Under Sail. Felix Riesenberg
the peculiar one sided lay of his mind. The hard knocks of experience were alone accountable for his knowledge, varied and picturesque in the telling. He was chockful of religion and was constantly repenting the bad deeds of his youth, telling them at great length, and with such relish, that it seemed they had come to be his one unfailing source of enjoyment. A terrible drunk in his day, he had also indulged in robbery, having looted a house in Australia while tramping overland to Sydney from Port Hunter, where he had "jumped" a schooner, leaving everything behind, because of a row with the mate, in which he felled him with a handspike.
"Walked away with a piece o' change an' a whole kit o' dunnage," was the way he put it.
And also, according to his story, Jimmy had been a lightweight fighter in his youth, many, many years before. He was the best chantey-man in the crew; to hear him "sing" a rope was an inspiration to tired arms and backs.
While memory lasts, the picture of our first chantey, a few days after leaving port, will remain with me as one of the great thrills that have come my way. A heavy squall in the forenoon watch sent all of our tops'l yards to the caps, everything coming down by the run, to hang slatting in the gear. Sky sails, royals, flying jib, t'gans'ls, jib tops'l, jib, fore topmast stays'l, and then the upper tops'ls were lowered, the latter thrashing and straining against the downhauls as the ship heeled to it almost on her beam ends, gaining headway with a rush, and righting herself as we spilled the wind from the bulging canvas.
Passing as quickly as it came, the squall left us wallowing under lower tops'ls, the courses hanging in their gear.
All hands were called to make sail, and as we manned the main tops'l halyards Jimmy Marshall jumped to the pin rail, and with one leg over the top of the bulwark, he faced the line of men tailing along the deck.
"A chantey, boys!" shouted Mr. Stoddard as he took his place "beforehand" on the rope. "Come now, run her up, lads. Up! Up!" and the heavy yard commenced to creep along the mast to the sound of the creaking parral, the complaining of the blocks, and the haunting deep sea tune of "Blow the Man Down," greatest of all the two haul chanteys.
Jimmy—"Now rouse her right up boys for Liverpool town,"
Sailors—"Go way—way—blow the man down."
Jimmy—"We'll blow the man up and blow the man down,"
Sailors—"Oh, give us some time to blow the man down."
Jimmy—"We lay off the Island of Maderdegascar." Sailors—"Hi! Ho! Blow the man down." Jimmy—"We lowered three anchors to make her hold faster," Sailors—"Oh, give us some time to blow the man down."
Chorus
All hands—"Then we'll blow the man up,
And we'll blow the man down,
Go way—way—blow the man down.
We'll blow him right over to Liverpool town,
Oh, give us some time to blow the man down.
Ho! Stand by your braces,
And stand by your falls;
Hi! Ho! Blow the man down,
We'll blow him clean over to Liverpool town,
Oh, give us some time to blow the man down."
Old Marshall faced to windward, his mustache lifting in the breeze, the grey weather worn fringe of hair bending up over his battered nose. He always sang with a full quid in his cheek, and the absence of several front teeth helped to give a peculiar deep-sea quality to his voice.
"We have a man-o-war crew aboard, Mr. Zerk!" shouted the Captain from the top of the cabin, where he had come out to see the fun.
"Aye, aye, sir! Some crew!" returned the Mate, looking over us with a grim smile.
CHAPTER III
CHRISTMAS DAY ON THE HIGH SEAS
Life was not always so pleasant on board the Fuller. Hard words were the common run of things and the most frightful and artistic profanity often punctuated the working of the ship. Given a ship's company barely strong enough to handle a two thousand five hundred ton three-skysail yarder, even had they all been seasoned able seamen, our officers had to contend with a crew over half of which rated below that of the "ordinary" classification of seamanship, thick skinned clodhoppers, all thumbs on a dark night, and for many weeks after leaving port, as useless as so much living ballast. The kicking and moulding into form of this conglomerate mass of deep sea flotsam, gathered for the ship by the boarding masters, and duly signed on the ship's articles as A.B., called for all but superhuman efforts. The curse is far more potent than the gentle plea, especially when hard fists and hobnailed sea boots are backed by all of the age old authority of the sea. To work a ship of the proportions of the Fuller, with seventeen hands forward, called for man driving without thought of anything but the work required.
The latter days of the sailing ship as a carrier, before invoking the aid of steam auxiliary apparatus, in the hoisting and hauling, brought forth the brute sea officer aft, and the hardened fo'c'sle crowd, half sailor and half drudge, forward. The "bucko mate" walked her decks, and the jack tar, stripped of his pigtail, his bell mouthed canvas trousers, his varnished sailor hat, and his grog, remained in plain dungaree and cotton shirt to work the biggest sailing craft in the history of the world on the last hard stages of their storm tossed voyages.
Mixed with our real sailors were the worthless (so far as sea lore went) scrapings of the waterfront. Shipped by the boarding masters for the benefit of their three months' "advance," and furnished for sea with rotten kits of dunnage, as unreliable and unfitted for the work as the poor unfortunate dubs who were forced by an unkind fate to wear them.
On the other hand, the real sailor-men of the crew were valued accordingly, and I can hardly remember an instance where either one of the mates singled out for abuse those men who had shipped as A.B. and were so in fact. My schoolship training (St. Mary's '97) stood by me, and though barely turned eighteen, I was saved from most of the drudgery meted out to the farmers of the watch.
After washing through the heavy seas we encountered for the first few weeks of the voyage, while beating off the coast on the long reach eastward to the Azores, the long hard pine sweep of the main deck became slippery with a deposit of white salt-water slime. The sheen of this scum, in the moonlight, under a film of running water, gave the decks a ghastly "Flying Dutchman" like appearance, and the footing became so precarious that something had to be done.
"They have the 'bear' out," Scouse announced, as he trudged into the fo'c'sle carrying a "kid" of cracker hash, ditto of burgoo, a can of coffee, and a bag of hard tack, this cargo of sustenance being our regulation breakfast menu.
"The bear?" I asked, as we gathered about this appetizing spread.
"Yes, the bear," volunteered Brenden, grinning with the rest of the sailors. "The bear for Scouse, and Joe, and Martin, and Fred." At eight bells, as we mustered aft, a subdued banter went on among the men. The starboard watch were all grinning, and as they went below four sheepish looking fellows of the other side turned the "bear" over to the farmers of our watch. "Keep that jackass baby carriage moving now. D'ye hear me? Keep it moving!" bellowed the mate, for there was some reluctance in taking hold, and as Scouse and Martin tailed on, opposed to Joe and Fred, the doleful scrape of the bear mingled with the general laughter at the mate's sally.