Standish of Standish Part 9

But as the day went on the stormy sky lowered yet more and more blackly, the wind, shifting between east and north, swooped in angry gusts across the black waters, or blew in so fierce a gale that the shallop scarcely bore her close-reefed sails, and more than once careened so as to ship alarming seas. The air, filled with sleet and icy snow, cut like a knife through the thickest clothing, and again Edward Tilley, swooning with exhaustion and cold, lay lifeless in the bottom of the boat, sadly watched by his brother in hardly better plight and by Carver, who, like the father of a family, carried all his children in his heart.

About the middle of the afternoon these skirmishes of the storm concentrated in one furious and irresistible attack, before which even the hardy sailors lowered their heads and clung to whatever lay nearest, while Clarke, who was steering, suddenly reeled violently against the bulwark, and recovering himself with a fearful oath seized an oar and thrusting it out astern shouted,--

"We be all dead men! The rudder has broke, and no man can steer in such a sea as this with an oar!"

"Two men may, so they be men and not cowards!" shouted John Alderton in retort, and springing to the stern he thrust out his own oar, calling to a comrade,--"Here, Cornish Jim, come you and help me, and so long as ash blades and stout arms hold we two will steer the craft."

"Good cheer, men!" hailed Coppin from the bows where he was on the lookout. "I see the harbor straight ahead! We are all but in! Carry on, carry on with your sails there, Clarke, and let us make the haven before the gale rises to its height."

"She'll never carry another inch of canvas," expostulated English as the mate shook out a reef in the mainsail, but Coppin and Clarke were now in command, since only they professed to know the coast, and the warning was unheeded, especially as the wind had for a moment lulled or rather drawn back for a more formidable spring, swooping down as the last reef point was loosed with a force that s.n.a.t.c.hed the great sail from the men's hands, and buried the nose of the shallop deep under water. The sail cracked and filled until it was tense as iron, but the honest Holland duck could not give way, and it was the mast that had to go, breaking into three pieces and falling overboard with a splintering crash. Nor was this the worst, for with the mast went the great sail with all its hamper of blocks and cordage, which, half in and half out the boat, threatened to capsize and swamp her before it could be cut away.

"Save the sail, men!" cried English through all the hubbub. "As good lose all as lose our sail! Gather it in and stow it as best we may. Keep her before the wind, you lubbers! Handle your oars for your lives!"

For now the great boat, losing her sail, must depend upon oars, and with two men at each, and Alderton and the Cornish giant steering as best they might against a sea howling and leaping like wild beasts around them, the shattered craft drove on past the headland of Manomet, steering straight for the deadly rocks off the Gurnet's Head, which Coppin espying from the bows, he uttered a cry of dismay, shouting,--

"The Lord be merciful to our sinful souls, for I never saw this place before!"

"Breakers ahead!" shouted Clarke. "Beach her, Alderton! Run her ash.o.r.e on yon headland! We that can swim may save ourselves! Beach her, I say!"

"And I say no such coward thing," retorted Alderton. "About with her, men! Row, row for your lives! Bend down to it! So! Pull, pull! I see a channel ahead and smooth water! Hold on here, Jim, till I get out another oar, this cracks! Now then! Yeo-ho! Here we go past the reef!"

And weathering Brown's Island and the Gurnet Rocks, the brave fellow steering more by instinct than sight, for darkness had fallen with the storm, the shallop struck the channel then dividing Saquish from the Gurnet, flew through it like a hunted creature, and forging past the north headland of a small densely wooded island found herself in calm water close under its lee.

"There, men, ye are safe, thanks to stout hearts and arms and good ashen blades!" exclaimed Alderton drawing his first full breath since seizing the steering oar.

"Thanks to G.o.d Almighty who still giveth His servants the victory,"

amended Carver, who had toiled with the st.u.r.diest.

"And now, where are we and what is to do next?" demanded Standish clenching his blistered hands.

"We are between two sh.o.r.es, maybe islands both, maybe the lee sh.o.r.e is the main," replied Coppin peering through the darkness. "And more I know not."

"And I for one am minded to get ash.o.r.e and see if there be stuff for a fire and shelter, whatever name the place may hold," cried Hopkins dashing the drops of salt water from his face and beard.

"And I," added Standish heartily. "What say you, Master Carver? Shall we land and make some sort of randevous upon the sh.o.r.e?"

"The place may be full of salvages, who, drawn by the light of a fire, can come upon us unaware," replied Carver hesitatingly.

"As well risk another encounter as to perish here of cold and exhaustion," suggested Winslow.

"Safety most often lies on the side of courage," declared Standish sententiously.

"And Master Tilley will die if naught be done for him," pleaded Howland, and to this consideration Carver at once yielded his careful scruples.

"Ay, John, thou 'rt right to mind me of that," said he. "Some of us will go ash.o.r.e and make a fire, whereat to comfort those who are overborne by cold and weariness, and some shall keep the boat until the first are refreshed, and so hold watch and watch."

"And I will be of the first watch ash.o.r.e," cried Clarke, the master's mate; "for I'd twice liefer meet all the salvages of the Indies than to freeze like a clod, so here goes." And stepping upon the gunwale he made a spring in the dark, alighting upon a slippery rock and measuring his length upon the sand. Nothing daunted, however, he grasped a handful of sand in each fist, as if his prostration had been voluntary, and springing to his feet cried in a braggadocio voice,--

"I seize this land for King James of England and for myself."

"Thyself!" growled Coppin, jealously. "We'll call it Clarke's Land, then; for truly 't is all thou 'rt ever likely to be master of."

"Nay, then, thou 'rt welcome to the six feet they'll give thee after thou 'rt hung," retorted Clarke, and the sailors chuckled at the jest, while the Pilgrims gravely arranged which watch should first land, and which keep the boat.

Peering around in the obscurity, the pioneers soon found a sheltered nook close under the bluff, and built their fire and made their camp very near the spot where a little wharf now lies, and where generation after generation of their children has stood to meditate, to dream, to drink in the glory of summer seas and skies, or beneath the August moon to whisper in each others ears the old, old story, never so fresh and never so real as it has come to some of them on the sh.o.r.es of Clarke's Island.

No rosy dreams, no moonlit pa.s.sages were theirs however, who in that stormy December night first trod that pleasant sh.o.r.e, but rather the sternest realities of life and death, as with numb and icy fingers they struck a light and sheltered the feeble blaze loth to catch upon the wet twigs and leaves hastily collected.

"Either there are no Indians or this is an island too small for hunting," said Hopkins as he groped in the thicket at the top of the bluff for small wood.

"And how know you that?" inquired Howland who helped him.

"By this undergrowth that we are gathering, lad. The Indians burn it off year by year in the haunts of the deer, so that they may course there freely, but here thou seest are plenty of old and dry twigs."

"The better for our fire," returned Howland philosophically, not so much interested at that moment in the habits of Indians as in providing for Elizabeth Tilley's father.

The more cautious brethren in the pinnace meantime had anch.o.r.ed and made things as snug as possible on board, but as the fire blazed up, and one after another on sh.o.r.e showed signs of its genial influence, the dangers of abandoning the boat grew less and less formidable, until Standish, rubbing his hands and turning to toast the other side of his person, cried exultingly,--

"Aha, I am warm! I have seen the fire!"

"So have I seen it, and here goes to feel it!" cried Coppin jumping as far toward land as he could, and splashing the rest of the way, for he had sulkily remained on board when Clarke leaped ash.o.r.e and claimed the island.

"Methinks the example is good if the manner be uncourteous," said Winslow wistfully.

"Ay," replied Carver a little annoyed by Coppin's action, although he claimed no authority over the rough fellow. "I was just about to say that it were as well that we landed, taking our arms with us and standing on our guard, for truly we are perishing here."

The permission calmly waited for was thankfully received, and in a few moments the whole party was gathered about the now jubilant fire which, fed with cedar logs, sent up clouds of perfumed smoke to float like incense among the crests of the shivering parent trees.

The next morning broke calm and 'sunshining,' and the Pilgrims, renewing their fire, offered a solemn prayer of thanksgiving and confidence, and sat down to breakfast.

After this came an exploration, which showed the small size and compact nature of the island, as well as its total lack of inhabitants. This tour was followed by an informal council about the fire, wherein it was resolved to remain during the day, which was Sat.u.r.day, upon the island, drying and cleaning their weapons, rigging a temporary mast for the shallop, baling and drying her, and restoring by rest and comfort some measure of strength to the feebler members of the party. Also, and this not the least consideration, the next day being Sunday, they would thus be prepared to observe it with that decency and recollection which were part of their religion.

The plan arranged, all set heartily to work to carry it out, the sailors going aboard to bale the boat, and Clarke and Alderton undertaking to fit the new mast. A proud young cedar, growing straight and tall among his slender admirers, was soon found, and as the white man's axe for the first time since cedars grew upon Clarke's Island bit into the heart of one of their number, we well might fancy that, mingling with the east wind and the sound of the surf on Salthouse Beach rose the echo of the dirge, startling the sailors of Egean sh.o.r.es, long before,--

"Pan is dead! Great Pan is dead!"

Late in the afternoon when all the work was done, and the men sat or lay around the fire enjoying the Sabbatical repose long distinguishing the New England Sat.u.r.day evening, Carver, Standish, Bradford, and Winslow climbed the hill rising sharply above their camping-ground, and paused by what is now called Sunset Rock to look about them.

"Clarke's Island is but a small addition to King James's territory,"

said Winslow with his subtle smile, as he glanced over the ninety acres of woodland lying around him.

"Our own England is not very large," replied Carver quietly, "but she hath long arms."

"And I," cried Standish gayly, "am but a little fellow, and yet am not in the way of calling upon bigger men to protect me! Despise not the day of small things, Master Winslow, albeit you carry your head some inches higher than mine."

"There is a great rock showing above the scrub oaks to the north," said Bradford pointing in that direction. "Let us climb it and see what lieth beyond."

"Have with you, brother!" responded Standish, and forcing their way through the stunted growth covering this higher and bleaker portion of the island the four men soon stood at the base of an enormous bowlder about thirty feet in height, brought hither in some glacial overflow of the forgotten years.