Rattlin the Reefer Part 18

One morning, after a literary skirmish in the captain's cabin the overnight, Mr Silva smiled me over to him on his side of the quarter-deck, just as day was breaking. The weather was beautiful, and we had got well into the trade winds.

"Mr Rattlin," said he, "you have not yet read my book. You are very young, but you have had a liberal education."

I bowed with flattered humility.

"I will lend it to you--you shall read it; and as a youthful, yet a clever scholar--give me your opinion of it--be candid. I suppose you have heard the trivial, foolish, spiteful objection started against a pa.s.sage I have employed in the second page?" and he takes a copy out of his pocket and begins to read it to me until he comes to "After having _paved_ our way up the _river_," he then enters into a long justificatory argument, the gravamen of which was to prove, that in figurative phrases a great lat.i.tude of expression was not only admissible but often elegant.

I begged leave, in a.s.senting to his doctrine, to differ from his application of it, as we ought not to risk, by using a figurative expression, the exciting of any absurd images or catachrestical ideas.

The author began to warm, and terminated my gentle representation by ordering me over to leeward, with this pompous speech, "I tell you what, sir, your friends have spent their money and your tutors their time upon you to little purpose; for know, sir, that when progress is to be made anywhere, in any shape, or in any manner, a more appropriate phrase than paving your way cannot be used--send the top-men aloft to loose the top-gallant sails."

Checked, though not humbled, I repeat the necessary orders, and no sooner do I see the men on the rattlings, than I squeak out at the top of my voice, "_Pave your way_ up the rigging--_pave your way_, you lubbers." The men stop for a moment, grin at me with astonishment, and then scamper up like so many party-coloured devils.

"Mr Rattlin, pave your way up to the mast-head, and stay there till I call you down," said the angry lieutenant; and thus, through my love for the figurative, for the first time I tasted the delights of a mast-heading.

CHAPTER THIRTY NINE.

RALPH REGENERATETH HIMSELF AND BECOMETH GOOD, FOR HALF-AN-HOUR--SINGETH ONE VERSE OF A HYMN, ESCHEWETH TELLING ONE LIE, AND GETTETH HIS REWARD IN BEING ASKED TO BREAKFAST.

What a nice, varied, sentimental, joyous, lachrymose, objurgatory, laudatory, reflective volume might be made, ent.i.tled, "Meditations at the Mast-head!"

When I found myself comfortably established in my aery domicile, I first looked down on the vessel below with a feeling nearly akin to pity, then around me with a positive feeling of rapture, and at length above me with a heart-warming glow of adoration. Perched up at a height so great, the decks of the frigate looked extremely long and narrow; and the foreshortened view one has of those upon it makes them look but little bigger or more important than so many puppets. Beneath me I saw the discontented author of my elevation, and of "A Tour up and down the Rio de la Plate," skipping actively here and there to avoid the splashing necessary in washing the decks. I could not help comparing the annoyance of this involuntary dance with the after-guard, this _croissez_ with clattering buckets, and _dos a dos_ing with wet swabs, with my comfortable and commanding rec.u.mbency upon the cross-trees. I looked down upon Lieutenant Silva, and pitied him. I looked around me, and my heart was exceeding glad. The upper rim of the sun was dallying with a crimson cloud, whilst the greater part of his disc was still below the well-defined deep-blue horizon. All above him to the zenith was chequered with small vapours, layer over layer, like the scales of a breastplate of burnished gold. The little waves were mantling, dimpling, and seemed playfully striving to emulate the intenser glories of the heavens above. They now flashed into living light, now a.s.sumed the blushing hue of a rosebud, and here and there wreathed up into a diminutive foam, mocking the smile of youth when she shows her white teeth between her beauty-breathing lips. As I swung aloft, with a motion gentle as that of the cradled infant, and looked out upon the splendours beneath and around me, my bosom swelled with the most rapturous emotions. Everywhere, as far as my eye could reach, the transparent and beryl-dyed waters were speckled with white sails, actually "blushing rosy red" with the morning beams. Far, far astern, hull down, were the huge dull sailers, spreading all their studding-sails to the wind, reminding me of frightened swans with expanded wings. Conspicuous among these were the two men-of-war brigs, obliquely sailing now here and then there, and ever and anon firing a gun, whose mimic thunder came with melodious resonance over the waters, whilst the many-coloured signals were continually flying and shifting.

They were the hawks among the covey of the larger white-plumed birds.

At this moment our gallant frigate, like a youthful and a regal giant, more majestic from the lightness of her dress, walked in conscious superiority in the midst of all. She had, as I before mentioned, just set her top-gallant sails, in order to take her proud station in the van. We now pa.s.sed vessel after vessel, each with a different quant.i.ty of canvas set, according to her powers of sailing. It was altogether a glorious sight, and to my feelings, excelled in quiet and cheerful sublimity any review, however splendid might be the troops, or imposing their numbers. Then the breeze came so freshly and kissingly on my cheek, whispering such pleasant things to my excited fancy, and invigorating so joyously the fibres of my heart--I looked around me, and was glad.

When the soul is big with all good and pure feelings, grat.i.tude will be there; and, at her smiling invitation, piety will come cheerfully and clasp her hand. Surely not that sectarian piety, which metes out wrath instead of mercy to an erring world; not that piety, dealing "d.a.m.nation round the land," daily making the pale, within which the only few to be saved are folded, more and more circ.u.mscribed; nor even that bigotted, sensuous piety, which floats on the frankincense that eddies round the marble altar, and which, if una.s.sisted by the vista of the dark aisle, the dimly-seen procession, the choral hymn, the banner, and the relic, faints, and sees no G.o.d: no, none of these will be the piety of a heart exulting in the beneficence of the All-Good. Then and there, why should I have wished to have crept and grovelled under piled and sordid stone?

Since first the aspiring architect spanned the arch at Thebes, which is _not_ everlasting, and lifted the column at Rome, which is _not_ immortal, was there ever dome like that which glowed over my head imagined by the brain of man? "Fretted with golden fires," and studded with such glorious clouds, that it were almost sinful not to believe that each veiled an angel; the vast concave, based all around upon the sapphire horizon, sprang upwards, terminating above me in that deep, deep, immeasurable blue, the best type of eternity;--was not this a fitting temple for worship? What frankincense was ever equal to that which nature then spread over the wave and through the air? All this I saw--all this I felt. I looked upwards, and I was at once enraptured and humbled. Perhaps then, for the first time since I had left my schoolboy's haunts, I bethought me that there was a G.o.d. Too, too often I had heard his awful presence wantonly invoked, his sacred name taken in vain. Lately, I had not shuddered at this habitual profanation. The work of demoralisation had commenced. I knew it then, and with this knowledge, the first pang of guilty shame entered my bosom. I stood up with reverence upon the cross-trees. I took off my hat, and though I did not even whisper the prayers we had used at school, mentally I went through the whole of them. When I said to myself, "I have done those things that I ought not to have done, and have _left undone_ those things that I _ought_ to have done," I was startled at the measure of sin that I had confessed. I think that I was contrite. I resolved to amend. I gradually flung off the hardness that my late life of recklessness had been encrusting upon my heart. I softened towards all who had ever shown me kindness; and, in my mind, I faithfully retraced the last time that I had ever walked to church with her whom I had been fond to deem my mother. These silent devotions, and these home-harmonised thoughts, first chastened, and then made me very, very happy. At last, I felt the spirit of blissful serenity so strong upon me, that, forgetting for a moment to what ridicule I might subject myself; I began to sing aloud that morning hymn that I had never omitted, for so many years, until I had joined the service--

"Awake, my soul, and with the sun."

And I confess that I sang the whole of the first verse.

I am sure that no one will sneer at all this. The good will not--the wicked dare not. The worst of us, even if his sin have put on the armour of infidelity, must remember the time when he believed in a G.o.d of love, and loved to believe it. For the sake of that period of happiness, he will not, cannot condemn the expression of feelings, and the manifestation of a bliss that he has himself voluntarily, and, if he would ask his own heart, and record the answer, miserably, cast away.

However, it will be long before I again trouble the reader with anything so _outre_ as that which I have just written. Many were the days of error, and the nights of sin, that pa.s.sed before I again even looked into my own heart. The feelings with which I made my mast-head orisons are gone and for ever. How often, and with what bitterness of spirit, have I said, "Would that I had then died!" If there is mercy in heaven--I say it with reverence--I feel a.s.sured that then to have pa.s.sed away, would have been but the closing of the eyes on earth to awaken immediately in the lap of a blissful immortality. Since then the world's foot has been upon my breast, and I have writhed under the opprobrious weight; and, with sinful pride and self-trust, have, though grovelling in the dust, returned scorn for scorn, and injury for injury--even wrong for wrong.

I have been a sad dog, and that's the truth; but--

I have been forced to hunt, and to house, and to howl with dogs much worse than myself; and that's equally true.

"Maintopmast-head there," squeaked out the very disagreeable treble of Captain Reud, who had then come on deck, as I was trolling, "Shake off dull sloth, and early rise."

"Mr Rattlin, what do you say?"

"Ay, ay, sir."

"Ay, ay, sir! what were you saying? How many sails are there in sight?"

"I can't make out, sir."

"Why not? Have you counted them?"

Now, as I before stated, I had taken off my hat, and was standing up in a fit of natural devotion; and the captain, no doubt, thought that I was bareheaded, and shading my eyes, the better to reckon the convoy. To lie would have been so easy, and I was tempted to reply to the question, that I had. But my better feelings predominated; so, at the risk of a reprimand, I answered, "Not yet, sir."

At this moment Mr Silva, the lieutenant of the watch, placed the mast-head look-outs, and sent the signal-man up to a.s.sist me in counting the convoy; and, at the same time, the latter bore me a quiet message, that when the number was ascertained I might come down.

I came on deck, and gave the report.

"I am very glad, Mr Rattlin," said the captain, approvingly, "to see you so attentive to your duty. No doubt you went up of your own accord to count the convoy?"

"Indeed, sir," said I, with a great deal of humility, "I did not."

"What--how? I thought when I came on deck I heard you singing out."

"I was mast-headed, sir."

"Mast-headed! How--for what?"

At this question, revenge, with her insidious breath, came whispering her venom into my ear; but a voice, to the warnings of which I have too seldom attended, seemed to reverberate in the recesses of my heart, and say, "Be generous." If I had told the truth maliciously, I should have a.s.suredly have drawn ridicule, and perhaps anger, on the head of the lieutenant, and approbation to myself. I therefore briefly replied, "For impertinence to Mr Silva, sir."

And I was amply repaid by the eloquent look that, with eyes actually moistened, my late persecutor cast upon me. I read the look aright, and knew, from that moment, that he was deserving of better things than a continued persecution for having unfortunately misapplied an expression.

I immediately made a vow that I would read the "Tour up and down the Rio de la Plate," with exemplary a.s.siduity.

"I am glad," said the captain, "that you candidly acknowledge your offence, instead of disrespectfully endeavouring to justify it. I hope, Mr Silva, that it is not of that extent to preclude me from asking him to breakfast with us this morning?"

"By no means," said Silva, his features sparkling with delight; "he is a good lad: I have reason to say, a very good lad."

I understood him; and though no explanations ever took place between us, we were, till he was driven from the ship, the most perfect friends.

"Well," said the captain, as he turned go down the quarter-deck ladder, "you will, at the usual time, both of you, _pave your way into the cabin_. I am sure, Mr Silva, you won't object to that, though I have not yet made up my mind as to the propriety of the expression, so we'll have the purser, and talk it over in a friendly, good-humoured way."

And saying this, he disappeared, with a look of merry malignancy that no features but his own could so adequately express.

The scene at the breakfast-table was of the usual description.

Authority, masking ill-nature under the guise of quizzing, on the one hand, and literary obstinacy fast resolving itself into deep personal hostility on the other.

CHAPTER FORTY.

HOW TO MAKE A DAY'S WORK EASY--RALPH AVOIDETH TROUBLE BY ANTIc.i.p.aTING LAND, BUT IS ANTIc.i.p.aTED BY THE ENEMY--A CHAPTER ALTOGETHER OF CHASING, WHICH IT IS HOPED WILL PLEASANTLY CHASE AWAY THE READER'S ENNUI.

We had now the usual indications of approaching the land. In fact, I had made it, by my reckoning, a fortnight before. The non-nautical reader must understand, that the young gentlemen are required to send into the captain daily, a day's work, that is, an abstract of the course of the ship for the last twenty-four hours, the distance run, and her whereabouts exactly.

Now, with that failing that never left me through life, of feeling no interest where there was no difficulty to overcome, after I had fully conquered all the various methods of making this calculation, to make it all became a great bore. So I clapped on more steam, and giving the ship more way, and allowing every day for forty or fifty miles, of westerly currents, I, by my account, ran the _Eos_ high and dry upon the Island of Barbadoes, three good weeks before we made the land. Thus, I had the satisfaction of looking on with placid indolence, whilst my messmates were furiously handling their Gunter's scales, and straining their eyes over the small printed figures in the distance and departure columns of John Hamilton Moore, of blessed (cursed?) memory, in a cabin over 90 degrees Fahrenheit, that was melting at the same time the youthful navigator, and the one miserable purser's dip that tormented rather than enlightened him with its flickering yellow flame.

As we neared the island, greater precautions were taken to preserve the convoy. We sailed in more compact order, and scarcely progressed at all during the night. The whippers-in were on the alert, for it was well known that this part of the Atlantic was infested with numerous small French men-of-war, and some privateer schooners.