As yet she was keeping well ahead of the canoes. The two midshipmen anxiously watched the proceedings of the latter.
The blacks in the stern-sheets were standing up and gesticulating, and flourishing their clubs and lances, and encouraging their companions. The sun at length went down, and with the last gleam of light shed by his rays they could see the canoes still in pursuit. Darkness, however, now rapidly rose over the deep, and hid them from their view. Murray wisely bethought him of altering the schooner’s course more to the southward for a short time. Nearly an hour passed, and there were no signs of the canoes. They had therefore little apprehension that they would overtake them. The schooner was hauled up again on a wind. The night passed away, and when morning broke neither the canoes nor the land were in sight.
“If the breeze lasts we may hope to regain the ground we lost last night,” observed Murray. But it did not, and when once more they reached in towards the land, they found that they had made as little progress as before. Again, too, their provisions were running short. Though they might catch some fish, the supply was uncertain.
“We shall have to bear up again for Cape Coast Castle after all, I am afraid,” observed Adair to Murray. “And really, Alick, if I were you, I would leave the old craft there, and let us find our way as we best can to Sierra Leone. Yet, of course, if you resolve to continue the voyage, I’ll stick by you. You’ll not think I hesitate about that point.”
“I know full well that you’d not desert me, Paddy, even if things were ten times as bad as they are,” answered Murray. “But you also know me well enough not to suppose that I would disobey my orders and abandon the schooner while she holds together. If she gets a slight repair, with a fresh supply of provisions, she will be as well able to perform the voyage as she was at first. There is no use starving, though; and as we have scarcely anything left to eat on board, we’ll keep away at once for Cape Coast Castle.”
The order to put up the helm was received with no little satisfaction by Needham and the rest, and in less than three days the schooner was riding safely at anchor before the old fort. The Governor received the two midshipmen with the greatest kindness.
“Well, my lads,” said he, “I suppose you have had enough of this knocking about in your rotten old tub, and will not object to leave her this time. We shall soon have a man-of-war here, which will carry you up to Sierra Leone, and I will bear you free from all blame with your captain or anyone else. You should no longer risk your own lives, or those of your people, in such a vessel.”
“I am much obliged to you, sir,” said Murray. “I’ve made up my mind long ago on the matter, but I am willing to let any of the people leave me who wish it, and will try to get others in their stead.”
The Governor, who was really anxious about the safety of the young officer, whose perseverance he very much admired, the next day went on board the schooner, hoping to persuade the crew to abandon her; and expecting to gain his point under the belief that no other people would be obtained to go in her. They assembled on deck. The Governor addressed them. Murray said nothing.
“I sticks by my officers,” said Needham, touching his hat, and going behind Murray. Not another word did he utter.
“So do I, sir,” said White, doing the same. Wasser and the other blacks, grinning from ear to ear, and scratching their woolly pates, followed Needham and White. Murray felt much gratified.
“There, sir,” said he to the Governor, “you see that my men will not desert me or the ship. We are bound to continue the voyage.”
“I give up all hope of preventing you,” said the kind-hearted Governor with a sigh. “However, as go you will, we will try to make you as comfortable as we can.”
The Governor was as good as his word, and provisions and stores of all sorts were sent on board. There was little chance of their starving this time, though that of their going to the bottom was not much diminished, as few means were procurable of giving anything like a substantial repair to the little craft. Among other gifts Alick and Terence received a couple of parrots and a monkey. The first two were presented to Murray, the latter to Adair. The little craft was once more pronounced ready for sea. They, had been employed all day in setting up the rigging, and in bending sails, when one of the men proposed a swim overboard, to cool themselves after the heat to which they had been subject. In an instant all hands were in the water swimming about round and round the vessel. The boat was in the water on the starboard side. Murray, intending to bathe afterwards, was alone on deck. Suddenly he saw the ill-omened fin of a shark rising above the water at no great distance off, and then his snout appeared and his wicked eyes were visible surveying the scene of action. Murray shouted to Adair and the rest of the people to come on board. No one lost an instant in attempting to obey the order. Wasser alone was on the port side at the moment, and nearest to where the shark had appeared. He was a good swimmer as he had before shown, and instead of singing out for a rope with which to climb up on that side, he struck out to pass round the schooner’s stern. It was a fatal resolve. Murray was watching the ominous fin. It disappeared. “Swim towards the stern! swim towards the stern! splash about with your legs, Wasser!” he cried out, running aft and heaving the poor negro a rope. “Catch hold of this, my lad, catch hold of this!” Wasser made a spring at the rope, for instinctively he was aware what was behind him. He had half lifted himself out of the water, when he uttered a fearful shriek. The monster shark had seized him by the legs. In vain he struggled; in vain Murray hauled away to drag him out of the water; the ferocious fish would not let go his hold; the poor negro shrieked again and again. By that time Terence and Needham had climbed on board, and, coming to Murray’s assistance, they leaned over the counter, and, seizing Wasser by the arms, pulled him up still farther out of the water, and then White joining them with a boathook, drove the point into one of the monster’s eyes, when he at length opened his jaws, and retreated to a short distance, still, however, watching his writhing prey, as if ready to make another attack. It would be too horrible were I to describe the dreadful condition in which the shark had left poor Wasser’s legs. One foot was entirely gone, while the other leg was bare to the bone. A mattress was got up on deck, and Murray and Adair, with all the skill they could command, set to work to doctor the negro lad, while they sent off to the port for assistance.
“No use, thank ye, Massas,” said Wasser, shaking his head. “Doctor no do good. My time come. Me die happy. Once me thought fetish take me, now me know where me go—who wait for me.”
He pointed solemnly upwards as he spoke. The death-bed of that poor black lad might well be envied by many a proud white man. Wasser’s predictions proved not unfounded. When the doctor came on board, he pronounced his case utterly hopeless, and as Wasser himself entreated that he might not be sent on shore, he was allowed to remain where he was. All night the two midshipmen and Needham sat up watching him, and doing their best to relieve his pain. At daybreak they were to get under weigh, and with the dying lad on board they once more left Cape Coast Castle and shaped a course for Sierra Leone. The wind still continued light, and in order to keep them from gloomy thoughts or apprehensions, Murray set all hands to work to fish. They had plenty of lines and bait this time, and as they sailed along, the sea seemed literally alive with fish of every description. There were bonitoes, and dolphins; and skipjacks without number, all affording sport and very pleasant provender; while the seaman’s arch-enemies, the sharks, cruised round them as if they had made up their minds that they were to become their prey. Poor Wasser had lingered on from day to day, it appearing that each hour would prove his last, when, just at daybreak on the fourth morning after leaving harbour, he called Murray with a faint voice to his side. “Me go, Massa! me go up dere, good-bye,” he whispered, and with his hand pointing upwards he fell back. His arms dropped by his side, and Murray saw that the faithful lad was dead. A funeral at sea is often an impressive ceremony. That of poor Wasser was short, but though there were few in attendance, it was not the less sad, for by his gentle and obliging manners, and his coolness and courage in danger, he had won the affection and respect of all with whom he had sailed. The body was sewn securely up in his blankets and hammock, with such heavy weights as could be spared fastened to the feet, and when launched overboard, after Murray had read the funeral service, it shot quickly out of sight.
“Well, Tom, I don’t think as how Jack Shark will be able to grab the poor fellow before he gets safely down to the bottom.”
I do not know exactly what sort of a notion sailors have of the bottom of the ocean, but I rather think they have an idea that it is a comfortable sort of a place, where people can spend their time pleasantly enough if they can but once contrive to reach it without being caught by a shark or other marine monster.
When they had got over the feelings produced by Wasser’s death, the little crew managed to amuse themselves tolerably well. Murray taught his parrots to sing and whistle, and to talk, till they became wonderfully tame and fond of him while Paddy contrived to instruct his monkey Queerface, as he called him, so well, that he fully rivalled his old friend Quirk on board the Racer. Paddy used to observe that as Queerface could act like a human being, while the parrots could talk like one, their united talents would enable them to make a very full representation of a young savage, or indeed of some of his acquaintances who considered themselves polished young gentlemen, but often acted no better than monkeys, and scarcely knew the meaning of what they were saying more than did the parrots. There was no fear of the parrots flying away, so they were allowed full liberty, and in calm weather they used to sit on the rigging nodding their heads and cleaning their feathers, and talking away with the greatest glee, till Queerface, who had been watching them from the deck, would take it into his head to spring up the rigging after them and chase them from shroud to shroud, or they would keep out of his reach by circling round and round the vessel, completely laughing at his beard. One day a huge shark was seen following the vessel.
“I wonder what he wants with us!” exclaimed Paddy gravely. “If we do not catch him, perhaps he will catch one of us.”
“Such a notion is a mere superstition,” observed Murray. “However, we will try and catch him.”
A bonito had just been caught, and that, it was agreed, would serve as a good bait for the shark. There was no hook on board large enough to secure him, so another plan was adopted by Needham’s suggestion. The bonito was secured to a small line, while with the end of the peak-halyards a running bowline knot was formed and placed over it, or rather round it. The fish was thus in the very centre of the loop, or slip knot it might be called, but a short distance before it.
“We shall have the gentleman, no fear of it,” observed Paddy, as he watched the shark dart forward towards the bait. Murray managed the line with the bait, Paddy kept the bowline to draw it tight when the shark should get his head well into it. Silently and cautiously the monster glided on, his cruel green eye on the bonito, which Murray gradually withdrew till it was close up to the counter. Then suddenly the shark, afraid of losing his prey, made a dart at the fish till the bowline was just behind his two hind fins, when Paddy, giving a sudden jerk to it, brought it tight round him. The men, when they saw this, endeavoured to catch a turn with the rope to secure the monster, but quick as lightning he gave a terrific jerk to the rope and tore it through their hands. Out flew the rope. Unhappily Paddy was standing in the middle of the coil, and before he could jump out of it a half-hitch was caught round his leg.
“Hold on! hold on, lads!” he shrieked out; “oh, Murray, help!” It was too late. He was drawn up right over the gunwale; but just as he was going overboard he seized hold of the peak-halyards where they were belayed to the side, and held on like grim death. The shark tugged and tugged away terribly. He could hold on no longer. He felt his fingers relaxing their grasp, and in another moment he would have been dragged under the water with small chance of escape, when Needham seized him firmly by the jacket. Ned, however, forgot that it would be necessary for him to get a grasp of something, but before he had done so he found himself dragged over with Paddy. At that moment White sprung up and grasped hold of his legs just as they were disappearing over the gunwale, and at the same time Sambo, the other black, caught hold of White, who would inevitably otherwise have followed Needham, and thus poor Murray saw himself in a moment about to be deprived of his brother officer and crew. He himself now sprung to their assistance. All I have been describing took place within a few seconds of time. With a boathook, fortunately at hand, he got a hold of Paddy’s jacket which considerably relieved Needham, and at the same moment, the shark coming up again towards the schooner, he and Needham were hauled on board again, his leg being happily released from the coil which had caught it without the necessity of cutting the rope. Poor Paddy’s leg was however dreadfully mangled, and, unable to stand, he sank down with pain on the deck. Queerface was all the time chattering and jumping about in a state of the greatest excitement, evidently understanding somewhat of his master’s danger; and no sooner did Adair regain the deck than he ran up and, squatting down by his side, made so ludicrous a face that, in spite of his pain Terence could not help bursting out into a fit of laughter, which, as he afterwards remarked, must wonderfully have relieved poor Queerface’s mind. The shark meantime was hauled on board, though when they had got him thus far he flapped about and struggled so violently that he almost took the deck from the crew. Little mercy had he to expect from their hands. His enemies now attacked him with anything which first came in their way, but they made little impression on him while his head was the chief point of assault. Queerface chattered away and skipped about, taking very good care, however, to keep clear of him, and the parrots, Polly and Nelly, sung and talked as vehemently as if very much in the scene, till Sambo, the black cook, watching his opportunity, rushed in with his cleaver and gave the monster a blow on the upper part of his tail, which in an instant quieted him. Not another flap did he give with tail or fin, his huge jaws closed, and he was dead. After all their trouble, he was of no great use to them. They cut a few slices out of him for frying, for seamen will often eat shark’s flesh with much the same feeling that a Feejee islander or a New Zealander a few years ago used to eat their enemies taken in war. His skin, however, was of some value, and that accordingly they took off and preserved.
