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The Castaways of Disappointment Island

Chapter III. — On the Island

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Chapter III.
On the Island.

Down came the sea upon me! What had become of all my shipmates I did not know. I was alone—the only living thing in that realm of death! I clung to the rail with all my might, but I was struck down as if by a giant's hand; my frail grasp was torn away, and the waves closed over me.

How the water thundered in my ears! I seemed to be whirled over and over, like a cork in a whirlpool. My head seemed to be bursting, and a thousand lights danced before my eyes. Down, down, I seemed to go, never to rise again—fighting, struggling, longing for one gasp of air. Ah, that was a fearful sensation !

I struck against something, which I clutched frantically—I think it must have been the foot of the foresail, under water—but I was dragged away; and still in my agony there was that mad battle to force my way up through the water. I was dying ! I was going mad ! I—— Ah, I had been dashed against something; my fingers clutched a rope, and, with a last page 50despairing effort, I pulled myself upwards, hand over hand, in the direction of the blessed air. Up—up; and then, thank heaven, air— air at last!

I clung there, helpless, gasping, unable to do aught save clutch that precious rope; and then, after a bit, when my wits came back, I saw that I had hold of one of the fore-topmast back-stays, and was quite near the fore-top, whilst below me there was nothing but the heaving water. The last wave had carried the Dundonald to her doom, and I had gone down with her; but the lifebelt which I had on had been my salvation, and had brought me to the surface again.

Slowly, painfully, my limbs feeling like lead, my clothes weighing me down, almost finished by my long submersion, I climbed painfully still higher—I was on the port side—and, to my confused senses, it seemed as if someone else was clambering up behind me. Like gigantic skeleton fingers, the ship's masts rose from the waves, and I could see by their slope that the sunken wreck had a list towards the cliffs. I felt a thrill of hope; for from where I was, it seemed to me that the port top-gallant yard arm was actually touching the cliff, in which case I might leave my perilous position and gain the land. So, slowly and painfully, up the rigging I went, and out to the end of the yard, only to find that my eyes had deceived me. Between the yard and the cliff yawned a space of thirty feet or more. For all chance of crossing it, it might have been as many miles.

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And then again there came that strange idea that someone was behind me, and I turned sharply. Why, there was someone ! I caught sight of a dim form, and at the same time a well-known voice hailed me:

"Is that you, Charlie?"

It was John Judge, an Irishman from Passage West. Thank Heaven there was still one living soul left to speak to ! We gripped each other by the hand, and Judge said solemnly:

"Charlie, I think that we two are the only ones left of us all; and God knows how long we shall last, or whether we shall ever get ashore."

"There is a good thirty feet between the end of the yard and the cliff," I answered. "It would be madness to try and jump it."

"True, lad," he said; "but it is swinging across we might be. We can cut away a few good lines, perhaps, make one end fast to the yard-arm, put a bowline to the other end, and then try and swing for it."

It was a desperate venture, but the case was desperate; and so I gave Judge my knife— for he had lost his own—and in a few minutes he had brought a good length of line, which I made fast to the yard-arm.

"It is too short," I said; and he answered that he would soon get some more; but as he was cutting away I heard him utter a cry of dismay.

"What's wrong, John?" I asked; and he answered ruefully:

"I've dropped the knife, Charlie. We are done for entirely now."

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Yes, we were done for—or so it seemed. We could only sit there above the waves, cowering together for warmth, fearing each moment that the mast would go, and wait for the coming of the dawn.

And in those terrible hours we seemed to hear strange cries of distress, as of some fellow clinging to something, and unable longer to hold on; and two or three times there seemed to come from the shore an awful kind of shriek, which we thought must come from the throat of the black, Sam Watson. If it did he must have died in the night, and dropped into the sea, for we never saw him again !

How heavy my clothing seemed to me ! Its weight dragged me down, and my sea boots were unbearable. There, up on the crosstrees, I threw them off; but I little thought how, later, I was to regret that action.

And now, far away, the first faint grey streaks of dawn began to creep into the sky; but the rain never ceased, and the cold seemed to get right into our bodies, and rob us of every bit of strength.

"John !"

"What is it, Charlie ?"

I had been looking down from the cross trees, and something caught my eye; it was that which made me break the silence.

"I believe there is some poor fellow clinging to the fore-top below us," I said; and John Judge looked down.

"I believe you are right, Charlie. He seems about done. Let's go and lend him a hand."

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"Right you are, John. Come on."

So, though we seemed too perished to move, we got down to the foretop; but, to our surprise, we found not one, but no less than nine of our shipmates there, and a terrible condition they were in. Hardly one but had received some injury—a gash, or a jagged stab from wreckage or rock; for some of them had been washed clean from the ship, and back again. The two mates were there, though the first mate seemed like a dying man, he had been so battered and submerged. Still, they were alive, and were as glad to see us as we were to see them; for though it did not lessen our peril, there was something of comfort and feeling that one's companions were there. It took away that awful feeling of loneliness which I had at first experienced.

Clearer grew the sickly light of the dawn, only to reveal to us how utterly hopeless our position was. Only thirty feet from the cliff, but between us and it a fierce sea ran, roaring in from the open, roaring out through the tunnel, the waves meeting and leaping, as if mocking our plight and rejoicing in our misery.

"Lads," said the first mate, as we clung there, gazing helplessly at the cliff, "it's hard saying it, but I fear this is the end. The poor old ship won't stand much more, and she will go to pieces under us. We had better prepare for the worst, lads, as many another seaman has had to do in his time."

Perhaps it was his hurt that made him seem so hopeless, but at any rate there was no page 54questioning the truth of his words. It seemed as if the poor fellows who had already gone were the most fortunate; for we had endured the tortures of the night, and would have to share their fate in the end.

"There is one thing we might do," he went on thoughtfully, "and that is, cut a few lines away. They may come in handy, and if any of us get ashore, they may serve to help the rest."

Well, there wasn't much chance of getting ashore; but still, the cutting away of the lines would serve to occupy thought, and the exercise might put a little warmth into my frozen, stiffened limbs; so I at once offered to carry out the order. My own knife had been lost by John Judge, but the mate handed me his—a big clasp-knife—which I opened and put between my teeth; and so I started working my way aloft again.. I got to the topmast head, and worked away there, and then started to go higher, when—I started; I could not think but that my senses were leaving me. There, through the grey, misty light I saw a face—a white, haggard face—looking across at me from the cliff. Was I wandering—was it a ghost—or what ? No, it was a real face, it belonged to one of the crew. There, on the cliff, was one of our ordinary seamen—a Russian Finn, Michael Pul by name !

My word, how I yelled to those below ! That sight put new life into me. A sailor can go anywhere with a rope, providing he has someone to fasten the other end for him—and here was someone now.

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"Come up. Come up ! Pul is on the cliff !" I yelled and all the time I was hard at work cutting away one of our new topsail spilling lines—a good, reliable rope, as it needed to be seeing that over it all of us were to pass to safety.

One end I made fast to the upper top-gallant yard-arm, and then hove the other end to Pul, which he secured to the craggy part of the cliff; and there we had a bridge. Those angry waves might rear and leap now as much as they would. They might pound the shattered timbers of the Dundonald. Across that bridge, hand over hand, we were going to swing to the spot where Pul, and, to our surprise, two others, stood waiting to receive us.

And as we gathered, we heard a faint cry of distress from the cliff; and there we saw two more of our companions, perched on a very narrow ledge of rock just above the reach of the waves; though the heavy spray drenched them again and again.

They were in an awful position, for they could not get up or down; and as we then were we could not help them. But we shouted words of encouragement, and commenced our journey—a hard and painful one for men who were cut and bleeding, half frozen, and all suffering from being nearly drowned. We were all so weak that we could hardly crawl; but still the hope of safety acted like a spur; and, one by one, we all got across, though we had to cut a length of line and make a bowline for the first mate to sit in, for he page 56was so nearly done, that he had no strength left.

However, by the mercy of God we all got across; and then at once we went to the rescue of the other two, and hove them the line which we had with us—only to find that it was too short.

Well, there was but one way out of that; we had to strand the rope. It was hard work for our fingers, numbed so that they had lost all feeling, but it was done; and though the line was not nearly so strong, it was long enough, and at last they managed to get hold of it.

But they were so terribly weak, that they had not the power to swarm up to us; so we had to haul them up, one at a time, over the rocky face of that awful cliff. Poor fellows, they were terribly punished; and when at last we had them on top, they were so cut and gashed, that it was a hard job to recognize them.

Well, there we were, a group of shivering, bleeding castaways, standing on the edge of those black cliffs in the grey light of the morning, whilst below us the waves dashed, and the masts of our poor ship stuck up like gravestones marking where she lay. We mustered to see who had gone and who was spared—alas! spared for what terrible fate ? we asked ourselves as we stood there. Twenty-eight men we had been, all told, and now but sixteen were left; and many of them little better than dying. Our brave captain was gone, and his son Jimmy; page 57and no stone may mark the grave where they sleep, in those far southern seas.

Well, we gathered there in desperate plight, and yet our spirits rose, for it does not take much to make a sailor cheerful The mates declared that we were on Auckland Island; and they said confidently that there was a Government depot on the island.

These depôts are huts erected by the Government, and furnished with stores, and frequently boats. They are noted on the charts, so that in the event of mariners being cast away, as we then were, they might get food and clothes, and the chance of existing, until a relief ship came to the station.

Well, the mates were positive that there was a depot, if not more than one, on Auckland Island; and if it was there, we were the ones who meant to find it.

"We have got to make for the north-east," the mate declared." There is a depot there, and another in the south somewhere."

And so we started off, and we didn't mind how soon we got there, for we were all desperately hungry, having had nothing to eat since the first dog-watch the day before.

Daylight was fully in now, and we tramped forward with some heart, forgetting our past trials in the hope of speedy succour. But it was a hard road that we had to travel, for we seemed to be on the side of a mountain, which went up and up, in some places almost too steep for climbing. But it had to be taken, for the road north-east led across that mountain, and in the page 58north-east the depot would be found. We saw no trees—only great masses of a low bush, something like blackberry. There was a good deal of coarse, scrubby grass, but—and it was for this we looked most eagerly—we saw never a sight of water; and water was the one thing which we most needed now.

Still, there might be plenty the other side of the mountain; and so we toiled on, often having to stop from utter weakness, staggering like so many drunken men, racked with pain in every limb, but ever creeping on and on, towards the north-east.

And as we toiled along we noticed that there was an immense number of a certain species of sea bird, which we call mollyhawks, nesting there. These mollyhawks are a species of the Fulmar Petrel, and are about nineteen inches long when they are full-grown. They stared at us as if not able to make out what sort of creatures we were, but they did not attempt to fly away when we went near them; and, as we said to one another, it seemed quite certain that if the worst came to the worst we could find something to eat for a while, even if mollyhawk flesh is not the nicest thing imaginable.

We had toiled half way up the mountain side, when, suddenly and swiftly, our journey was stayed by the mist, which came thick, silent, sudden, and blotted out the whole of the scene.

We did not dare attempt to move forward through that, for we knew nothing of what perils might be in our pathway—what deep rivers, what yawning precipices. A thousand page 59dangers might be before us; so, though we were all eager to continue, the mate called a halt, and we gathered on the bare ground, faint with hunger, and perished with cold; whilst, to add to our misery, with the mist came the rain— not a gentle rain, but torrents of it, like streams of ice-cold water.

Now, our plight seemed quite as bad as it had been when we were on the wreck. I cannot describe that cold—it was something which is unknown in Britain, even in the worst of winters. We trembled with it, so that we could not keep still; and, as the rain beat upon us, we felt that we were sinking into a thick mess of muddy slush.

Most of us, too, had very little clothing; and the majority of us had kicked off our boots, as I had done, to secure a last chance if we had been cast into the sea. Our feet were frozen and wounded; and altogether our plight was one truly miserable.

And now we were hungry—so hungry that we felt maddened; and at last some of us thought of the nestling mollyhawks, and set off to catch one—that must have been about three o'clock in the afternoon.

Well, it did not prove a very hard task to get the birds, but there was no way of cooking them; we could only skin them and eat them raw, tearing their warm flesh with our teeth, like wild beasts.

I know that will sound very terrible to my readers, but then none of them can possibly know what being so hungry as we were means. page 60I have often thought, since, how often people turn up their noses at good food—as I have done myself—and here I was glad to have a feed of raw mollyhawk, rending the flesh with my teeth—too hungry even to shudder at such a horrible meal.

And still the rain kept steadily on, and still the mist lay thick all around, and we were unable to move; so, clustering together there, we told each other of our adventures; and I heard how the two fellows came to be upon that ledge of rock, and also how Pul and his two comrades managed to get ashore.

When the lifebelts had been served out, and the majority of us had gone forward to the forecastle with the captain, there were some six or seven men who stayed aft, thinking that, after all, they would stand a better chance there; and, indeed, in that they were right, as afterwards turned out.

These men were my old friend Low, who had sailed with me in the Commonwealth; the steward, Mr. Smith, who was a very big man, weighing nearly twenty stone, and hailing from Falmouth; Harry Walters, a Norwegian A.B.; Michael Pul, Robert Ellis, O.S., of Adelaide; John Grattan, an Irishman, better known as Mickey; and Herman Queerfelt, the German. These men stayed aft together, whilst all the rest of the crew sought refuge under the forecastle-head.

Now, when the Dundonald started sinking forward, the steward shook hands with Harry Walters—for they had been shipmates before page 61in a barque called the Dunreggan—and he wished him good-bye; and then, with a set, white face he walked into the cabin, and shut the door behind him. Different men have different ways in the face of death—some like to cluster together as if for mutual comfort; but Mr. Smith shut himself away, perhaps tc wait alone on his knees until his God called to him.

Be it as it may, he had not been in the cabin very many minutes before there was an explosion inside. The compressed air blew the skylight right out, hurling it full sixteen feet into the air, and almost at the same moment the charthouse on the poop was washed overboard; whilst every boat was smashed, and the skids broken down by the heavy seas that swept aboard. That was the last that they saw of the steward, for the ship was going down fast, and they had to dash to the rigging for refuge.

Robert Ellis and Mickey managed to swarm up one of the mizzen topmast backstays, and from there to reach the upper topsail-yard, which was close in to the cliff. For you will remember that since the Dundonald had run in stern first, the mizzen-mast and the jigger were much nearer to the cliff than the foremast upon which the rest of us had taken refuge.

Well, these two had crawled along the upper top sail-yard, and with great difficulty and danger they managed to get off on to the ledge, where we afterwards found them, only to discover that they had hardly mended their plight by the page 62exchange, It was true they were no longer on the breaking vessel, but they were in a tight corner; for below was a sheer drop into the sea, and above, the cliff towered almost straight— indeed, bulging out over them if anything.

They had passed an awful night, being more cramped and frozen than any of us, and they had given up all hope when they were seen by us, and hauled into safety.

Now, there were four men aft when the ship went down—Low, Pul, Walters and Queerfelt; and these, headed by Low, made a dive for the jigger-rigging, the jigger being the Dundonald's fourth mast—the one nearest the stern.

Through the swirl of the seas that closed over the ship they forced their way to this haven of temporary safety, crowding together there and expecting to go down every moment.

But the jigger was right close to the face of the cliff, and Low, swarming up, made his way to the top-mast-head, and examined the situation; whilst the other three hung on for dear life, waiting to hear from him, whether they had any chance of escape, and knowing nothing of what had befallen us away in the forepart of the ship.

Presently Low came making his way back, and his first words filled them with hope; for he declared that the jigger-topmast was hard against the cliffs, and that, bad as they looked, they were not impossible to climb.

"I can put my foot on the cliff," he said in his quiet, confident manner, "and I mean to try it. If I can only get ashore with a piece of rope, page 63I can save all hands—that is, if any are left alive save us four."

Well, the other three felt a bit cheered, and they followed Low as he made his way back to the cliff. It was a chance, but it was a dog's one, so risky that it seemed only going to death a little the quicker to them as they looked.

There at the top-mast head the cliff rose black as night, glistening with the rain and the spray; whilst as to path of any sort, there was not one safe enough for a mouse to climb, let alone a man. And it was up that steep cliff they must go if they were to escape the death which awaited them where they were.

With a heart of courage and cheery words, Low led the way, ever one of the first to brave peril and toil; and the others, taking heart of grace, followed in his footsteps.

Queerfelt was the one next to Low, and he had hardly started on his journey when from above there came a shower of loose stones and gravel, so that he had a very narrow shave of being carried down. But he clung on with finger-nails and toes, and he fancied that through the darkness there came a muffled cry, and that something big and heavy whizzed by him. He thought it a big boulder displaced by Low above. But when at last—breathless, bleeding, bruised—he and the two behind him reached the summit, no Low was to be seen; nor did we ever see him again.

That shower of stones was occasioned when he slipped, that cry was his last cry, that heavy body whizzing past in the darkness was he falling page 64into the angry waters that fretted and warred against the foot of the cliff which he had so bravely tried to climb. God rest him for the brave man and the true shipmate that he was to all who sailed with him !

So these three men—Pul, Walters and Queer-felt—got ashore, and that without getting a sea over them; though, of course, they were drenched with rain. And therefore they were in a better plight than the rest of us who had been nigh drowned, and who were just upon finished when we made the land.

Such were the stories they told us as we camped out there in the open, shivering and wretched, with no shelter from the pitiless rain. The mist showed no signs of lifting, so there was nothing for it but to stay where we were, and pass the night there; and we were so utterly exhausted that we had not the strength to try and crawl an inch. We just lay down full length on the mud, and let the rain beat upon us, and the wind howl around us; whilst from below we could hear the angry roar of the sea.

Is it to be wondered at if we thought of our companions who had gone ? They at any rate were at rest, and would feel hunger and cold no more. The mates tried to keep our spirits up, though the first mate was suffering terribly himself. He tried not to show it, but kept telling us that the mist would go in the morning, and that then we should be able to find the depôt.

But what a night of suffering that was! page 65I was huddled up with the Chilian, Santiago Marino. He had his sea boots on, so he did not suffer quite so much; but I had naked feet, and I could have screamed with the agony of the cold in them. It was so bad that at last I tried to dig a hole in the ground with my nails, and, putting my feet into it, covered them with the muddy earth, and so got a little warmth into them. It was a poor sort of blanket that, and I lay groaning beneath my breath, praying for the light.

Presently Santiago suggested that we should be no worse off if we got up, and went to get some more mollyhawks. The warm flesh might put a little life into us, whilst if we stayed as we were we should probably be dead by the morning.

So we went together and had another dreadful feed, and yet it seemed to put new life into us. And then we waited and waited, until at last the day broke, and as the light grew stronger the mist lifted and drifted away, and we were free to continue our journey once more.

Wet, covered with mud, the most pitiable objects that ever were seen, we staggered on, helping each other up when we fell, not making a mile an hour, but never giving up, urged on by the inspiring thought that at the end of the march we should find food and the means of getting a fire.

Now we were travelling over sharp, rocky-ground, which cut and wounded our feet until we left a trail of blood behind us; and then we would be going through long, rank grass, sinking up to our ankles in liquid mud. And so we page 66went on, on, up and up, ever drawing nearer to the summit, crawling at last on hands and knees —on and on, until at last the goal was reached, and we stood casting eager eyes around.

But why do those groans of bitter disappointment escape our lips, and why do we stare so wildly into each other's haggard faces ? Oh, the bitter mockery of it! All our hard, wearisome, agonising climb had been for nothing! We were not on Auckland Island at all! That lay far away, with a good six miles of angry, fiercely-running sea between us and it.

We were on a bleak, barren island about three miles long and two wide. No trace of water, no sign of life of any sort could we see ! All silence, all mountain, and scrub and loneliness, and all around the waves which, if we had escaped them, would now shut us in to die of starvation. We did not know the name of the island then, yet in our minds we named it aright—it was indeed Disappointment Island!