The White Squall Part 14

This made the sailor who was "taking his trick" all alert, instead of lounging over the spokes as he had been doing previously, listening to our talk.

Presently, a quick puff of air came from the west again, and the _Josephine_ began to gather way; but almost in an instant afterwards the wind shifted right ahead, coming down with the cloud, and the yards were at once braced round, the vessel being headed towards the north.

The cloud approached rapidly now on our weather bow; and, as it got nearer, we could see that its bottom edge, which was attenuated to the proportions of a slender pillar of vapour, seemed to be united to the water, the sea, where it joined the surface, being greatly agitated, foaming up in columns of spray that were circled round and round and then drawn up in corkscrew fashion into the denser body above.

"Why, it's a water-spout!" exclaimed Mr Marline in great surprise.

"So it is," said the captain, a bit startled and perplexed too. "Look sharp, Marline, and see to the hatches being battened down and the scuppers open; for, if the blessed thing bursts immediately overhead, it will flood our decks with a deluge of water worse than if we had shipped a heavy sea."

"Aye, aye, sir," answered the other, scuttling down the p.o.o.p-ladder to attend to these orders; but he had hardly left the captain's side ere a terrific gust of wind struck us, coming from the same direction as the water-spout.

The instant after, the wind shifted round to the opposite quarter, and then a series of squalls, hot and strong, seemed to a.s.sail us from almost every point of the compa.s.s at once.

"Hands shorten sail!" roared out Captain Miles again, using the palms of his two hands before his mouth for a speaking trumpet. "Be smart, men!

Some of you brail up the spanker here and man the jib downhaul. Right!

Now, away aloft the rest of you; we must have those topsails close- reefed. Cast-off the halliards--there--cheerily, men; that's the way to do it!"

No sooner were the hands down from the topsail-yards, however, than he had them up again to take in the courses, which had already been clewed up and were now furled; the _Josephine_ lying-to under close-reefed topsails, with the fore-topmast staysail set to keep her in command of her helm.

She did not look so gay as she had done earlier in the day, with all her snowy plumage spread before the favouring breeze; but, she was all the better prepared to battle with the elements, and now steadily and st.u.r.dily awaited their onset.

The struggle was not long delayed.

Closer and closer came the whirling water-spout, surrounded by columns of misty spray and accompanied by the fierce wind. The sea was agitated with violent eddies that rocked the ship to her centre every moment; and, above the shriek of the constant squalls tearing through the rigging, and the splash of the boiling water at the foot of the terrible cloud column, we could distinguish a peculiar hoa.r.s.e sucking noise, as if the whole herd of Neptune's horses were drinking their fill, and letting us know about it, too!

CHAPTER TEN.

DISRATED.

I can't say what the rest felt; but I know that I, for one, was frightened when I heard that strange gurgling noise and saw the great black thing, spinning round like a teetotum and swirling up the water, coming down on our ship as if to overwhelm her!

The squalls, which succeeded each other from different directions in rapid sequence, were even more dangerous than the water-spout; but Captain Miles was too good a seaman to be easily beaten, even by the most adverse circ.u.mstances.

Telling off some of the best hands to the fore and main-braces on either side, so that these could be let go or hauled taut in an instant as the wind shifted, thus necessitating the vessel changing her tack with similar rapidity, he went to the helm himself; and from this point, with the a.s.sistance of Moggridge, he conned the ship as coolly as if he were in charge of a yacht trying to weather the mark-boat in a race so as to get to windward of her compet.i.tors!

The captain was trying to make as much northing as he could, as well as endeavouring to run out of reach of the water-spout, which latter, although it gyrated about in the water so queerly and seemed moving every way at once, came up more from the eastwards, travelling to the south of west apparently; and, expert seaman that he was, in spite of the veering wind, which backed round every moment, he gallantly manoeuvred so as to gain his object--sailing ahead between the squalls, as it were.

"Ready about!" he would call out one minute, when the main-topsail was backed and the fore-yard swung round; and, almost as soon as this was done and the weather braces handed, the cry "'bout ship!" was again repeated, when the _Josephine_ was brought once mere back to her previous bearings.

Such tackings and beatings about, surely, no ship ever underwent before in so short a time!

"By Jingo, he's a sailor every inch of him!" I heard one of the old hands of the crew murmur in admiration as he pulled in with a will the weather braces for about the sixth time in as many minutes; and, truth to say, I could not help sharing the feeling of respect all the crew had for our captain, who, easy-going as he was generally in fine weather, letting the first mate then attend to the working of the ship, he was "all there," as they said, when the necessity for prompt action in any emergency called for exertion and made him show himself in his true colours.

But, struggle to outstrip it as much as he might, the water-spout came nearer and nearer to us, bearing down still broadside-on upon the ship.

As I stood close to the captain and Moggridge, who alone were on the p.o.o.p besides myself, Mr Marline and Davis the second mate being in the waist, looking after the men at the braces amidships, I noticed that the pillar of cloud became more transparent in proportion as it decreased in size from the upper portion, until it seemed almost perfectly so at the lower extremity where it touched the sea. I observed, too, that a small inner column of equal diameter, looking like a gla.s.s tube, went up the middle. This, evidently, was the water which was being sucked up into the ma.s.s of vapour above as if by a syphon.

Fortunately, just as it seemed almost touching the ship, when the whirling waves round its base made us oscillate from side to side, the _Josephine_, heeling over to her chain-plates from a sudden rush of wind that appeared to accompany it, the portentous column of vapour darted off almost at right angles to its former course; and then, the cloud, having taken up more of the sea-water than it could contain, burst with a loud hissing sort of report, the contents falling around us in the form of a heavy downpour of rain which sluiced our decks down, but happily did no further damage.

"Thank G.o.d!" exclaimed Captain Miles reverently, taking off his cap and looking upwards in grateful recognition of the providential care that had watched over and protected us from the fearful peril which had threatened us; and his thanksgiving was partic.i.p.ated in by more than one other, I knew, for I could see Moggridge's lips moving in silent prayer, while I felt inclined to fall on my knees, my heart was so full of joy and gladness at our narrow escape.

I was overpowered with a feeling of wonder and awe.

Strangely enough, there seemed some strong connection between the water- spout and the wind; for, no sooner had the column of vapour broken up, than the heavy clouds dispersed away to leeward. The sun then came out again, and the squally weather calmed down to a gentle breeze from the south-east that enabled us to haul round again on our proper course, the ship presently being covered anew with canvas and the reefs in the topsails shaken out.

When all danger was over, though, the whole thing puzzled me very much.

"What is a water-spout?" I asked Captain Miles later on in the evening after dinner, as he was having a quiet cigar on the p.o.o.p before turning in. I saw that he then looked inclined for a chat, and thought it a good opportunity to seek for information.

He answered my question in the Irish way, by asking me another.

"Did you ever see a whirlwind when you were at Grenada, Tom?" he inquired.

"Yes," I replied, "I recollect a long time ago noticing one at Mount Pleasant once, and wondering at the way in which all the loose straw in the stable-yard was circled round and round, as if in a funnel, and then drawn up into the sky."

"Well, then," said Captain Miles, "the celebrated Dr Franklin has demonstrated, if I recollect aright, that a whirlwind on land, and a water-spout at sea, arise from similar general causes, and may be considered one and the same thing."

"But, what is the cause of them?" I asked now.

"The action of opposing atmospheric currents, Tom, if you can understand what I mean. Two contrary winds meet: a vortex therefore ensues; and, any cloud that happens to be between these opposing currents of air at the time is condensed into a conical form and turned round with great celerity. This whirling motion drives from the centre of the cloud all the particles of vapour contained in it; consequently, a vacuum is thereby produced in the body of it; and, as nature abhors a vacuum in every case, the water of the sea lying below the overhanging ma.s.s is carried up, in centrifugal fashion, and in a sort of way by capillary attraction, into the vacant centre of the cloud cylinder."

"Why does it not stop there?" said I. "That one just now burst."

"Ah, that fellow was like a greedy boy who has eaten too much, and has to disgorge after he has filled his little stomach too full! But, some water-spouts carry their contents on to the land, where, when the clouds have been attracted by mountains or some lofty object, they may do great damage by wrecking houses and inundating the country for miles round.

At sea, they are not half so dangerous, having plenty of room there to expend themselves without effecting much injury, except a ship should be right beneath them when they fall to pieces."

"Do you think, sir," I then inquired, "that one would have sunk us, if it had burst over the _Josephine_?"

"Well, I hardly know, Tom," answered Captain Miles reflectively.

"Although it looked terrific enough at one time, I am not inclined to believe now that it would have been attended with any very serious calamity to our ship, had even the whole quant.i.ty of water it contained fallen on our decks. If you recollect, I ordered beforehand the hatches to be battened down and the scuppers in the waist cleared. Besides, the cylinder or spiral column of vapour, you observed, was very like a gla.s.s tube in the centre of the water-spout, and this coming in contact with our masts and rigging it would have been at once broken, when the surrounding air rushing into the vacuum to restore the atmospheric equilibrium, the torrent of water would have been forced sideways instead of descending perpendicularly, coming down merely as a heavy tropical shower, similar to those you have been well acquainted with in Grenada. I have heard of some vessels being damaged by water-spouts, but I have never come across anyone who happened to be on board one of them at the time, so I rather fancy the tale was one of those generally 'told to the marines.'"

So, laughing it off, the captain finished his little scientific lecture at this point, while I went below to my bunk, wishing to get undressed before Harry the steward came to douse the light in the cabin, which he always did sharp to time.

If the water-spout did us no actual damage it certainly served as a very bad omen. It took away the favourable breezes, which, before its advent on the scene, had sped the _Josephine_ so gaily on her way home to England; and the weather for some days afterwards was not nearly so pleasant, tedious calms and contrary winds preventing our making the rapid pa.s.sage Captain Miles antic.i.p.ated from our good running at the beginning of the voyage.

We were now in the region between the regular trade-winds and what are termed "the anti-trades or pa.s.sage winds," above the tropic of Cancer.

This is a particular portion of the ocean between the parallels known to sailors as the "Horse Lat.i.tudes," where there is generally a lull met with in the currents of air that elsewhere reign rampant over the sea; and, once arrived within the precincts of this blissful zone, the ship tossed about there for a week at a stretch, hardly making a mile towards her wished-for goal--only rocking restlessly on the bosom of the deep.

There is nothing so irksome as calm weather at sea, to those at all events whose duty lies upon the waters and who do not go on shipboard for mere pleasure.

So long as the wind blows, whether favourably or not, there is something to do. If it be fair, there is the cheering prospect of counting the number of knots run when the log is hove, and knowing that one is getting each hour so much nearer one's destination; while, if King Aeolus be unpropitious, there is all the excitement of fighting against his efforts to delay the vessel, and the proud satisfaction of making way in spite of adverse breezes.

But, in a calm, nothing can be done excepting to wait patiently, or impatiently, for the wind to blow again; and, consequently, all is dreary stagnation and dead monotony--the captain ever pacing the p.o.o.p in not the best of tempers, with the men idling about the decks, or else occupied in the unexciting task of unreeving rope yarn, to keep their hands from mischief, and, perhaps, polishing up the ring-bolts as a last resource!

Under such circ.u.mstances, it is not at all to be wondered that the crew of a vessel usually get discontented; and, should her officers be in the least inclined to be tyrannical, an ill feeling is produced which sometimes leads to an outbreak.

Hardly a single mutiny ever occurred on a ship at sea save in calm weather; at other times the hands have too much to do even to grumble, in the way that sailors love to do ash.o.r.e, comparing their nautical experience to "a dog's life"--albeit they never give up the sea all the same!