LIFE on a sailing ship affords as much excitement
and thrills as those who love the sea require, but one
must be able to adapt oneself to surroundings that
some people would consider hard. The food is, naturally,
of the plainest, one's accommodation is limited, and it
depends on the quantity of rain-water collected as
to the amount of washing one can enjoy, either for
oneself or one's clothing.
My ship, the full-rigged iron ship, British Enterprise,
of 1,600 tons, sailed from the London Docks for Sydney
with a general cargo, and had a complement of 32 all
told, i.e., a captain, four mates, six apprentices, a
steward, a cook, a carpenter, a sailmaker, a donkeyman,
a bos'n and 15 seamen (the donkeyman making the
sixteenth when not required to function as a donkey-
man) ; of these the captain, officers, apprentices and
steward were accommodated under the poop.
I was lucky to be sailing from London on my first
voyage, for it enabled my father and my sister Natalie
to see me off, and to admire the fine ship in which I
was sailing. My father took a great fancy to one of
my fellow apprentices whom he met on the wharf ;
this made him feel that I would have nice companions.
As soon as I got aboard I made myself useful by
executing any order given as though I had already
been to sea, and thanks to my Worcester training, it
was a long time before the crew realised that I was
only a first voyager. It is true that I became very
seasick, but I managed to conceal this fact by not
giving way to it ; all that the crew noticed was that I
remained very pale for some days after leaving London,
but they put my paleness down to consumption, and
rather pitied me, till I had recovered from my unpleasant complaint.
Once we got into the trade winds we were enabled
to enjoy, in our watch below, fishing for dolphin and
bonito from the jib-boom, which I found very exciting
work ; and I shall never forget how uncomfortable
I felt when I hooked my first dolphin. I had been
playing my hook, baited with a piece of red bunting,
under the dolphin striker for a little while, when a goodsized dolphin took it, and I suddenly felt the weight
of this large fish flapping about in mid-air. I must
admit I felt that fishing was not all that it is cracked
up to be, as I was standing on the sloping jib-boom
foot-rope, and was unable to use both hands freely to
haul up the fish ; which shows my inexperience, as I
should have first placed myself in a position that enabled
me to have both hands free to haul in my catch. Luckily
for me the bos'n noticed my difficulty and came to my
assistance.
All sailors find the belt of calm and light winds near
the Equator, called the doldrums, monotonous ; but,
as there is usually much heavy rain, there is a great
abundance of fresh water for washing purposes, and
every advantage is taken of it in one's watch below,
while the watch on deck scrubs paint work.
This drudgery is, however, soon forgotten once the
ship gets into the roaring forties, where one experiences
a more-or-less continuous westerly gale, and even the
bluff-bowed British Enterprise did over 300 miles a
day while running her easting. It was delightful to be
travelling at such a speed, but not always comfortable
on deck. Once, while aloft, I saw the ship roll herself
full of water from a sea rushing past, and could see
nothing of her but the poop, deckhouse and forecastle.
All the openings below are so tightly battened down
in a sailing ship that one feels no anxiety from water
shipped in the manner described.
On nearing Sydney I had my first experience of a
southerly " buster," and it was a very terrifying moment
when we seemed engulfed in a dark cavern formed
of black clouds, as we hurriedly reduced sail with a
feeling that the tempest would be on us before we were
ready to receive it. As luck would have it, the black
clouds passed over us before the wind came, but when
it did come its violence was terrific, and we tumbled
about so furiously that I wondered if we could possibly
live through it.
We entered Sydney Harbour soon after the storm
had died away, and a more perfect and beautiful
harbour I do not know. I found the city of Sydney
most enjoyable, and had a thoroughly good time while
there. After discharging our cargo we sailed round to
Newcastle, New South Wales, and took in a cargo of
coal for San Francisco.
On this voyage a rather unusual thing happened
in respect to birthdays : the third mate told us one
morning that it was the captain's birthday, and that
after wishing the captain many happy returns of the day
he had said, " It is my birthday too, sir," whereupon
the captain gave him a bottle of sherry to celebrate
the day. I then told the third mate that it was my
birthday also, and that the captain could prove it by
looking at my indentures. This was done, and I was
sent a bottle of sherry, too, which my messmates and
I thoroughly appreciated. That three out of the eleven
—captain, four officers and six apprentices—should
celebrate their birthdays on the same day was most
unusual, was it not ?
On entering San Francisco Harbour the crimps
were on board before the ship had been anchored,
and lay aloft among the crew while they furled sail,
offering inducements to our men to leave the ship and
go ashore with them. This many of them did, poor
chaps, lost all they had earned in our ship, and were
packed off in another ship in a day or two, from which
ship the crimps would get three months of the men's
pay in advance.
We loaded grain at 'Frisco, with instructions to proceed to Queenstown for orders. Our cargo of grain
was in bags, but, notwithstanding the fact that the
ship's hold was completely lined with boards, this did
not prevent the bags from coming into contact with the
iron sides of the ship and spoiling the grain. I was
much interested in the way the lining boards were
handled and nailed in position by two men only, on
each side of the ship ; for the boards were about 20
feet by 12 inches by 1 inch thick, and the men, while
holding a board in position at each end with one hand,
drove a nail in with the other hand, the nail being held
against the hammer head when the first stroke was
taken. It looked simple enough, for the men doing
the work had such skill, but it must have taken much
practice to make them so expert.
While at 'Frisco we caught many large crabs alongside the ship by means of a net tied to an iron hoop,
which was lowered to the bottom with a bone secured
to it. These crabs were excellent eating and helped
to vary our simple menu.
By having friends at 'Frisco I was enabled to see a
good deal of the place, and greatly enjoyed my stay
there. I often spent my Sundays at the house of a
friend who lived at San Rafael, making the trip from
'Frisco on a huge ferry steamer.
I have nothing to record before we reached the
mountainous seas off Cape Horn, where we saw the
majestic albatross poised in the air for hours on end
without making any apparent movement with their
wings. How much those who fly in aeroplanes must
envy the albatross its grace and ease of flight.
We had among our crew a very old white-haired
man who happened to have a large hole in each of his
sea boots when we were in the bitterly cold weather
off Cape Horn, and when I noticed that he had no socks
on, I asked him why. His reply was that his socks
would get wet through the holes in his boots if he wore
them. In spite of his age, he was as tough as they make
them, and I saw him knocked over by a heavy sea
more than once and be none the worse for it, which is
not so bad for a man of about 70. I fancy we must
have shipped him at 'Frisco to replace one of those
who had left the ship there.
One morning when we were off Cape Horn, Going,
the senior apprentice of my watch, caught a Mother
Carey's chicken by means of a piece of thread he had
trailed out of the port-hole by his bunk, which happened
to be on the lee side of the ship. A Mother Carey's
chicken (the Stormy Petrel, a small sea bird about the
size of a lark, which is seen in southern seas during
boisterous weather) is considered by sailors to be a
bird of ill omen. They believe that anyone who catches
one brings bad luck to himself and the ship he is in,
so my messmate asked me not to tell anyone that he
had caught the bird. I am not superstitious, but the
following happenings are sufficient grounds for the
average sailor to be afraid of catching a Mother Carey's
chicken.
While passing the Falkland Islands a few days
afterwards, a squall carried away our jib-boom. This
is nothing out of the way, but that is the only time
I have ever seen a jib-boom carried away.
All went well till we approached the Azores in the
North Atlantic, when Going told me that he had
dreamed we would sight at noon that day a derelict
vessel with men on board of her. He had just told me
this, when the officer on the poop taking the sun sang
out, " Sail oh." We jumped on deck, and sure enough
found, when we got closer, that the craft sighted was
indeed a derelict. She was a wooden barque-rigged
vessel that had lost her mainmast (broken off at the
deck), her fore to'gallant mast was gone, and her main
bulwarks were broken away, while the sea, which was
running very high, broke across her deck.
There were five men in the fore rigging, two of whom
were lying down in the foretop, and she had two signal
flags secured to the fore topmast rigging, indicating
that she was in distress and required assistance. Though
the day was bright, there was a heavy gale blowing,
before which we had been running. On nearing the
derelict we hove-to as close to her as we could and a
boat was cleared away, but the captain would not allow
it to be lowered. He said that if it were lowered in the
sea then running he would lose six men and an officer
without saving those on the derelict. We stood by,
but the weather got worse, and by the following morning
we had lost sight of the derelict. This incident very
much upset the crew and it was a good thing that they
knew nothing of the catching of the Mother Carey's
chicken.
A day or two later, while running before a gale,
our main topmast, with masts and yards above it, was
seen to sway heavily from side to side each time the
vessel rolled, which we found to be caused by the
crumpling up of the steel topmast above the iron fid
or bar that held it in position. All hands were called
at once and the mast was steadied by frapping the
rigging together and passing lashings through the
deck ringbolts, and when this was done the upper masts
and yards were lowered on deck.
In due course we arrived at Queenstown, Ireland,
where we had to call for orders, and while there a new
main topmast was fitted. One of the riggers engaged
to do this work fell from aloft and subsequently died.
As the ship remained at Queenstown several days,
and our orders instructed us to proceed to Hull, the
captain got his wife across from Liverpool and engaged
a Channel pilot.
All being ready we proceeded on our voyage to Hull
before a north-westerly gale. That night as we tore
along it was suddenly discovered that the light on
Trevose Head had been mistaken for the one on the
Scilly Isles off Land's End, and the ship was brought
to the wind in a hurry, with the natural result that most
of our sails blew to ribbons. However, as the ship
was now on a dead lee shore about two miles from
frowning rocky cliffs, fresh topsails had to be bent,
and we were all kept busy. Luck was with us, notwithstanding the Mother Carey's chicken incident,
for we managed to claw off the lee shore and eventually
anchored off Lundy Island, where we were fitted out
with fresh sails taken from a sister ship at Liverpool.
We arrived later on at Hull without further incident.
I frequently met my fellow apprentice, Going, in
after years. He turned out to be a particularly smart
officer and held excellent posts as commander of
several large liners ; but somehow he could never stick
it anywhere long, and always threw up his job, although
he was very popular with everyone. He has now
given up the sea, at the age of 72, his last years in China
having been very hard ones, and is happily settled in
England with relatives.