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The Ocean Waifs: A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea

Chapter Forty.
Launching the Life-Preserver

It is scarce necessary to say that, during all this time. Little William, on board the Catamaran, was half wild with anxious thoughts. He had obeyed the first instructions shouted to him by Ben Brace, and taken to the steering-oar; but, after struggling for some time to get the craft round, and seeing that his efforts were of no avail, he dropped it to comply with the still later orders given by the sailor: to let loose the halliards and lower the sail. Ben had wondered, and with a slight feeling of chagrin, why this last order had not been executed, – at least more promptly, – for at a later period he knew the sail had been lowered; but Ben was of course ignorant of the cause of the delay.

His conjecture, however, afterwards expressed, when he half-remembered having put “a ugly knot on the haulyards”; which he, little William, “maybe warn’t able to get clear as fast as mout a been wished,” was perfectly correct; as was also the additional hypothesis that the sail had been got down at last, “either by loosin’ the belay or cuttin’ the piece o’ rope.”

The latter was in reality the mode by which the sailor-lad had succeeded in lowering the sail.

As Ben had conjectured, the belaying loop had proved too much for the strength of William’s fingers; and, after several fruitless efforts to untie the knot, he had at length given it up, and, seizing the axe, had severed the halliard by cutting it through and through.

Of course the sail came down upon the instant; but it was then too late; and when William again looked out over the ocean, he saw only the ocean itself, with neither spot nor speck to break the uniformity of its boundless bosom of blue.

In that glance he perceived that he was alone, – he felt for the first time that he was alone upon the ocean!

The thought was sufficient to beget despair, – to paralyse him against all further action; and, had he been a boy of the ordinary stamp, such might have been the result. But he was not one of this kind. The spirit which had first impelled him to seek adventure by sea, proved a mind moulded for enterprise and action. It was not the sort of spirit to yield easily to despair; nor did it then.

Instead of resigning himself up to fate or chance, he continued to exert the powers both of his mind and body, in the hope that something might still be done to retrieve the misfortune which had befallen the crew of the Catamaran. He again returned to the steering-oar; and, hastily detaching it from the hook upon which it had been mounted as a rudder, he commenced using it as a paddle, and endeavoured to propel the raft against the wind.

It is scarce necessary to say that he employed all his strength in the effort; but, notwithstanding this, he soon became convinced that he was employing it in vain. The huge Catamaran lay just as Snowball had characteristically described her, – “like a log o’ ’hogany wood in a calm ob de tropic.”

Even worse than this; for, paddle as he would, the sailor-lad soon perceived that the raft, instead of making way against the wind, or even holding its ground, still continued to drift rapidly to leeward.

At this crisis another idea occurred to him. It might have occurred sooner, had his mind not been monopolised with the hope of being able to row the raft to windward. Failing in this, however, his next idea was to throw something overboard, – something that might afford a support to the swimmers struggling in the water.

The first object that came under his eyes promising such rapport was the sea-kit of the sailor. As already stated, it was amidships, – where its owner had been exploring it. The lid was open, and little William perceived that it was wellnigh empty; since its contents could be seen scattered on all sides, just as the sailor had rummaged them out, forming a paraphernalia of sufficient variety and extent to have furnished the forecastle of a frigate.

The sight of the chest, with its painted canvas covering, which Little William knew to be water-tight, was suggestive. With the lid locked down, it might act as a buoy, and serve for a life-preserver. At all events, no better appeared to offer itself; and, without further hesitation, the lad slammed down the lid, which fortunately had the trick of locking itself with a spring, and, seizing the chest by one of the sennit handles, he dragged it to the edge of the raft, gave it a final push, and launched it overboard into the blue water of the ocean.

Little William was pleased to see that the kit, even while in the water, maintained its proper position, – that is, it swam bottom downwards. It floated buoyantly, moreover, as if it had been made of cork. He was prepared for this; for he remembered having listened to a conversation in the forecastle of the Pandora, relating to this very chest, in which Ben Brace had taken the principal part, and in which the sea-going qualities of his kit had been freely and proudly commented upon. William remembered how the ci-devant man-o’-war’s-man had boasted of his craft, as he called the kit, proclaiming it “a reg’lar life-buoy in case o’ bein’ cast away at sea,” and declaring that, “if ’t war emp’y, – as he hoped it never should be, – it would float the whole crew o’ a pinnace or longboat.”

It was partly through this reminiscence that the idea of launching the chest had occurred to little William; and, as he saw it receding from the stern of the Catamaran, he had some happiness in the hope, that the confidence of his companion and protector might not be misplaced; but that the vaunted kit might prove the preserver, not only of his life, but of the life of one who to little William was now even dearer than Ben Brace. That one was Lilly Lalee.

Chapter Forty One.
A Lookout from Aloft

After launching the kit, little William did not think of surrendering himself to inaction. He bethought him that something more should be done, – that some other waifs should be turned adrift from the Catamaran, which, by getting into the way of the swimmers, might offer them an additional chance of support.

What next? A plank? No; a cask, – one of the empty water-casks? That would be the thing, – the thing itself.

No sooner thought of than one was detached. The lashings were cut with the axe, in default of his finding a knife; and the cask, like the kit, soon fell into the wake. Not very rapidly it was true; for the Catamaran now, deprived of her sail, did not drift so fast to leeward as formerly. Still she went faster than either the kit or the cask, however; on account of the breeze acting upon her stout mast and some other objects that stood high upon her deck; and William very reasonably supposed that to swimmers so much exhausted, – as by that time must be both Ben and Snowball, – even the difference of a cable’s length might be of vital importance.

It occurred to him also, that the greater the number of waifs sent in their way, the better would be their chance of seeing and getting hold of one of them. Instead of desisting therefore, as soon as he had detached the first cask, he commenced cutting loose a second, and committing it to the sea in like manner.

Having freed a second, he continued on to a third, and then a fourth, and was actually about to sever the lashings of a fifth one, with the intention to leave only the sixth one – that which contained the stock of precious water – attached to the Catamaran. He knew that the raft would still float, without any of the casks to buoy it up; and it was not any fear on that score that caused him to desist, when about to give the cut to the cords that confined cask Number 5. It was an observation which he had made of an entirely different nature; and this was, that the third cask when set loose, and more especially the fourth, instead of falling into the wake of the Catamaran, kept close by her side, as if loath to part company with a craft to which they had been so intimately attached.

William wondered at this, but only for a short moment. He was not slow in comprehending the cause of the unexpected phenomenon. The raft, no longer buoyed up, had sunk almost to the level of the surface; and the breeze now failed to impel it any faster than the casks themselves: so that both casks and Catamaran were making leeway at a like rate of speed, or rather with equal slowness.

Though the sailor-lad was dissatisfied on first perceiving this, after a moment’s reflection, he saw that it was a favourable circumstance. Of course, it was not that the casks were making more way to leeward, but that the Catamaran was making less; and, therefore, if there was a chance of the swimmers coming up with the former, there was an equal probability of their overtaking the latter, – which would be better in every way. Indeed, the raft was now going at such a rate, that the slowest swimmer might easily overtake her, provided the distance between them was not too great.

It was this last thought that now occupied the mind of little William, and rendered him anxious. Had the swimmers fallen too far into the wake? Or would they still be able to swim on to the raft?

Where were they at that moment? He looked aft, towards the point from which he supposed himself to have been drifting. He was not sure of the direction; for the rude construction on which he stood had kept constantly whirling in the water, – now the stem, now the quarters, anon the bows, or beam-ends turned towards the breeze. He looked, but saw nothing. Only the sea-kit that by this time had got several hundred fathoms to windward, cask Number 1 a little nearer, and Number 2 still nearer. These, however, strung out in a line, enabled him to conjecture the direction in which the swimmers, if still above water, should be found.

Indeed, it was something more definite than a conjecture. Rather was it a certainty. He knew that the raft could not have made way otherwise than down the wind; and that those who belonged to it could not be elsewhere than to windward.

Guided, therefore, by the breeze, he gazed in this direction, – sweeping with his eye an arc of the horizon sufficiently large to allow for any deviation which the swimmers might have made from the true track.

He gazed in vain. The kit, the casks, a gull or two, soaring on snowy wings, were all the objects that broke the monotony of the blue water to windward.

He glided across the low-lying planks of the raft, and up to the empty cask still attached, which offered the highest point for observation. He balanced himself on its top, and once more scanned the sea to windward.

Nothing in sight, save kit, casks, and gulls lazily plying their long scimitar-shaped wings with easy unconcern, as if the limitless ocean was, – what in reality it was, – their habitat and home.

Suffering the torture of disappointment, – each moment increasing in agony, – little William leaped down from the cask; and, rushing amidships, commenced mounting the mast.

In a few seconds he had swarmed to its top: and, there clinging, once more directed his glance over the water. He gazed long without discovering any trace of his missing companions, – so long that his sinews were tried to the utmost; and the muscles both of his arms and limbs becoming relaxed, he was compelled to let go, and slide down despairingly upon the planks forming the deck of the Catamaran.

He stayed below only long enough to recover strength; and then a second time went swarming up the stick. If kit and casks should serve no better purpose, they at least guided him as to the direction; and looking over both, he scanned the sea beyond.

The gulls guided him still better; for both – there was a brace of them – had now descended near to the surface of the sea; and, wheeling in short flights, seemed to occupy themselves with some object in the water below. Though they were at a great distance off, he could hear an occasional scream proceeding from their throats: as if the object attracting them excited either their curiosity or some passion of a more turbulent character.

Their evolutions, – constantly returning towards a centre, – guided the eye of the observer until it rested on an object just visible above the sheen of the water. The colour of this object rendered it the more easy of being distinguished amidst the blue water that surrounded it; for it was blacker than anything which the sea produces, – unless it were the bone of the giant Mysticetus. Its shape, too – almost a perfect sphere – had something to do in its identification: for William was able to identify it, and by a process of negative reasoning. It was not the black albatross, the frigate-bird, nor the booby. Though of like colour, there was no bird of such form as that. There was neither beast nor fish belonging to the sea that could show such a shape above its surface. That sable globe, rounded like a sea-hedgehog, or a Turk’s-head clew, and black as a tarred tackle-block, could be nothing else than the woolly pate of Snowball, the sea-cook!

A little beyond were two other objects of dark colour and founded shape; but neither so dark nor so round as that already identified. They must be the heads of the English sailor and Lilly Lalee. They appeared to be equally objects of attraction to the gulls, that alternately flew from one to the other, or kept hovering above them, – and continuously uttering their shrill, wild screams, – now more distinctly heard by little William, clinging high up on the mast of the Catamaran.

Chapter Forty Two.
Once more aboard

The sailor-lad did not remain longer on the top of the mast than just to satisfy himself that what he saw were his companions, still afloat and alive. They were not at such a distance neither as to render it altogether impossible for them to recover their lost way; and, stimulated by this hope, little William determined upon continuing his efforts to assist them.

Gliding back upon the planks of the raft, he laid hold of the detached oar; and once more plying it as a paddle, he endeavoured to propel the Catamaran up the wind.

It is true he made but slight progress in this direction but he had the satisfaction of knowing that the craft held her ground, and something more; as he could tell from the fact of the casks last set loose by him, falling a little to leeward. This showed that he must himself be making way to the windward.

The sea-chest and the cask first loosed from its lashings, had been launched long before any of the others, – for it was only after an interval of reflection that he had set free the rest, – and the former were now far to windward. When looking from the masthead he had noted that the position of the swimmers was not so far beyond the kit; and it was scarce possible at that time, that they could have failed to discover it. Without staying to consider whether they had done so or not, William had come down from his perch; and now that he had reapplied himself to the oar, and saw that he was gaining ground in the right direction, he did not like to desist. Every fathom he made to windward was a fathom nearer to the saving of the lives of his companions, – a stroke less for the swimmers to make, – to whom, wearied as they must now be, the saving of even a single stroke might be an object.

With this thought urging him to perseverance, the sailor-lad stuck to his oar, wielding it with all the strength in his arms, and only thinking of the one purpose, – to make way against the wind. Fortunately the breeze, already gentle, seemed each moment to grow gentler, – as if unwilling to oppose his efforts in the cause of humanity; and little William perceived, to his great gratification, that the casks already passed by the Catamaran were falling far into her wake. This proved that he must be gaining upon the others.

All at once a glad sight came suddenly under his eyes. Earnestly occupied with the oar, he had permitted more than a minute to elapse without casting a glance ahead. When at length he renewed his lookout to windward, he was surprised to see, not only the cask and the sea-chest still nearer but on the top of the latter, a something that was not there before. Something that lay along the lid, with arms stretched downwards, and hands clutching its projecting edges. He also perceived two dark rounded objects in the water, – one near each end of the chest, – one rounder and blacker than the other, but both easily distinguishable as the heads of human beings.

The singular tableau was at once understood. Lilly Lalee was on the top of the sea-kit; Snowball and Ben Brace were flanking it, one at each end. The chest was supporting all three. Hurrah! they were saved!

Little William, at that moment, felt certain they would be saved; though that joyful certainty had not yet been communicated to them. Standing erect upon an elevated part of the raft, the boy had the advantage of them, and could note every movement they were making, without being seen by them.

He did not spend much time in merely looking at them. He knew that that would be of no avail; and after giving utterance to one or two joyous ejaculations, he returned to the oar, if possible plying it with greater energy than ever, from the renewed encouragement which he now derived from the confidence of success.

When he turned again and stood upright, looking to windward, the tableau had changed. Lilly Lalee was still lying along the lid of the chest, but only one head was seen in the water! It was that of the sailor, as the white face and the long flowing hair told him.

Where was the cranium of the sea-cook? Where was the skull of Snowball? Gone with his body to the bottom?

These interrogatories flashed across the brain of the lad, causing him a feeling of alarm. It was of short continuance, however. In the next moment they were answered, and to his satisfaction. The Coromantee was seen astride of the cask, more conspicuous than ever: only, being now in a slightly different direction, he had not been seen at the first glance.

Without shouting, or making any other idle demonstration, the intelligent youth once more applied himself to the oars, and vigorously propelled the raft to windward.

He did not again desist, until a voice falling upon his ear and, pronouncing his name, caused him to look once more in the direction of the swimmers.

Then, instead of seeing the Coromantee astride of the cask, he perceived the round black physiognomy of that individual above the surface of the water, and scarce a cable’s length from the Catamaran!

A double line of frothy ripple proceeding from each of his large spread ears, and running rapidly into his wake, indicated the direction in which he was swimming, – towards the raft, – while his eyeballs showing fearfully, and white as the froth itself, – the spluttering and blowing that proceeded from his thick lips, and the agitation of the sea around him, – all told that he was doing his very best to come up with the Catamaran.

“Golly!” he gasped out, on perceiving himself within safe distance of being heard. “Row dis way, lilly Willy! Row like de debbil, good lad! I’se most done up, – dat I be. In de space ob anoder cable length dis chile he muss a gub up!”

And ending his speech with a loud “Whugh,” partly to clear the water from his throat, and partly to express the satisfaction he felt at the near prospect of deliverance, he continued to strike on towards the raft.

In a few seconds more the long-protracted struggle was brought to a termination. Snowball succeeded in reaching the raft, and, assisted by the sailor-lad, clambered aboard.

Only staying to catch a little breath, the negro laid hold of the second oar; and the Catamaran, under the double stroke, was soon brought en rapport with the sea-chest; when the remainder of the crew were restored to her decks, and delivered from a death that but a short time before had framed so certain as to be inevitable.

Chapter Forty Three.
Refitting the Raft

On once more setting foot on the deck of the Catamaran the strong sailor was so thoroughly exhausted that he was unable to stand erect, and after scrambling aboard, and staggering a pace or two, he lay down along the planks. Lilly Lalee was taken care of by little William; who, half-leading, half-lifting her in his arms, tenderly placed her upon some pieces of canvas near the foot of the mast.

For this service, so fondly yet delicately performed, the boy felt himself amply rewarded by the glance of gratitude that shone in the eyes of the child, – even without the thanks faintly murmured by her on perceiving she was safe.

Snowball, equally exhausted, dropped into a recumbent position. All three remained silent for a considerable length of time, and without stirring either hand or foot, – as though to speak or move in their state of extreme weariness was impossible.

Little William, however, did not resign himself to inaction. As soon as he had disposed of Lalee, he made direct to that corner of the Catamaran where a small barrel or keg, half submerged under the water, was attached to one of the timbers of the craft. It was the keg containing the precious “Canary.”

Carefully extracting the bung, – which, in the lashing of the keg, had been purposely kept upwards, – he inserted a dipper, – that is to say, a small tin vessel, or drinking “taut,” – which had turned up among the stores of the sea-kit, and which, having been already used for the same purpose, was provided with a piece of cord attached around its rim, like the vessel in use among the gaugers or wine-merchants for drawing their wine from the wood. This was hoisted out again, filled with the sweet fluid which the keg contained; and which was at once administered, – first to Lilly Lalee, then to William’s own especial protector, Ben Brace; and lastly, after a fresh draw from the keg, to the real owner of the wine, – the Coromantee. The spirit of the grape, grown upon the declivities of Teneriffe, acted like magic on all three; and in a few minutes both sailor and sea-cook were sufficiently restored to think about taking certain prudent measures, that had now become necessary, and that would require a fresh exertion of their strength.

These measures were the recovery of the empty casks which William had detached from the Catamaran; and for the want of which that improvised craft not only lay much lower in the water than when they had left her, but was altogether a less seaworthy structure.

The sailor’s chest, – for which its owner now felt increased affection, – was the first thing secured; and next the cask upon which Snowball had bestraddled himself to get a better view. Both were near, and easily reached by a little rowing.

The other three casks had drifted to a considerable distance to leeward, and were still continuing their course; but as all three were in sight, the crew of the Catamaran anticipated no great difficulty in overtaking them.

Nor did any occur. A pair of oars handled by the sailor and sea-cook, with the sailor-boy standing up to direct the course in which they should pull, soon brought the raft down upon the straying hogsheads; and they were picked up one after the other, the severed ropes respliced, and all of them set back in their old positions, – so that but for the wet garments clinging around the bodies of those who had been overboard, and perhaps the pale and wearied expression upon their countenances, no one could have told that anything had gone wrong on board the Catamaran.

As to their wet clothes, none of them cared much for that; and if there had been any discomfort in it, it was not likely to continue long under the hot sun then shining down upon them. So rapidly was this part of the damage becoming repaired that all three, – but more especially Snowball – were now surrounded by a cloud of evaporation that would soon dry every stitch of clothing they had on.

The negro, – partly from the natural heat proceeding from his own body, and partly from the strong sunbeams, – was smoking like a fresh kindled pit of charcoal: so that, through the strata of steam that encompassed his head and shoulders, it would have been impossible to tell whether he was black or white. In the midst of this Juno-like nimbus however, the negro continued to talk and act, helping the sailor and little William, until not only were the water-casks restored to their proper places, but the sail was hauled up to the mast, and the Catamaran once more scudding before the breeze, as if not the slightest accident had occurred either to craft or crew.

Care was taken, however, this time to make fast the halliard rope with a proper “belay”; and although Snowball might have deserved a caution to be more vigilant for the future, it was not deemed necessary to administer it, as it was thought the peril out of which they had so miraculously escaped would prove to him a sufficient reminder.

There was but one misfortune arising out of the adventure that might have caused the crew of the Catamaran any serious regret. This was the loss of a large portion of their stock of provisions, – consisting of the dried fish, – partly those that had been half cured by Snowball previous to the union of the two rafts, and partly the flitches of shark-meat, that had been taken from the lesser raft, and added to Snowball’s store.

These, with the object of having them thoroughly dried, had been exposed to the sun, on the tops of the water-casks which little William had let loose. In the hurry and excitement of the moment, it was not likely the lad should give a thought to the flitches of fish. Nor did he; and while freeing the water-casks from their fastenings, and pushing them off from the raft, the pieces were all permitted to slide off into the water, and either swim or go to the bottom, as their specific gravity might dictate. The consequence was, that, when everything else was recovered, these were lost, – having actually gone to the bottom, or floated out of sight; or, what was more probable than either, having been picked up by the numerous predatory birds hovering in the heavens above, or the equally voracious fish quartering the depths of the ocean underneath.

It was not without some chagrin that Snowball contemplated his reduced stores, – a chagrin in which his companions could equally participate. At the time, however, they felt the misfortune less bitterly than they might otherwise have done, – their spirits being buoyed up by the miraculous escape they had just made, as well as by a hope that the larder so spent might be replenished, and by a process similar to that by which it had been originally stocked.