The Ocean Cat's Paw: The Story of a Strange Cruise

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

  A QUESTION OF FEAR.

  It was as if all the bad weather had been left behind, for after alittle snatch or two, as Joe Cross called them, the cruise down southhad been glorious.

  The bluff, good-humoured sailor explained to Rodd what he meant by asnatch, something after this fashion.

  "You see, sir, after we started from Havre the weather seemed to be abit sorry for itself for being so dirty, and you know how we bowledalong down south till the wind got into a tantrum again--got out of bedthe wrong way, as you may say, and then everything was wrong. We weregetting into the Bay, you see, where it comes quite natural to lay allthat day. In the Bay of Biscay O! Then Nature got all out of sortsagain. It seemed as if she was waxy to let us have it so comfortable,and made a snatch to drag us back again. But the old man was one toomany for her, and kept on for them two bad days, when we sailed out ofher reach and everything was fine."

  "Yes, Joe, it was fine. All that coast of Spain and Portugal waslovely."

  "Yes, sir, and you got grumbling 'cause your uncle wouldn't give ordersfor us to let go the anchor for you to go fishing."

  "Well, see how grand it was, and how calm the sea used to get of anevening before we put in to Gibraltar."

  "And then you weren't half satisfied, sir. You'll excuse me, Mr Rodd,sir, but you do make me laugh;" and to the boy's great annoyance the manhalf turned from him, leaned over the taffrail, laughed till his sidesshook, and then pulling himself up suddenly wiped his eyes. "I am verysorry, sir," he said.

  "Doesn't seem like it," cried Rodd warmly, as he made as if to go away.

  It was one evening when the calm sea as it heaved seemed in places toglint forth all the glorious colours of a beautiful pearl shell, and theeast wind was of a different complexion to that familiar to an Englishlad, for it was soft, balmy and sweet, suggestive of its having beenblowing gently for miles and miles over beds of flowers.

  "Oh, don't go away in a tiff, Mr Rodd, sir. It was only me, and youknow what I am. I didn't mean no offence."

  "Well, it was offensive," said Rodd. "How would you like to be laughedat?"

  "Me, sir?" cried the man merrily. "Me who has been knocking about thesea nearly all my life, first in a west-country fishing-boat, and thenin a King's ship, and been in action! Like being laughed at! Why,bless your heart, sir, it suits me down to the deck. I like it. Dealbetter than having the old man dropping on to me about something beingwrong aloft."

  "Well, I don't see that there was anything to laugh at," cried Rodd,softening down a little, for somehow the liking he had felt for thesturdy-looking sailor ever since he had come on board had gone onincreasing, and Rodd affected Joe's society more than that of any one inthe ship. At least he said so to Uncle Paul, who shook his head andwith a grim smile joined issue.

  "No, Pickle," he cried, "I won't have that. You seem to make betterfriends with the cook than with anybody."

  "Oh, uncle," replied the boy, "you always do tease me about myappetite."

  "Never mind, Pickle," said Uncle Paul good-humouredly. "Go on eating,and grow."

  But to return to the conversation by the taffrail.

  "No, sir," said Joe Cross, "of course you don't, sir. It'd be contrairyto nature if you did. We chaps can't see ourselves. There's the oldBun. He's been offended over and over again because people told him hewas so fat. He can't see it, sir."

  "Oh, he must," cried Rodd, laughing.

  "There aren't no must in it, sir. He can't. He might find it outperhaps if he tried to get into a pair of boy's trousers--yours, forinstance; but then that aren't likely, because you won't give him thechance, and what's more, he wouldn't want to. You try him some dayabout being too fat, and you see if he don't stare at you."

  "He will, Joe, when I'm so rude to him. But come now, you areshuffling. Why is it that you laugh at me?"

  "Well, sir, because I like you, for one thing, and another is becauseyou are such an unreasonable chap."

  "I? Unreasonable?" cried Rodd hotly. "That I'm sure I'm not!"

  "Why, sir, wasn't you put out because your uncle and the old manwouldn't sail right into the Mediterranean Sea?"

  "Well, there was nothing unreasonable in that. I am sure it would havebeen very interesting."

  "Not it, sir. I've been there over and over again, and it always seemedto me just like any other sea, only a bit rougher sometimes, and itaren't got hardly any tide. You wait till we get a little further on,and you'll find plenty to make you open you eyes wider than ever youopened them before. I don't know a finer place for seeing wonders ofthe deep than along where we are going, as you say we are to, rightalong the West Coast of Afriky. Why, you might begin fishing anddredging directly after we had put in at Mogador, where the fish arewonderful, and you can't drop in a line without hauling something out."

  "That's good," cried Rodd eagerly; "but I am afraid uncle won't let ushave much time for ordinary fishing. He will be more on the look-outfor curiosities."

  "Ah, well, there's plenty of them too, sir--all sorts, and the fartheryou gets into warmer water the more there are."

  "What sort?" asked Rodd.

  "All sorts, and the nearer you are to land the more you get. Then Isuppose some time we shall come upon that there Sargassey Sea."

  "Where's that?" asked Rodd.

  "Right away down south, sir. Let's see, if I remember right we falls inwith that soon after you pass the islands."

  "What islands?"

  "Let's see; I ought to know, sir. The fust that comes near Europe isthe Azores; then farther south there's that there island where all thesick people goes, Madeiry; then there's the Canaries, where the birdscome from; only they aren't all yaller like people keeps in their cages.Most I seed there was green, and put me in mind of them little chaps aswe have at home with the yaller heads--you know, sir; them as cries, `Alittle bit of bread and no cheese.' And you see them up country,a-twittering among the hedges."

  "Yes, I know," said Rodd sharply; "but what about the Sargassey Sea?"

  "Ah! I'm thinking it was after that we come to that sea, only I aren'tquite sure, sir. But if I recollect right, they say it shifts aboutaccording to what sort of weather we have."

  "Well, so does every sea," cried Rodd, "when the waves are runninghigh."

  "Ah, but they don't run high here, sir. You see, the Sargassey Seaaren't like other seas, and I suppose it's only part of the Atlanticafter all. It's all smooth like because as far as you can see it's alllike one great bed of floating seaweed, so thick that you can hardlysail through it at times, and if you go out into it in a boat it's asmuch as you can do to dip your oars."

  "Have you been out amongst it then?" asked Rodd.

  "Yes, sir, more'n once. It was when I was in the _Prince George_ offthe West Coast of Africa, and we had got a surgeon on board there, andhim and our second lieutenant had both got it badly."

  "What, West African fever?" cried Rodd.

  "No, no, sir; same as your uncle's got--looking after strange things aslives in the sea. I was one of the crew of the second cutter then, andin the beautiful calm weather we used to take the doctor and the secondluff out in this Sargassey Sea, which used to look sometimes as if wewere floating about in green fields."

  "Oh, you mean the Sargasso Sea!" cried Rodd. "Nay, I don't, sir; Imeans the Sargassey Sea."

  "Well, that's the same thing, only you spell it differently," criedRodd.

  "Oh no, sir; that I don't. That's a thing as I never pretended to do.I can take my spell at the pump or at any other job; but what you callspelling was never in my way."

  "But you mean the same thing," cried Rodd. "It isn't Sar-gass-ey; it'sSar-gass-o."

  "Ho! Sar-gass-ho, is it, sir?"

  "Yes, of course."

  "All right, sir; I'm willing. But my one was all alive with littlethings, little fish and slugs and snails of all kinds of rum sorts; andour second luff used to make us haul in great lengths of the seaweed asw
as floating about, and then help him to pick 'em out into bottles tillthey were quite full, and looking just as if they was pickles same asyou see in the grocers' shops in Plymouth town."

  "Well, the same as you saw uncle and me do that day during the calm?"

  "Yes, sir, just like that, only yours as you did were small shop andours was like big warehouse, though I don't think our doctor did muchgood with them, because so many of them used to go bad, and our cook andhis mate used to have to throw no end away and wash the bottles."

  "Ah, ours won't go bad," said Rodd confidently. "My uncle will preservethem differently to that."

  "Oh, yes, I suppose so, sir. You see, we've all come out this timeready for the job; our officers on the _Prince George_ only did theirbit just for a day or two's holiday like, and our job was to look afterthe mounseers' cruisers, not to catch tittlebats and winkles, and itwasn't so very long after that we was at it hammer and tongs with a bigFrench frigate, making work for the doctor of a precious different kind,and for our ship's carpenters too. Different sort of nat'ral historythat was, sir, I can tell you, for we lost nineteen of our men and had alot wounded; but we took the frigate, and carried her safe intoPortsmouth Harbour."

  "Ah!" cried Rodd softly, as his eyes flashed at the thoughts of thedeeds of naval daring carried out by our men-of-war. "I wish I'd beenthere!"

  "You do, sir?" said Joe. "Mean it?"

  "Mean it? Of course! There, don't look at me like that. I wasn'tthinking of being a man, but a reefer--one of those middies that we usedto see at Plymouth."

  "Ah, it's all very fine, sir," said Joe, shaking his head, "and itsounds very nice about firing broadsides and then getting orders toboard when the two big men-of-war get the grappling-irons on board andyou have to follow your officers, scrambling with your cutlass in yourhand out of the chains from your ship into the enemy's; and all the timethere's the roaring of the guns and the popping away of the marines upin the tops, and the men cheering as your officers lead them on. It's avery different thing, sir, to what you think, and so I can tell you."

  "Why, Joe," cried Rodd, almost maliciously, "you talk as if you feltafraid!"

  "Afraid, sir?" said the man, quietly and thoughtfully. "No, sir. No,sir; I never felt afraid, and I never knowed one of my messmates as saidhe was."

  "Oh no, of course they wouldn't say so," cried Rodd, laughing.

  "No, sir, that's right. But I aren't bragging, sir. I've been inseveral engagements like that, and my messmates always seemed to feeljust as I did. You see, they'd got it to do, sir, and we always feltthat it was only mounseers that we'd got to beat and captur' their ship;and then as soon as we had begun, whether we was crews of guns, strippedand firing away, or answering the orders to board, why, then we neverhad time to feel afraid."

  "What, not when you saw your messmates shot down beside you?" criedRodd.

  "My word, no, sir!" cried Joe, laughing. "We none of us felt afraidthen; it only made us feel wild and want to sarve the other side out.No, sir," continued the bluff fallow, in a quiet matter-of-fact way, andhis voice utterly free of vaunt, "whether it's a sea-fight or things aregoing wrong in a storm, we sailor fellows are always too busy to feelafraid. You see, I think, sir, it has something to do with the drilland discipline, as they calls it, training the lads all to worktogether. You see, it makes them feel so strong."

  "I can't say I do see," said Rodd.

  "No, sir, because you haven't been drilled; but it's like this 'ere.One man's one man, and a hundred men's a hundred men--no, stop; thataren't quite what I mean. It aren't in my way, Mr Rodd, sir; I neverwas a beggar to argue. The fat Bun can easily beat me at that. This'ere's what I mean. One man's one man, and a hundred men's a hundredone men. That's if they aren't drilled and trained like sailors orsoldiers; but if they are trained, you see each one man feels as if hehas got a hundred men with him all working together, and con-se-quently,sir, every chap aboard feels as if he's as strong as a hundred men. Nowdon't you see, sir?"

  "Well, yes," said Rodd quietly; "I think I begin to see what you mean."

  "Why, of course you do, sir. Say it's heaving a boat aboard, and ittakes twenty men to do it. Why, if they go and try one at a time, whereare you? But if you all go and take hold together, and your officersays to you, `Now, my lads, with a will, all together! Heave ho!' whythen, up she comes. Well now, I do call that rum! Look at that, sir.If here aren't the old man, just as if he had heard what we was talkingabout, passing the word for gun drill, or else a bit of knicketty knockwith the cutlasses and pikes!"