The Red Eric

Having thus floored his adversary, the philosophic mariner turned to Glynn and said—

“In course we can’t expect to be on full allowance.”

“Of course not, old boy; the captain remarked, just as I left him, that we’d have to be content with short allowance—very short allowance indeed.”

Gurney sighed deeply.

“How much?” inquired Tim.

“About three ounces of biscuit, one ounce of salt junk, and a quarter of a pint of water per day.”

Gurney groaned aloud.

“You, of all men,” said Glynn, “have least reason to complain, Gurney, for you’ve got fat enough on your own proper person to last you a week at least!”

“Ay, a fortnight, or more,” added Rokens; “an’ even then ye’d scarcely be redooced to a decent size.”

“Ah, but,” pleaded Gurney, “you scarecrow creatures don’t know how horrid sore the process o’ comin’ down is. An’ one gets so cold, too. It’s just like taking off yer clo’s.”

“Sarves ye right for puttin’ on so many,” said Rokens, as he rose to resume work, which he and Gurney had left off three-quarters of an hour before, in order to enjoy a quiet, philosophical tête-à-tête during dinner.

“It’s a bad business, that of the planking not being sufficient to deck or even half-deck the boat,” observed Glynn, as they went together towards the place where the new boat was being built.

“It is,” replied Rokens; “but it’s a good thing that we’ve got plenty of canvas to spare. It won’t make an overly strong deck, to be sure; but it’s better than nothin’.”

“A heavy sea would burst it in no time,” remarked Gurney.

“We must hope to escape heavy seas, then,” said Glynn, as they parted, and went to their several occupations.

The boat that was now building with the most urgent despatch, had a keel of exactly twenty-three feet long, and her breadth, at the widest part, was seven feet. She was being as well and firmly put together as the materials at their command would admit of, and, as far as the work had yet proceeded, she bid fair to become an excellent boat, capable of containing the whole crew, and their small quantity of provisions. This last was diminishing so rapidly, that Captain Dunning resolved to put all hands at once on short allowance. Notwithstanding this, the men worked hard and hopefully; for, as each plank and nail was added to their little bark, they felt as if they were a step nearer home. The captain and the doctor, however, and one or two of the older men, could not banish from their minds the fact that the voyage they were about to undertake was of the most perilous nature, and one which, in any other than the hopeless circumstances in which they were placed at that time, would have been regarded as the most desperate of forlorn hopes.

For fourteen souls to be tossed about on the wide and stormy sea, during many weeks, it might be months, in a small open boat, crowded together and cramped, without sufficient covering, and on short allowance of food, was indeed a dreary prospect, even for the men—how much more so for the delicate child who shared their trials and sufferings? Captain Dunning’s heart sank within him when he thought of it; but he knew how great an influence the conduct and bearing of a commander has, in such circumstances, on his men; so he strove to show a smiling, cheerful countenance, though oftentimes he carried a sad and anxious heart in his bosom. To the doctor and Tim Rokens alone did he reveal his inmost thoughts, because he knew that he could trust them, and felt that he needed their advice and sympathy.

The work progressed so rapidly, that in a few days more the boat approached completion, and preparations were being made in earnest for finally quitting the little isle on which they had found a home for so many days.

It was observed by the captain that as the work of boat-building drew to a close, Glynn Proctor continued to labour long after the others had retired to rest, wearied with the toils of the day—toils which they were not now so well able to bear as heretofore, on account of the slight want of vigour caused by being compelled to live on half allowance.

One evening the captain went down to the building yard in Fairyland, and said to Glynn—

“Hallo, my boy! at it yet? Why, what are you making? A dog-kennel, eh?”

“No; not exactly that,” replied Glynn, laughing. “You’ll hardly guess.”

“I would say it was a house for Jacko, only it seems much too big.”

“It’s just possible that Jacko may have a share in it,” said Glynn; “but it’s not for him.”

“Who, then? Not for yourself, surely!”

“It’s for Ailie,” cried Glynn gleefully. “Don’t you think it will be required?” he added, looking up, as if he half feared the captain would not permit his contrivance to be used.

“Well, I believe it will, my boy. I had intended to get some sort of covering for my dear Ailie put up in the stern-sheets; but I did not think of absolutely making a box for her.”

“Ah, you’ll find it will be a capital thing at nights. I know she could never stand the exposure, and canvas don’t keep out the rain well; so I thought of rigging up a large box, into which she can creep. I’ll make air-holes in the roof that will let in air, but not water; and I’ll caulk the seams with oakum, so as to keep it quite dry inside.”

“Thank you, my boy, it’s very kind of you to take so much thought for my poor child. Yet she deserves it, Glynn, and we can’t be too careful of her.”

The captain patted the youth on the shoulder, and, leaving him to continue his work, went to see Gurney, who had been ailing a little during the last few days. Brandy, in small quantities, had been prescribed by the doctor, and, fortunately, two bottles of that spirit had been swept from the wreck. Being their whole stock, Captain Dunning had stowed it carefully away in what he deemed a secret and secure place; but it turned out that some member of the crew was not so strict in his principles of temperance as could be desired; for, on going to the spot to procure the required medicine, it was found that one of the bottles was gone.

This discovery caused the captain much anxiety and sorrow, for, besides inflicting on them the loss of a most valuable medicine, it proved that there was a thief in their little society.

What was to be done? To pass it over in silence would have shown weakness, which, especially in the circumstances in which they were at that time placed, might have led at last to open mutiny. To discover the thief was impossible. The captain’s mind was soon made up. He summoned every one of the party before him, and, after stating the discovery he had made, he said—

“Now, lads, I’m not going to charge any of you with having done this thing, but I cannot let it pass without warning you that if I discover any of you being guilty of such practices in future, I’ll have the man tied up and give him three dozen with a rope’s-end. You know I have never resorted, as many captains are in the habit of doing, to corporal punishment. I don’t like it. I’ve sailed in command of ships for many years, and have never found it needful; but now, more than ever, strict discipline must be maintained; and I tell you, once for all, that I mean to maintain it at any cost.”

This speech was received in silence. All perceived the justice of it, yet some felt that, until the thief should be discovered, they themselves would lie under suspicion. A few there were, indeed, whose well-known and long-established characters raised them above suspicion, but there were others who knew that their character had not yet been established on so firm a basis, and they felt that until the matter should be cleared up, their honesty would be, mentally at least, called in question by their companions.

With the exception of the disposition to mutiny related in a previous chapter, this was the first cloud that had risen to interrupt the harmony of the shipwrecked sailors, and as they returned to their work, sundry suggestions and remarks were made in reference to the possibility of discovering the delinquent.

“I didn’t think it wos poss’ble,” said Rokens. “I thought as how there wasn’t a man in the ship as could ha’ done sich a low, mean thing as that.”

“No more did I,” said Dick Barnes.

“Wall, boys,” observed Nikel Sling emphatically, “I guess as how that I don’t believe it yet.”

“Arrah! D’ye think the bottle o’ brandy stole his-self?” inquired Briant.

“I ain’t a-goin’ fur to say that; but a ghost might ha’ done it, p’raps, a-purpose to get us into a scrape.”

There was a slight laugh at this, and from that moment the other men suspected that Sling was the culprit. The mere fact of his being the first to charge the crime upon any one else—even a ghost—caused them, in spite of themselves, to come to this conclusion. They did not, however, by word or look, show what was passing in their minds, for the Yankee was a favourite with his comrades, and each felt unwilling that his suspicion should prove to be correct.

“I don’t agree with you,” said Tarquin, who feared that suspicion might attach to himself, seeing that he had been the ringleader in the recent mutiny; “I don’t believe that ghosts drink.”

“Och! that’s all ye know!” cried Phil Briant. “Av ye’d only lived a month or two in Owld Ireland, ye’d have seen raison to change yer mind, ye would. Sure I’ve seed a ghost the worse o’ liquor meself.”

“Oh! Phil, wot a stunner!” cried Gurney.

“It’s as true as me name’s Phil Briant—more’s the pity. Did I niver tell ye o’ the Widdy Morgan, as had a ghost come to see her frequently?”

“No, never—let’s hear it.”

“Stop that noise with yer hammer, then, Tim Rokens, jist for five minutes, and I’ll tell it ye.”

The men ceased work for a few minutes while their comrade spoke as follows—

“It’s not a long story, boys, but it’s long enough to prove that ghosts drink.

“Ye must know that wance upon a time there wos a widdy as lived in a small town in the county o’ Clare, in Owld Ireland, an’ oh! but that was the place for drinkin’ and fightin’. It wos there that I learned to use me sippers; and it wos there, too, that I learned to give up drinkin’, for I comed for to see what a mighty dale o’ harm it did to my poor countrymen. The sexton o’ the place was the only man as niver wint near the grog-shop, and no wan iver seed him overtook with drink, but it was a quare thing that no wan could rightly understand why he used to smell o’ drink very bad sometimes. There wos a young widdy in that town, o’ the name o’ Morgan, as kep’ a cow, an’ owned a small cabin, an’ a patch o’ tater-ground about the size o’ the starn sheets of our owld long-boat. She wos a great deal run after, wos this widdy—not that the young lads had an eye to the cow, or the cabin, or the tater-estate, by no manes—but she wos greatly admired, she wos. I admired her meself, and wint to see her pretty fraquent. Well, wan evenin’ I wint to see her, an’ says I, ‘Mrs Morgan, did ye iver hear the bit song called the Widdy Machree?’ ‘Sure I niver did,’ says she. ‘Would ye like to hear it, darlint?’ says I. So she says she would, an’ I gave it to her right off; an’ when I’d done, says I, ‘Now, Widdy Morgan, ochone! will ye take me?’ But she shook her head, and looked melancholy. ‘Ye ain’t a-goin’ to take spasms?’ said I, for I got frightened at her looks. ‘No,’ says she; ‘but there’s a sacret about me; an’ I like ye too well, Phil, to decaive ye; if ye only know’d the sacret, ye wouldn’t have me at any price.’

“‘Wouldn’t I?’ says I; ‘try me, cushla, and see av I won’t.’

“‘Phil Briant,’ says she, awful solemn like, ‘I’m haunted.’

“‘Haunted!’ says I; ‘’av coorse ye are, bliss yer purty face; don’t I know that ivery boy in the parish is after ye?’

“‘It’s not that I mane. It’s a ghost as haunts me. It haunts me cabin, and me cow, and me tater-estate; an’ it drinks.’

“‘Now, darlint,’ says I, ‘everybody knows yer aisy frightened about ghosts. I don’t belave in one meself, an’ I don’t mind ’em a farden dip; but av all the ghosts in Ireland haunted ye, I’d niver give ye up.’

“‘Will ye come an’ see it this night?’ says she.

“‘Av coorse I will,’ says I. An’ that same night I wint to her cabin, and she let me in, and put a candle on the table, an’ hid me behind a great clock, in a corner jist close by the cupboard, where the brandy-bottle lived. Then she lay down on her bed with her clo’s on, and pulled the coverlid over her, and pretinded to go to slape. In less nor half-an-hour I hears a fut on the doorstep; then a tap at the door, which opened, it seemed to me, of its own accord, and in walks the ghost, sure enough! It was covered all over from head to fut in a white sheet, and I seed by the way it walked that it wos the worse of drink. I wos in a mortal fright, ye may be sure, an’ me knees shuk to that extint ye might have heard them rattle. The ghost walks straight up to the cupboard, takes out the brandy-bottle, and fills out a whole tumbler quite full, and drinks it off; it did, the baste, ivery dhrop. I seed it with me two eyes, as sure as I’m a-standin’ here. It came into the house drunk, an’ it wint out drunker nor it came in.”

“Is that all?” exclaimed several of Briant’s auditors.

“All! av coorse it is. Wot more would ye have? Didn’t I say that I’d tell ye a story as would prove to ye that ghosts drink, more especially Irish ghosts? To be sure it turned out afterwards that the ghost was the sexton o’ the parish as took advantage o’ the poor widdy’s fears; but I can tell ye, boys, that ghost niver came back after the widdy became Mrs Briant.”

“Oh! then ye married the widder, did ye?” said Jim Scroggles.

“I did; an’ she’s alive and hearty this day av she’s not—”

Briant was interrupted by a sudden roar of laughter from the men, who at that moment caught sight of Jacko, the small monkey, in a condition of mind and body that, to say the least of it, did him no credit. We are sorry to be compelled to state that Jacko was evidently and undoubtedly tipsy. Gurney said he was “as drunk as a fiddler.”

We cannot take upon ourself to say whether he was or was not as drunk as that. We are rather inclined to think that fiddlers, as a class, are maligned, and that they are no worse than their neighbours in this respect, perhaps not so bad. Certainly, if any fiddler really deserves the imputation, it must be a violoncello player, because he is, properly speaking, a base-fiddler.

Be this, however, as it may, Jacko was unmistakably drunk—in a maudlin state of intoxication—drunker, probably, than ever a monkey was before or since. He appeared, as he came slowly staggering forward to the place where the men were at work on the boat, to have just wakened out of his first drunken sleep, for his eyes were blinking like the orbs of an owl in the sunshine, and in his walk he placed his right foot where his left should have gone, and his left foot where his right should have gone, occasionally making a little run forward to save himself from tumbling on his nose, and then pulling suddenly up, and throwing up his arms in order to avoid falling on his back. Sometimes he halted altogether,—and swayed to and fro, gazing, meanwhile, pensively at the ground, as if he were wondering why it had taken to rolling and earthquaking in that preposterous manner; or were thinking on the bald-headed mother he had left behind him in the African wilderness. When the loud laugh of the men saluted his ears, Jacko looked up as quickly and steadily as he could, and grinned a ghastly smile—or something like it—as if to say, “What are you laughing at, villains?”

It is commonly observed that, among men, the ruling passion comes out strongly when they are under the influence of strong drink. So it is with monkeys. Jacko’s ruling passion was thieving; but having, at that time, no particular inducement to steal, he indulged his next ruling passion—that of affection—by holding out both arms, and staggering towards Phil Briant to be taken up.

A renewed burst of laughter greeted this movement. “It knows ye, Phil,” cried Jim Scroggles.

“Ah! then, so it should, for it’s meself as is good to it. Come to its uncle, then. O good luck to yer purty little yaller face. So it wos you stole the brandy, wos it? Musha! but ye might have know’d ye belonged to a timp’rance ship, so ye might.”

Jacko spread his arms on Briant’s broad chest—they were too short to go round his neck—laid his head thereon, and sighed. Perhaps he felt penitent on account of his wickedness; but it is more probable that he felt uneasy in body rather than in mind.

“I say, Briant,” cried Gurney.

“That’s me,” answered the other.

“If you are Jacko’s self-appointed uncle, and Miss Ailie is his adopted mother, wot relation is Miss Ailie to you?”

“You never does nothin’ right, Gurney,” interposed Nikel Sling; “you can’t even preepound a pruposition. Here’s how you oughter to ha’ put it. If Phil Briant be Jacko’s uncle, and Miss Ailie his adopted mother—all three bein’ related in a sorter way by bein’ shipmates, an’ all on us together bein’ closely connected in vartue of our bein’ messmates—wot relation is Gurney to a donkey?”

“That’s a puzzler,” said Gurney, affecting to consider the question deeply.

“Here’s a puzzler wot’ll beat it, though,” observed Tim Rokens; “suppose we all go on talkin’ stuff till doomsday, w’en’ll the boat be finished?”

“That’s true,” cried Dick Barnes, resuming work with redoubled energy; “take that young thief to his mother, Phil, and tell her to rope’s-end him. I’m right glad to find, though, that he is the thief arter all, and not one o’ us.”

On examination being made, it was found that the broken and empty brandy-bottle lay on the floor of the monkey’s nest, and it was conjectured, from the position in which it was discovered, that that dissipated little creature, having broken off the neck in order to get at the brandy, had used the body of the bottle as a pillow whereon to lay its drunken little head. Luckily for its own sake, it had spilt the greater part of the liquid, with which everything in its private residence was saturated and perfumed.

On having ocular demonstration of the depravity of her pet, Ailie at first wept, then, on beholding its eccentric movements, she laughed in spite of herself.

After that, she wept again, and spoke to it reproachfully, but failed to make the slightest impression on its hardened little heart. Then she put it to bed, and wrapped it up carefully in its sailcloth blanket.

With this piece of unmerited kindness Jacko seemed touched, for he said, “Oo-oo—oo-oo—ooee-ee!” once or twice in a peculiarly soft and penitential tone, after which he dropped into a calm, untroubled slumber.

Chapter Twenty One.

The Boat Finished—Farewell to Fairyland—Once more at Sea

At last the boat was finished. It had two masts and two lug-sails, and pulled eight oars. There was just sufficient room in it to enable the men to move about freely, but it required a little management to enable them to stow themselves away when they went to sleep, and had they possessed the proper quantity of provisions for their contemplated voyage, there is no doubt that they would have found themselves considerably cramped. The boat was named the Maid of the Isle, in memory of the sandbank on which she had been built, and although in her general outline and details she was rather a clumsy craft, she was serviceable and strongly put together.

Had she been decked, or even half-decked, the voyage which now began would not have been so desperate an undertaking; but having been only covered in part with a frail tarpaulin, she was not at all fitted to face the terrible storms that sometimes sweep the southern seas. Each man, as he gazed at her, felt that his chance of ultimate escape was very small indeed. Still, the men had now been so long contemplating the voyage and preparing for it, and they had become so accustomed to risk their lives upon the sea, that they set out upon this voyage at last in cheerful spirits, and even jested about the anticipated dangers and trials which they knew full well awaited them.

It was a lovely morning, that on which the wrecked crew of the whaler bade adieu to “Fairyland,” as the islet had been named by Ailie—a name that was highly, though laughingly, approved of by the men. The ocean and sky presented that mysterious co-mingling of their gorgeous elements that irresistibly call forth the wonder and admiration of even the most unromantic and matter-of-fact men. It was one of Ailie’s peculiarly beloved skies. You could not, without much consideration, have decided as to where was the exact line at which the glassy ocean met the clear sky, and it was almost impossible to tell, when gazing at the horizon, which were the real clouds and which the reflections.

The bright blue vault above was laden with clouds of the most gorgeous description, in which all the shades of pearly-grey and yellow were mingled and contrasted. They rose up, pile upon pile, in stupendous majesty, like the very battlements of heaven, while their images, clear and distinct almost as themselves, rolled down and down into the watery depths, until the islet—the only well-defined and solid object in the scene—appeared to float in their midst. The rising sun shot throughout the vast immensity of space, and its warm rays were interrupted, and broken, and caught, and absorbed, and reflected in so many magical ways, that it was impossible to trace any of the outlines for more than a few seconds, ere the eye was lost in the confusion of bright lights and deep shadows that were mingled and mellowed together by the softer lights and shades of every degree of depth and tint into splendid harmony.

In the midst of this scene Captain Dunning stood, with Ailie by his side, and surrounded by his men, on the shores of the little island. Everything was now in readiness to set sail. The boat was laden, and in the water, and the men stood ready to leap in and push off.

“My lads,” said the captain, earnestly, “we’re about to quit this morsel of sandbank on which it pleased the Almighty to cast our ship, and on which, thanks be to Him, we have found a pretty safe shelter for so long. I feel a sort o’ regret almost at leavin’ it now. But the time has come for us to begin our voyage towards the Cape, and I need scarcely repeat what you all know well enough—that our undertakin’ is no child’s play. We shall need all our bodily and our mental powers to carry us through. Our labour must be constant, and our food is not sufficient, so that we must go on shorter allowance from this day. I gave you half rations while ye were buildin’ the boat, because we had to get her finished and launched as fast as we could, but now we can’t afford to eat so much. I made a careful inspection of our provisions last night, and I find that by allowing every man four ounces a day, we can spin it out. We may fall in with islands, perhaps, but I know of none in these seas—there are none put down on the charts—and we may get hold of a fish now and then, but we must not count on these chances. Now it must be plain to all of you that our only chance of getting on well together in circumstances that will try our tempers, no doubt, and rouse our selfishness, is to resolve firmly before starting—each man for himself—that we will lay restraint on ourselves and try to help each other as much as we can.”

There was a ready murmur of assent to this proposal; then the captain continued:—

“Now, lads, one word more. Our best efforts, let us exert ourselves ever so much, cannot be crowned with success unless before setting out, we ask the special favour and blessing of Him who, we are told in the Bible, holds the waters of the ocean in the hollow of His hand. If He helps us, we shall be saved; if He does not help us, we shall perish. We will therefore offer up a prayer now, in the name of our blessed Redeemer, that we may be delivered from every danger, and be brought at last in peace and comfort to our homes.”

Captain Dunning then clasped his hands together, and while the men around him reverently bowed their heads, he offered up a short and simple, but earnest prayer to God.

From that day forward they continued the habit of offering up prayer together once a day, and soon afterwards the captain began the practice of reading a chapter aloud daily out of Ailie’s Bible. The result of this was that not only were the more violent spirits among them restrained, under frequent and sore privations and temptations, but all the party were often much comforted and filled with hope at times when they were by their sufferings well-nigh driven to despair.