34. CHAPTER XXXIV.
HOW THEY STEERED ON THEIR WAY.
When we quitted the Chamois for the brigantine, we
must have been at least two hundred leagues to the westward
of the spot, where we had abandoned the Arcturion.
Though how far we might then have been, North or South
of the Equator, I could not with any certainty divine.
But that we were not removed any considerable distance
from the Line, seemed obvious. For in the starriest night
no sign of the extreme Polar constellations was visible;
though often we scanned the northern and southern horizon
in search of them. So far as regards the aspect of
the skies near the ocean's rim, the difference of several degrees
in one's latitude at sea, is readily perceived by a person
long accustomed to surveying the heavens.
If correct in my supposition, concerning our longitude at
the time here alluded to, and allowing for what little progress
we had been making in the Parki, there now remained
some one hundred leagues to sail, ere the country we sought
would be found. But for obvious reasons, how long precisely
we might continue to float out of sight of land, it was
impossible to say. Calms, light breezes, and currents made
every thing uncertain. Nor had we any method of estimating
our due westward progress, except by what is called
Dead Reckoning,—the computation of the knots run hourly;
allowances being made for the supposed deviations from our
course, by reason of the ocean streams; which at times in
this quarter of the Pacific run with very great velocity.
Now, in many respects we could not but feel safer aboard
the Parki than in the Chamois. The sense of danger is
less vivid, the greater the number of lives involved. He
who is ready to despair in solitary peril, plucks up a heart
in the presence of another. In a plurality of comrades is
much countenance and consolation.
Still, in the brigantine there were many sources of uneasiness
and anxiety unknown to me in the whale-boat.
True, we had now between us and the deep, five hundred
good planks to one lath in our buoyant little chip. But the
Parki required more care and attention; especially by night,
when a vigilant look-out was indispensable. With impunity,
in our whale-boat, we might have run close to shoal
or reef; whereas, similar carelessness or temerity now,
might prove fatal to all concerned.
Though in the joyous sunlight, sailing through the sparkling
sea, I was little troubled with serious misgivings; in
the hours of darkness it was quite another thing. And the
apprehensions, nay terrors I felt, were much augmented by
the remissness of both Jarl and Samoa, in keeping their
night-watches. Several times I was seized with a deadly
panic, and earnestly scanned the murky horizon, when rising
from slumber I found the steersman, in whose hands for the
time being were life and death, sleeping upright against the
tiller, as much of a fixture there, as the open-mouthed
dragon rudely carved on our prow.
Were it not, that on board of other vessels, I myself had
many a time dozed at the helm, spite of all struggles, I
would have been almost at a loss to account for this heedlessness
in my comrades. But it seemed as if the mere
sense of our situation, should have been sufficient to prevent
the like conduct in all on board our craft.
Samoa's aspect, sleeping at the tiller, was almost appalling.
His large opal eyes were half open; and turned
toward the light of the binnacle, gleamed between the lids
like bars of flame. And added to all, was his giant stature
and savage lineaments.
It was in vain, that I remonstrated, begged, or threatened:
the occasional drowsiness of my fellow-voyagers
proved incurable. To no purpose, I reminded my Viking
that sleeping in the night-watch in a craft like ours, was
far different from similar heedlessness on board the Arcturion.
For there, our place upon the ocean was always
known, and our distance from land; so that when by night
the seamen were permitted to be drowsy, it was mostly,
because the captain well knew that strict watchfulness
could be dispensed with.
Though in all else, the Skyeman proved a most faithful
ally, in this one thing he was either perversely obtuse, or
infatuated. Or, perhaps, finding himself once more in a
double-decked craft, which rocked him as of yore, he was
lulled into a deceitful security.
For Samoa, his drowsiness was the drowsiness of one
bent on sleep, come dreams or death. He seemed insensible
to the peril we ran. Often I sent the sleepy savage below,
and steered myself till morning. At last I made a point of
slumbering much by day, the better to stand watch by
night; though I made Samoa and Jarl regularly go through
with their allotted four hours each.
It has been mentioned, that Annatoo took her turn at
the helm; but it was only by day. And in justice to the
lady, I must affirm, that upon the whole she acquitted herself
well. For notwithstanding the syren face in the binnacle,
which dimly allured her glances, Annatoo after all
was tolerably heedful of her steering. Indeed she took
much pride therein; always ready for her turn; with marvelous
exactitude calculating the approaching hour, as it
came on in regular rotation. Her time-piece was ours, the
sun. By night it must have been her guardian star; for
frequently she gazed up at a particular section of the
heavens, like one regarding the dial in a tower.
By some odd reasoning or other, she had cajoled herself
into the notion, that whoever steered the brigantine, for
that period was captain. Wherefore, she gave herself
mighty airs at the tiller; with extravagant gestures issuing
unintelligible orders about trimming the sails, or pitching
overboard something to see how fast we were going. All
this much diverted my Viking, who several times was delivered
of a laugh; a loud and healthy one to boot: a phenomenon
worthy the chronicling.
And thus much for Annatoo, preliminary to what is
further to be said. Seeing the drowsiness of Jarl and
Samoa, which so often kept me from my hammock at night,
forcing me to repose by day, when I far preferred being
broad awake, I decided to let Annatoo take her turn at the
night watches; which several times she had solicited me to
do; railing at the sleepiness of her spouse; though abstaining
from all reflections upon Jarl, toward whom she had of
late grown exceedingly friendly.
Now the Calmuc stood her first night watch to admiration;
if any thing, was altogether too wakeful. The mere
steering of the craft employed not sufficiently her active
mind. Ever and anon she must needs rush from the tiller
to take a parenthetical pull at the fore-brace, the end of
which led down to the bulwarks near by; then refreshing
herself with a draught or two of water and a biscuit, she
would continue to steer away, full of the importance of her
office. At any unusual flapping of the sails, a violent
stamping on deck announced the fact to the startled crew.
Finding her thus indefatigable, I readily induced her to
stand two watches to Jarl's and Samoa's one; and when
she was at the helm, I permitted myself to doze on a pile
of old sails, spread every evening on the quarter-deck.
It was the Skyeman, who often admonished me to
“heave the ship to” every night, thus stopping her headway
till morning; a plan which, under other circumstances,
might have perhaps warranted the slumbers of all. But
as it was, such a course would have been highly imprudent.
For while making no onward progress through the water,
the rapid currents we encountered would continually be
drifting us eastward; since, contrary to our previous experience,
they seemed latterly to have reversed their flow, a
phenomenon by no means unusual in the vicinity of the
Line in the Pacific. And this it was that so prolonged our
passage to the westward. Even in a moderate breeze, I
sometimes fancied, that the impulse of the wind little more
than counteracted the glide of the currents; so that with
much show of sailing, we were in reality almost a fixture
on the sea.
The equatorial currents of the South Seas may be regarded
as among the most mysterious of the mysteries of the
deep. Whence they come, whither go, who knows? Tell
us, what hidden law regulates their flow. Regardless of
the theory which ascribes to them a nearly uniform course
from east to west, induced by the eastwardly winds of the
Line, and the collateral action of the Polar streams; these
currents are forever shifting. Nor can the period of their
revolutions be at all relied upon or predicted.
But however difficult it may be to assign a specific cause
for the ocean streams, in any part of the world, one of the
wholesome effects thereby produced would seem obvious
enough. And though the circumstance here alluded to is
perhaps known to every body, it may be questioned, whether
it is generally invested with the importance it deserves.
Reference is here made to the constant commingling and
purification of the sea-water by reason of the currents.
For, that the ocean, according to the popular theory,
possesses a special purifying agent in its salts, is somewhat
to be doubted. Nor can it be explicitly denied, that those
very salts might corrupt it, were it not for the brisk circulation
of its particles consequent upon the flow of the
streams. It is well known to seamen, that a bucket of
sea-water, left standing in a tropical climate, very soon
becomes highly offensive; which is not the case with rain-water.
But I build no theories. And by way of obstructing the
one, which might possibly be evolved from the statement
above, let me add, that the offensiveness of sea-water left
standing, may arise in no small degree from the presence of
decomposed animal matter.
