Afloat at Last Part 3

"I'm very happy, I am sure, to see you on board and make your acquaintance," said the pleasant-faced young officer, turning to me in a nice cordial way that increased the liking I had already taken to him at first sight. "Have you got your traps with you all right, Mr Graham?"

"My father sent on my sea-chest containing all my clothes and things last night by the goods train from our place, addressed to the brokers in Leadenhall Street, as they directed, sir; so I hope it will arrive in time," I replied, quite proud of a grown-up fellow like Mr Mackay addressing me as "Mister."

"You needn't be alarmed about its safety, then, I suppose," observed he jokingly. But, of course, although he might have thought so from my manner, I had really no fears respecting the fate of my chest, and of its being forthcoming when I wanted it. Indeed, until that moment, I had not thought about it at all; for I knew father had despatched it all right from Westham; and when he attended to anything no mishap ever occurred--at least that was our opinion at home!

Fancying, from the expression of my face as these thoughts and the recollection of those I had left behind at the rectory flashed through my mind, that I was perhaps worrying myself about the chest, which of course I wasn't, Mr Mackay hastened, as he imagined, to allay my fears.

"There, there! don't bother yourself about your belongings, my boy,"

said he kindly; "your chest and other dunnage came down to the ship early this morning from the brokers along with that of the other youngsters, and you'll find it stowed in that after-deckhouse below there, where you midshipmen or apprentices will all live together in a happy family sort of way throughout the voyage."

"Thank you, sir," I answered, much obliged for his courtesy and information; although, I confess, I wondered where the "house" was of which he spoke, there being nothing like even a cottage on the deck, which with everything connected with it was utterly strange to me.

My face must again have reflected my thoughts; for even Tim Rooney noticed the puzzled expression it bore, as I looked over the p.o.o.p rail in the direction Mr Mackay pointed.

"I don't think, sorr, the young gintleman altogether onderconstubbles your manin'," he remarked to the mate in that loud whisper of his which the poor man really did not intend me to hear, as I'm sure he wouldn't have intentionally hurt my feelings. "Sure an' it's a reg'ler green hand the bhoy is entoirely."

"Never mind that now; he'll soon learn his way to the weather earring, if I don't mistake the cut of his jib," retorted Mackay in a lower tone of voice than the other, although I caught the sense of what he said equally well, as he turned to me again with the evident desire of putting me at my ease. "Have you seen any of your mess-mates yet, my boy--eh?"

"No, sir," I answered, smiling in response to his kindly look. "I have seen no one since I came on board but you and Mr Rooney, who spoke to me first; and, of course, those men working over there."

"Sure, sorr, all av 'em are down below a-grubbin' in the cuddy since dinner-toime," interposed my friend the boatswain by way of explanation, on seeing the mate looked surprised at hearing that none of the other officers were about when all should have been so busy. "Ivery man Jack av 'em, sorr, barrin' Misther Saunders; who, in coorse, as I tould you, sorr, has bin down in the hould a-sayin' to the stowage of the cargy, more power to his elbow! An', be the same token, I thinks I sayed him jist now coom up the main-hatchway an' goin' to the cuddy too, to join the others at grub."

"Oh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr Mackay with deep meaning, swinging round on his heel, all alert in an instant; and taking hold of a short bar of iron pointed at the end, lying near, which Tim Rooney told me afterwards was what is called a "marling-spike," he proceeded to rap with it vigorously against the side of the companion hatchway, shouting out at the same time so that he could be heard all over the ship: "Tumble up, all you idlers and stowaways and everybody! Below there--all hands on deck to warp out of dock!"

"Be jabers, that'll fetch 'em, sorr," cried Tim with a huge grin, much relishing this summoning of the laggards to work. "Sure, yer honour, ye're the bhoy to make 'em show a leg when ye wants to, an' no misthake at all, at all!"

"Aye, and I want them now," rejoined the other with emphasis. "We have got no time to lose; for, the tide is making fast, and the tug has been outside the lock-gates waiting for the last half-hour or more to take us in tow as soon as we get out in the stream. Below there--look alive and tumble up before I come down after you!"

In obedience to this last hail of Mr Mackay, which had a sharp authoritative ring about it, a short, podgy little man with a fat neck and red whiskers, who, as I presently learned, was Mr Saunders, the second mate, came up the companion way; and as I perceived him to be wiping his mouth as he stepped over the coaming of the hatchway, this showed that the boatswain's surmise of his being engaged "grubbing" with the others was not far wrong.

Mr Saunders was followed up from below by a couple of st.u.r.dy youths, who appeared to be between eighteen and nineteen or thereabout; and, behind them again, the last of the file, slowly stepped out on to the deck a lanky boy of about the same age as myself--which I forgot to mention before was just fifteen, although I looked older from my build and height.

"You're a nice lot of lazy fellows to leave in charge of the work of the ship!" cried Mr Mackay on the three presenting themselves before him, slowly mounting the companion stairs, one after the other, as if the exertion was almost too great for them, poor fellows, after their dinner! "Here, you Matthews, look sharp and stir your stumps a bit--one would think you were walking in your sleep. I want you to see to that spring forwards as we unmoor!"

The boatswain had already descended from the p.o.o.p and gone to his station in the fore part of the ship; and now, with the first mate's words, all was stir and action on board.

The tallest of the two youths immediately dashed off towards the bows of the ship with an alacrity that proved his slow movements previously had been merely put on for effect, and were not due to any const.i.tutional weakness; for, he seemed to reach the forecastle in two bounds, and I could see him, from a coign of vantage to which he nimbly mounted on top of the knightheads, giving orders to a number of men on the wharf, who had gathered about the ship in the meantime, and directing them to pa.s.s along the end of the fore hawser round a bollard on the jetty, near the end of the lock-gates by which entrance was gained from the adjacent river to the basin in which the vessel was lying.

Tom Jerrold, the second youth--I heard him called by that name--was sent to look after another hawser pa.s.sed over the bows of the ship on the starboard side, the end of the rope being bent round a capstan in the centre of the wharf.

Then, on Mr Mackay's word of command, the great wire cables mooring the ship to the jetty were cast off; and, a gang of the dock labourers manning the capstan, with their broad chests and sinewy arms pressed against the bars, as they marched round it singing some monotonous chorus ending in a "Yo, heave, ho!" the ship began to move--at first slowly inch by inch, and then with increased way upon her as the _vis inertiae_ of her hull was overcome--towards the lock at the mouth of the basin, the gates of which had been opened, or rather the caisson floated out shortly before, as the tide grew to the flood.

Dear me! What with the constant and varied orders to the gang of men working the capstan, and the others easing off the hawser that had been pa.s.sed round the bollard, keeping a purchase on it and hauling in the slack as the vessel crept along out of the dock so as to prevent her "taking charge" and slewing round broadside on at the entrance where she met the full force of the stream, I was well-nigh deafened with the hoa.r.s.e shouts and unintelligible cries that filled the air on all sides, everybody apparently having something to say, and all calling out at once.

"Bear a hand with that spring!" Mr Mackay would roar out one instant in a voice that quite eclipsed that of Tim Rooney, loud as I thought that on first going on board. "Easy there!" screamed Matthews from his perch forwards, not to be outdone; while the boatswain was singing out for a "fender" to guard the ship's bows from scrunching against the dock wall, and Tom Jerrold overseeing the men at the bollard on the wharf calling out to them to "belay!" as her head swung a bit. Even lanky young Sam Weeks, the other middy like myself, had something or other to say about the "warp fouling," the meaning of which I did not catch, although he seemed satisfied at adding to the general hubbub. All the time, too, there was the red-headed Mr Saunders, the second mate, who had stationed himself in the main-chains, whence he could get a good view of what was going on both forward and aft alike, continually urging on the men at the capstan to "heave with a will!"--just as if they wanted any further urging, when they had Mr Mackay at them already and their tramping chorus, "Yo, heave, ho" to fall back upon!

It was a wonder, with so many contradictory commands, as these all seemed to my ignorant ears, that some mishap did not happen. But, fortunately, nothing adverse occurred to delay the ship; and those on sh.o.r.e being apparently as anxious to get rid of the Silver Queen as those on board were to clear her away from the berth she had so long occupied when loading alongside the jetty, she was soon by dint of everybody's shouting and active co-operation warped out of the basin into the lock, drifting thence on the bosom of the tideway into the stream.

Here, a little st.u.r.dy tug of a paddle steamer, which had been waiting for us the last hour or more, puffing up huge volumes of dense black smoke, and occasionally sounding her shrill steam whistle to give vent to her impatience, ranged up alongside, someone on her deck heaving dexterously a line inboard, which Tim Rooney the boatswain as dexterously caught as it circled in the air like a la.s.so and fell athwart the boat davits amidships.

The line was then taken forwards by Tim Rooney outside the rigging, he walking along the gunwale till he gained the forecastle; there, another man then lending a hand, the line was hauled in with the end of a strong steel hawser bent on to it, that had been already pa.s.sed over the stern of the tug, and the bight carried across the "towing-horse" and firmly fastened to the tug's fore-deck, while our end on reaching the forecastle of the Silver Queen was similarly secured inboard, Tim satisfying himself that it was taut by jumping on it.

"Are you ready?" now hailed the master of the tug from the paddle-box of his little vessel, calling out to Mr Mackay who was leaning over the p.o.o.p of ours which seemed so big in comparison, the hull of the ship towering above the tug and quite overshadowing her. "Are you ready, sir?"

"Aye, aye!" sang out Mr Mackay in answer. "You can start as soon as you like. Fire up and heave ahead!"

Then, the steamer's paddles revolved, the steel hawser, stretched over her towing-horse astern and attached to our bows, tightened with a sort of musical tw.a.n.g as it became rigid like a bar of iron; and, in another minute or so, the Silver Queen was under good way, sailing down the Thames outwards bound.

"Fo'c's'le, ahoy there!" presently shouted out Mr Mackay near me all of a sudden, making me jump round from my contemplation of the river, into which I was gazing down from over the stern, looking at the broad white foaming wake we left behind us as we glided on. "Is the bosun there?"

"Aye, aye, sorr," promptly replied Tim Rooney, showing himself from behind the deck-house between the mainmast and foremast, which had previously hidden him from the view of the p.o.o.p. "I'm here, sort."

"Then send a hand aft to the wheel at once," rejoined Mr Mackay. "Look sharp, we're under steerage-way."

"Aye, aye, sorr," answered the boatswain as before; and as he spoke I could see a tall seaman making his way aft in obedience to the first mate's orders; and, before Mr Mackay had time to walk across the deck, he had mounted the p.o.o.p, cast off the lashings that prevented the wheel from moving, and was whirling the spokes round with both hands in thorough ship-shape style.

This man's name was Adams, as I subsequently learnt; and he was the sailmaker--one of the best sailors on board, and one of the old hands, having sailed with Tim Rooney, as the latter told me, the two previous voyages. That sort of man, in the boatswain's words, who was always "all there" when wanted.

I am antic.i.p.ating matters, however, Mr Mackay being not yet done with Tim; for, after telling Adams to go aft to take his trick at the wheel, the worthy boatswain was just about disappearing again behind the forward deck-house as before to resume some job on which he seemed very intent, when his steps were once more arrested by the mate's hail, "Bosun!"

"Aye, aye, sorr," cried Tim Rooney rather savagely as he stopped and faced round towards the break of the p.o.o.ps on which Mr Mackay stood by the rail; and I'm sure I heard him mutter something else below his breath even that distance off.

"Is the anchor all clear?" asked the first mate. "You know we shall want it for bringing up at Gravesend."

"Yis, sorr," said the other. "I ased off the catfalls an' shank painter iver since the mornin'; an', sure, the blissid anchor is a-c.o.c.kbill, all riddy to lit go whin ye gives the worrud."

"And the cable--how many shackles have you got up?"

"Thray lingths, sorr. I thought that enough for the river, wid a fower fathom bottom; so, I've bitted it at that, an' me an' Jackson are a- sayin' about clearin' the cable range now."

"That's right," replied Mr Mackay, apparently satisfied that at last everything forward was going on as it should; for he turned away from the p.o.o.p rail and entered into conversation with a stout thickset strange man, dressed in sailor's clothes, but with a long black oilskin or waterproof over his other garments reaching down to his heels, although it wasn't raining at all, being a bright, fine afternoon.

Not only had this new-comer arrived on board without my noticing him, although I had been looking out all the time, but he managed to get up on the p.o.o.p in the most mysterious way. I was certain he had not been anywhere near the moment before, and yet, now, there he was.

He must be the captain at last, I thought, having been expecting to see that personage appear on the scene every moment; and my impression of his being one in authority was confirmed a moment later, when, from his giving some order or command, Mr Mackay left him hastily, and coming further aft took up a position nearer me, close to Adams, just abaft the binnacle. The oilskin man, however, remained on the weather side of the p.o.o.p at the head of the ladder, whence he had a good look-out ahead, clear of all intervening obstacles, and from which post he proceeded to direct the steering of the ship by waving his arms this way and that as if he were an animated windmill

The first mate interpreted as quickly these signals for the benefit of Adams, pa.s.sing on the words of warning they conveyed, "Hard up!" or "Down helm!" or "Steady!" as the case might be. These frequent and often contradictory orders were necessary, when, owing to some unexpected bend in the river, the Silver Queen would luff up suddenly and shoot her head athwart stream hard a-port, or else try to "take the bit between her teeth," and sheer into the sh.o.r.e on the starboard hand as if she wanted to run up high and dry on the mud, loth to leave her native land.

She required good steering.

Aye, and careful watching too, on the part of the helmsman; for, in addition to the natural turnings and windings of the channel-way, which were many, the Thames curving about and twisting itself into the shape of a corkscrew between London Bridge and the Nore, the tug had besides continually to alter her course, thus, naturally, making us change ours too, as the tow-rope slackening one moment would cause the ship's bows to fall off, and then tightening like a fiddle-string the next instant her head would be jerked back again viciously into its former position, right astern of the little vessel at whose mercy we were, as if she insisted on the Silver Queen following obediently in her wake.

This eccentric mode of procedure, however, must not be altogether ascribed to any contrariness of disposition on the part of the gallant tug, which, in spite of occasional stoppages and frequent alterations of course, yet towed us along steadily down the river--a pigmy pulling a giant. Such a monster we seemed, lumbering behind her as she panted and puffed huge volumes of black smoke from her tall striped funnel, with much creaking of her engines and groaning of her poor strained timbers, and the measured rhythmical beat of her paddle-floats on the surface of the water, that sounded as if she were "spanking" it out of spite.

No, it wasn't the fault of the little, dirty, toiling tug, whose daily drudgery did not give her time to look after her toilet and study her personal appearance like those bigger craft she had always tacked on to her tail. For these turnings and twistings we had to take in our downward journey to Gravesend and the open sea beyond; the innumerable backings and fillings and bendings this way and that, now going ahead full speed for a couple of minutes, now coming to a full stop with a sharp order to let her drift astern, were all due to the fact of the tug having to keep clear, and keep us clear, too, of the innumerable inward- bound steamers, pa.s.senger boats, and other vessels coming up stream.

The tideway being crowded with craft of all sorts, navigation was exceedingly difficult for a heavily-laden ship in tow, especially in that awkward reach between Greenwich and Blackwall, where the river, after trending south by east, makes an abrupt turn almost due north.

This place I thought the worst part of the journey then when I first saw it; and, I am of the same opinion still, although now better acquainted with the Thames and all its mysteries.

On the bustle that ensued when she began to warp out of dock, I had left the p.o.o.p, along with the boatswain and the others, going down the ladder at the side on to the main-deck; but, when arrived there, I soon discovered that an idler like myself, standing by with nothing to do, was in the way alike of the ropes that were being thrown and dragged about and of the men handling them--this knowledge being brought home very practically by my getting tripped and knocked about from pillar to post by those rushing here and there to execute the various orders hoa.r.s.ely bawled out to them each instant, and which would not admit of delay.