There Was No Lulls, And Very
Little Variation In Its Fierceness.
Our ship, being light,
rolled so as almost to send the fore yard-arm under water,
and drifted off bodily, to leeward.
All this time there was
not a cloud to be seen in the sky, day or night; - no, not so
large as a man's hand. Every morning the sun rose cloudless
from the sea, and set again at night, in the sea, in a flood of
light. The stars, too, came out of the blue, one after another,
night after night, unobscured, and twinkled as clear as on a still
frosty night at home, until the day came upon them. All this time,
the sea was rolling in immense surges, white with foam, as far as
the eye could reach, on every side, for we were now leagues and
leagues from shore.
The between-decks being empty, several of us slept there in hammocks,
which are the best things in the world to sleep in during a storm;
it not being true of them, as it is of another kind of bed, "when the
wind blows, the cradle will rock;" for it is the ship that rocks,
while they always hang vertically from the beams. During these
seventy-two hours we had nothing to do, but to turn in and out,
four hours on deck, and four below, eat, sleep, and keep watch.
The watches were only varied by taking the helm in turn, and now
and then, by one of the sails, which were furled, blowing out of
the gaskets, and getting adrift, which sent us up on the yards;
and by getting tackles on different parts of the rigging, which were
slack. Once, the wheel-rope parted, which might have been fatal
to us, had not the chief mate sprung instantly with a relieving
tackle to windward, and kept the tiller up, till a new one could
be rove. On the morning of the twentieth, at daybreak, the gale
had evidently done its worst, and had somewhat abated; so much so,
that all hands were called to bend new sails, although it was still
blowing as hard as two common gales. One at a time, and with great
difficulty and labor, the old sails were unbent and sent down
by the bunt-lines, and three new topsails, made for the homeward
passage round Cape Horn, and which had never been bent, were got
up from the sailroom, and under the care of the sailmaker, were
fitted for bending, and sent up by the halyards into the tops, and,
with stops and frapping lines, were bent to the yards, close-reefed,
sheeted home, and hoisted. These were done one at a time, and with
the greatest care and difficulty. Two spare courses were then
got up and bent in the same manner and furled, and a storm-jib,
with the bonnet off, bent and furled to the boom. It was twelve
o'clock before we got through; and five hours of more exhausting
labor I never experienced; and no one of that ship's crew, I will
venture to say, will ever desire again to unbend and bend five large
sails, in the teeth of a tremendous north-wester.
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