Читать книгу Idylls of the Sea, and Other Marine Sketches онлайн

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As the result of a series of adventures while mate of an old Cumberland brig under the nominal command of one of the most besotted drunkards I have ever known, I found myself adrift in an Acadian coast village early in December, friendless and penniless. Already the icy barrier was rapidly forming which would effectually bar all navigation until the ensuing spring, and the thought of being thus frozen up in helpless idleness for months, coupled with the prospect of winter for my young wife in England without my support, was almost more than I could bear. Kismet threw in my way the commander, owner, and builder of a tiny schooner, who, disgusted with his “bad luck,” had freighted his cockleshell with the harvest of his farm, three hundred barrels of potatoes, and purposed sailing for the West Indies in order to sell vessel and cargo. Of ocean navigation he knew nothing, all his previous nautical experience having been confined to the rugged coasts of Nova Scotia, so that he was highly elated at the idea of engaging a mate with a London certificate. Not that he would have hesitated to launch out into the Atlantic without any other knowledge than he possessed, without chronometer, sextant, or ephemeris. Like many of the old school of sea-farers, now perhaps quite extinct, he would have reckoned upon finding his way to port in time by asking from ship to ship sighted on the passage, for he was in no hurry. I was in no mood for bargaining—a way of escape was my urgent need—and in a few hours from our meeting we were busily rowing the wee craft down the fast-emptying river. The crew consisted of the skipper, his ten-year-old son, myself, and a gawky, half-witted lad of sixteen, who strutted under the title of cook. Bitter, grinding poverty was manifest in every detail of our equipment, principally in the provisions, which consisted solely of a barrel of flour, a small tub of evil-smelling meat (source unknown), and a keg of salt flavoured with a few herrings. Of course, there was the cargo, and the skipper concealed, moreover, under his pillow a few ounces of tea, about 3 lb. of wet sugar in an oozing bag, and a bottle of “square” gin. “Medical comforts,” he explained, with an air of knowing what ought to be carried on a deep-water voyage.