Of
Course, The Galilee Would Have Sailed From The Marquesas Without Me,
For I Was Bent On Finding Another Fayaway And Another Kory-Kory.
I
doubt that the captain read desertion in my eye.
Perhaps even the
berth of cabin-boy was already filled. At any rate, I did not get
it.
Then came the rush of years, filled brimming with projects,
achievements, and failures; but Typee was not forgotten, and here I
was now, gazing at its misty outlines till the squall swooped down
and the Snark dashed on into the driving smother. Ahead, we caught
a glimpse and took the compass bearing of Sentinel Rock, wreathed
with pounding surf. Then it, too, was effaced by the rain and
darkness. We steered straight for it, trusting to hear the sound of
breakers in time to sheer clear. We had to steer for it. We had
naught but a compass bearing with which to orientate ourselves, and
if we missed Sentinel Rock, we missed Taiohae Bay, and we would have
to throw the Snark up to the wind and lie off and on the whole
night - no pleasant prospect for voyagers weary from a sixty days'
traverse of the vast Pacific solitude, and land-hungry, and fruit-
hungry, and hungry with an appetite of years for the sweet vale of
Typee.
Abruptly, with a roar of sound, Sentinel Rock loomed through the
rain dead ahead. We altered our course, and, with mainsail and
spinnaker bellying to the squall, drove past. Under the lea of the
rock the wind dropped us, and we rolled in an absolute calm. Then a
puff of air struck us, right in our teeth, out of Taiohae Bay. It
was in spinnaker, up mizzen, all sheets by the wind, and we were
moving slowly ahead, heaving the lead and straining our eyes for the
fixed red light on the ruined fort that would give us our bearings
to anchorage. The air was light and baffling, now east, now west,
now north, now south; while from either hand came the roar of unseen
breakers. From the looming cliffs arose the blatting of wild goats,
and overhead the first stars were peeping mistily through the ragged
train of the passing squall. At the end of two hours, having come a
mile into the bay, we dropped anchor in eleven fathoms. And so we
came to Taiohae.
In the morning we awoke in fairyland. The Snark rested in a placid
harbour that nestled in a vast amphitheatre, the towering, vine-clad
walls of which seemed to rise directly from the water. Far up, to
the east, we glimpsed the thin line of a trail, visible in one
place, where it scoured across the face of the wall.
"The path by which Toby escaped from Typee!" we cried.
We were not long in getting ashore and astride horses, though the
consummation of our pilgrimage had to be deferred for a day. Two
months at sea, bare-footed all the time, without space in which to
exercise one's limbs, is not the best preliminary to leather shoes
and walking.
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