Peter Trawl Part 34

"I came in here about two months ago for the first time this voyage to obtain provisions and water," began Captain Rounds, "and as none of us understood the language of the people, I shipped a couple of natives who spoke English very fairly to act as interpreters. Besides having been to sea on board other whalers, they were, I thought, likely to prove useful hands. Everything went on in a satisfactory way while I lay here. The natives who came on board behaved themselves well, and King George, their chief, seemed a very decent sort of fellow, and was as honest in his dealings as I could expect. I had made it a rule when I came out to these parts never to trust many of my people ash.o.r.e at a time among the heathen natives without having some of the princ.i.p.al natives on board as hostages, or so well-behaved and friendly did these appear that I should otherwise not have hesitated to let half my crew land at a time, feeling confident that they would be well treated. Thus it was that I every evening at sundown fired off my guns, and kept a strict watch during the night. I did this, not from any fear of being attacked, but that I considered it prudent to keep to the rule I had laid down, and to maintain discipline on board. You'll see that I was fortunate in doing so. I parted on good terms with King George and his people without having any reason to alter the favourable opinion I had formed of them, taking the two native interpreters with me. From the way I treated them they became very friendly and much attached to me.

We had been at sea for some time, and had caught three or four whales, each of which cost us, perhaps, more than the usual trouble to take.

The two natives, who go by the names of Jackey and Tubbs, seemed very much struck by the exertions we had to make to secure the whales, and one day they came to me and said that they could put me up to the means of filling the ship with perfect ease if I would follow their advice. I asked them what they meant. They then told me that a ship lay sunk in their harbour loaded with casks of oil, and that they knew the exact spot where she went down. I then learnt from them the following particulars.

"You, Hawkins, well knew Barber, who commanded the _Harriet_, of London, as you sailed together as mates with old Captain Newton in the _Felicity_. I met Barber when I first came out to the Pacific, and was wondering that I had never since heard of him or the _Harriet_. The natives now told me that about a year ago she had put into this harbour, there being no other vessels here at the time. You remember what a good-natured, yet somewhat careless fellow he was. The natives came in numbers on board his ship, and appeared to be on the most friendly terms with him and his crew. They at length, one day, invited his men to go ash.o.r.e, and he consequently allowed the greater number of them to land.

This sort of thing continued while he lay in the harbour. King George and most of his though they came down to visit the ship when she first arrived, were, at that time, living in another part of the island, and the people just here did pretty much as they liked.

"Barber, with a boat's crew, only remained on board, when, on going on deck in the morning, he caught sight of three of his men running down towards the beach as fast as they could go, with a posse of natives after them. Presently they were overtaken. First one was struck down by the club of a savage, and directly afterwards the other two shared the same fate. The natives, on reaching the sh.o.r.e, jumped into their canoes, a whole fleet of which came paddling off towards the ship. The crew, on seeing this, I suspect, took fright, thinking that they should all be murdered, as their mates on sh.o.r.e had been. Captain Barber himself would, I am certain, have stopped to defend his ship, but probably fearing that it would be of no use to make the attempt while his crew were so faint-hearted, he ordered the boat to be lowered with such provisions and water as could be hastily thrown into her. They had scarcely left the side of the ship before the savages were up to her.

They pursued the boat for some distance, but at length gave up the chase, eager to get back and secure their prize. They then set to work to plunder the vessel of everything they considered of value. They stripped her of her sails and rigging, and all the iron-work they could get at, managing even to carry away her topmasts, jib-boom, and yards.

Having done this, they towed the vessel higher up the harbour and scuttled her.

"When King George, who had known Captain Barber and some of his people-- for he had been down at the harbour when the ship first arrived--heard of the ma.s.sacre he was very indignant, and Jackey and Tubbs told me that he killed no less than thirty of those who had taken part in it with his own hand. Whether this was actually the case or not I could not make out; but, after cross-questioning the two natives, I came to the conclusion that he himself had no hand in the ma.s.sacre, and was entirely ignorant of it till afterwards. What has become of poor Barber and his boat's crew I am anxious to ascertain; but he would have had a fearfully long pa.s.sage to make to any other island, and I'm afraid that he and his companions must have perished from hunger and thirst before they could have reached any friendly sh.o.r.e.

"Having fallen in shortly after I heard this with the _Lydia_ and _Pearl_, I communicated the intelligence to them, and we determined to put in here to ascertain the truth of the story.

"Now you have come we shall be sufficiently strong-handed both to defend ourselves from the natives, and to recover the _Harriet's_ cargo if we cannot raise her."

Captain Hawkins at once entered into Captain Rounds' views, and they agreed the next morning with their brother captains to set to work.

Captain Rounds, who was a very ingenious man, had a diving-bell constructed out of a cask, with pipes to lead the air into it.

Proceeding with the boats, we found the ship sunk in six fathoms of water at a spot Jackey and Tubbs pointed out. They willingly agreed to descend in the diving-bell, and Brown and another man also went down in it. It was then found that the ship had been set on fire, but she had sunk before the flames had reached the cargo. It was calculated that there were one thousand six hundred barrels of oil in her.

Her figure-head and other articles were got up, thus clearly identifying her as the unfortunate _Harriet_.

The captains proposed raising her, and dividing the oil between them; but after a great deal of consultation it was considered that they had better give up the plan, as it would have occupied a long time, and caused a difficulty on their arrival at home as to whether they had a right to possess themselves of it. Thus the results of many a hard month's labour were lost.

King George watched our proceedings with much interest, generally hovering about the boats in his canoe while we were at work. Perhaps he thought from the first that we should not succeed, though I think we should have done so had it been desirable to make the attempt. As soon as the undertaking was abandoned, the other vessels, which had only come in for water and provisions, sailed, and we were left alone in the harbour. The king, who did not appear to be at all offended by the way Captain Hawkins had treated him on his first visit, at once came on board, and appeared to be excessively friendly. He spoke English remarkably well, having learned it on board a whaler in his youth, and kept it up by frequently talking to runaway sailors who had remained at the island. He invited the captain to go ash.o.r.e and visit him in his palace, the name we gave to the great hut in which he lived.

"With great pleasure, king," answered the captain: "but fair play's a jewel, you know. If I go to visit you, your brother here will remain on board to keep my mates company till I return."

The captain told Mr Griffiths to keep a strict watch on the king's brother, and not to allow him to leave the cabin lest he might slip overboard and swim on sh.o.r.e.

We called the young savage Charlie, though that was not his real name.

Charlie, who spoke a little English, seemed perfectly content; and when the king and the captain went on sh.o.r.e, descended to the cabin without the slightest hesitation. As the stern-windows, through which Charlie might have squeezed himself if he had had a mind, were left open for the sake of the air, Mr Griffiths told me to remain in the cabin whenever he was on deck. At night he was locked up in the state-room. I don't know that the captain was very well pleased at having the savage sleeping in his bed.

Next morning the captain came back, saying that he had been hospitably treated. In the afternoon, as Charlie wished to return, and as the doctor and several men were on sh.o.r.e, the captain sent me, with Miles Soper and Brown, to bring the king off, that he might take his brother's place.

We pulled up a long narrow creek for several miles, till we arrived at the royal residence, which was a large hut with a framework of poles and roofed over with matting. Near it were other huts, and a number of natives were employed in different ways, some pounding kava between two large stones, when the root, thus thoroughly bruised, was thrown into water. This is a much pleasanter way of preparing the beverage than by employing the women to chew it, as is done in Samoa.

The king was away when we arrived, and we had thus plenty of time to walk about the village and look around us. Some natives were engaged in cooking fish and yams. This was done by putting them into a hole on the top of some hot stones and leaves, and then covering them up with more hot stones, leaves, and earth at the top of all. We soon had an opportunity of tasting them, and I can answer for their being most delicious.

As the king didn't appear we walked some little distance into the country, for we knew that we were perfectly safe while the king's brother remained as a hostage. Going into a hut we found a young woman about to light a fire. I watched the process. She first took half of the log that had been split in two and laid it down with the split side upwards; then taking a small piece of hard wood about a foot long and pointed at one end, she sat down astride of the log and commenced rubbing the sharp point of the stick up and down the grain of the large piece, thus making a groove, and shoving the shavings which she worked out to the farther end, till at length they ignited, when immediately catching up some dry leaves which lay handy, and blowing gently, she soon obtained a blaze. I tried the experiment under her directions and succeeded very well. Though simple and easy as is this method of obtaining fire, I have never seen it tried in any other place.

On our return to the village we found the king, who invited us to feast on the fish and yams which I had seen cooking. We were now joined by the captain and Dr c.o.c.kle, with the second mate and several men, and I was directed to go back with the king, who had to take his brother's place on board.

His majesty preferred going alone in his own canoe. I sat in the bows with a long pole to keep the bow off the rocks as we went down the creek, and he placed himself astern with a paddle in his hand. He giving the canoe a shove from the bank, away we went. I was highly amused at the thought of carrying off the king as a prisoner. He, however, seemed to take it as a matter of course, and chatted and laughed as we glided along. Presently he asked--

"You young Englishman ever been here before? I think I know your face."

"When was it your majesty fancied that you saw me?" I inquired.

"Let me see," he said, holding his paddle in the air for a moment; "were you ever aboard the ship that my rascally people sent to the bottom out there?" and he pointed to where the _Harriet_ lay.

"No," I answered, a dreadful thought coming into my mind. "Was the person you fancy I am killed with the rest of the crew?"

"I think not. If I think so, I no ask you," he answered. "I see him with the captain when he visit the sh.o.r.e, and each time I go on board the ship. When I come down to the harbour I took great fancy to him, and asked captain to let him stay with me, but he and captain say no.

He want to go home to see father and mother, brother and sister. When I found the men killed I remembered him, but no find him 'mong them. Dat all I know, but me think that he was with captain when they got away in the boat."

At first, on hearing what the king said, I was almost in despair, for I was very sure that he was speaking of my brother Jack, as I thought that by this time I should have grown very like him, as I often heard my mother say that I was so when I was at the age at which he went to sea.

How he had got on board the _Harriet_ I could not tell, any more than I could what had become of her boat. Still there was a possibility of his having escaped. I had no wish to return on sh.o.r.e with "Prince Charlie"

after I had handed the king over to the care of Mr Griffiths, as I wanted to talk about the matter to Jim. As may be supposed, we did talk about it for many an hour. I was now eager to be out of the harbour, in the hopes that we might visit some other islands at which Jack might be found. Jim was as sanguine as ever that he would be found. When I told Mr Griffiths he looked very grave.

"It is possible, my lad," he said, "and nothing would give me greater pleasure than to find him at last; but you know what is likely to have been the fate of the poor fellows in a boat, with a scanty supply of provisions and a long voyage to the nearest land. Just look at the chart. We are away from all civilised countries, with the wildest savages on each side of us."

Next day, when the captain and the rest of the party came on board, and as soon as our royal visitor had taken his departure, I was very glad to hear the order given to get under way. The breeze being fair we stood out of the harbour.

We were soon at our old work again. My patience was sorely tried. If I had not been actively engaged I don't know what I should have done.

My idea was that the captain would at once sail in search of the missing boat, but he had no idea of the sort in his head. He either was convinced that she was lost, or considered that it was his business to fill up his ship as soon as possible, and not to waste time in looking for those who might never be found.

We had caught several whales, when the time came for returning to the j.a.pan fishing ground, as it's called, some distance off the east coast of those islands. My hope of finding Jack decreased, but didn't die away altogether.

Jim kept me up. "We don't know in what direction the boat went," he observed. "She may have steered to the northward, and we are as likely to fall in with him the way we're going as anywhere else."

I often consulted the chart. To the northward of Strong's Island I saw the Caroline group, consisting of a vast number of coral islands, and north-west of them, again, the Ladrone Islands, the princ.i.p.al of which, Guam, is inhabited by Spaniards. Knowing this, Captain Barber may have attempted to reach it, and one day, to my satisfaction, I heard from the doctor that Captain Hawkins intended to call there before returning home.

We were now leaving those islands I have mentioned to the southward. We were very successful on the j.a.pan ground, and nearly completed our cargo, at least the lower hold was full.

At length, one calm day, a large whale was seen spouting at some distance from the ship. Four boats were lowered. The captain, the two mates, and Brown went in them, Miles Soper going as the chief mate's boat-steerer. His boat was the first up, and in a short time Soper put two irons into the whale, which almost instantly turned over on its back, threw its lower jaw open, and nipped her clean in two.

Wonderful to relate, the men all got clear, and Mr Griffiths, standing up on half of the boat, plunged his lance right down the whale's throat, and then jumped off and swam with the other men to the next boat coming up. The captain's boat now fastened to the whale, which, turning as before on its back, treated her in the way it had the first. When we who were on board saw this, we began to lower the spare boats as fast as we could. While we were thus employed, the doctor, who was looking on, exclaimed--

"There's a third boat caught!"

And we saw that the second mate's boat, which had got up, had been nipped by the whale. Brown's boat, the fourth, now pulled gallantly up, watching every movement of the monster, if necessary to get out of its way; but the wound it had received had already weakened it, and though it made at his boat he escaped, and succeeded in plunging several harpoons and lances into its body.

Meanwhile the crews of the other boats which had been destroyed had been hanging on to them, and though the sea was swarming with sharks it was a remarkable fact that not one of the men was lost. Sharks rarely bite people when a whale is bleeding, but keep following the track of the blood. Brown took some of the men on board, and we in the spare boats, leaving only the doctor and two hands to take care of the ship, pulled quickly up and rescued the remainder.

We soon had the whale alongside; it was the largest we had caught-- nearly a hundred feet in length; but we got very little oil out of it, for, having been fastened to previously, there was a huge swelling on its back as big as a tun b.u.t.t, which was, no doubt, the cause of the blubber being so thin. We had still some spare s.p.a.ce, and the crew were eager to catch the additional whales required to complete our cargo, that we might at length direct our course homeward. Although I should have before been the most eager of any to return to England, yet now, with the idea that had taken hold of me that Jack was somewhere in the neighbourhood, I was anxious to remain until I had found him. Jim shared my feelings, but I didn't suppose anybody else did.

We remained a week or more, however, after killing the last huge whale which had cost us so much trouble, without seeing another, when the captain determined to steer for the Ladrone Islands. As we had now been some months without obtaining fresh provisions, we first directed our course for the Bonins, some degrees to the eastward of the coast of j.a.pan. We understood that there were wild pigs, if not goats and sheep, on them. At all events, that fish could be caught in abundance off the sh.o.r.e. In a few days we sighted them, and ran under the lee of one of the group called South Island. Here the ship was hove-to, and a boat lowered, in which Mr Griffiths, the doctor, Horner, Jim and I, Brown and Miles Soper and Coal, with two other men, went. We took with us besides fishing-lines the whaling gear and a couple of muskets, three or four casks to fill with water, and provisions for the day, for we didn't intend to get back to the ship till evening.

Mr Griffiths, who had been there before, took the boat inside a high reef of rocks, where he had, he said, caught a number of fish.

Our first object was to obtain bait. Miles Soper and Coal undertook to swim on sh.o.r.e with baskets and catch some crabs, for which the fish in these seas seem to have a special fondness. We pulled in as close as we could to land them, and in a short time they filled their baskets, and shouted to us to return and take them off. We now dropped our kedge anchor just inside the surf, in between two and three fathoms of water, which was so clear that we could see the fish as they swam about, darted at the bait, and swallowed the hooks.

We quickly hauled in a number of magnificent fish. We were so eager at the sport that we didn't consider how rapidly the time pa.s.sed, while the doctor was more occupied with admiring the variously-coloured coral, the richly-tinted seaweeds, and the curiously-shaped fish of all the hues of the rainbow, swimming in and out among the trees of their marine gardens.

At last Mr Griffiths, pulling out his watch, exclaimed, "Hulloa! How time has gone by! Get up the anchor, lads. We ought to be off."