The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" Part 15

Numerous fishing-vessels now came out, with their black tanned sails and strong bluff bows and hardy-looking crews, who all hailed me cheerily when they were near enough, and often came near to see. Fast the yawl sped along the white chalk cliffs, and my chart in its glazed frame did excellent service now, for the wind and sea rose more again; and at length, when we came near the last headland for Newhaven, we lowered the mainsail and steadily ran under mizen and jib. Newhaven came in sight, deeply embayed under the magnificent cliff, which, at other times I could have gazed on for an hour, admiring the grand dashing of the waves, but we had to hoist mainsail again, so as to get in before the tide would set out strongly, and so increase every minute the sea at the harbour's mouth.

It was more than exciting to enter here with such waves running. Rain, too, came on, just as the Rob Roy dashed into the first three rollers, and they were big and green, and washed her well from stem right on to stern, but none entered farther. The bright yellow hue of the waves on one side of the pier made me half afraid that it was shallow there, and, hesitating to pa.s.s, I signalled to some men near the pier-head as to which way to go, but they were only visitors. The tide ran strongly out, dead in my teeth, yet the wind took me powerfully through it all, and then instantly, even before we had rounded into quiet water, the inquisitive uncommunicative spectators roared out, "Where are you from?"

"What's your name?" and all such stupid things to say to a man whose whole mind in a time like this has to be on sail and sea and tiller.

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During this pa.s.sage from the Isle of Wight I had noticed now and then, when the waves tossed more than usual, that a dull, heavy, thumping sound was heard aboard the yawl, and gradually I concluded that her iron keel had been broken by the rock at Bembridge, and that it was swinging free below my boat. This idea increased my anxiety to get in safely; and to make sure of the matter we took the Rob Roy at once to the "gridiron,"

and laid her alongside a screw-steamer which had been out during the night, and had run on a rock in the dark thunderstorm. The "baulks" or beams of the gridiron under water were very far apart, and we had much difficulty in placing the yawl so as to settle down on two of them, but the crew of the steamer helped me well, and all the more readily, as I had given them books at Dieppe, a gift they did not now forget.

Just as the ebbing tide had lowered the yawl fairly on the baulks, another steamer came in from France, crowded with pa.s.sengers, and the waves of her swell lifted my poor little boat off her position, and rudely fixed her upon only one baulk, from which it was not possible to move her; therefore, when the tide descended she was hung up askew in a ludicrous position of extreme discomfort to her weary bones; but when I went outside to examine below, there was nothing whatever amiss, and gladness for this outweighed all other troubles, and left me quite ready for a good sleep at night.

For this purpose we rowed the yawl into a quiet little river, and lashed her alongside a neat schooner, whose captain and wife and children and their little dog 'Lady' were soon great friends, for they were courteous people, as might be expected in a respectable vessel; it is generally so.

Now the Rob Roy settled into soft mud for a good rest of three days, and I went to the Inn where "Mr. Smith" landed from France in 1848, after he had given up being King Louis Philippe.

The Inn traded upon this fact, and it had other peculiarities-very bad chops, worse tea, no public room, and a very deaf waitress! the whole sufficiently uncomfortable to justify my complaint, and it must be a very bad inn indeed that is not comfortable enough for _me_.

Here I was soon accosted by a reader of canoe books, and next day we inspected the oyster-beds, and a curious corn-mill driven by tide-water confined in a basin-one of the few mills worked by the power of the moon.

Also we wandered over the new sea fortifications, which are built and hewed by our Government one week, and the week afterwards if there comes a shower of rain they tumble down again. This is the case, at any rate, with the Newhaven fortress, and we must only hope that an invading army will not attack the place during the wrong week.

Three steamers in a day, all crowded with Exhibition pa.s.sengers, that was a large traffic for a small port like Newhaven; but it did not raise the price of anything except ham sandwiches, and I bought my supplies of eggs and b.u.t.ter and bread, and walked off with them all, as usual, to the extreme astonishment of an aristocratic shop-woman.

In crossing a viaduct my straw hat blew off into a deep hole among mud, and I asked a boy to fetch it. The little fellow was a true Briton. He put down his bundle, laboriously built a bridge of stones, and at imminent risk of a regular mud-bath, at length clasped the hat. His pluck was so admirable, that he had a shilling as a reward, which, be it observed, was half the price of the hat itself two months before, a "No.

2" hat, useful to shop in.

This incident put an end to quiet repose, for the boy-life of the town was soon stirred to its lowest depth, and all youngsters with any spirit of gain trooped down to the yawl, waiting off and on for the next day also, in hopes of another mishap as a chance of luck to them.

The dingey too had its usual meed of applause; but one rough mariner was so vociferous in deriding its minuteness, that at last I promised him a sovereign if he could catch me, and he might take any boat in the port.

At first he was all for the match, and began to strip and prepare, but his ardour cooled, and his abuse also subsided.

Many Colchester boats were here, nearly all of them well "found," and with civil crews, who were exceedingly grateful for books to read on the Sunday, and, resting among them, was a little yacht of five tons, which had been sent out with only one man to take her from Dover to Ryde. Poor fellow! he had lost his way at night and was unable to keep awake, until at last two fishermen fell in with the derelict and brought him in here, hungry and amazed; but I regarded him with a good deal of interest as rather in my line of life, and I quite understood his drowsy feelings when staring at the compa.s.s in the black, whistling rain.

CHAPTER XIX.

Tide waiter-Beachy Head-Night Ghost-Man overboard-Ship ahoy!-Overfalls-Thoughts-Thunder-A question-Day-Good-bye, dingey!-Dungeness-A nap.

The barometer mounted steadily all Sunday, so we resolved to start next morning at break of day. But though the night was quiet the vessels near my berth were also getting ready, therefore at last I gave up all hopes of sleep, and for company's sake got ready also after midnight, that we might have all the tide possible for going round Beachy Head, which, once pa.s.sed, we could find easy ports all the way to London. So about two o'clock, in the dark, we are rowing out again on the ebbing tide, and the water at the pier-head looks placid now compared with the boiling and dashing it made there when the yawl pa.s.sed in before.

Dawn broke an hour afterwards with a dank and silent mist skirting up far-away hills, and a gentle east wind faintly breathing as our tea-cup smoked fragrant on deck. The young breeze was only playful yet, so we anch.o.r.ed, waiting for it to rise in earnest or the tide to slacken, as both of them were now contrary; and meantime we rested some hours preparing for a long spell of unknown work; but I could not sleep in such a lovely daybreak, not having that most valuable capacity of being able to sleep when it is wanted for coming work, and not for labour past.

The east wind baffled the yawl and a whole fleet of vessels, all of us trying to do the same thing, namely, to arrive at Beachy Head before two o'clock in the day; for, if this could be managed, we should there find the tide ebbing eastwards, and so get twelve hours of current in our favour.

This feature-the division of the tides there-makes Beachy Head a well-marked point in the navigation of the Channel. The stream from the North Sea meets the other from the Atlantic here, and here also they begin to separate. After beating, in downright sailing, one after another of the schooners and brigs and barques in company, I saw at last with real regret that not one of us could reach the point in time, and yet the yawl got there only a few minutes too late; but it was dead calm, and I even rowed her on to gain the last little mile.

One after another the vessels gave it up, and each cast anchor. Coming to a pilot steamer, I hailed: "Shall I be able to do it?" "No, sir,"

they said; "no,-very sorry for you, sir; you've worked hard, sir, but you're ten minutes too late." Within that time the tide had turned against us. We had not crossed the line of division, and so the yawl had to be turned towards sh.o.r.e to anchor there, and to wait the tide until nine o'clock at night, unless a breeze came sooner.

After three hours' work she reached the desired six fathoms' patch of sand, just under the n.o.ble white cliff that rears its head aloft about 600 feet, standing ever as a giant wall, sheer, upright, out of the sea.

Dinner done and everything set right (for this is best policy always), I slipped into my cabin and tried to sleep as the sun went down, but a little land-breeze soon began, and every now and then my head was raised to see how tide or wind progressed. Then I must have fallen once into a mild nap, and perhaps a dream, for sudden and strong a rough hand seemed to shake the boat, and, on my leaping up, there glanced forth a brilliant flash of lightning that soon put everybody on the _qui vive_.

Now was heard the clink of distant cables, as I raised mine also in the dark, with only the bright shine of the lighthouse like a keen and full-opened eye gazing down from the cliff overhead.

Compa.s.s lighted, ship-lantern fixed, a reef in each sail, and, with a moment's thought of the very similar events that had pa.s.sed only a few nights ago, we steered right south, away, away to the open sea.

It was black enough all around; but yet the strong wind expected after thunder had not come, and we edged away eastward, doubly watchful, however, of the dark, for the crowd of vessels here was the real danger, and not the sea.

Look at the ghost of Rob Roy flitting on the white sail as the lamp shines brightly. Down comes the rain, and with it flash after flash, peal upon peal of roaring thunder, and the grandeur of the scene is unspeakable. The wind changed every few minutes, and vessels and boats and steamers whirled past like visions, often much too near to be welcome.

[Picture: Beachy Head Ghost]

A white dazzling gleam of forked lightning cleaves the darkness, and behold! a huge vessel close at hand, but hitherto unseen, lofty and full-sailed, and for a moment black against the instant of light, and then utterly lost again. The plashing of rain hissed in the sea, and a voice would come out of the unseen-"Port, you lubber!" The ship, or whatever it is, has no lights at all, though on board it they can see mine. Ah, it's no use peering forward to discover on which side is the new danger; for when your eye has gazed for a time at the lighted compa.s.s it is powerless for half a minute to see in the dark s.p.a.ce forward; or, again, if you stare into the blackness to scan the faintest glimmer of a sail ahead, then for some time after you cannot see the compa.s.s when looking at it dazzled. This difficulty in sailing alone is the only one we felt to be quite insuperable.

Again a steam whistle shrieked amid the thunder, and two eyes glared out of the formless vapour and rain-the red and the green lights, the signals that showed where she was steaming to. There was shouting from her deck as she kept rounding and backing, no doubt for a man overboard. As we slewed to starboard to avoid her, another black form loomed close on the right; and what with wind, rain, thunder, and ships, there was everything to confuse just when there was every need of cool decision.

It would be difficult for me to exaggerate the impressive spectacle that pa.s.sed along on the dark background of this night. To shew what others thought, we may quote the following paragraph from the 'Pall Mall Gazette' of next day, the 20th of August: {260}-

"The storm which raged in London through the whole of last night was beyond question by far the most severe and protracted which has occurred for many years. It began at half-past eight o'clock, after a day of intense heat, which increased as the evening advanced, though it never reached the sultriness which was remarked before the storm of last week. The first peal of thunder was heard about nine, and from that time till after five this morning it never ceased for more than a few minutes, while the lightning may be said to have been absolutely continuous. Its vivid character was something quite unusual in the storms of recent summers, and the thunder by which it was often instantaneously followed can only be described as terrific.

The storm reached its greatest violence between two and three o'clock, when a smart gale of wind sprang up, and for about ten minutes the tempest was really awful."

We had noticed some rockets sent up from Eastbourne earlier in the evening; probably these were fireworks at a _fete_ there, but the rain must have soon drowned the gala. Certainly it closed up my view of all other lights but the lightning, though sometimes a shining line appeared for a moment in the distance, perhaps from Hastings; and at one time the moon came out red and full, and exactly at the top of a vessel's lofty sails. One steamer had puzzled me much by its keeping nearly still.

This drifted close up at last, and they called out, "Ahoy, there!-are you a fishing boat?" They wanted to know their bearings, as the current and shifting wind made the position of Beachy Head quite uncertain in the dark. {261} I replied to their hail-"No, I'm the yacht Rob Roy, crew of one man; don't you see my white sails?" and they answered-"See? why, who can see to-night?"

Sometimes a sudden and dead lull came with an ominous meaning, and then the loud hissing of rain could be heard advancing to us in the dark till it poured on the yawl in sheets of water, and the mere dripping from the peak of my sou'wester was enough to obscure vision.

And yet, after a few hours of the turmoil and excitement, this state of things became quite as it were _natural_, so soon does one get accustomed to any circ.u.mstances, however strange at first. I even cooked hot tea; it was something to do, as well as to drink, and singing and whistling also beguiled the dark hours of eager, strained matching. In a lighter moment, once a great lumbering sloop sailed near, and we hailed her loudly, "How's the wind going to be?"-for the wind kept ever changing (but the thunder and lightning were going on still). A gruff voice answered, "Can't say; who _can_ say-night-this sort-think it'll settle east." This was bad news for me, but it did not come true. The sloop's skipper wished for an east wind, and so he expected it.

A stranger sound than any before now forced attention as it rapidly neared us, and soon the sea was white around with boiling, babbling little waves-what could it be? Instantly I sounded with the lead, but there was no bottom-we were not driving on sh.o.r.e-it was one of the "overfalls" or "ripples" we have mentioned before where a turbid sea is raised in deep water by some far-down precipice under the waves.

The important question at once arose as to which of the "overfalls" on my chart this could be-the one marked as only a mile from Beachy Head, or the other ten miles further on. Have we been turning and wheeling about all this dreary night in only a few square miles of sea, or have we attained the eastern tide, and so are now running fast on our course?

The incessant and irksome pitching and rolling which the overfalls caused, might be patiently borne, if only we could be a.s.sured that the yawl progressed. But all was still left in doubt.

So sped the storm for eight long hours, with splendours for the eye, and dark long thrills of the sublime, that stirred deep the whole inner being with feelings vivid and strong, and loosed the most secret folds of consciousness with thoughts I had never felt before, and perhaps shall never know again. The mind conjured up the most telling scenes it had known of "alone" and of "thunder," to compare with this where both were now combined.

To stand on the top of Mont Blanc, that round white icicle highest in Europe, and all alone to gaze on a hundred peaks around-that was indeed impressive.

More so was it to kneel alone at the edge of Etna, and to fill the mind from the smoking water with thoughts and fancies teeming out of the hot, black, and wide abyss.

[Picture: Map of English Channel]

Thunder and lightning, also, in the crater of Vesuvius we had wondered at before; and it had been grander still, when the flashes lighted up Niagara pouring out its foam that glistened for a moment dazzling white and then vanished, while the thundering heavens sounded louder than the heavy torrent tumbling into the dark. But here, in my yawl on the sea, was more splendid than these. Imagination painted its own free picture on a black and boundless background of mind strung tight by near danger; and from out this spoke the deep loud diapason, while the quick flashing at intervals gave point to all. Then that glorious anthem came to my memory, where these words of the 18th Psalm are n.o.bly rendered:-

"He bowed the heavens and came down, and darkness was under His feet.