Our Ship Was
Now All Cased With Ice, - Hull, Spars, And Standing Rigging; - And
The Running Rigging So Stiff That We Could Hardly Bend It So As
To Belay It, Or, Still Worse, Take A Knot With It; And The Sails
Nearly As Stiff As Sheet Iron.
One at a time, (for it was a long
piece of work and required many hands,) we furled the
Courses,
mizen topsail, and fore-topmast staysail, and close-reefed the
fore and main topsails, and hove the ship to under the fore,
with the main hauled up by the clewlines and buntlines, and ready
to be sheeted home, if we found it necessary to make sail to get
to windward of an ice island. A regular look-out was then set,
and kept by each watch in turn, until the morning. It was a tedious
and anxious night. It blew hard the whole time, and there was an
almost constant driving of either rain, hail, or snow. In addition
to this, it was "as thick as muck," and the ice was all about us.
The captain was on deck nearly the whole night, and kept the
cook in the galley, with a roaring fire, to make coffee for him,
which he took every few hours, and once or twice gave a little to
his officers; but not a drop of anything was there for the crew.
The captain, who sleeps all the daytime, and comes and goes at
night as he chooses, can have his brandy and water in the cabin,
and his hot coffee at the galley; while Jack, who has to stand
through everything, and work in wet and cold, can have nothing
to wet his lips or warm his stomach.
This was a "temperance ship," and, like too many such ships, the
temperance was all in the forecastle. The sailor, who only takes
his one glass as it is dealt out to him, is in danger of being drunk;
while the captain, who has all under his hand, and can drink as much
as he chooses, and upon whose self-possession and cool judgment the
lives of all depend, may be trusted with any amount, to drink at
his will. Sailors will never be convinced that rum is a dangerous
thing, by taking it away from them, and giving it to the officers;
nor that, that temperance is their friend, which takes from them
what they have always had, and gives them nothing in the place of
it. By seeing it allowed to their officers, they will not be
convinced that it is taken from them for their good; and by
receiving nothing in its place, they will not believe that
it is done in kindness. On the contrary, many of them look
upon the change as a new instrument of tyranny. Not that
they prefer rum. I never knew a sailor, in my life, who would
not prefer a pot of hot coffee or chocolate, in a cold night,
to all the rum afloat.
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