4. CHAPTER IV.
The Skyeman seemed so earnest and upright a seaman,
that to tell the plain truth, in spite of his love for me, I
had many misgivings as to his readiness to unite in an undertaking
which apparently savored of a moral dereliction.
But all things considered, I deemed my own resolution
quite venial; and as for inducing another to join me, it
seemed a precaution so indispensable, as to outweigh all
other considerations.
Therefore I resolved freely to open my heart to him; for
that special purpose paying him a visit, when, like some old
albatross in the air, he happened to be perched at the foremast-head,
all by himself, on the lookout for whales never seen.
Now this standing upon a bit of stick 100 feet aloft for
hours at a time, swiftly sailing over the sea, is very much
like crossing the Channel in a balloon. Manfred-like, you
talk to the clouds: you have a fellow feeling for the sun.
And when Jarl and I got conversing up there, smoking our
dwarfish “dudeens,” any sea-gull passing by might have
taken us for Messrs. Blanchard and Jeffries, socially puffing
their after-dinner Bagdads, bound to Calais, via Heaven,
from Dover. Honest Jarl, I acquainted with all: my conversation
with the captain, the hint implied in his last
words, my firm resolve to quit the ship in one of her boats,
and the facility with which I thought the thing could be
done. Then I threw out many inducements, in the shape
of pleasant anticipations of bearing right down before the
wind upon the sunny isles under our lee.
He listened attentively; but so long remained silent
that I almost fancied there was something in Jarl which
would prove too much for me and my eloquence.
At last he very bluntly declared that the scheme was a
crazy one; he had never known of such a thing but thrice
before; and in every case the runaways had never afterwards
been heard of. He entreated me to renounce my
determination, not be a boy, pause and reflect, stick to the
ship, and go home in her like a man. Verily, my Viking
talked to me like my uncle.
But to all this I turned a deaf ear; affirming that my
mind was made up; and that as he refused to accompany
me, and I fancied no one else for a comrade, I would go
stark alone rather than not at all. Upon this, seeing my
resolution immovable, he bluntly swore that he would
follow me through thick and thin.
Thanks, Jarl! thou wert one of those devoted fellows
who will wrestle hard to convince one loved of error; but
failing, forthwith change their wrestling to a sympathetic
hug.
But now his elderly prudence came into play. Casting
his eye over the boundless expanse below, he inquired how
far off were the islands in question.
“A thousand miles and no less.”
“With a fair trade breeze, then, and a boat sail, that is
a good twelve days' passage, but calms and currents may
make it a month, perhaps more.” So saying, he shook his
old head, and his yellow hair streamed.
But trying my best to chase away these misgivings, he
at last gave them over. He assured me I might count
upon him to his uttermost keel.
My Viking secured, I felt more at ease; and thoughtfully
considered how the enterprise might best be accomplished.
There was no time to be lost. Every hour was carrying
us farther and farther from the parallel most desirable for us
to follow in our route to the westward. So, with all possible
dispatch, I matured my plans, and communicated them
to Jarl, who gave several old hints—having ulterior probabilities
in view—which were not neglected.
Strange to relate, it was not till my Viking, with a rueful
face, reminded me of the fact, that I bethought me of a circumstance
somewhat alarming at the first blush. We must
push off without chart or quadrant; though, as will shortly
be seen, a compass was by no means out of the question.
The chart, to be sure, I did not so much lay to heart; but
a quadrant was more than desirable. Still, it was by no
means indispensable. For this reason. When we started, our
latitude would be exactly known; and whether, on our
voyage westward, we drifted north or south therefrom, we
could not, by any possibility, get so far out of our reckoning,
as to fail in striking some one of a long chain of islands,
which, for many degrees, on both sides of the equator,
stretched right across our track.
For much the same reason, it mattered little, whether
on our passage we daily knew our longitude; for no known
land lay between us and the place we desired to reach. So
what could be plainer than this: that if westward we
patiently held on our way, we must eventually achieve our
destination?
As for intervening shoals or reefs, if any there were, they
intimidated us not. In a boat that drew but a few inches
of water, but an indifferent look-out would preclude all danger
on that score. At all events, the thing seemed feasible
enough, notwithstanding old Jarl's superstitious reverence
for nautical instruments, and the philosophical objections
which might have been urged by a pedantic disciple of Mercator.
Very often, as the old maxim goes, the simplest things are
the most startling, and that, too, from their very simplicity.
So cherish no alarms, if thus we addressed the setting sun—
“Be thou, old pilot, our guide!”
