University of Virginia Library

65. CHAPTER LXV.

We lay in Rio so long—for what reason the Commodore
only knows—that a saying went abroad among the impatient
sailors that our frigate would at last ground on the beef-bones
daily thrown overboard by the cooks.

But at last the good tidings came. “All hands up anchor,
ahoy!” And bright and early in the morning up came our
old iron, as the sun rose in the East.

The land-breeze at Rio—by which alone vessels may emerge
from the bay—is ever languid and faint. It comes from gardens
of citrons and cloves, spiced with all the spices of the
Tropic of Capricorn. And, like that old exquisite, Mohammed,
who so much loved to snuff perfumes and essences, and
used to lounge out of the conservatories of Khadija, his wife,
to give battle to the robust sons of Koriesh; even so this Rio
land-breeze comes jaded with sweet-smelling savors, to wrestle
with the wild Tartar breezes of the sea.

Slowly we dropped and dropped down the bay, glided like
a stately swan through the outlet, and were gradually rolled by
the smooth, sliding billows broad out upon the deep. Straight
in our wake came the tall main-mast of the English fighting-frigate,
terminating, like a steepled cathedral, in the bannered
cross of the religion of peace; and straight after her came the
rainbow banner of France, sporting God's token that no more
would he make war on the earth.

Both Englishman and Frenchman were resolved on a race;
and we Yankees swore by our top-sails and royals to sink
their blazing banners that night among the Southern constellations
we should daily be extinguishing behind us in our run
to the North.

“Ay,” said Mad Jack, “St. George's banner shall be as
the Southern Cross, out of sight, leagues down the horizon,
while our gallant stars, my brave boys, shall burn all alone
in the North, like the Great Bear at the Pole! Come on,
Rainbow and Cross!”

But the wind was long languid and faint, not yet recovered
from its night's dissipation ashore, and noon advanced, with
the Sugar-Loaf pinnacle in sight.

Now it is not with ships as with horses; for though, if a
horse walk well and fast, it generally furnishes good token that
he is not bad at a gallop, yet the ship that in a light breeze
is outstripped, may sweep the stakes, so soon as a t'-gallant
breeze enables her to strike into a canter. Thus fared it with
us. First, the Englishman glided ahead, and bluffly passed
on; then the Frenchman politely bade us adieu, while the
old Neversink lingered behind, railing at the effeminate breeze.
At one time, all three frigates were irregularly abreast, forming
a diagonal line; and so near were all three, that the stately
officers on the poops stiffly saluted by touching their caps,
though refraining from any further civilities. At this juncture,
it was a noble sight to behold those fine frigates, with dripping
breast-hooks, all rearing and nodding in concert, and to look
through their tall spars and wilderness of rigging, that seemed
like inextricably-entangled, gigantic cobwebs against the sky.

Toward sundown the ocean pawed its white hoofs to the
spur of its helter-skelter rider, a strong blast from the Eastward,
and, giving three cheers from decks, yards, and tops,
we crowded all sail on St. George and St. Denis.

But it is harder to overtake than outstrip; night fell upon
us, still in the rear—still where the little boat was, which, at
the eleventh hour, according to a Rabbinical tradition, pushed
after the ark of old Noah.

It was a misty, cloudy night; and though at first our lookouts
kept the chase in dim sight, yet at last so thick became
the atmosphere, that no sign of a strange spar was to be seen.
But the worst of it was, that, when last discerned, the Frenchman

was broad on our weather-bow, and the Englishman gallantly
leading his van.

The breeze blew fresher and fresher; but, with even our
main-royal set, we dashed along through a cream-colored
ocean of illuminated foam. White-Jacket was then in the
top; and it was glorious to look down and see our black hull
butting the white sea with its broad bows like a ram.

“We must beat them with such a breeze, dear Jack,” said
I to our noble Captain of the Top.

“But the same breeze blows for John Bull, remember,” replied
Jack, who, being a Briton, perhaps favored the Englishman
more than the Neversink.

“But how we boom through the billows!” cried Jack, gazing
over the top-rail; then, flinging forth his arm, recited,

Camoens! White-Jacket, Camoens! Did you ever read
him? The Lusiad, I mean? It's the man-of-war epic of the
world, my lad. Give me Gama for a Commodore, say I—
Noble Gama! And Mickle, White-Jacket, did you ever read
of him? William Julius Mickle? Camoens's Translator? A
disappointed man though, White-Jacket. Besides his version
of the Lusiad, he wrote many forgotten things. Did you ever
see his ballad of Cumnor Hall?—No?—Why, it gave Sir
Walter Scott the hint of Kenilworth. My father knew Mickle
when he went to sea on board the old Romney man-of-war.
How many great men have been sailors, White-Jacket! They
say Homer himself was once a tar, even as his hero, Ulysses,
was both a sailor and a shipwright. I'll swear Shakspeare
was once a captain of the forecastle. Do you mind the first
scene in The Tempest, White-Jacket? And the world-finder,
Christopher Columbus, was a sailor! and so was Camoens,
who went to sea with Gama, else we had never had the
Lusiad, White-Jacket. Yes, I've sailed over the very track
that Camoens sailed—round the East Cape into the Indian
Ocean. I've been in Don Jose's garden, too, in Macao, and
bathed my feet in the blessed dew of the walks where Camoens
wandered before me. Yes, White-Jacket, and I have
seen and sat in the cave at the end of the flowery, winding
way, where Camoens, according to tradition, composed certain
parts of his Lusiad. Ay, Camoens was a sailor once!
Then, there's Falconer, whose `Shipwreck' will never founder,
though he himself, poor fellow, was lost at sea in the Aurora
frigate. Old Noah was the first sailor. And St. Paul,
too, knew how to box the compass, my lad! mind you that
chapter in Acts? I couldn't spin the yarn better myself.
Were you ever in Malta? They called it Melita in the
Apostle's day. I have been in Paul's cave there, White-Jacket.
They say a piece of it is good for a charm against
shipwreck; but I never tried it. There's Shelly, he was
quite a sailor. Shelly—poor lad! a Percy, too—but they
ought to have let him sleep in his sailor's grave—he was
drowned in the Mediterranean, you know, near Leghorn—
and not burn his body, as they did, as if he had been a bloody
Turk. But many people thought him so, White-Jacket, because
he didn't go to mass, and because he wrote Queen Mab.
Trelwarney was by at the burning; and he was an ocean-rover,
too! Ay, and Byron helped put a piece of a keel on the
fire; for it was made of bits of a wreck, they say; one wreck
burning another! And was not Byron a sailor? an amateur
forecastle-man, White-Jacket! so he was; else how bid the
ocean heave and fall in that grand, majestic way? I say,
White-Jacket, d'ye mind me? there never was a very great
man yet who spent all his life inland. A snuff of the sea,
my boy, is inspiration; and having been once out of sight of
land, has been the making of many a true poet and the blasting
of many pretenders; for, d'ye see, there's no gammon
about the ocean; it knocks the false keel right off a pretender's
bows; it tells him just what he is, and makes him feel
it, too. A sailor's life, I say, is the thing to bring us mortals
out. What does the blessed Bible say? Don't it say that
we main-top-men alone see the marvelous sights and wonders?
Don't deny the blessed Bible, now! don't do it! How it
rocks up here, my boy!” holding on to a shroud; “but it only
proves what I've been saying—the sea is the place to cradle
genius! Heave and fall, old sea!”

“And you, also, noble Jack,” said I, “what are you but a
sailor?”

“You're merry, my boy,” said Jack, looking up with a
glance like that of a sentimental archangel doomed to drag
out his eternity in disgrace. “But mind you, White-Jacket,
there are many great men in the world besides Commodores
and Captains. I've that here, White-Jacket”—touching his
forehead—“which, under happier skies—perhaps in you solitary
star there, peeping down from those clouds—might have
made a Homer of me. But Fate is Fate, White-Jacket;
and we Homers who happen to be captains of tops must
write our odes in our hearts, and publish them in our heads.
But look! the Captain's on the poop.”

It was now midnight; but all the officers were on deck.

“Jib-boom, there!” cried the Lieutenant of the Watch,
going forward and hailing the headmost look-out. “D'ye see
any thing of those fellows now?”

“See nothing, sir.”

“See nothing, sir,” said the Lieutenant, approaching the
Captain, and touching his cap.

“Call all hands!” roared the Captain. “This keel sha'n't
be beat while I stride it.”

All hands were called, and the hammocks stowed in the
nettings for the rest of the night, so that no one could lie between
blankets.

Now, in order to explain the means adopted by the Captain
to insure us the race, it needs to be said of the Neversink,
that, for some years after being launched, she was
accounted one of the slowest vessels in the American Navy.
But it chanced upon a time, that, being on a cruise in the
Mediterranean, she happened to sail out of Port Mahon in
what was then supposed to be very bad trim for the sea.

Her bows were rooting in the water, and her stern kicking
up its heels in the air. But, wonderful to tell, it was soon
discovered that in this comical posture she sailed like a shooting-star;
she outstripped every vessel on the station. Thenceforward
all her Captains, on all cruises, trimmed her by the
head; and the Neversink gained the name of a clipper.

To return. All hands being called, they were now made
use of by Captain Claret as make-weights, to trim the ship,
scientifically, to her most approved bearings. Some were
sent forward on the spar-deck, with twenty-four-pound shot
in their hands, and were judiciously scattered about here
and there, with strict orders not to budge an inch from their
stations, for fear of marring the Captain's plans. Others
were distributed along the gun and berth decks, with similar
orders; and, to crown all, several carronade guns were un-shipped
from their carriages, and swung in their breechings
from the beams of the main-deck, so as to impart a sort of
vibratory briskness and oscillating buoyancy to the frigate.

And thus we five hundred make-weights stood out that
whole night, some of us exposed to a drenching rain, in order
that the Neversink might not be beaten. But the comfort
and consolation of all make-weights is as dust in the balance
in the estimation of the rulers of our man-of-war world.

The long, anxious night at last came to an end, and, with
the first peep of day, the look-out on the jib-boom was hailed;
but nothing was in sight. At last it was broad day; yet still
not a bow was to be seen in our rear, nor a stern in our van.

“Where are they?” cried the Captain.

“Out of sight, astern, to be sure, sir,” said the officer of
the deck.

“Out of sight, ahead, to be sure, sir,” muttered Jack
Chase, in the top.

Precisely thus stood the question: whether we beat them,
or whether they beat us, no mortal can tell to this hour, since
we never saw them again; but for one, White-Jacket will
lay his two hands on the bow-chasers of the Neversink, and
take his ship's oath that we Yankees carried the day.