luck, and we had wore +ship and put her head for my friends, when as we were jogging +through the streets, I clap my eyes on John himself coming out of a +toyshop! He was carrying a little boy, and conducting two uncommon +pretty women to their coach, and he told me afterwards that he had +never in his life seen one of the three before, but that he was so +taken with them on looking in at the toyshop while they were buying +the child a cranky Noah's Ark, very much down by the head, that he +had gone in and asked the ladies' permission to treat him to a +tolerably correct Cutter there was in the window, in order that such +a handsome boy might not grow up with a lubberly idea of naval +architecture. + +We stood off and on until the ladies' coachman began to give way, +and then we hailed John. On his coming aboard of us, I told him, +very gravely, what I had said to my friend. It struck him, as he +said himself, amidships. He was quite shaken by it. "Captain +Ravender," were John Steadiman's words, "such an opinion from you is +true commendation, and I'll sail round the world with you for twenty +years if you hoist the signal, and stand by you for ever!" And now +indeed I felt that it was done, and that the Golden Mary was afloat. + +Grass never grew yet under the feet of Smithick and Watersby. The +riggers were out of that ship in a fortnight's time, and we had +begun taking in cargo. John was always aboard, seeing everything +stowed with his own eyes; and whenever I went aboard myself early or +late, whether he was below in the hold, or on deck at the hatchway, +or overhauling his cabin, nailing up pictures in it of the Blush +Roses of England, the Blue Belles of Scotland, and the female +Shamrock of Ireland: of a certainty I heard John singing like a +blackbird. + +We had room for twenty passengers. Our sailing advertisement was no +sooner out, than we might have taken these twenty times over. In +entering our men, I and John (both together) picked them, and we +entered none but good hands--as good as were to be found in that +port. And so, in a good ship of the best build, well owned, well +arranged, well officered, well manned, well found in all respects, +we parted with our pilot at a quarter past four o'clock in the +afternoon of the seventh of March, one thousand eight hundred and +fifty-one, and stood with a fair wind out to sea. + +It may be easily believed that up to that time I had had no leisure +to be intimate with my passengers. The most of them were then in +their berths sea-sick; however, in going among them, telling them +what was good for them, persuading them not to be there, but to come +up on deck and feel the breeze, and in rousing them with a joke, or +a comfortable word, I made acquaintance with them, perhaps, in a +more friendly and confidential way from the first, than I might have +done at the cabin table. + +Of my passengers, I need only particularise, just at present, a +bright-eyed blooming young wife who was going out to join her +husband in California, taking with her their only child, a little +girl of three years old, whom he had never seen; a sedate young +woman in black, some five years older (about thirty as I should +say), who was going out to join a brother; and an old gentleman, a +good deal like a hawk if his eyes had been better and not so red, +who was always talking, morning, noon, and night, about the gold +discovery. But, whether he was making the voyage, thinking his old +arms could dig for gold, or whether his speculation was to buy it, +or to barter for it, or to cheat for it, or to snatch it anyhow from +other people, was his secret. He kept his secret. + +These three and the child were the soonest well. The child was a +most engaging child, to be sure, and very fond of me: though I am +bound to admit that John Steadiman and I were borne on her pretty +little books in reverse order, and that he was captain there, and I +was mate. It was beautiful to watch her with John, and it was +beautiful to watch John with her. Few would have thought it +possible, to see John playing at bo-peep round the mast, that he was +the man who had caught up an iron bar and struck a Malay and a +Maltese dead, as they were gliding with their knives down the cabin +stair aboard the barque Old England, when the captain lay ill in his +cot, off Saugar Point. But he was; and give him his back against a +bulwark, he would have done the same by half a dozen of them. The +name of the young mother was Mrs. Atherfield, the name of the young +lady in black was Miss Coleshaw, and the name of the old gentleman +was Mr. Rarx. + +As the child had a quantity of shining fair hair, clustering in +curls all about her face, and as her name was Lucy, Steadiman gave +her the name of the Golden Lucy. So, we had the Golden Lucy and the +Golden Mary; and John kept up the idea to that extent as he and the +child went playing about the decks, that I believe she used to think +the ship was alive somehow--a sister or companion, going to the same +place as herself. She liked to be by the wheel, and in fine +weather, I have often stood by the man whose trick it was at the +wheel, only to hear her, sitting near my feet, talking to the ship. +Never had a child such a doll before, I suppose; but she made a doll +of the Golden Mary, and used to dress her up by tying ribbons and +little bits of finery to the belaying-pins; and nobody ever moved +them, unless it was to save them from being blown away. + +Of course I took charge of the two young women, and I called them +"my dear," and they never minded, knowing that whatever I said was +said in a fatherly and protecting spirit. I gave them their places +on each side of me at dinner, Mrs. Atherfield on my right and Miss +Coleshaw on my left; and I directed the unmarried lady to serve out +the breakfast, and the married lady to serve out the tea. Likewise +I said to my black steward in their presence, "Tom Snow, these two +ladies are equally the mistresses of this house, and do you obey +their orders equally;" at which Tom laughed, and they all laughed. + +Old Mr. Rarx was not a pleasant man to look at, nor yet to talk to, +or to be with, for no one could help seeing that he was a sordid and +selfish character, and that he had warped further and further out of +the straight with time. Not but what he was on his best behaviour +with us, as everybody was; for we had no bickering among us, for'ard +or aft. I only mean to say, he was not the man one would have +chosen for a messmate. If choice there had been, one might even +have gone a few points out of one's course, to say, "No! Not him!" +But, there was one curious inconsistency in Mr. Rarx. That was, +that he took an astonishing interest in the child. He looked, and I +may add, he was, one of the last of men to care at all for a child, +or to care much for any human creature. Still, he went so far as to +be habitually uneasy, if the child was long on deck, out of his +sight. He was always afraid of her falling overboard, or falling +down a hatchway, or of a block or what not coming down upon her from +the rigging in the working of the ship, or of her getting some hurt +or other. He used to look at her and touch her, as if she was +something precious to him. He was always solicitous about her not +injuring her health, and constantly entreated her mother to be +careful of it. This was so much the more curious, because the child +did not like him, but used to shrink away from him, and would not +even put out her hand to him without coaxing from others. I believe +that every soul on board frequently noticed this, and not one of us +understood it. However, it was such a plain fact, that John +Steadiman said more than once when old Mr. Rarx was not within +earshot, that if the Golden Mary felt a tenderness for the dear old +gentleman she carried in her lap, she must be bitterly jealous of +the Golden Lucy. + +Before I go any further with this narrative, I will state that our +ship was a barque of three hundred tons, carrying a crew of eighteen +men, a second mate in addition to John, a carpenter, an armourer or +smith, and two apprentices (one a Scotch boy, poor little fellow). +We had three boats; the Long-boat, capable of carrying twenty-five +men; the Cutter, capable of carrying fifteen; and the Surf-boat, +capable of carrying ten. I put down the capacity of these boats +according to the numbers they were really meant to hold. + +We had tastes of bad weather and head-winds, of course; but, on the +whole we had as fine a run as any reasonable man could expect, for +sixty days. I then began to enter two remarks in the ship's Log and +in my Journal; first, that there was an unusual and amazing quantity +of ice; second, that the nights were most wonderfully dark, in spite +of the ice. + +For five days and a half, it seemed quite useless and hopeless to +alter the ship's course so as to stand out of the way of this ice. +I made what southing I could; but, all that time, we were beset by +it. Mrs. Atherfield after standing by me on deck once, looking for +some time in an awed manner at the great bergs that surrounded us, +said in a whisper, "O! Captain Ravender, it looks as if the whole +solid earth had changed into ice, and broken up!" I said to her, +laughing, "I don't wonder that it does, to your inexperienced eyes, +my dear." But I had never seen a twentieth part of the quantity, +and, in reality, I was pretty much of her opinion. + +However, at two p.m. on the afternoon of the sixth day, that is to +say, when we were sixty-six days out, John Steadiman who had gone +aloft, sang out from the top, that the sea was clear ahead. Before +four p.m. a strong breeze springing up right astern, we were in open +water at sunset. The breeze then freshening into half a gale of +wind, and the Golden Mary being a very fast sailer, we went before +the wind merrily, all night. + +I had thought it impossible that it could be darker than it had +been, until the sun, moon, and stars should fall out of the Heavens, +and Time should be destroyed; but, it had been next to light, in +comparison with what it was now. The darkness was so profound, that +looking into it was painful and oppressive--like looking, without a +ray of light, into a dense black bandage put as close before the +eyes as it could be, without touching them. I doubled the look-out, +and John and I stood in the bow side-by-side, never leaving it all +night. Yet I should no more have known that he was near me when he +was silent, without putting out my arm and touching him, than I +should if he had turned in and been fast asleep below. We were not +so much looking out, all of us, as listening to the utmost, both +with our eyes and ears. + +Next day, I found that the mercury in the barometer, which had risen +steadily since we cleared the ice, remained steady. I had had very +good observations, with now and then the interruption of a day or +so, since our departure. I got the sun at noon, and found that we +were in Lat. 58 degrees S., Long. 60 degrees W., off New South +Shetland; in the neighbourhood of Cape Horn. We were sixty-seven +days out, that day. The ship's reckoning was accurately worked and +made up. The ship did her duty admirably, all on board were well, +and all hands were as smart, efficient, and contented, as it was +possible to be. + +When the night came on again as dark as before, it was the eighth +night I had been on deck. Nor had I taken more than a very little +sleep in the day-time, my station being always near the helm, and +often at it, while we were among the ice. Few but those who have +tried it can imagine the difficulty and pain of only keeping the +eyes open--physically open--under such circumstances, in such +darkness. They get struck by the darkness, and blinded by the +darkness. They make patterns in it, and they flash in it, as if +they had gone out of your head to look at you. On the turn of +midnight, John Steadiman, who was alert and fresh (for I had always +made him turn in by day), said to me, "Captain Ravender, I entreat +of you to go below. I am sure you can hardly stand, and your voice +is getting weak, sir. Go below, and take a little rest. I'll call +you if a block chafes." I said to John in answer, "Well, well, +John! Let us wait till the turn of one o'clock, before we talk +about that." I had just had one of the ship's lanterns held up, +that I might see how the night went by my watch, and it was then +twenty minutes after twelve. + +At five minutes before one, John sang out to the boy to bring the +lantern again, and when I told him once more what the time was, +entreated and prayed of me to go below. "Captain Ravender," says +he, "all's well; we can't afford to have you laid up for a single +hour; and I respectfully and earnestly beg of you to go below." The +end of it was, that I agreed to do so, on the understanding that if +I failed to come up of my own accord within three hours, I was to be +punctually called. Having settled that, I left John in charge. But +I called him to me once afterwards, to ask him a question. I had +been to look at the barometer, and had seen the mercury still +perfectly steady, and had come up the companion again to take a last +look about me--if I can use such a word in reference to such +darkness--when I thought that the waves, as the Golden Mary parted +them and shook them off, had a hollow sound in them; something that +I fancied was a rather unusual reverberation. I was standing by the +quarter-deck rail on the starboard side, when I called John aft to +me, and bade him listen. He did so with the greatest attention. +Turning to me he then said, "Rely upon it, Captain Ravender, you +have been without rest too long, and the novelty is only in the +state of your sense of hearing." I thought so too by that time, and +I think so now, though I can never know for absolute certain in this +world, whether it was or not. + +When I left John Steadiman in charge, the ship was still going at a +great rate through the water. The wind still blew right astern. +Though she was making great way, she was under shortened sail, and +had no more than she could easily carry. All was snug, and nothing +complained. There was a pretty sea running, but not a very high sea +neither, nor at all a confused one. + +I turned in, as we seamen say, all standing. The meaning of that +is, I did not pull my clothes off--no, not even so much as my coat: +though I did my shoes, for my feet were badly swelled with the deck. +There was a little swing-lamp alight in my cabin. I thought, as I +looked at it before shutting my eyes, that I was so tired of +darkness, and troubled by darkness, that I could have gone to sleep +best in the midst of a million of flaming gas-lights. That was the +last thought I had before I went off, except the prevailing thought +that I should not be able to get to sleep at all. + +I dreamed that I was back at Penrith again, and was trying to get +round the church, which had altered its shape very much since I last +saw it, and was cloven all down the middle of the steeple in a most +singular manner. Why I wanted to get round the church I don't know; +but I was as anxious to do it as if my life depended on it. Indeed, +I believe it did in the dream. For all that, I could not get round +the church. I was still trying, when I came against it with a +violent shock, and was flung out of my cot against the ship's side. +Shrieks and a terrific outcry struck me far harder than the bruising +timbers, and amidst sounds of grinding and crashing, and a heavy +rushing and breaking of water--sounds I understood too well--I made +my way on deck. It was not an easy thing to do, for the ship heeled +over frightfully, and was beating in a furious manner. + +I could not see the men as I went forward, but I could hear that +they were hauling in sail, in disorder. I had my trumpet in my +hand, and, after directing and encouraging them in this till it was +done, I hailed first John Steadiman, and then my second mate, Mr. +William Rames. Both answered clearly and steadily. Now, I had +practised them and all my crew, as I have ever made it a custom to +practise all who sail with me, to take certain stations and wait my +orders, in case of any unexpected crisis. When my voice was heard +hailing, and their voices were heard answering, I was aware, through +all the noises of the ship and sea, and all the crying of the +passengers below, that there was a pause. "Are you ready, Rames?"-- +"Ay, ay, sir!"--"Then light up, for God's sake!" In a moment he and +another were burning blue-lights, and the ship and all on board +seemed to be enclosed in a mist of light, under a great black dome. + +The light shone up so high that I could see the huge Iceberg upon +which we had struck, cloven at the top and down the middle, exactly +like Penrith Church in my dream. At the same moment I could see the +watch last relieved, crowding up and down on deck; I could see Mrs. +Atherfield and Miss Coleshaw thrown about on the top of the +companion as they struggled to bring the child up from below; I +could see that the masts were going with the shock and the beating +of the ship; I could see the frightful breach stove in on the +starboard side, half the length of the vessel, and the sheathing and +timbers spirting up; I could see that the Cutter was disabled, in a +wreck of broken fragments; and I could see every eye turned upon me. +It is my belief that if there had been ten thousand eyes there, I +should have seen them all, with their different looks. And all this +in a moment. But you must consider what a moment. + +I saw the men, as they looked at me, fall towards their appointed +stations, like good men and true. If she had not righted, they +could have done very little there or anywhere but die--not that it +is little for a man to die at his post--I mean they could have done +nothing to save the passengers and themselves. Happily, however, +the violence of the shock with which we had so determinedly borne +down direct on that fatal Iceberg, as if it had been our destination +instead of our destruction, had so smashed and pounded the ship that +she got off in this same instant and righted. I did not want the +carpenter to tell me she was filling and going down; I could see and +hear that. I gave Rames the word to lower the Long-boat and the +Surf-boat, and I myself told off the men for each duty. Not one +hung back, or came before the other. I now whispered to John +Steadiman, "John, I stand at the gangway here, to see every soul on +board safe over the side. You shall have the next post of honour, +and shall be the last but one to leave the ship. Bring up the +passengers, and range them behind me; and put what provision and +water you can got at, in the boats. Cast your eye for'ard, John, +and you'll see you have not a moment to lose." + +My noble fellows got the boats over the side as orderly as I ever +saw boats lowered with any sea running, and, when they were +launched, two or three of the nearest men in them as they held on, +rising and falling with the swell, called out, looking up at me, +"Captain Ravender, if anything goes wrong with us, and you are +saved, remember we stood by you!"--"We'll all stand by one another +ashore, yet, please God, my lads!" says I. "Hold on bravely, and be +tender with the women." + +The women were an example to us. They trembled very much, but they +were quiet and perfectly collected. "Kiss me, Captain Ravender," +says Mrs. Atherfield, "and God in heaven bless you, you good man!" +"My dear," says I, "those words are better for me than a life-boat." +I held her child in my arms till she was in the boat, and then +kissed the child and handed her safe down. I now said to the people +in her, "You have got your freight, my lads, all but me, and I am +not coming yet awhile. Pull away from the ship, and keep off!" + +That was the Long-boat. Old Mr. Rarx was one of her complement, and +he was the only passenger who had greatly misbehaved since the ship +struck. Others had been a little wild, which was not to be wondered +at, and not very blamable; but, he had made a lamentation and uproar +which it was dangerous for the people to hear, as there is always +contagion in weakness and selfishness. His incessant cry had been +that he must not be separated from the child, that he couldn't see +the child, and that he and the child must go together. He had even +tried to wrest the child out of my arms, that he might keep her in +his. "Mr. Rarx," said I to him when it came to that, "I have a +loaded pistol in my pocket; and if you don't stand out of the gang- +way, and keep perfectly quiet, I shall shoot you through the heart, +if you have got one." Says he, "You won't do murder, Captain +Ravender!" "No, sir," says I, "I won't murder forty-four people to +humour you, but I'll shoot you to save them." After that he was +quiet, and stood shivering a little way off, until I named him to go +over the side. + +The Long-boat being cast off, the Surf-boat was soon filled. There +only remained aboard the Golden Mary, John Mullion the man who had +kept on burning the blue-lights (and who had lighted every new one +at every old one before it went out, as quietly as if he had been at +an illumination); John Steadiman; and myself. I hurried those two +into the Surf-boat, called to them to keep off, and waited with a +grateful and relieved heart for the Long-boat to come and take me +in, if she could. I looked at my watch, and it showed me, by the +blue-light, ten minutes past two. They lost no time. As soon as +she was near enough, I swung myself into her, and called to the men, +"With a will, lads! She's reeling!" We were not an inch too far +out of the inner vortex of her going down, when, by the blue-light +which John Mullion still burnt in the bow of the Surf-boat, we saw +her lurch, and plunge to the bottom head-foremost. The child cried, +weeping wildly, "O the dear Golden Mary! O look at her! Save her! +Save the poor Golden Mary!" And then the light burnt out, and the +black dome seemed to come down upon us. + +I suppose if we had all stood a-top of a mountain, and seen the +whole remainder of the world sink away from under us, we could +hardly have felt more shocked and solitary than we did when we knew +we were alone on the wide ocean, and that the beautiful ship in +which most of us had been securely asleep within half an hour was +gone for ever. There was an awful silence in our boat, and such a +kind of palsy on the rowers and the man at the rudder, that I felt +they were scarcely keeping her before the sea. I spoke out then, +and said, "Let every one here thank the Lord for our preservation!" +All the voices answered (even the child's), "We thank the Lord!" I +then said the Lord's Prayer, and all hands said it after me with a +solemn murmuring. Then I gave the word "Cheerily, O men, Cheerily!" +and I felt that they were handling the boat again as a boat ought to +be handled. + +The Surf-boat now burnt another blue-light to show us where they +were, and we made for her, and laid ourselves as nearly alongside of +her as we dared. I had always kept my boats with a coil or two of +good stout stuff in each of them, so both boats had a rope at hand. +We made a shift, with much labour and trouble, to got near enough to +one another to divide the blue-lights (they were no use after that +night, for the sea-water soon got at them), and to get a tow-rope +out between us. All night long we kept together, sometimes obliged +to cast off the rope, and sometimes getting it out again, and all of +us wearying for the morning--which appeared so long in coming that +old Mr. Rarx screamed out, in spite of his fears of me, "The world +is drawing to an end, and the sun will never rise any more!" + +When the day broke, I found that we were all huddled together in a +miserable manner. We were deep in the water; being, as I found on +mustering, thirty-one in number, or at least six too many. In the +Surf-boat they were fourteen in number, being at least four too +many. The first thing I did, was to get myself passed to the +rudder--which I took from that time--and to get Mrs. Atherfield, her +child, and Miss Coleshaw, passed on to sit next me. As to old Mr. +Rarx, I put him in the bow, as far from us as I could. And I put +some of the best men near us in order that if I should drop there +might be a skilful hand ready to take the helm. + +The sea moderating as the sun came up, though the sky was cloudy and +wild, we spoke the other boat, to know what stores they had, and to +overhaul what we had. I had a compass in my pocket, a small +telescope, a double-barrelled pistol, a knife, and a fire-box and +matches. Most of my men had knives, and some had a little tobacco: +some, a pipe as well. We had a mug among us, and an iron spoon. As +to provisions, there were in my boat two bags of biscuit, one piece +of raw beef, one piece of raw pork, a bag of coffee, roasted but not +ground (thrown in, I imagine, by mistake, for something else), two +small casks of water, and about half-a-gallon of rum in a keg. The +Surf-boat, having rather more rum than we, and fewer to drink it, +gave us, as I estimated, another quart into our keg. In return, we +gave them three double handfuls of coffee, tied up in a piece of a +handkerchief; they reported that they had aboard besides, a bag of +biscuit, a piece of beef, a small cask of water, a small box of +lemons, and a Dutch cheese. It took a long time to make these +exchanges, and they were not made without risk to both parties; the +sea running quite high enough to make our approaching near to one +another very hazardous. In the bundle with the coffee, I conveyed +to John Steadiman (who had a ship's compass with him), a paper +written in pencil, and torn from my pocket-book, containing the +course I meant to steer, in the hope of making land, or being picked +up by some vessel--I say in the hope, though I had little hope of +either deliverance. I then sang out to him, so as all might hear, +that if we two boats could live or die together, we would; but, that +if we should be parted by the weather, and join company no more, +they should have our prayers and blessings, and we asked for theirs. +We then gave them three cheers, which they returned, and I saw the +men's heads droop in both boats as they fell to their oars again. + +These arrangements had occupied the general attention advantageously +for all, though (as I expressed in the last sentence) they ended in +a sorrowful feeling. I now said a few words to my fellow-voyagers +on the subject of the small stock of food on which our lives +depended if they were preserved from the great deep, and on the +rigid necessity of our eking it out in the most frugal manner. One +and all replied that whatever allowance I thought best to lay down +should be strictly kept to. We made a pair of scales out of a thin +scrap of iron-plating and some twine, and I got together for weights +such of the heaviest buttons among us as I calculated made up some +fraction over two ounces. This was the allowance of solid food +served out once a-day to each, from that time to the end; with the +addition of a coffee-berry, or sometimes half a one, when the +weather was very fair, for breakfast. We had nothing else whatever, +but half a pint of water each per day, and sometimes, when we were +coldest and weakest, a teaspoonful of rum each, served out as a +dram. I know how learnedly it can be shown that rum is poison, but +I also know that in this case, as in all similar cases I have ever +read of--which are numerous--no words can express the comfort and +support derived from it. Nor have I the least doubt that it saved +the lives of far more than half our number. Having mentioned half a +pint of water as our daily allowance, I ought to observe that +sometimes we had less, and sometimes we had more; for much rain +fell, and we caught it in a canvas stretched for the purpose. + +Thus, at that tempestuous time of the year, and in that tempestuous +part of the world, we shipwrecked people rose and fell with the +waves. It is not my intention to relate (if I can avoid it) such +circumstances appertaining to our doleful condition as have been +better told in many other narratives of the kind than I can be +expected to tell them. I will only note, in so many passing words, +that day after day and night after night, we received the sea upon +our backs to prevent it from swamping the boat; that one party was +always kept baling, and that every hat and cap among us soon got +worn out, though patched up fifty times, as the only vessels we had +for that service; that another party lay down in the bottom of the +boat, while a third rowed; and that we were soon all in boils and +blisters and rags. + +The other boat was a source of such anxious interest to all of us +that I used to wonder whether, if we were saved, the time could ever +come when the survivors in this boat of ours could be at all +indifferent to the fortunes of the survivors in that. We got out a +tow-rope whenever the weather permitted, but that did not often +happen, and how we two parties kept within the same horizon, as we +did, He, who mercifully permitted it to be so for our consolation, +only knows. I never shall forget the looks with which, when the +morning light came, we used to gaze about us over the stormy waters, +for the other boat. We once parted company for seventy-two hours, +and we believed them to have gone down, as they did us. The joy on +both sides when we came within view of one another again, had +something in a manner Divine in it; each was so forgetful of +individual suffering, in tears of delight and sympathy for the +people in the other boat. + +I have been wanting to get round to the individual or personal part +of my subject, as I call it, and the foregoing incident puts me in +the right way. The patience and good disposition aboard of us, was +wonderful. I was not surprised by it in the women; for all men born +of women know what great qualities they will show when men will +fail; but, I own I was a little surprised by it in some of the men. +Among one-and-thirty people assembled at the best of times, there +will usually, I should say, be two or three uncertain tempers. I +knew that I had more than one rough temper with me among my own +people, for I had chosen those for the Long-boat that I might have +them under my eye. But, they softened under their misery, and were +as considerate of the ladies, and as compassionate of the child, as +the best among us, or among men--they could not have been more so. +I heard scarcely any complaining. The party lying down would moan a +good deal in their sleep, and I would often notice a man--not always +the same man, it is to be understood, but nearly all of them at one +time or other--sitting moaning at his oar, or in his place, as he +looked mistily over the sea. When it happened to be long before I +could catch his eye, he would go on moaning all the time in the +dismallest manner; but, when our looks met, he would brighten and +leave off. I almost always got the impression that he did not know +what sound he had been making, but that he thought he had been +humming a tune. + +Our sufferings from cold and wet were far greater than our +sufferings from hunger. We managed to keep the child warm; but, I +doubt if any one else among us ever was warm for five minutes +together; and the shivering, and the chattering of teeth, were sad +to hear. The child cried a little at first for her lost playfellow, +the Golden Mary; but hardly ever whimpered afterwards; and when the +state of the weather made it possible, she used now and then to be +held up in the arms of some of us, to look over the sea for John +Steadiman's boat. I see the golden hair and the innocent face now, +between me and the driving clouds, like an angel going to fly away. + +It had happened on the second day, towards night, that Mrs. +Atherfield, in getting Little Lucy to sleep, sang her a song. She +had a soft, melodious voice, and, when she had finished it, our +people up and begged for another. She sang them another, and after +it had fallen dark ended with the Evening Hymn. From that time, +whenever anything could be heard above the sea and wind, and while +she had any voice left, nothing would serve the people but that she +should sing at sunset. She always did, and always ended with the +Evening Hymn. We mostly took up the last line, and shed tears when +it was done, but not miserably. We had a prayer night and morning, +also, when the weather allowed of it. + +Twelve nights and eleven days we had been driving in the boat, when +old Mr. Rarx began to be delirious, and to cry out to me to throw +the gold overboard or it would sink us, and we should all be lost. +For days past the child had been declining, and that was the great +cause of his wildness. He had been over and over again shrieking +out to me to give her all the remaining meat, to give her all the +remaining rum, to save her at any cost, or we should all be ruined. +At this time, she lay in her mother's arms at my feet. One of her +little hands was almost always creeping about her mother's neck or +chin. I had watched the wasting of the little hand, and I knew it +was nearly over. + +The old man's cries were so discordant with the mother's love and +submission, that I called out to him in an angry voice, unless he +held his peace on the instant, I would order him to be knocked on +the head and thrown overboard. He was mute then, until the child +died, very peacefully, an hour afterwards: which was known to all +in the boat by the mother's breaking out into lamentations for the +first time since the wreck--for, she had great fortitude and +constancy, though she was a little gentle woman. Old Mr. Rarx then +became quite ungovernable, tearing what rags he had on him, raging +in imprecations, and calling to me that if I had thrown the gold +overboard (always the gold with him!) I might have saved the child. +"And now," says he, in a terrible voice, "we shall founder, and all +go to the Devil, for our sins will sink us, when we have no innocent +child to bear us up!" We so discovered with amazement, that this +old wretch had only cared for the life of the pretty little creature +dear to all of us, because of the influence he superstitiously hoped +she might have in preserving him! Altogether it was too much for +the smith or armourer, who was sitting next the old man, to bear. +He took him by the throat and rolled him under the thwarts, where he +lay still enough for hours afterwards. + +All that thirteenth night, Miss Coleshaw, lying across my knees as I +kept the helm, comforted and supported the poor mother. Her child, +covered with a pea-jacket of mine, lay in her lap. It troubled me +all night to think that there was no Prayer-Book among us, and that +I could remember but very few of the exact words of the burial +service. When I stood up at broad day, all knew what was going to +be done, and I noticed that my poor fellows made the motion of +uncovering their heads, though their heads had been stark bare to +the sky and sea for many a weary hour. There was a long heavy swell +on, but otherwise it was a fair morning, and there were broad fields +of sunlight on the waves in the east. I said no more than this: "I +am the Resurrection and the Life, saith the Lord. He raised the +daughter of Jairus the ruler, and said she was not dead but slept. +He raised the widow's son. He arose Himself, and was seen of many. +He loved little children, saying, Suffer them to come unto Me and +rebuke them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven. In His name, +my friends, and committed to His merciful goodness!" With those +words I laid my rough face softly on the placid little forehead, and +buried the Golden Lucy in the grave of the Golden Mary. + +Having had it on my mind to relate the end of this dear little +child, I have omitted something from its exact place, which I will +supply here. It will come quite as well here as anywhere else. + +Foreseeing that if the boat lived through the stormy weather, the +time must come, and soon come, when we should have absolutely no +morsel to eat, I had one momentous point often in my thoughts. +Although I had, years before that, fully satisfied myself that the +instances in which human beings in the last distress have fed upon +each other, are exceedingly few, and have very seldom indeed (if +ever) occurred when the people in distress, however dreadful their +extremity, have been accustomed to moderate forbearance and +restraint; I say, though I had long before quite satisfied my mind +on this topic, I felt doubtful whether there might not have been in +former cases some harm and danger from keeping it out of sight and +pretending not to think of it. I felt doubtful whether some minds, +growing weak with fasting and exposure and having such a terrific +idea to dwell upon in secret, might not magnify it until it got to +have an awful attraction about it. This was not a new thought of +mine, for it had grown out of my reading. However, it came over me +stronger than it had ever done before--as it had reason for doing-- +in the boat, and on the fourth day I decided that I would bring out +into the light that unformed fear which must have been more or less +darkly in every brain among us. Therefore, as a means of beguiling +the time and inspiring hope, I gave them the best summary in my +power of Bligh's voyage of more than three thousand miles, in an +open boat, after the Mutiny of the Bounty, and of the wonderful +preservation of that boat's crew. They listened throughout with +great interest, and I concluded by telling them, that, in my +opinion, the happiest circumstance in the whole narrative was, that +Bligh, who was no delicate man either, had solemnly placed it on +record therein that he was sure and certain that under no +conceivable circumstances whatever would that emaciated party, who +had gone through all the pains of famine, have preyed on one +another. I cannot describe the visible relief which this spread +through the boat, and how the tears stood in every eye. From that +time I was as well convinced as Bligh himself that there was no +danger, and that this phantom, at any rate, did not haunt us. + +Now, it was a part of Bligh's experience that when the people in his +boat were most cast down, nothing did them so much good as hearing a +story told by one of their number. When I mentioned that, I saw +that it struck the general attention as much as it did my own, for I +had not thought of it until I came to it in my summary. This was on +the day after Mrs. Atherfield first sang to us. I proposed that, +whenever the weather would permit, we should have a story two hours +after dinner (I always issued the allowance I have mentioned at one +o'clock, and called it by that name), as well as our song at sunset. +The proposal was received with a cheerful satisfaction that warmed +my heart within me; and I do not say too much when I say that those +two periods in the four-and-twenty hours were expected with positive +pleasure, and were really enjoyed by all hands. Spectres as we soon +were in our bodily wasting, our imaginations did not perish like the +gross flesh upon our bones. Music and Adventure, two of the great +gifts of Providence to mankind, could charm us long after that was +lost. + +The wind was almost always against us after the second day; and for +many days together we could not nearly hold our own. We had all +varieties of bad weather. We had rain, hail, snow, wind, mist, +thunder and lightning. Still the boats lived through the heavy +seas, and still we perishing people rose and fell with the great +waves. + +Sixteen nights and fifteen days, twenty nights and nineteen days, +twenty-four nights and twenty-three days. So the time went on. +Disheartening as I knew that our progress, or want of progress, must +be, I never deceived them as to my calculations of it. In the first +place, I felt that we were all too near eternity for deceit; in the +second place, I knew that if I failed, or died, the man who followed +me must have a knowledge of the true state of things to begin upon. +When I told them at noon, what I reckoned we had made or lost, they +generally received what I said in a tranquil and resigned manner, +and always gratefully towards me. It was not unusual at any time of +the day for some one to burst out weeping loudly without any new +cause; and, when the burst was over, to calm down a little better +than before. I had seen exactly the same thing in a house of +mourning. + +During the whole of this time, old Mr. Rarx had had his fits of +calling out to me to throw the gold (always the gold!) overboard, +and of heaping violent reproaches upon me for not having saved the +child; but now, the food being all gone, and I having nothing left +to serve out but a bit of coffee-berry now and then, he began to be +too weak to do this, and consequently fell silent. Mrs. Atherfield +and Miss Coleshaw generally lay, each with an arm across one of my +knees, and her head upon it. They never complained at all. Up to +the time of her child's death, Mrs. Atherfield had bound up her own +beautiful hair every day; and I took particular notice that this was +always before she sang her song at night, when everyone looked at +her. But she never did it after the loss of her darling; and it +would have been now all tangled with dirt and wet, but that Miss +Coleshaw was careful of it long after she was herself, and would +sometimes smooth it down with her weak thin hands. + +We were past mustering a story now; but one day, at about this +period, I reverted to the superstition of old Mr. Rarx, concerning +the Golden Lucy, and told them that nothing vanished from the eye of +God, though much might pass away from the eyes of men. "We were all +of us," says I, "children once; and our baby feet have strolled in +green woods ashore; and our baby hands have gathered flowers in +gardens, where the birds were singing. The children that we were, +are not lost to the great knowledge of our Creator. Those innocent +creatures will appear with us before Him, and plead for us. What we +were in the best time of our generous youth will arise and go with +us too. The purest part of our lives will not desert us at the pass +to which all of us here present are gliding. What we were then, +will be as much in existence before Him, as what we are now." They +were no less comforted by this consideration, than I was myself; and +Miss Coleshaw, drawing my ear nearer to her lips, said, "Captain +Ravender, I was on my way to marry a disgraced and broken man, whom +I dearly loved when he was honourable and good. Your words seem to +have come out of my own poor heart." She pressed my hand upon it, +smiling. + +Twenty-seven nights and twenty-six days. We were in no want of +rain-water, but we had nothing else. And yet, even now, I never +turned my eyes upon a waking face but it tried to brighten before +mine. O, what a thing it is, in a time of danger and in the +presence of death, the shining of a face upon a face! I have heard +it broached that orders should be given in great new ships by +electric telegraph. I admire machinery as much is any man, and am +as thankful to it as any man can be for what it does for us. But it +will never be a substitute for the face of a man, with his soul in +it, encouraging another man to be brave and true. Never try it for +that. It will break down like a straw. + +I now began to remark certain changes in myself which I did not +like. They caused me much disquiet. I often saw the Golden Lucy in +the air above the boat. I often saw her I have spoken of before, +sitting beside me. I saw the Golden Mary go down, as she really had +gone down, twenty times in a day. And yet the sea was mostly, to my +thinking, not sea neither, but moving country and extraordinary +mountainous regions, the like of which have never been beheld. I +felt it time to leave my last words regarding John Steadiman, in +case any lips should last out to repeat them to any living ears. I +said that John had told me (as he had on deck) that he had sung out +"Breakers ahead!" the instant they were audible, and had tried to +wear ship, but she struck before it could be done. (His cry, I dare +say, had made my dream.) I said that the circumstances were +altogether without warning, and out of any course that could have +been guarded against; that the same loss would have happened if I +had been in charge; and that John was not to blame, but from first +to last had done his duty nobly, like the man he was. I tried to +write it down in my pocket-book, but could make no words, though I +knew what the words were that I wanted to make. When it had come to +that, her hands--though she was dead so long--laid me down gently in +the bottom of the boat, and she and the Golden Lucy swung me to +sleep. + + +ALL THAT FOLLOWS, WAS WRITTEN BY JOHN STEADIMAN, CHIEF MATE, + + +On the twenty-sixth day after the foundering of the Golden Mary at +sea, I, John Steadiman, was sitting in my place in the stern-sheets +of the Surf-boat, with just sense enough left in me to steer--that +is to say, with my eyes strained, wide-awake, over the bows of the +boat, and my brains fast asleep and dreaming--when I was roused upon +a sudden by our second mate, Mr. William Rames. + +"Let me take a spell in your place," says he. "And look you out for +the Long-boat astern. The last time she rose on the crest of a +wave, I thought I made out a signal flying aboard her." + +We shifted our places, clumsily and slowly enough, for we were both +of us weak and dazed with wet, cold, and hunger. I waited some +time, watching the heavy rollers astern, before the Long-boat rose +a-top of one of them at the same time with us. At last, she was +heaved up for a moment well in view, and there, sure enough, was the +signal flying aboard of her--a strip of rag of some sort, rigged to +an oar, and hoisted in her bows. + +"What does it mean?" says Rames to me in a quavering, trembling sort +of voice. "Do they signal a sail in sight?" + +"Hush, for God's sake!" says I, clapping my hand over his mouth. +"Don't let the people hear you. They'll all go mad together if we +mislead them about that signal. Wait a bit, till I have another +look at it." + +I held on by him, for he had set me all of a tremble with his notion +of a sail in sight, and watched for the Long-boat again. Up she +rose on the top of another roller. I made out the signal clearly, +that second time, and saw that it was rigged half-mast high. + +"Rames," says I, "it's a signal of distress. Pass the word forward +to keep her before the sea, and no more. We must get the Long-boat +within hailing distance of us, as soon as possible." + +I dropped down into my old place at the tiller without another word- +-for the thought went through me like a knife that something had +happened to Captain Ravender. I should consider myself unworthy to +write another line of this statement, if I had not made up my mind +to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--and +I must, therefore, confess plainly that now, for the first time, my +heart sank within me. This weakness on my part was produced in some +degree, as I take it, by the exhausting effects of previous anxiety +and grief. + +Our provisions--if I may give that name to what we had left--were +reduced to the rind of one lemon and about a couple of handsfull of +coffee-berries. Besides these great distresses, caused by the +death, the danger, and the suffering among my crew and passengers, I +had had a little distress of my own to shake me still more, in the +death of the child whom I had got to be very fond of on the voyage +out--so fond that I was secretly a little jealous of her being taken +in the Long-boat instead of mine when the ship foundered. It used +to be a great comfort to me, and I think to those with me also, +after we had seen the last of the Golden Mary, to see the Golden +Lucy, held up by the men in the Long-boat, when the weather allowed +it, as the best and brightest sight they had to show. She looked, +at the distance we saw her from, almost like a little white bird in +the air. To miss her for the first time, when the weather lulled a +little again, and we all looked out for our white bird and looked in +vain, was a sore disappointment. To see the men's heads bowed down +and the captain's hand pointing into the sea when we hailed the +Long-boat, a few days after, gave me as heavy a shock and as sharp a +pang of heartache to bear as ever I remember suffering in all my +life. I only mention these things to show that if I did give way a +little at first, under the dread that our captain was lost to us, it +was not without having been a good deal shaken beforehand by more +trials of one sort or another than often fall to one man's share. + +I had got over the choking in my throat with the help of a drop of +water, and had steadied my mind again so as to be prepared against +the worst, when I heard the hail (Lord help the poor fellows, how +weak it sounded!) - + +"Surf-boat, ahoy!" + +I looked up, and there were our companions in misfortune tossing +abreast of us; not so near that we could make out the features of +any of them, but near enough, with some exertion for people in our +condition, to make their voices heard in the intervals when the wind +was weakest. + +I answered the hail, and waited a bit, and heard nothing, and then +sung out the captain's name. The voice that replied did not sound +like his; the words that reached us were: + +"Chief-mate wanted on board!" + +Every man of my crew knew what that meant as well as I did. As +second officer in command, there could be but one reason for wanting +me on board the Long-boat. A groan went all round us, and my men +looked darkly in each other's faces, and whispered under their +breaths: + +"The captain is dead!" + +I commanded them to be silent, and not to make too sure of bad news, +at such a pass as things had now come to with us. Then, hailing the +Long-boat, I signified that I was ready to go on board when the +weather would let me--stopped a bit to draw a good long breath--and +then called out as loud as I could the dreadful question: + +"Is the captain dead?" + +The black figures of three or four men in the after-part of the +Long-boat all stooped down together as my voice reached them. They +were lost to view for about a minute; then appeared again--one man +among them was held up on his feet by the rest, and he hailed back +the blessed words (a very faint hope went a very long way with +people in our desperate situation): "Not yet!" + +The relief felt by me, and by all with me, when we knew that our +captain, though unfitted for duty, was not lost to us, it is not in +words--at least, not in such words as a man like me can command--to +express. I did my best to cheer the men by telling them what a good +sign it was that we were not as badly off yet as we had feared; and +then communicated what instructions I had to give, to William Rames, +who was to be left in command in my place when I took charge of the +Long-boat. After that, there was nothing to be done, but to wait +for the chance of the wind dropping at sunset, and the sea going +down afterwards, so as to enable our weak crews to lay the two boats +alongside of each other, without undue risk--or, to put it plainer, +without saddling ourselves with the necessity for any extraordinary +exertion of strength or skill. Both the one and the other had now +been starved out of us for days and days together. + +At sunset the wind suddenly dropped, but the sea, which had been +running high for so long a time past, took hours after that before +it showed any signs of getting to rest. The moon was shining, the +sky was wonderfully clear, and it could not have been, according to +my calculations, far off midnight, when the long, slow, regular +swell of the calming ocean fairly set in, and I took the +responsibility of lessening the distance between the Long-boat and +ourselves. + +It was, I dare say, a delusion of mine; but I thought I had never +seen the moon shine so white and ghastly anywhere, either on sea or +on land, as she shone that night while we were approaching our +companions in misery. When there was not much more than a boat's +length between us, and the white light streamed cold and clear over +all our faces, both crews rested on their oars with one great +shudder, and stared over the gunwale of either boat, panic-stricken +at the first sight of each other. + +"Any lives lost among you?" I asked, in the midst of that frightful +silence. + +The men in the Long-bout huddled together like sheep at the sound of +my voice. + +"None yet, but the child, thanks be to God!" answered one among +them. + +And at the sound of his voice, all my men shrank together like the +men in the Long-boat. I was afraid to let the horror produced by +our first meeting at close quarters after the dreadful changes that +wet, cold, and famine had produced, last one moment longer than +could be helped; so, without giving time for any more questions and +answers, I commanded the men to lay the two boats close alongside of +each other. When I rose up and committed the tiller to the hands of +Rames, all my poor follows raised their white faces imploringly to +mine. "Don't leave us, sir," they said, "don't leave us." "I leave +you," says I, "under the command and the guidance of Mr. William +Rames, as good a sailor as I am, and as trusty and kind a man as +ever stepped. Do your duty by him, as you have done it by me; and +remember to the last, that while there is life there is hope. God +bless and help you all!" With those words I collected what strength +I had left, and caught at two arms that were held out to me, and so +got from the stern-sheets of one boat into the stern-sheets of the +other. + +"Mind where you step, sir," whispered one of the men who had helped +me into the Long-boat. I looked down as he spoke. Three figures +were huddled up below me, with the moonshine falling on them in +ragged streaks through the gaps between the men standing or sitting +above them. The first face I made out was the face of Miss +Coleshaw, her eyes were wide open and fixed on me. She seemed still +to keep her senses, and, by the alternate parting and closing of her +lips, to be trying to speak, but I could not hear that she uttered a +single word. On her shoulder rested the head of Mrs. Atherfield. +The mother of our poor little Golden Lucy must, I think, have been +dreaming of the child she had lost; for there was a faint smile just +ruffling the white stillness of her face, when I first saw it turned +upward, with peaceful closed eyes towards the heavens. From her, I +looked down a little, and there, with his head on her lap, and with +one of her hands resting tenderly on his cheek--there lay the +Captain, to whose help and guidance, up to this miserable time, we +had never looked in vain,--there, worn out at last in our service, +and for our sakes, lay the best and bravest man of all our company. +I stole my hand in gently through his clothes and laid it on his +heart, and felt a little feeble warmth over it, though my cold +dulled touch could not detect even the faintest beating. The two +men in the stern-sheets with me, noticing what I was doing--knowing +I loved him like a brother--and seeing, I suppose, more distress in +my face than I myself was conscious of its showing, lost command +over themselves altogether, and burst into a piteous moaning, +sobbing lamentation over him. One of the two drew aside a jacket +from his feet, and showed me that they were bare, except where a +wet, ragged strip of stocking still clung to one of them. When the +ship struck the Iceberg, he had run on deck leaving his shoes in his +cabin. All through the voyage in the boat his feet had been +unprotected; and not a soul had discovered it until he dropped! As +long as he could keep his eyes open, the very look of them had +cheered the men, and comforted and upheld the women. Not one living +creature in the boat, with any sense about him, but had felt the +good influence of that brave man in one way or another. Not one but +had heard him, over and over again, give the credit to others which +was due only to himself; praising this man for patience, and +thanking that man for help, when the patience and the help had +really and truly, as to the best part of both, come only from him. +All this, and much more, I heard pouring confusedly from the men's +lips while they crouched down, sobbing and crying over their +commander, and wrapping the jacket as warmly and tenderly as they +could over is cold feet. It went to my heart to check them; but I +knew that if this lamenting spirit spread any further, all chance of +keeping alight any last sparks of hope and resolution among the +boat's company would be lost for ever. Accordingly I sent them to +their places, spoke a few encouraging words to the men forward, +promising to serve out, when the morning came, as much as I dared, +of any eatable thing left in the lockers; called to Rames, in my old +boat, to keep as near us as he safely could; drew the garments and +coverings of the two poor suffering women more closely about them; +and, with a secret prayer to be directed for the best in bearing the +awful responsibility now laid on my shoulders, took my Captain's +vacant place at the helm of the Long-boat. + +This, as well as I can tell it, is the full and true account of how +I came to be placed in charge of the lost passengers and crew of the +Golden Mary, on the morning of the twenty-seventh day after the ship +struck the Iceberg, and foundered at sea. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg eText The Wreck of the Golden Mary + diff --git a/old/wrkgm10.zip b/old/wrkgm10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..61616e9 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/wrkgm10.zip |