 Chapter 29 Part 1 of Two Years Before the Mast, loading for home. We turned in early, knowing that we might expect an early call, and, sure enough, before the stars had quite faded, and we were turned to, heaving out ballast. A regulation of the port forbids any ballast to be thrown overboard. Accordingly, our long boat was lined inside with rough boards and brought alongside the gangway, but where one tubful went into the boat twenty went overboard. This is done by every vessel, and it saves more than a week of labour, which would be spent in loading the boats, rowing them to the point, and unloading them. When the people from the prosidio were on board, the boat was hauled up in the ballast thrown in, but when the coast was clear, she was dropped astern again, and the ballast fell overboard. This is one of those petty frauds which many vessels practice in ports of inferior foreign nations, and which are lost sight of among the deeds of greater weight, which are hardly less common. Unfortunately, a sailor not being a free agent in work aboard ship is not accountable, yet the fact of being constantly employed without thought in such things begets an indifference to the rights of others. Friday and a part of Saturday we were engaged in this work until we had thrown out all but what we wanted under our cargo on the passage home. Then as the next day was Sunday, and a good day for smoking ship, we cleared everything out of the cabin and folk sole, made a slow fire of charcoal, birch bark, brimstone, and other matters, on the ballast in the bottom of the hold, cocked up the hatches, and opened every seam, and pasted over the cracks of the windows, and the slides of the scuttles and companion way. After smoke was seen coming out we cocked and pasted, and so far as we could made the ship smoke tight. The captain and officers slept under the awning which was spread over the quarter-deck, and we stowed ourselves away under an old studying-sole which we drew over one side of the folk-sole. The next day, from fear that something might happen in the way of fire, orders were given for no one to leave the ship, and as the decks were lumbered up, we could not wash them down, so we had nothing to do all day long. Unfortunately, our books were where we could not get at them, and we were turning about for something to do when one man recollected a book he had left in the galley. We went after it, and it proved to be Woodstock. This was a great windfall, and as all could not read it at once, I, being the scholar of the company, was appointed reader. I got a knot of six or eight about me, and no one could have had a more attentive audience. Some laughed at the scholars, and went over the other side of the folk-sole to work and spin their yarns, but I carried the day, and had the cream of the crew for my hearers. Many of the reflections in the political parts I omitted, but all the narrative they were delighted with, especially the descriptions of the Puritans, and the sermons and harangues of the round-head soldiers. The gallantry of Charles is Dr. Radcliffe's plots, the navery of Truzy Tompkins. In fact, every part seemed to chain their attention. Many things which, while I was reading, I had a misgiving about, thinking them above their taste. I was surprised to find them enter into completely. I read nearly all day, until sundown, when as soon as supper was over, as I had nearly finished, they got a light from the galley, and, by skipping what was less interesting, I carried them through to the marriage of Everard, and the restoration of Charles II, before eight o'clock. The next morning we took the battens from the hatches and opened the ship. A few stifled rats were found, and what bugs, cod-croaches, fleas, and other vermin there might have been on board must have unrove their lifelines before the hatches were opened. The ship being now ready, we covered the bottom of the hold over, fore and aft, with dried brush for dunnage, and having leveled everything away, we were ready to take in our cargo. All the hides that had been collected since the California left the coast, a little more than two years, amounting to about forty thousand, had been cured, dried, and stored away in the house, waiting for our good ship to take them to Boston. Now begin the operation of taking in our cargo, which kept us hard at work from the gray of the morning till starlight, for six weeks with the exception of Sundays, and of just time to swallow our meals. To carry the work on quicker, a division of labor was made. Two men threw the hides down from the piles in the house, two more picked them up and put them on a long, horizontal pull, raised a few feet from the ground, where they were beaten by two more with flails, somewhat like those used in threshing wheat. When beaten, they were taken from this pull by two more and placed on a platform of boards, and ten or a dozen men with their trousers rolled up and hides upon their heads were constantly going back and forth from the platform to the boat, which was kept off where she would just float. The throwing the hides upon the pull was the most difficult work, and required a slight of hand which was only to be got by long practice. As I was known for a hide cure, this post was assigned to me, and I continued at it for six or eight days, tossing in that time from eight to ten thousand hides until my wrists became so lame that I gave in and was transferred to the gang that was employed in filling the boats, where I remained for the rest of the time. As we were obliged to carry the hides in our heads from fear of their getting wet, we each had a piece of sheepskin sewed to the inside of our hats, with a roll next to our heads, and thus were able to bear the weight day after day, which might otherwise have worn off our hair and borne hard upon our skulls. Upon the hull ours was the best birth, for though the water was nipping cold early in the morning and late at night, and being so continually wet was rather an exposure, yet we got rid of the constant dust and dirt from the beating of the hides, and being all of us young and hearty did not mind the exposure. The older men of the crew, whom it would have been imprudent to keep in the water, remained on board with the mate to stow the hides away as fast as they were brought off by the boats. We continued at work in this manner until the lower hull was filled to within four feet of the beams, when all hands were called aboard to begin steeping. As this is a peculiar operation it will require a minute description. Before stowing the hides, as I have said, the ballast is leveled off, just above the kielsen, and then loose stentage is placed upon it on which the hides rest. The greatest care is used in stowing to make the ship hold as many hides as possible. It is no mean art, and a man skilled in it is an important character in California. Many in dispute have I heard raging hide between professed beachcombers as to whether the hides should be stowed shingling or back to back and flipper to flipper, upon which point there is an entire and bitter division of sentiment among the savants. We adopted each method at different periods of the stowing, and parties ran high in the folk soul, some siding with old Bill in favor of the former, and others scouting him and relying upon English Bob of the Ayakucho, who had been eight years in California, and was willing to risk his life and limb in the latter method. At length a compromise was affected, and a middle course of shifting the ends and backs at every lay was adopted, which worked well, and which each party granted was better than that of the other, though inferior to its own. Having filled up the ship in this way, to within four feet of her beams, the process of steving began, by which a hundred hides are got into a place where scarce one could be forced by hand, and which presses the hides to the utmost, sometimes starting the beams of the ship, resembling in its effects the jackscroops which are used in stowing cotton. Each morning we went ashore and beat and brought off as many hides as we could steve in a day, and after breakfast went down into the hold, where we remained at work till night, except a short spell for dinner. The length of the hold from stem to stern was floored off level, and we began with raising a pile in the after part, hard against the bulkhead of the run, and filling it up to the beams, crowding in as many as we could by hand, and pushing in with oars, when a large book was made from the twenty-five to fifty hides doubled at the backs, and placed one within another, so as to leave but one outside hide for the book. An opening was then made between two hides in the pile, and the back of the outside hide of the book inserted. Even below this book were placed smooth strips of wood, well greased, called weighs, to facilitate the sliding end of the book. Two long heavy spars, called steves, made of the strongest wood, and sharpened off like a wedge at one end, were placed with their wedge ends into the inside of the hide, which was the center of the book, and to the other end of each straps were fitted, to which large tackles were hooked. Note. This word, when used to signify a pulley or a purchase formed by blocks and a rope, is always by a semen pronounced tackle. End of note. Composed each of two huge purchase blocks, one hooked to the strap on the end of the steve, and the other into a dog fastened into one of the beams, as far aft as it could be got. When this was arranged in the weighs greased upon which the book was to slide, the falls of the tackles were stretched forward, and all hands tallied on, and bowsed away upon them until the book was well entered. When these tackles were nippered, straps and toggles clapped upon the falls, and two more loft tackles hooked on with dogs in the same manner. And thus, by loft upon loft, and power was multiplied, until into a pile in which one hide more could not be crowded by hand a hundred or a hundred and fifty were often driven by this complication of purchases. When the last loft was hooked on, all hands were called to the rope, cook, steward, and all, and ranging ourselves at the falls, one behind the other, sitting down on the hides, with their heads just even with the beams, we set taut upon the tackles, and striking up a song, and all laying back at the chorus, we bowed the tackles home, and drove the large books chock in out of sight. The sailor's songs for compstants and falls are of a peculiar kind, having a chorus at the end of each line. The burden is usually sung by one alone, and at the chorus all hands join in, and the louder the noise the better. With us the chorus seemed almost to raise the decks of the ship, and might be heard at a great distance ashore. A song is as necessary to sailors, as a drum and five to a soldier. They must pull together as soldiers must step in time, and they can't pull in time, or pull with a will, without it. Many a time when a thing goes heavy, one fellow yo-hoing a lively song like Heave to the Girls, Nancy-O, Jack Cross-Tree, Cheerily Men, etc., has put life and strength into every arm. We found a great difference in the effect of the various songs in driving in the hides. Two or three songs would be tried, one after another, with no effect. Not an inch could be got upon the tackles. When a new song struck up seemed to hit the humor of the moment, and drove the tackles, two blocks at once. Heave round Hardy, captain gone ashore, dandy ship and a dandy crew, and the like might go for common poles, but on an emergency when we wanted a heavy raise the dead pole, which should start the beams of the ship, there was nothing like, time for us to go round the corner, tally hi-ho you know, or hurrah hurrah my Hardy bullies. This was the most lively part of our work, a little boating and beach work in the morning, then twenty or thirty men down in a closed hold, where we were obliged to sit down and slide about, passing hides and rousing about the great steves, tackles and dogs, singing out at the falls, and seeing the ship filling up every day. The work was as hard as it could well be. There was not a moment's cessation for Monday morning till Saturday night, when we were generally beaten out and glad to have a full night's rest, a wash and a shift of clothes, and a quiet Sunday. During all this time, which would have startled Dr. Bram, we lived upon almost nothing but fresh beef, fried beef steaks three times a day, morning, noon, and night. That morning and night we had a quart of tea to each man in an allowance of about a pound of hard bread a day, but our chief article of food was beef. A mess consisting of six men, had a large wooden kid piled up with beef steaks, cut thick and fried and fat with the greased port over them. Around this we sat, attacking it with our jackknives and teeth, and with the appetite of young lions, and sent back an empty kid to the galley. This was done three times a day. How many pounds each man ate in a day I will not attempt to compute. A whole bullock, we ate liver and all, lasted us but four days. Such devouring of flesh I venture to say is not often seen. But one man ate in a day over a hearty man's allowance would make an English peasant's heart leap into his mouth. Indeed, nearing all the time we were upon the coast our principal food was fresh beef. And every man had perfect health. But this was a time of a special devouring, and what we should have done without meat I cannot tell. Once or twice when our bullocks felled, and we were obliged to make a meal upon dry bread and water, it seemed like feeding upon shavings. Light and dry, feeling unsatisfied, and at the same time full. We were glad to see four quarters of a bullock just killed swinging from the foretop. Whatever theories may be started by sedentary men, certainly no men could have gone through more hard work and exposure for sixteen months in more perfect health, and without aliens and failings than our ship's crew. Let them have lived upon Hygia's own baking and dressing. Friday, April 15th. Arrived Brick Pilgrim from the Wendard. It was a sad sight for her crew to see us getting ready to go off the coast, when they, who had been longer on the coast than the alert, were condemned to another year's hard service. I spent an evening on board, and found them making the best of the matter, and determined to rough it out as they might. But Stimson, after considerable negotiating and working, had succeeded in persuading my English friend, Tom Harris, my companion in the Inker Watch, for thirty dollars, some clothes, and an intimation Captain Flockin that he should want a second mate before the voyage was over, to take his place in the brig as soon as she was ready to go up to Wendard. The first opportunity I could get to speak to Captain Flockin, I asked him to step up to the oven and look at Hope, whom he knew well, having had him on board his vessel. He went to see him at once, and said that he was doing pretty well. But there was so little medicine on board the brig, and she would be so long on the coast, that he could spare none for him. But that Captain Arthur would take care of him when he came down to the California, which would be in a week or more. I had been to see Hope the first night after he got into San Diego this last time, and had frequently since spent the early part of the night in the oven. I hardly expected, when I left him to go to Wendard, to find him alive on my return. He was certainly as low as he could well be when I left him, and what would be the effect of the medicines that I gave him I hardly then dared to conjecture, yet I knew that he must die without them. I was not a little rejoiced therefore, and relieved upon our return to see him decidedly better. The medicines were strong, and took hold and gave a check to the disorder which was destroying him, and, more than that, they had begun the work of exterminating it. I never shall forget the gratitude that he expressed. All the Kanakas attributed his escape solely to my knowledge, and would not be persuaded that I had not all the secrets of the physical system open to me and under my control. My medicines, however, were gone, and no more could be got from the ship, so his life was left to hang upon the arrival of the California. On April 24 we had now been nearly seven weeks in San Diego, and taken in the greater part of our cargo, and were looking out every day for the arrival of the California, which had our agent on board, when, this afternoon, some Kanakas, who had been over the hill for rabbits and to fight rattlesnakes, came running down the path, singing out, SAIL HO, with all their might. Mr. Hatch, our third mate, was a sure, and asking them particularly about the size of the sail, et cetera, and learning that it was Moku, Nui Moku, hailed our ship, and said that the California was on the other side of the point. Instantly all hands were turned up. The bow-guns run out and loaded, the ensign and broad-penet set, the yards squared by lifts and braces, and everything got ready to make a fair appearance. The instant she showed her nose round the point, we begin our salute. She came in under top-gallant sails, clued up and furled her sails in good order, and came to within swinging distance of us. It being Sunday and nothing to do, all hands were on the folksal, criticizing the newcomer. She was a good substantial ship, not quite so long as the alert, wall-sided and kettle-bottomed, after the latest fashion of south shore cotton and sugar wagons, strong, too, and tight, and a good average sailor, but with no pretensions to beauty, and nothing in the style of a crack ship. Upon the whole we were perfectly satisfied that the alert might hold up her head with a ship twice as smart as she. At night some of us got a boat and went on board, and found a large roomy folksal, for she was squareer forward than the alert, and a crew of a dozen or fifteen men and boys sitting round on their chests, smoking and talking, and ready to give a welcome to any of our ship's company. It was just seven months since they left Boston, which seemed but yesterday to us. Accordingly we had much to ask, for though we had seen the newspapers which she had brought, yet these were the very men who had been in Boston, and seen everything with their own eyes. One of the green hands was a Boston boy from one of the public schools, and, of course, knew many things which we wished to ask about, and, on inquiring the names of our two Boston boys, found that they had been schoolmates of his. Our men had hundreds of questions to ask about Ann Street, the boarding houses, the ships and port, the rate of wages, and other matters. Among her crew were two English-maniforce men, so that, of course, we soon had music. They sang in the true sailor's style, and the rest of the crew, which was a remarkably musical one, joined in the choruses. They had many of the latest sailor's songs, which had not yet got about among our merchantmen, and which they were very choice of. They began soon after we came on board, and kept it up until after two bells, when the second mate came forward and called the Alerts Away! Battle songs, drinking songs, boat songs, love songs, and everything else, they seemed to have a complete assortment of, and I was glad to find that All in the Downs, Poor Tom Bolen, The Bay of Biscay, Listy Lansman, and other classical songs of the sea still held their places. In addition to these, they had picked up at the theaters and other places a few songs of a little more genteel cast, which they were very proud of, and I shall never forget hearing an old salt, who had broken his voice by hard drinking on shore, unbellowing from the masthead in a hundred norwesters, singing, with all manner of ungovernable trills and quavers, in the high notes breaking into a rough falsetto, and in the low ones, ground and long like the dying away of the bosons, all hands ahoy, down the hatchway. Oh no, we never mention him. Last line, he rowed out at the top of his voice, breaking each word into half a dozen syllables. This was very popular, and Jack was called upon every night to give them his sentimental song. No one called more loudly than I, for the complete absurdity of the execution and the sailor's perfect satisfaction in it were ludicrous beyond measure. End of Chapter 29 Part 1 Chapter 29 Part 2 of Two Years Before the Mast This little box recording is in the public domain. Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana Jr. Chapter 29 Part 2 Loading for Home The next day the California began unloading her cargo, and her boat's crews, in coming and going, saying their boat songs, keeping time with their oars. This they did all day long for several days, until their hides were all discharged, when a gang of them were sent on board the alert to help us steeve our hides. This was a windfall for us, for they had a set of new songs for the capstan and fall, and ours had got nearly worn out by six weeks constant use. I have no doubt that this timely reinforcement of songs hastened our work several days. Our cargo was now nearly all taken in, and my old friend, the pilgrim, having completed her discharge, unmoored, to set sail the next morning on another long trip to Winderd. I was just thinking of her hard lot, and congratulating myself on my escape from her. When I received a summons into the cabin, I went aft, and there found, seated round the cabin table, my own captain, Captain Falcon of the pilgrim, and Mr. Robertson, the agent. Captain Thompson turned to me and asked abruptly, Dana, do you want to go home in the ship? Certainly, sir, said I. I expect you to go home in the ship. Then, said he, you must get someone to go in your place on board the pilgrim. I was so completely taken aback by this sudden intimation that for a moment I could make no reply. I thought it would be hopeless to attempt to prevail upon any of the ship's crew to take twelve months more upon the California in the brig. I knew, too, that Captain Thompson had received orders to bring me home in the alert, and he had told me, when I was at the hide-house, that I was to go home in her. And even if this had not been so, it was cruel to give me no notice of the step they were going to take, until a few hours before the brig would sell. As soon as I had got my wits about me, I put on a bold front, and told him plainly that I had a letter in my chest informing me that he had been written to by the owners in Boston to bring me home in the ship, and, moreover, that he had told me that he had such instructions, and that I was to return in the ship. To have this told him, and to be opposed in such a manner, was more than my Lord Paramount had been used to. He turned fiercely upon me, and tried to look me down and face me out of my statement, but finding that that wouldn't do, and that I was entering upon my defense in such a way as would show to the other two that he was in the wrong, he changed his ground, and pointed to the shipping papers of the pilgrim, from which my name had never been erased, and said that there was my name, that I belong to her, that he had an absolute discretionary power, and, in short, that I must be on board the pilgrim by the next morning with my chest and hammock, or have someone ready to go in my place, and that he would not hear another word from me. No court of star chamber could proceed more summarily with a poor devil than this trail was about to do with me, condemning me to a punishment worse than a botany bay exile, and to a fate which might alter the whole current of my future life. For two more years in California might have made me a sailor for the rest of my days. I felt all this, and saw the necessity of being determined. I repeated what I had said, and insisted upon my right to return in the ship. I raised my arm and told my crack before them all, but it would have all availed me nothing, had I been some poor body before this absolute domineering tribunal. But they saw that I would not go, unless we at armies, and they knew that I had friends and interest enough at home to make them suffer for any injustice they might do me. It was probably this that turned the scale. For the captain changed his tone entirely, and asked me if, in any case, one went in my place, I would give him the same sum that Stimson gave Harris to exchange with him. I told him that if anyone was sent on board the break I should put him, and being willing to help him in that, are almost any amount, but would not speak of it as an exchange. Very well, said he. Go forward about your business and send English Ben here to me. I went forward with a light heart, fulfilling as much anger and contempt as I well could contain between my teeth. English Ben was sent after, and in a few moments came forward, looking as though he had received his sentence to be hanged. The captain had told him to get his things ready to go on board the break next morning, and that I would give him thirty dollars and a suit of clothes. The hands had knocked off for dinner and were standing about the folk soul when Ben came forward and told his story. I could see plainly that it made a great excitement, and that, unless I explained the matter to them, the filling would be turned against me. Ben was a poor English boy, a stranger in Boston and without friends or money, and being an active, willing lad and a good sailor for his years was a general favorite. Oh yes, said the crew, the captain has let you off because you are a gentleman's son and taken Ben because he is poor, and has got nobody to say a word for him. I knew that this was too true to be answered, but I excused myself from any blame, and told them that I had a right to go home at all events. This pacified them a little, but Jack had got a notion that a poor lad was to be imposed upon, and did not distinguish very clearly. And though I knew that I was in no fault, and, in fact, had barely escaped the grossest injustice, yet I felt that my birth was getting to be a disagreeable one, the notion that I was not one of them, which by participation in all their labor and hardships, and having no favors shown me and never asserting myself among them, had been laid asleep, was beginning to revive. But far stronger than any feeling for myself was the pity I felt for the poor lad. He had depended upon going home in the ship, and from Boston was going immediately to Liverpool to see his friends. Besides this, having begun the voyage with very few clothes, he had taken up the greater part of his wages in the slop chest, and it was every day a losing concern to him. And like all the rest of the crew, he had a hearty hatred of California, and the prospect of eighteen months or two years more of high-droging seemed completely to break down his spirit. I had determined not to go myself, happen what would, and I knew that the captain would not dare to attempt to force me. I knew, too, that the two captains had agreed together to get someone, and that unless I could prevail upon someone to go voluntarily, there would be no help for Ben. From this consideration, though I had said that I would have nothing to do with an exchange, I did my best to get someone to go voluntarily. I offered to give an order upon the owners in Boston for six months' wages, and also all the clothes, books, and other matters which I should not want upon the voyage home. When this offer was published in the ship, and the case of poor Ben set forth in strong colors, several who would not dream of going themselves were busy in taking it up to the others, who they thought might be tempted to accept it, and at length a Boston boy, a harem scarim lad, a great favorite, Harry May, whom we called Harry Bluff, and who did not care what country or ship he was in, if he had clothes enough and money enough, partly from pity for Ben, and partly from the thought that he should have cruising money for the rest of his stay, came forward, and offered to go and sling his hammock in the bloody hooker. Lest his purpose should cool, I signed an order for the summup on the owners in Boston, gave him all the clothes I could spare, and sent him aft to the captain, to let him know what had been done. The skipper accepted the exchange, and was doubtless glad to have it pass off so easily. At the same time he cashed the order, which was endorsed to him. Note, when our crew were paid off in Boston, the owners answered the orders of Stimson and me, but refused to deduct the amount from the payroll, saying that the exchanges were made under compulsion. End note. And the next morning the lad went aboard the brig, apparently in good spirits, having shaken hands with each of us and wished us a pleasant passage home, jingling the money in his pockets and calling out. Never say die while there's a shot in the locker! The same boat carried off Harris, my old watchmate, who had previously made an exchange with my friend Stimson. I was sorry to part with Harris. Nearly two hundred hours as we had calculated it, we had walked the ship's deck together at Inker Watch when all hands were below and talked over and over every subject which came within the kin of either of us. He gave me a strong grip with his hands, and I told him, if he came to Boston, not to fail to find me out, and let me see my old watchmate. The same boat brought on board Stimson, who had begun the voyage with me from Boston, and like me was going back to his family and to the society in which he had been born and brought up. We congratulated each other upon finding what we had long talked over and wished for, thus brought about, and none on board the ship were more glad than ourselves to see the old brig standing round the point under full sail. As she passed a breast of us we all collected in the waist, and gave her three loud, hearty cheers, waving our hats in the air. Her crews sprang into the rigging and chains, and answered us with three as loud, to which we, after the nautical custom, gave one in return. I took my last look of their familiar faces as they passed over the rail, and saw the old black cook put his head out of the galley and wave his cap over his head. Her crew flew aloft to loose the top gallant sails and royals, and two captains waved their hands to each other, and in ten minutes we saw the last inch of her white canvas as she rounded the point. Relieved as I was to see her well off, and I felt like one who had just sprung from an iron trap which was closing upon him, I had yet a feeling of regret at taking the last look at the old craft in which I had spent a year, and the first year of my sailor's life which had been my first home in the new world into which I had entered, and which I had associated so many events. My first leaving home, my first crossing the equator, Cape Horn, Juan Fernandez, Death at Sea, and other things, serious and common. Yet with all this, and the sentiment I had from my old shipmates condemned to another term of California life, the thought that we were done with it, and that one week more would see us on a way to Boston, was a cure for everything. Friday, May 6th, completed the getting in of our cargo, and it was a memorable day in our calendar. The time when we were to take in our last hide we had looked forward to, for sixteen months as the first bright spot. When the last hide was stowed away the hatches cocked down, the tarpaulins battened onto them, the long boat hoisted in and secured, and the decks swept down for the night. The chief mate sprang upon the top for the long boat, called all hands into the waist, and giving us a signal by swinging his cap over his head we gave three long, loud cheers, which came from the very bottom of our hearts and made the hills and valleys ring again. In a moment we heard three in answer from the California's crew, who had seen us taking in the long boat. The cry they heard, its meaning new. The last week we had been occupied in taking in the supply of wood and water for the passage home, and in bringing on board the spare spars, sails, etc. I was sent off with a party of Indians to fill the water casks at a spring about three miles from the shipping and near the town, and was absent three days, living at the town and spending the daytime and filling the casks, and transporting them on ox carts to the landing place, once they were taken on board by the crew with boats. This being all done with, we gave one day to bending our sails, and at night every sail, from the courses to the sky sails, was bent and every studying vessel ready for sitting. Before our sailing, an unsuccessful attempt was made by one of the crew of the California to effect an exchange with one of our number. It was a lad between fifteen and sixteen years of age, who went by the name of the Reefer, having been a midshipman in the East India Company ship. His singular character and story had excited our interest ever since the ship came into port. He was a delicate, slender little fellow, with a beautiful pearly complexion, regular features, forehead as white as marble, black hair curling beautifully round it, tapering delicate fingers, small feet, soft voice, gentle manners, and, in fact, every sign of having been well-born and bred. At the same time there was something in his expression which showed a slight deficiency of intellect. How great the deficiency was or what it resulted from, whether he was born so, whether it was the result of a disease or accident, or whether, as some said, it was brought on by his distress of mind during the voyage, I cannot say. From his account of himself and from many circumstances which were known in connection with his story he must have been the son of a man of wealth. His mother was an Italian. He was probably a natural son, for unscarsely any other way could the incidents of his early life be accounted for. He said his parents did not live together, and he seemed to have been ill-treated by his father, though he had been delicately brought up and indulged in every way, and he had then with him trinkets which had been given him at home. Yet his education had been sadly neglected, and when only twelve years old he was sent as a midshipman in the company's service. His own story was that he afterwards ran away from home upon a difficulty which he had with his father, and went to Liverpool once he sailed in the ship Rialto, Captain Holmes for Boston. Captain Holmes endeavored to get him a passage back, but there being no vessel to sail for some time, the boy left him, and went to board at a common sailor's boarding-house in Ann Street, where he supported himself for a few weeks by selling some of his valuables. At length, according to his own account, being desirous of returning home, he went to a shipping office where the shipping articles of the California were open. Upon asking where the ship was going, he was told by the shipmaster that she was bound for California. Not knowing where that was, he told him that he wanted to go to Europe, and asked if California was in Europe. The shipping master answered him in a way which the boy did not understand, and advised him to ship. The boy signed the articles, received his advance, laid out a little of it in clothes, and spent the rest, and was ready to go on board, when, upon the money of selling, he heard that the ship was bound upon the northwest coast on a two or three years voyage, and was not going to Europe. Frightened at this prospect, he slipped away when the crew were going aboard, wandered up into another part of the town, and spent all the foreign in it and straying about the common in neighboring streets, having no money and all his clothes and other things being in his chest on board, and being a stranger he became tired and hungry, and ventured down toward the shipping to see if the vessel had sailed. He was just turning the corner of the street when the shipping master, who had been in shirts of him, popped upon him, seized him, and carried him on board. He cried and struggled, and said he did not wish to go on the ship, but the topsoles were at the mast head, the fast just ready to be cast off, and everything in the hurry and confusion of departure, so that he was hardly noticed, and a few who did inquire about the matter were told that it was merely a boy who had spent his advance, and tried to run away. Had the owners of the vessel known anything of the matter, they would doubtless have interfered, but they either knew nothing of it, or heard, like the rest, that it was only an unruly boy who was sick of his bargain. As soon as the boy found himself actually at sea, and upon a voyage of two or three years in length, his spirits felled him. He refused to work, and became so miserable that Captain Arthur took him into the cabin, where he assisted the steward, and occasionally pulled and hauled about decks. He was in this capacity when we saw him, and though it was much better work for him than the life in the folk soul, and the hard work, watching, and exposure, which his delegate frame could not have borne, yet to be joined with a black fellow in waiting upon a man whom he probably looked upon as but little, in point of education and matters, above one of his father's servants, was almost too much for his spirit to bear. Had he entered upon this situation of his own free will, he could have endured it, but to have been deceived, and in addition to that, forced into it, was intolerable. He made every effort to go home on our ship, but his captain refused to part with him, except in the way of exchange, and that he could not affect. If this account of the whole matter which we had from the boy, and which was confirmed by the crew, be correct. I cannot understand why Captain Arthur should have refused to let him go, especially as he had the name, not only with that crew, but with all that he had ever commanded, of an unusually kind-hearted man. The truth is, the unlimited power which merchant captains have upon long voyages on strange coasts takes away the sense of responsibility, and not too often, even in men otherwise well-disposed, gives growth to a disregard for the rights and feelings of others. The land was sent on shore to join the gang at the hide-house. From thence I was afterwards rejoiced to hear. He affected his escape, and went down to Caleo in a small Spanish schooner, and from Caleo he probably returned to England. Soon after the arrival of the California I spoke to Captain Arthur about hope, the Canaka, and as he had known him on the voyage before and liked him, he immediately went to see him and gave him proper medicines, and under such care he began rapidly to recover. The Saturday night before our sailing I spent an hour in the oven and took leave of my Canaka friends, and, really, this was the only thing connected with leaving California which was in any way unpleasant. I felt an interest in affection for many of these simple, true-hearted men, such as I never felt before but for a near relation. Hope shook me by the hand, and said he should soon be well again, and ready to work for me when I came upon the coast next voyage as officer of the ship, and told me not to forget when I became Captain how to be kind to the sick. Old Mr. Bingham and King Manini went down to the boat with me, shook me heartily by the hand, and wished us a good voyage, and went back to the oven, chanting one of their deep monotonous improvised song, the burden of which I gathered to be about us and our voyage. Sunday, May 8. This promised to be our last day in California. Our 40,000 hides and 30,000 horns, beside several barrels of otter and beaver skins, were all stowed below, and the hatches cocked down. Note, we had also a small quantity of gold dust which Mexicans or Indians had brought down to us from the interior. It was not uncommon for our ships to bring a little, as I have since learned from the owners. I heard rumors of gold discoveries, but they attracted little or no attention, and were not followed up. End of note, all our spare spars were taken on board and lashed, our water cast secured, and our livestock, consisting of four blocks, a dozen sheep, a dozen or more pigs, and three or four dozens of poultry, were all stowed away in their different quarters. The bullocks and the longboats, the sheep in a pen on the forehatch, the pigs in a sty under the boughs of the longboat, and the poultry in their proper coop, and the jolly boat was full of hay for the sheep and bullocks. Our unusually large cargo, together with the stores for a five-month voyage, brought the ship channels down into the water. In addition to this, she had been steamed so thoroughly, and was so bound by the compression of her cargo, forced into her by machinery so powerful, that she was like a man in a straight jacket, and would be but a dull sailor until she had worked herself loose. The California had finished discharging her cargo, and was to get underway at the same time with us. Having washed down decks and got breakfast, the two vessels lay side by side in complete readiness for sea, our incense hanging from the peaks, and our tall spars reflected from the glossy surface of the river, which, since sunrise, had been unbroken by a ripple. At length a few whiffs came across the water, and by eleven o'clock the regular northwest wind set steadily in. There was no need for calling all hands, for we had all been hanging about the folksal the whole afternoon, and were ready for a start upon the first sign of a breeze. Often we turned our eyes out upon the captain, who was walking the deck, with every now and then a look to windard. He made a sign to the mate who came forward, took his station deliberately between the night heads, cast the glance aloft, and called out, hands lay aloft and loose to sails. We were half on the rigging before the order came, and never since we left Boston were the gaskets off the yards, and the rigging overhauled in a shorter time. Already forward, sir. Already the main. Crawl, Jack, yards ready, sir. Lay down all hands, but one on each yard. The yard arm and butt gaskets were cast off, and each sail hung by the jigger, with one man standing by the tie to let go. At the same moment that we sprang aloft, a dozen hands sprang into the rigging of the California, and in an instant we were all over her yards. And her sails, too, were ready to be dropped at the word. In the meantime our bow gun had been loaded and run out, and its ditch charge was to be the signal for dropping the sails. A cloud of smoke came out of our bows. The echoes of the gun rattled our farewell among the hills of California, and the two ships were covered from head to foot with their white canvas. For a few minutes all was uproar and apparent confusion. Men jumping about like monkeys in the rigging, ropes and blocks flying, orders given and answered amid the confused noises of men singing out of the ropes. The topsails came to the mastheads with cheerily men, and in a few minutes every sail was set, for the wind was light. The head sails were backed, the windlass came round, lips lapped to the cry of the sailors. Oh, short, sir, said the mate. Up with them. Aye, aye, sir. A few hardy and long heaves, and the anchor showed its head. Hook, cat! The fall was stretched along the decks. All hands laid hold. They're off for the last time, said the mate, and the anchor came to the cat head, to the tune of, Time for us to go, with a rollicking chorus. Everything was done quickly as though it was for the last time. The headyards were filled away, and our ship began to move through the water on her homeward bound course. The California had got underway at the same moment, and we sailed down the narrow bay abreast, and were just off the mouth, and gradually drawing ahead of her were on the point of giving her three-parting chairs when suddenly we found ourselves stopped short, and the California ranging fast ahead of us. A bar stretches across the mouth of the harbor with water enough to float common vessels, but being low in the water and having kept well to lured as we were bound to the southern, we had stuck fast, while the California, being light, had floated over. We kept all sail on in the hope of forcing over, but felling in this we hover back, and lay waiting for the tide, which was on the flood, to take us back into the channel. This was something of a damper to us, and the captain looked not a little mortified and vexed. This is the same place where the Rosa got ashore, sir. Observed our red-headed second mate, most mal apropos. A maladdiction on the Rosa and him, too, was all the answer he got, and he slunk off to lured. In a few minutes the force of the wind and the rising of the tide backed us into the stream, and we were on our way to our old anchoring place, the tide setting swiftly up, and the ship barely manageable in the light breeze. We came, too, in our old berth opposite the hide-house, whose inmates were not a little surprised to see us return. We felt as though we were tied to California, and some of the crew swore that they should never get clear for the bloody coast. Note, this is a common expletive among sailors, and suits any purpose. End note. In about half an hour, which was near Highwater, the order was given to man the windlass, and again the anchor was catted, but there was no song, and not a word was said about the last time. The California had come back on finding that we had returned, and was hoved, too, waiting for us off the point. This time we passed the bar safely, and were soon up with the California, who filled away and kept us company. She seemed desirous of a trial of speed, and our captain accepted the challenge, although we were loaded down to the bolts of her chain-plates, as deep as a sand barge, and bound so taut with our cargo that we were no more fit for a race than a man in fetters, while our antagonist was in her best trim. Being clear of the point, the breeze became stiff, and the royal mass bent under our sails, but we would not take them in until we saw three boys spring aloft into the rigging of the California, when they were all furled at once. But with orders to our boys to stay aloft at the top gallant mass-heads, and loose them again at the word, it was my duty to furl the four-royal, and while standing by to loose it again I had a fine view of the scene. From where I stood the two vessels seemed nothing but spars and sails, while their narrow decks, far below, slanting over by the force of the wind aloft, appeared hardly capable of supporting the great fabrics raised upon them. The California was too wintered of us, and had every advantage, yet, while the breeze was stiff, we held our own. As soon as it began to slacken, she ranged a little ahead, and the order was given to loose the royals. In an instant the gaskets were off and the bunt dropped. She'd home the four-royal. Whether she'd home, least she'd home, is balled from aloft. Overhaul your clue-lines, shouts the mate. Aye, aye, sir, all clear. Taught leach, belay. Well, the lee-brace, haul-taught to winderd. And the royals are set. These brought us up again, but the wind continuing light the California said hers, and it was soon evident that she was walking away from us. Our captain then hailed and said that he should keep off to his course, adding, She isn't the alert now. If I had her in your trim, she would have out of sight by this time. This was good-naturedly answered from the California, and she braced sharp up, and stood close upon the wind of the coast, while we squared away our yards, and stood before the wind to the south-south-west. The California's crew manned her weather-rigging, waved the hats in the air, and gave us three hearty cheers, which we answered as heartily, and the customary single cheer came back to us from over the water. She stood on her way, dimmed to eighteen months or two years hard service upon that hated coast, while we were making our way to our home, to which every hour and every mile was bringing us nearer. As soon as we parted company with the California, all hands were sent aloft to set the city's souls. Booms were rigged out, tacks and halyards rove, sail after sail packed upon her, until every available inch of canvas was spread, that we might not lose a breath of fair wind. We could now see how much she was cramped and deadened by her cargo, for with a good breeze in her quarter, in every stage of canvas spread, we could not get more than six knots out of her. She had no more life in her than if she were waterlogged. The log was hove several times, but she was doing her best. We had hardly patience with her. But the older sailors said, Dan, bye, you'll see her work herself loose in a week or two, and then she'll walk up to Cape Horn like a racehorse. When all sail had been set, and the decks cleared up, the California was a spec in the horizon, and the coast lay like a low cloud along the northeast. At sunset they were both out of sight, and we were once more upon the ocean, where sky and water meet. End of Chapter 29, Part 2 Chapter 30, of Two Years Before the Mast, by Richard Henry Dana, Jr. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 30, Homeward Bound At eight o'clock all hands were called aft, and the watch is set for the voyage. Some changes were made, but I was glad to find myself still in a labored watch. Our crew was somewhat diminished, for a man and a boy had gone to the pilgrim. Another was second mate of the Iocucho, and a third, Harry Bennett, the oldest man of the crew, had broken down under the hard work and constant exposure on the coast, and having had a stroke of the palsy, was left behind at the hidehouse under the charge of Captain Arthur. The poor fellow wished very much to come home in the ship, and he ought to have been brought home in her. But a live dog is better than a dead lion, and a sick sailor belongs to nobody's mess, so he was sent ashore with the rest of the lumber, which was the only way. He was on board with his chest in the morning, and tried to make himself useful about decks. But his shuffling feet and weak arms led him into trouble, and some words were said to him by the mate. He had the spirit of a man, and had become a little tender, perhaps weakened in mind, and said, Mr. Brown, I always did my duty aboard until I was sick. If you don't want me, say so, and I'll go ashore. Bring up his chest, said Mr. Brown, and poor Bennett went down into a boat, and was taken ashore with tears in his eyes. He loved the ship and the crew, and wished to get home, but could not bear to be treated as a soldier or loafer on board. This was the only hard-hearted thing I ever knew Mr. Brown to do. By these diminuations we were shorthanded for a voyage round Cape Horn in the dead of winter. Besides Stimson and myself, there were only five in the folk cell, who, together with four boys in the steerage, the sailmaker, carpenter, and cook, and steward, composed the crew. In addition to this we were only four days out when the sailmaker, who was the oldest and best seamen on board, was taken with a palsy, and was useless for the rest of the voyage. A constant wading in the water, in all weathers to take off hides, together with the other labours, is too much for men, even in middle life, and for any who have not good constitutions. Besides these two men of ours, the second officer of the California and the carpenter of the pilgrim, as we afterwards learned, broke down under the work, and the latter died at Santa Barbara. The young man, too, Henry Mellis, who came out with us from Boston in the pilgrim, had to be taken from his birth before the mast and made clerk, on account of a fit of rheumatism, which attacked him soon after he came on the coast. By the loss of the sailmaker, our watch was reduced to five, of whom two were boys, who never steered but in fine weather, so that the other two and myself had to stand at the wheel four hours apiece out of every twenty-four, and the other watch had only four helmsmen. Nevermind were homeward bound was the answer to everything, and we should not have minded this were it not for the thought that we should be off Cape Horn in the very dead of winter. It was now the first part of May, and two months would bring us off the Cape in July, which is the worst month in the year there, when the sun rises at nine and sets at three, giving eighteen hours night, and there is snow and rain, gales and high seas in abundance. The prospect of meeting this in a ship half-manned and loaded so deep that every heavy sea must wash her for an aft, was by no means pleasant. The alert in her passage out doubled the Cape in the month of February, which is mid-summer, and we came round in the pilgrim in the latter part of October, which we thought was bad enough. There was only one of our crew who had been off there in the winter, and that was in a whale ship much lighter and higher than our ship, yet he said they had man-killing weather for twenty days without intermission, and their decks were swept twice, and they were all glad enough to see the last of it. The brandy one frigate, also in her recent passage round, had sixty days off the Cape, and lost several boats by the heavy seas. All this was for our comfort. Yet pass it we must, and all hands agreed to make the best of it. During our watches below, we overhauled our clothes and made and mended everything for bad weather. Each of us had made for himself a suit of oil cloth or tarpaulin, and these we got out, and gave thorough coatings of oil or tar, and hung upon the stays to dry. Our stout boots, too, we covered over with a thick mixture of melted grease and tar. Thus we took advantage of the warm sun and fine weather of the Pacific to prepare for its other face. In the forenoon watches below, our folksal looked like the workshop of what a sailor is, a jacket all trades. Thick stockings and drawers were darned and patched, mittens dragged from the bottom of the chest and mended, comforters made for the neck and ears, old flannel shirts cut up to line monkey jackets, saw westers relined with flannel and a pot of paint smuggled forward to give them a coat on the outside, and everything turned to hand, so that, although two years had left us but a scanty wardrobe, yet the economy and invention which necessity teaches a sailor soon put each of us in pretty good trim for bad weather, before we had seen the last of the fine. Even the cobbler's art was not out of place. Several old shoes were very decently repaired and with waxed ends, an awl, and the top of an old boot. I made me quite a respectable sheath for my knife. There was one difficulty, however, which nothing that we could do would remedy, and that was the leaking of the folksal, which made it very uncomfortable in bad weather, and rendered half the births tenetless. The tightest shifts in a long voyage from the constant strain which is upon the bow sprit will leak more or less around the heel of the bow sprit and the bits, which came down into the folksal. But, in addition to this, we had an unaccountable leak on the starboard bow near the cat head, which drove us from the forward birth on that side, and, indeed, when she was on the starboard tack from all the forward births. One of the after births, too, leaked in very bad weather, so that, in a ship, which was in other respects usually tight, and brought her cargo to Boston perfectly dry, we had, after every effort made to prevent it, in the way of cocking and leading, a folksal with only three dry births for the seven of us. However, as there is never but one watch below at a time, by turning in and out we did pretty well, and there being in our watch but three of us who lived forward, we generally had a dry birth apiece in bad weather. Note, on removing the cat head after the ship arrived in Boston, it was found that there were two holes under it, which had been bored for the purpose of driving tree-nose, and which, accidentally, had not been plugged up when the cat head was placed over them. This provoking little piece of negligence caused us great discomfort. All this, however, was but anticipation. We were still in fine weather in the North Pacific, running down the northeast trains, which we took on the second day after leaving San Diego. Sunday, May 15th, one week out, we were in latitude 14 degrees, 36 minutes north, longitude 116 degrees, 14 minutes west, having gone by reckoning over 1,300 miles in seven days. In fact, ever since leaving San Diego, we had had a fair wind, and as much as we wanted of it. For seven days, our lower and topmost studying cells were set all the time, and our royals and top-gallant studying souls whenever she could stagger under them. Indeed, the captain had shown from the moment we got to sea that he was to have no boy's play, but that the ship was to carry all she could, and that he was going to make up by cracking on to her what she wanted in lightness. In this way, we frequently made three degrees of latitude beside something in longitude in the course of 24 hours. Our days were spent in the usual ship's work. The rigging which had become slack from being long in port was to be set up. The breastback stays got up, studying soul booms rigged upon the main yard, and royal studying souls got ready for the light trades, ring-tail set, and new rigging fitted and sails made ready for Cape Horn. Four, with the ship's gear, as well as a sailor's wardrobe, fine weather must be improved to get ready for the bad to come. Our four-noon watch below, as I have said, was given to our own work, and our night watches were spent in the usual manner. A trick at the wheel, a lookout on the foxtail, a nap on a coil of rigging under the lee of the rail, a yarn around the windless end, or, as was generally my way, a solitary walk for and aft, in the weather waste between the windless end and the main tack. Every wave that she threw aside brought us nearer home, and every day's observation at noon showed a progress, which, if it continued, would in less than five months take us into Boston Bay. This is the pleasure of life at sea, fine weather, day after day without interruption, fair wind and aplenty of it, and homeward bound. Everyone was in good humor, things went right, and all was done with a will. At the dog watch, all hands came on deck and stood round the weather side of the foxtail, or sat upon the windless, and sung sea songs and those ballads of pirates and high women, which sailors delight in. Home, too, and what we should do when we got there, and when and how we should arrive was no infrequent topic. Every night after the kids and pots were put away, and we had lighted our pipes and cigars in the galley, gathered about the windless, the first question was, Well, Dana, what was the latitude today? Why, fourteen north, and she has been going seven knots ever since. Well, this'll bring us to the line in five days. Yes, but these trades won't last twenty-four hours longer. Says an old salt, pointing with the sharp of his hand to Lord. I know that by the look of the clouds. Then came all manner of calculations and conjectures as to the continuance of the wind, the weather unto the line, the southeast trades, etc., and rough guesses asked the time the ship would be up with the horn, and some, more venturous, gave her so many days to Boston light and offered to bet that she would not exceed it. You'd better wait till we get round Cape Horn, says an old croaker. Yes, says another, you may see Boston, but you got to smell hell before that good day. Rumors also of what had been said in the cabin, and as usual, found their way forward. The steward had heard the captain say something about the Straits of Magellan, and the men of the wheel fancied he had heard him tell, the passenger, that, if he found the wind ahead and the weather very bad off a cape, he should stick her off for New Holland, and come round the Cape of Good Hope. This passenger, the first and only one we had had, except to go from port to port on the coast, was no one else than a gentleman whom I had known in my smoother days, and the last person I should have expected to see off the coast of California, Professor Nuttle of Cambridge. I had left him quietly seated in the chair of Botany in Oranthology in Harvard University, and the next I saw of him he was strolling about San Diego Beach, in a sailor's pea jacket with a wide straw hat and barefooted, with his trousers rolled up to his knees, picking up stones and shells. He had traveled overland to the northwest coast, and come down in a small vessel to Monterey. There he learned there was a ship in the lured about to sail for Boston, and taking passage in the pilgrim, which was then at Monterey. He came slowly along, visiting the intermediate ports, and examining the trees, plants, earths, birds, etc., and joined us at San Diego shortly before we sailed. The second mate of the pilgrim told me that they had an old gentleman on board who knew me, and came from the college that I had been in. He could not recollect his name, but said he was a sort of oldish man with white hair, and spent all his time in the bush and along a beach picking up flowers and shells in such truck, and had a dozen boxes and barrels full of them. I thought over everybody who would be likely to be there, but could fix upon no one, when, the next day, just as we were about to shove off from the beach, he came down to the boat in the rig I have described, with his shoes in his hand and his pockets full of specimens. I knew him at once, though I should hardly have been more surprised to have seen the old South Steeple shoot up from the hide house. He probably had no more difficulty in recognizing me. As we left home, about the same time, we had nothing to tell each other, and owing to our different situations on board, I saw little of him on the passage home. Sometimes, when I was at the wheel of a calm night, and the steerage required little attention, and the officer of the watch was forward, he would come aft and hold a short yarn with me, but this was against the rules of the ship, as is, in fact, all intercourse between passengers and the crew. I was often amused to see the sailors puzzled to know what to make of him, and to hear the conjectures about him and his business. They were as much at a loss as our old cellmaker was with the captain's instruments in the cabin. He said there were three, the cronometer, the crionometer, and the thenometer. The pilgrims crew called Mr. Nuttle, old Curious, from his zeal for curiosities, and some of them said that he was crazy, and that his friends let him go about and amuse himself in this way. Why else would a rich man, sailors call every man rich who does not work with his hands and who wears a long coat and a crevette, should leave a Christian country and come to such a place as California to pick up shells and stones they could not understand? One of them, however, who had seen something more of the world ashore, said all to rights as he thought. Oh, vast there! You don't know anything about the craft. I've seen them colleges and know the ropes. They keep all such things for curiosities and study them, and have meant a purpose to go and get them. This old chap knows what he's about. He ain't the child you'd take him for. He'll carry all these things to the college, and if they are better than any that they have had before, he'll be the head of the college. Then, by and by, somebody else will go after some more. And if they beat him, you'll have to go again, or else give up his birth. That's the way they do it. This old Coney knows the ropes. He has worked to trevus over them, and come way out here, where nobody's ever been before, and where they'll never think of coming. This explanation satisfied Jack, and as it raised Mr. Nuttle's credit, and was near enough to the truth for common purposes, I did not disturb it. With the exception of Mr. Nuttle, we had no one on board but the regular ship's company in the line stock. Upon the stock we had made a considerable in-road. We killed one of the bullocks every four days, so that they did not last us up to the line. We, or rather the cabin, then begin upon the sheep and the poultry, for these never come into Jack's mess. Note, the customs as to the allowance of grub are very nearly the same in all American merchantmen. Whenever a pig is killed, the sailors have one mess from it. The rest goes to the cabin. The smaller livestock, poultry, etc., the sailors never taste. And indeed they do not complain of this, for it would take a great deal to supply them with a good meal. And without the accompaniments, which could hardly be furnished to them, it would not be much better than salt beef. But even as to the salt beef they are scarcely dealt fairly with. For whenever a barrel is opened before any of the beef is put into the harness cask, the steward comes up and picks it all over and takes out the best pieces, those that have any fat in them, for the cabin. This was done in both the vessels I was in, and the men said that it was usual in other vessels. Indeed it is made no secret, and some of the crew are usually called to help in assorting and putting away the pieces. By this arrangement the hard dry pieces, which the sailors call old horse, come to their share. There is a singular piece of rhyme, traditional among sailors, which they say over such pieces of beef. I do not know that it ever appeared in print before. When seated round the kid, if a particular bad piece is found, one of them takes it up and addresses it thus. There is a story current among seamen, that a beef dealer was convicted at Boston, of having sold old horse for ship stores, instead of beef, and had been sentenced to be confined in jail until he should eat the whole of it, and that he is now lying in Boston jail. I have heard this story often on board other vessels besides those of our own nation. It is very generally believed, and is always highly commended as a fair instance of retaliatory justice. End note. The pigs were left for the latter part of the voyage, for they are sailors and can stand all weathers. We had an old sow on board, the mother of numerous progeny, who had been twice round the Cape of Good Hope and once round Cape Horn. The last time going round was very nearly her death. We heard her squilling and moaning one dark night after it had been snowing and hailing for several hours, and climbing over into the sty we found her nearly froze to death. We got some straw and old sail and other things, and wrapped her up in a corner of the sty, where she stayed until we came into fine weather again. Wednesday, May 18th, latitude 9 degrees, 54 minutes north, longitude 113 degrees, 17 minutes west. The northeast trades had now left us, and we had the usual variable winds, the dual drums, which prevailed in the line, together with some rain. So long as we were in these latitudes, we had but little rest in our watch on deck at night, for as the winds were light and variable, and we could not lose a breath, we were all the watch bracing the yards and taking in and making sail, and humbugging with our flying kites. A little puff of wind on the larbored quarter, and then larbored four braces, and studying soul bones were rigged out, studying soul set aloe and aloft, the yards trimmed, the jibs and spanker in, when it would come as calm as a duck pond, the man at the wheel standing with the palm of his hand up, filling for the wind. Keep her off a little! All the back forward, sir, cries a man from the folk soul. Down where the brace is again, in come the studying soul all in a mess, which half an hour won't set right. Yards brace sharp up, and she's on the starboard tack, close hold. The studying souls now must be cleared away, and set up in the tops and on the booms, and the gear cut off and made fast. By the time this is done, and you are looking out for a soft plank for a nap, lay off here and square in the head yards, and the studying souls are all set again on the starboard side, so it goes until it is eight bales. Call the watch, leave the log, leave the wheel, and go below the larbid watch. Sunday, May 22nd, latitude five degrees 14 minutes north, longitude 116 degrees 45 minutes west. We were now a fortnight out, and within five degrees of the line to which two days of good breeze would take us. But we had, for the most part, with a sailor's call, an Irishman's hurricane, right up and down. This day it rained nearly all day, and, being Sunday in nothing to do, we stopped up the scuppers and filled the decks with rainwater, and bringing all our clothes on deck had a grand wash for and aft. When this was through, we stripped to our drawers and taking pieces of soap with strips of canvas for towels. We turned to and soaped, washed, and scrubbed one another down. To get off, as we said, the California grime. For the common wash and saltwater, which is all that Jack could get, being on an allowance of fresh, had little efficacy, and was more for taste than utility. The captain was below all the afternoon, and we had something nearer to Saturnalia than anything we had yet seen. For the mate came into the scuppers with a couple of boys to scrub him, and got into a contest with them in heaving water. By unplugging the holes, we let the soap suds off the deck, and in a short time had a new supply of clear rainwater, in which we had a grand rinsing. It was surprising to see how much soap and fresh water did for the confliction of many of us, how much of what we supposed to be tan and sea-blocking we got rid of. The next day the sun, rising clear, the ship was covered, four and aft, with clothes of all sorts hanging out to dry. As we approached the line, the wind came more easterly, and the weather clearer, and in twenty days from San Diego, Saturday, May 28th, at about three p.m., with a fine breeze from the east-south-east, we crossed the equator. In twenty-four hours after crossing the line we took, which was very unusual, the regular southeast trades. These winds came a little from the eastward of southeast, and with us they blew directly from the east-south-east, which was fortunate for us, as our course was south by west, and we could thus go one point free. The yards were braced so that every sail drew from the spanker to the flying jib, and the upper yards being squared in a little. The four and main top-gallant setting-sills were set, and drew handsomely. For twelve days this breeze blew steadily, not very in a point, and just so fresh that we could carry our royals, and during the whole time we hardly started a brace. Such progress did we make that on the end of seven days from the time we took the breeze on Sunday June 15th. We were in latitude nineteen degrees, 29 minutes south, and longitude 118 degrees, 01 minutes west, having made 1200 miles in seven days, very nearly upon a top bowline. Our good ship was getting to be herself again, and had increased her rate of sailing more than one-third since leaving San Diego. The crew ceased complaining of her, and the officers hoved the log every two hours with evident satisfaction. This was glorious sailing, a steady breeze, the light trade winds clouds over our head, the incomparable temperature of the Pacific, neither hot nor cold, a clear sun every day, and clear moon and stars every night, and new constellations rising in the south were the familiar ones sinking in the north, as we went on our course, stemming nightly toward the pole. Already we had sunk the north star in Great Bear, while the southern cross appeared well above the southern horizon, and all hands looked out sharp to the southern for the Magellan clouds, which each succeeding night we expected to make. The next time we see the north star, said one, we shall be standing to the northward, the other side of the horn. This was true enough, and no doubt it would be a welcome sight, for sailors say that in coming home from round Cape Horn, or the Cape of Good Hope, the north star is the first land you make. These trades were the same that in passage out in the pilgrim lasted nearly all the way from Juan Fernandez to the line, blowing steadily on our starboard quarter for three weeks, without our starting embrace, or even brailing down the skisals. Though we had now the same wind and were in the same latitude with the pilgrim on her passage out, yet we were nearly twelve hundred miles to the westward of her course. For the captain, depending upon the strong southwest winds which prevail in high, southern latitudes during the winter months, took the full advantage of the trades, and stood well to the westward, so far that we passed within about two hundred miles of Ducey's Island. It was this weather and selling that brought to my mind a little incident that occurred on board the pilgrim while we were in the same latitude. We were going along at a great rate, dead before the wind, with studying souls out on both sides, alone aloft, on a dark night, just after midnight, and everything as still as the grave, except the washing of the water by the vessel's side. Four, being before the wind, with a smooth sea, the little brig covered with canvas was doing great business with very little noise. The other watch was below, and all our watch, except myself and the man at the wheel, were asleep under the lee of the boat. The second mate, who came out before the mast, and was always very thick with me, had been holding a yarn with me, and had just gone after his place in the quarterdeck, and I had resumed my usual walk to and from the windless end, when suddenly we heard a loud scream coming from ahead, apparently from directly under the bowels. The darkness and complete stillness of the night, and the solitude of the ocean gave to the sound a dreadful and almost supernatural effect. Eyes stood perfectly still, and my heart beat quick. The sound woke up the rest of the watch, who stood looking at one another. What in the name of God is that? said the second mate, coming slowly forward. The first thought I had was that it might be a boat with a crew of some wrecked vessel, or perhaps the boat of some wellship, out overnight, and we had run it down in the darkness. This started us, and we ran forward and looked over the bowels and over the sides to Lourde, but nothing was to be seen or heard. What was to be done? Heave the ship aback and called the captain? Just at this moment, in crossing the folksal, one of the men saw light below, and looking down a scuttle, saw the watch all out of their berths, and a foul of one poor fellow dragging him out of his berth and shaking him to wake him out of a nightmare. They had been waked out of their sleep, and as much alarmed at the scream as we were, and were hesitating whether to come on deck, when the second sound, proceeding directly from one of the berths, revealed the cause of the alarm. The fellow got a good shaking for the trouble he had given, and we could well laugh, for our minds were not a little relieved by its ridiculous termination. We were now close upon the southern topical line, and, with so fine a breeze, were daily leaving the sun behind us, and drawing nearer to Cape Horn, for which it behooved us to make every preparation. Our rigging was overhauled and mended, or changed for new, where it was necessary. New and strong bobstays fitted in the place of the chain ones, which were worn out. The spritzel yard and martingale guise and back rope set well-taught. Brand-new four and main braces-rove, top-gallant sheets and wheel-ropes, made of green hide, laid up in the form of rope, were stretched and fitted. And new top-soclu lines, et cetera, rope, new four-top must-backstays fitted, and other preparations made in good season, that the ropes might have time to stretch and become limber before we got into cold weather. Sunday, June 12th, latitude 26 degrees, four minutes south, longitude 116 degrees, 31 minutes west. We had not lost the regular trades and had the winds variable, principally from the westward, and kept on in a southerly course, selling very nearly upon the meridian, and at the end of the week, Sunday, June 19th. We were in latitude 34 degrees, 15 minutes south, and longitude 116 degrees, 38 minutes west. End of chapter 30