The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" Part 14

But the glowing sun also took its morning meal, and greedily ate up the wind; and so the yachts from Ryde could be seen far off, looking farther off in a misty curtain, all only drifting with the tide, while they raced their hardest for a cup. Yet there is science and skill in drifting well. If the skipper has no wind to show his prowess in with sails, he must win by his knowledge of current, tide, and channel, while he seems perhaps to be carried along helplessly. One after another the pretty racers slowly rounded the Warner light-ship, and then each sunk back, as it were, into the gauzy distance, until they seemed like white pearls dotted on grey satin, and the Rob Roy was alone again, while the fog thickened more. Land was shut out, then sky, then every single thing, and the glazed sea seemed to stiffen as if it had set flat and smooth for ever.

To know that this state of thing was to last for hours would make it intolerable, but the expectancy of every moment buoys up the mind in hope, and every past moment is buried as you reach thus forward to the next coming.

Then the inexorable tide turned dead against me, and down went my anchor; for, at any rate, we must not be floated backwards. Tool-chest opened, and hammer and saw are instantly at work, for there are still "things to be done" on board, and when all improvements shall have been completed then vacant hours like these will be tedious enough; but never fear, there is no finality in a sailing-boat, if the brain keeps inventing and the fingers respond.

Out of the thick creamy fog a huge object slowly loomed, with a grand air of majesty, and a low but strenuous sound as it came nearer and clearer to eye and ear. It was an enormous Atlantic Steamer, and it went circling round and round in ample bends, but never too far to be unexpected again. Sometimes her great paddles moved with a measured plash, but slow, until she dissolved before my eyes into a faded vision.

Again, when hidden, there would still come a deep moaning from her hoa.r.s.e fog-whistle out of the impenetrable whiteness, and she again towered up suddenly behind, ever wheeling, gliding on, vapour and water so commingled that you could not say she floated, but was somehow faintly present like the dim picture on a canvas screen from a magic lantern half in focus. She was searching in the fog for the 'Nab' light-ship, thence to take new bearings and cleave the mist in a straight course at half-speed for Southampton. When she found the 'Nab' she vanished finally, and I was glad and sorry she was gone.

After long waiting, the faintest zephyr now at last dallied with my light flag for a minute, and the anchor was instantly raised. A schooner, also outward bound, soon gently burst its way through the cloudy barrier, and I tried to follow her, but she too melted into dimness, and left me in a noiseless, sightless vacancy, except when the distant gong of the light-ship told that they also had a fog there.

How did the ancients by any possibility manage to sail in a fog without a compa.s.s? In those days, too, they had no charts; yes, and there was no "Wreck chart," to tell at the year's end all the havoc strewn at the bottom of the sea.

Well, we sailed on and on, always seeming to sail on into pure cotton-wool, which blushed a little with an evening tint as the sun tired down, and so here was a long day told off and ending; but where exactly am I now as darkness falls?

You will say, "Why, the chart tells that, of course;" and so it does, if you have anything like sure reckoning to indicate what part of the mazy groups of figures on it to look for as your probable place; otherwise a dozen different places in it will all suit your soundings, and eleven of them are wrong.

Consider the _data_, for our calculation. The Rob Roy had been carried by two tides; one this way, the other that. She had sailed on three different tacks, that is, in various angular directions, and with different speeds, and these complicating forces had acted for times very uncertain. Where is she now? an all-important question for settling the start point in a night cruise, and on a dangerous coast.

The last time I was sailing in fog was on the Baltic, in my canoe, where, just at the nick of time, a look-out man was descried on a high ladder far overlooking the low rocky islands of the Swedish coast, and he speedily showed me that my bow was then pointed exactly wrong for the desired haven.

This may be the time, perhaps, to compare the canoe voyages with the yawl cruise, even if we cannot settle the question so often put to me, "Which was the most agreeable?"

A canoe voyage can be enjoyed by several men, each in a separate boat, and yet all in a combined party; that is, with distinct responsibility but united companionship. The yawl cruise devolves both toil and care on one alone, but he also has all the pleasure, and so it might be p.r.o.nounced at once to be more _selfish_ than the other voyage. But after a score of tours, in large and small parties, I see that selfishness is quite independent of the number concerned. A man who is pleasing his wife or his children in a tour I do not count at all; for everything that delights or benefits _them_ is of course a pleasure to _him_. Or again, he may journey with ten companions, and his travelling circle will indeed be larger, but the centre of it may be after all the same.

Of the thousand tourists who rush out over the Continent each summer there is little check on selfishness by meeting people in trains, steamers, and hotels for a temporary acquaintance which is speedily dissolved as soon as the interests or the likings of the companions are not coincident.

Unselfishness appears to consist in doing good when it is not exactly pleasant to do it, and to people who are not in our own groove, or in "our set," but like the people invited in the feast prescribed by Christ, and for whom we work as a duty, whether it is immediately agreeable or not. It is giving up our own will to G.o.d's command and obeying this ungrudgingly: and yet our own pleasure may be most in giving others pleasure, and we can be lavish of labour for others while we are selfish at the core. Thus it seems to be very difficult ever to be unselfish in the sense that it is often absurdly insisted upon; namely, that others are everything and yourself nothing. Nevertheless, after all casuistry, we know what is _meant_ by "selfish," as an undue regard. But the result of an action is to be looked at, and it does not become selfish because we alone do one part of it. A man who steps out from a crowd to pluck flowers alone on the edge of the cliff may bring back a bouquet that will give fragrant pleasure to them all, while another who stays in the group of gatherers may gather none at all or may be very selfish about his handful. Our lonely labour may, in fact, be useful for other people in the end.

The anxieties of the canoe trip are more varied and less heavy than in a sailing cruise.

In the yawl I was always sure of food and lodging, but then in the canoe one does not fear wind, wave, calm, and fog; for, at any rate, one can at the worst take the canoe ash.o.r.e. The risk of a total loss of the canoe is only fifteen pounds gone, but the other shipwreck risks ten times as much, and whereas each canoe danger can usually be avoided, those met in sailing at sea are often to be encountered without any escape.

The physical endurance required in a canoe is more under control of a previous arrangement. The muscular exertion with the paddle is generally voluntary, while that in the yawl was often hardest when one wanted most to rest. You need scarcely be forced, in canoeing, to go on two days and two nights without sleep, as will presently be seen was my fate in the yawl.

The scenery in traversing land and water in a canoe is of course more varied than in sailing always at sea, but the perils of the deep have a grandeur and wideness that seem to rouse far more the inner soul and with more profound emotions. The thoughts during a night storm at sea are of a higher strain than those in pa.s.sing the rapids in a river.

Finally, there is at first a sense of incongruity in the appearance of a canoe when in a cart, on a train, or in a house, and you have often to meet an inexplicable but evident _smile_ at the whole affair, which perhaps comes from pity, certainly from ignorance, and it may be from contempt; whereas a sailing-boat crossing the deep is doing what people in ports and ships know very well about, and if your boat keeps on doing it successfully they cannot despise the deed because the boat that does it is small. A man who comes to the "meet" on a little pony will not be laughed at if he is always well in at the death.

Perhaps the voyage alone in a yawl will not be so often repeated by other people as that in a canoe, but this last manner of touring became popular at once.

One of the members of the Royal Canoe Club (The late Hon. J. Gordon), a distinguished University oar and Wimbledon Prizeman, sailed {240} at night across the Channel from Dover to Boulogne, paddled through France and sailed to Ma.r.s.eilles, and thence from Nice to Genoa, through the Italian lakes, the Swiss lakes, and by the Reuss to the Rhine home again.

A second coasted along England, and paddled across the Channel from the French side in a 'Rob Roy' made with his own hands. A third crossed from Scotland to Ireland in his 'Rob Roy.' A critic complacently denied, a few months before these voyages, that a canoe could cross a bay eight miles wide. The canoes of our Members have paddled over thousands of miles in Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, including China and j.a.pan, besides cruises in Australia, New Zealand, and many groups of islands far away.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Bedtime-A trance-Thunderings-Chart-Light dims-Night flies-First running-Newhaven-On the gridiron-Mr. Smith-Tumbledown walls-Derelict.

"Where is the yawl now?" was the question we had asked in the fog, and the natural answer was-that the chart would tell, of course. So let us look at the small slice of chart copied on page 245, which is crammed, you see, with figures of soundings, and names of banks, buoys, and beacons; but the only thing to be seen on the actual horizon around us, is the Owers light behind, and about N.W. in its bearing. The tide will soon turn against our progress towards the east, therefore we tack towards sh.o.r.e, so as to be within anchorage soundings should it become needful to stop, for the wind has just changed rather suspiciously, and we can even hear the sound of the drums at Portsmouth as they beat the taptoo. A few bright meteors shoot athwart the heavens above, reminding us that this is one of their usual epochs-the 14th of August.

Now we are in ten fathoms by the lead, and we must anchor here, for the tide has fully turned and the wind has lulled, and perhaps it will do to sleep for six hours now before going on again.

The beautiful phosph.o.r.escence of the sea on this occasion was an attractive sight, and I could follow the line of my hemp cable by the gleam of silver light which enfolded it with a gradually softened radiance from the surface of the sea, down-down to an unseen depth, where, in sooth, it was dark enough. {242}

The gentle motion of riding with a chain-cable is quite in contrast to that when anch.o.r.ed by a rope; for this latter will jerk and pull, while the heavier chain, laid in a drooping curve, acts as a constant spring that eases and cushions every rude blow.

I intended to start again with any freshening breeze, and to get into Littlehampton for the night; therefore the small anchor and the hemp cable were used so as to be more ready for instant departure, and well it was thus.

Time sped slowly between looking at my watch to know the tide change, and dozing as I lay in the cabin-the dingey being of course astern; until in the middle of the night, lapsing through many dreams, I had glided into that delicious state when you dream that you are dreaming. On a sudden, and without any seeming cause, I felt perfectly awake, and yet in a sort of trance, and lying still a time, seeking what could possibly have awakened me thus. Then there came through the dark a peal of thunder, long, and loud, and glorious.

How changed the scene to look upon! No light to be seen from the Owers now, but a flash from above and then darkness, and soon a grand rolling of the same majestic, deep-toned roar.

Now I must prepare for wind. On with the life-belt, close the hatches, loose the mainsail, and double reef it, and reef the jib. Off with the mizen and set the storm-sail, and now haul up the anchor while yet there is time; and there was scarcely time before a rattling breeze got up, and waves rose too, and rain came down as we sailed off south to the open sea for room. Sea room is the sailor's want: the land is what he fears more than the water.

We were soon fast spinning along, and the breeze brushed all the haze away, but the night was very dark, and the rain made it hard to see. Now and then the thunder swallowed all other sounds, as the wild cries in the desert are silenced by the lion's roar.

Sometimes there was an arch shining above as the flashes leaped across the upper clouds, and then a sharp upright p.r.o.ng of forked lightning darted straight down between, while rain was driven along by the wind, and salt foam dashed up from the waves. It seemed like an earthly version of that heavenly vision which was beheld in Patmos by the beloved John:-"And I heard as it were the voice of a great mult.i.tude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings." {244}

How well our English word "thunder" suits the meaning in its sound, far better than _tonnerre_ or _tonitru_!

In the dark, a cutter dashed by me, crossing the yawl's bows, just as the lightning played on us both. It had no ship-light up, shameful to say.

I shouted out, "Going south?" and they answered, "Yes; come along off that sh.o.r.e."

[Picture: The Owers chart]

From the bit of chart here copied (covering only a few miles) it will be understood what kind of sh.o.r.e we had to avoid. There was quite water enough for our shallow craft, but it was the twisting of currents and tides that made the danger here.

The breeze now turned west, then south, and every other way, and it was exceedingly perplexing to know at once what to do in each case, especially as the waves became short and snappish under this pressure from different sides, and yet my compa.s.s quietly pointed right, with a soft radiance shining from it, and my mast-light in a brighter glow gleamed from behind me {246} on the white crest of the waves.

At one time a heavy squall roughened the dark water, and taxed all my powers to work the little yawl; but whenever a lull came, or a chance of getting on my proper course again, I bent round to "East by North,"

determined to make way in that direction.

In the middle of the night my compa.s.s lamp began to glimmer faint, and it was soon evident that the flame must go out. Here was a discomfort: the wind veered so much that its direction would be utterly fallacious as a guide to steer by, and this uncertainty might continue until the lightning ceased. Therefore, at all hazards, we must light up the compa.s.s again. So I took down the ship-light from the mizen shroud, and held it between my knees that it might shine on the needle, and it was curious how much warmth came from this lantern. Then I managed to get a candle, and cut a piece off, and rigged it up with paper inside the binnacle. This answered for about ten minutes, but finding it was again flickering, I opened the tin door, and found all the candle had melted into bright liquid oil; so this makeshift was a failure. However, another candle was cut, and the door being left open to keep it cool, with this lame light I worked on bravely, but very determined for the rest of my sailing days to have the oil bottle always accessible.

Finally the wind blew out the candle, though it was very much sheltered, and the ship-light almost at the same time also went out suddenly. Then we lay to, backed the jib, opened the cabin hatch, got out the oil, thoroughly cleaned the lamp, put in a new wick, and lighted it afresh, and a new candle in the ship's light; again we started all right once more, with that self-gratulation at doing all this successfully,-under such circ.u.mstances of wind, sea, and rain,-which perhaps was not more than due.

What with these things, and reefing several times, and cooking at intervals, there was so much to do and so much to think about during the night that the hours pa.s.sed quickly, and at last some stray streaks of dawn (escaped before their time perhaps) lighted up a cloud or two above, and then a few wave-tops below, and soon gave a general grey tint to all around, until by imperceptible but sure advance of clearness, the vague horizon seemed to split into land and water, and happily then it was seen plainly that the Rob Roy had not lost way in the dark.

As soon as there was light enough to read we began to study Sh.o.r.eham in the Pilot book, and neared it the while in the water; but though now opposite the Brighton coast, it was yet too faraway to make out any town, for we had stood well out to sea in the thunderstorm. All tiredness pa.s.sed off with the fresh morning air, and the breeze was now so strong that progress was steady and swift.

It may be remarked how a coast often appears quite different when you are fifteen or twenty miles out to sea, from what it does when you stand on the beach, or look from a row-boat close to the land. So now we were puzzled to find out Brighton, one's own familiar Brighton, with its dull half-sided street, neither town nor bathing-town, its beach unwalkable, and all its sights and glories done in a day. We might well be ashamed not to recognise at once the contour of the hills, which we had so often trudged over in column or in skirmish in the Volunteer Reviews.

The chain-pier was, of course, hardly discernible at a great distance.

But the "Grand Hotel" at last a.s.serted itself as a black cubical speck in the binocular field, and then we made straight for that; Sh.o.r.eham being gradually voted a bore, to be pa.s.sed by, and Newhaven adopted as the new goal for the day.

We had shaken out all reefs, and now tore along at full speed, with the spray-drift sparkling in the sun, and a frolicsome jubilant sea. The delights of going fast when the water is deep and the wind is strong-ah!

these never can be rightly described, nor the exulting bound with which your vessel springs through a buoyant wave, and the thrill of nerve that tells in the sailor's heart, "Well, after all, sailing is a pleasure supreme."