All Hands Were Now Employed In
Setting Up The Lee Rigging, Fishing The Spritsail-Yard, Lashing
The Galley, And Getting Tackles Upon The Martingale, To Bowse It
To Windward.
Being in the larboard watch, my duty was forward,
to assist in setting up the martingale.
Three of us were out on
the martingale guys and back-ropes for more than half an hour,
carrying out, hooking and unhooking the tackles, several times
buried in the seas, until the mate ordered us in, from fear of
our being washed off. The anchors were then to be taken up on
the rail, which kept all hands on the forecastle for an hour,
though every now and then the seas broke over it, washing the
rigging off to leeward, filling the lee scuppers breast high,
and washing chock aft to the taffrail.
Having got everything secure again, we were promising ourselves
some breakfast, for it was now nearly nine o'clock in the forenoon,
when the main topsail showed evident signs of giving way. Some sail
must be kept on the ship, and the captain ordered the fore and main
spencer gaffs to be lowered down, and the two spencers (which were
storm sails, bran new, small, and made of the strongest canvas)
to be got up and bent; leaving the main topsail to blow away,
with a blessing on it, if it would only last until we could set
the spencers. These we bent on very carefully, with strong robands
and seizings, and making tackles fast to the clews, bowsed them down
to the water-ways. By this time the main topsail was among the
things that have been, and we went aloft to stow away the remnant
of the last sail of all those which were on the ship twenty-four
hours before. The spencers were now the only whole sails on the
ship, and, being strong and small, and near the deck, presenting
but little surface to the wind above the rail, promised to hold
out well. Hove-to under these, and eased by having no sail above
the tops, the ship rose and fell, and drifted off to leeward like
a line-of-battle ship.
It was now eleven o'clock, and the watch was sent below to
get breakfast, and at eight bells (noon), as everything was
snug, although the gale had not in the least abated, the watch
was set, and the other watch and idlers sent below. For three
days and three nights, the gale continued with unabated fury,
and with singular regularity. 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. Towards night,
a few clouds appeared in the horizon, and as the gale moderated,
the usual appearance of driving clouds relieved the face of the sky.
The fifth day after the commencement of the storm, we shook a reef
out of each topsail, and set the reefed foresail, jib and spanker;
but it was not until after eight days of reefed topsails that we
had a whole sail on the ship; and then it was quite soon enough,
for the captain was anxious to make up for leeway, the gale having
blown us half the distance to the Sandwich Islands.
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