We Had Just Done Furling The Sails, When A Beautiful Little
Pleasure-Boat Luffed Up Into The Wind, Under Our Quarter, And The
Junior Partner Of The Firm To Which Our Ship Belonged, Jumped On
Board.
I saw him from the mizen topsail yard, and knew him well.
He shook the captain by the hand, and went down into the cabin,
and in a few moments came up and inquired of the mate for me.
The last time I had seen him, I was in the uniform of an undergraduate
of Harvard College, and now, to his astonishment, there came down
from aloft a "rough alley" looking fellow, with duck trowsers and
red shirt, long hair, and face burnt as black as an Indian's.
He shook me by the hand, congratulated me upon my return and my
appearance of health and strength, and said my friends were all
well. I thanked him for telling me what I should not have dared
to ask; and if -
"the first bringer of unwelcome news
Hath but a losing office; and his tongue
Sounds ever after like a sullen bell - "
certainly I shall ever remember this man and his words with
pleasure.
The captain went up to town in the boat with Mr. H - - -, and left
us to pass another night on board ship, and to come up with the
morning's tide under command of the pilot.
So much did we feel ourselves to be already at home, in anticipation,
that our plain supper of hard bread and salt beef was barely touched;
and many on board, to whom this was the first voyage, could scarcely
sleep. As for myself, by one of those anomalous changes of feeling
of which we are all the subjects, I found that I was in a state
of indifference, for which I could by no means account. A year
before, while carrying hides on the coast, the assurance that in a
twelvemonth we should see Boston, made me half wild; but now that I
was actually there, and in sight of home, the emotions which I had
so long anticipated feeling, I did not find, and in their place
was a state of very nearly entire apathy. Something of the same
experience was related to me by a sailor whose first voyage was
one of five years upon the North-west Coast. He had left home,
a lad, and after several years of very hard and trying experience,
found himself homeward bound; and such was the excitement of his
feelings that, during the whole passage, he could talk and think
of nothing else but his arrival, and how and when he should jump
from the vessel and take his way directly home. Yet when the vessel
was made fast to the wharf and the crew dismissed, he seemed suddenly
to lose all feeling about the matter. He told me that he went below
and changed his dress; took some water from the scuttle-butt and
washed himself leisurely; overhauled his chest, and put his clothes
all in order; took his pipe from its place, filled it, and sitting
down upon his chest, smoked it slowly for the last time. Here he
looked round upon the forecastle in which he had spent so many
years, and being alone and his shipmates scattered, he began to
feel actually unhappy. Home became almost a dream; and it was not
until his brother (who had heard of the ship's arrival) came down
into the forecastle and told him of things at home, and who were
waiting there to see him, that he could realize where he was, and
feel interest enough to put him in motion toward that place for
which he had longed, and of which he had dreamed, for years.
There is probably so much of excitement in prolonged expectation,
that the quiet realizing of it produces a momentary stagnation of
feeling as well as of effort. It was a good deal so with me. The
activity of preparation, the rapid progress of the ship, the first
making land, the coming up the harbor, and old scenes breaking upon
the view, produced a mental as well as bodily activity, from which
the change to a perfect stillness, when both expectation and the
necessity of labor failed, left a calmness, almost of indifference,
from which I must be roused by some new excitement. And the next
morning, when all hands were called, and we were busily at work,
clearing the decks, and getting everything in readiness for going up
to the wharves, - loading the guns for a salute, loosing the sails,
and manning the windlass - mind and body seemed to wake together.
About ten o'clock, a sea-breeze sprang up, and the pilot gave orders
to get the ship under weigh. All hands manned the windlass, and the
long-drawn "Yo, heave, ho!" which we had last heard dying away
among the desolate hills of San Diego, soon brought the anchor to
the bows; and, with a fair wind and tide, a bright sunny morning,
royals and sky-sails set, ensign, streamer, signals, and pennant,
flying, and with our guns firing, we came swiftly and handsomely
up to the city. Off the end of the wharf, we rounded-to and let
go our anchor; and no sooner was it on the bottom, than the decks
were filled with people: custom-house officers; Topliff's agent,
to inquire for news; others, inquiring for friends on board, or
left upon the coast; dealers in grease, besieging the galley to
make a bargain with the cook for his slush; "loafers" in general;
and last and chief, boarding-house runners, to secure their men.
Nothing can exceed the obliging disposition of these runners,
and the interest they take in a sailor returned from a long voyage
with a plenty of money. Two or three of them, at different times,
took me by the hand; remembered me perfectly; were quite sure I
had boarded with them before I sailed; were delighted to see me
back; gave me their cards; had a hand-cart waiting on the wharf,
on purpose to take my things up:
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