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The Castaways of Disappointment Island

Chapter IV. — We Get a Fire Going

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Chapter IV.
We Get a Fire Going.

There lay the island upon which we had hoped we were cast, a good six miles away; and as we stood upon that mountain-top, whichever way we turned our despairing eyes there were abundant signs of the inhospitable nature of the place upon which we had managed to land.

Everywhere the black rock cropped up in great masses, and, look where we would, we could discern no trace of life. Silence and desolation reigned here; solitude had made this place her habitation.

"What is to be done ? "

Sick, faint, so weak that we could hardly stand, we looked into each other's faces and put. that question. The death in the waves would have been quicker and more merciful than a lingering death from thirst and starvation here.

But whilst there was life there was hope, and even in our desperate plight that hope did not entirely desert us.

"It is no use thinking of reaching that island now," observed the first mate. And I shook my head.

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"Not the slightest. It is the Island of Dreams to which we can never get."

Why I should have called it by that name I cannot say, but the words came to my tongue, and as the Island of Dreams it was known to me until the day when I at last trod upon its shore, and it became a reality—a horrible, torturing reality at first.

"Well, it's no use standing here, staring over as though we thought we could get across that way," said one of the crowd "We have got to find fresh water, or it's all over with us. And perhaps there may be a depot on this island. You don't know."

Those words put fresh hope into us, and we decided, weak as we were, to split up into parties, and thoroughly explore the island.

There were five parties, and, parting from each other, we agreed to meet at a spot in the centre of the island later on, and to keep a sharp look-out for fresh water.

Weary and faint, we dragged our feet over those desert paths, casting eager glances in every direction in the hopes of seeing some pool or spring.

"There is a pool!"

The cry broke joyfully from the lips of one of my party, and we dashed forward eagerly. Oh, how we longed to throw ourselves down and drink and drink ! The desire put new life into us, and urged our weary feet; but when we reached the spot, and bent down to drink, we gave groans of disappointment. The water was salt and bitter—not as salt page 69as sea-water, truly, but too salt to be good for us.

But it was water, and the madness of thirst had got hold of us. We drank, reckless of what would follow, so long as our thirst was quenched. And then we went on, and the effects of our rashness soon made itself felt. Burning thirst attacked us, and our bodies seemed cramped with pain. I expect that, as the rock was volcanic, this water must have been full of mineral salts, and they were affecting us now.

Nothing to be seen—no sign of life of any sort. We wandered for hours, and at last made our way to the appointed rendezvous, and threw ourselves down, too weary and weak to care what became of us; and then, by twos and threes, the rest came straggling in, and each and all had the same tale to tell. The island was absolutely barren, and no fresh water was to be found.

"There must be fresh water," the mate declared. "It stands to reason the rain— and there is plenty of that—must collect somewhere. We must persevere, and find it."

Persevere! We had neither strength nor heart to do it. We felt that we could just lay there and die. And then, all of a sudden, the sun came out and shone brightly—the first time for days.

Oh, how good that seemed ! How we lay and basked in its beams! How it seemed to whisper hope to us ! It put new life into us, page 70and we felt that we would not give up whilst one of us had strength to crawl.

Seated there, we consulted upon ways and means, and the general opinion was that we ought to go back to the wreck and see if we could manage to get anything from her.

Of course, she was submerged, all but the masts, but, still, something might have floated to the shore; and in our present plight things which at other times would have been regarded as useless might be more valuable than the costliest treasures.

"Let us go and see how things are, lads," said the first mate, trying hard to repress all signs of his suffering. "It will give us something to do; and anything is better than sitting here idle."

And so most of us started. Some few remained, for they were too weak and spiritless to move; but the larger part of us commenced to descend towards the wreck, though what we hoped to find we could not tell.

But it was hard work, and ere we were halfway down most of us had stopped and thrown ourselves on the ground. We were too weak to go farther, too sick and faint from lack of food, and the effects of that salt water. The three men who had got ashore from the jigger had the most go in them, for they had not been half-drowned, as all the rest of us had been.

And now the sun went in again, and the grey clouds came back, and with them a chill, damp wind that seemed to cut us to the bones page 71—that made us tremble as with ague. Oh, the cold on that bleak mountain-side, and we were too weak to resist it!

From where we were we could see the wreck, and we perceived that the fore-royal mast had gone, and the yard as well. The sea was doing its work, and destroying the wreck piecemeal.

Panting with weakness, the first mate lay there, and the second was by his side, and I heard him mutter to himself:

"If we could only start a fire ! We shall all perish without one ! Oh, what would I give for a box of matches now ! "

A box of matches !

Like a flash the remembrance of that box which I had taken from John Puhze came back. I had put it in my pocket, and forgotten it until now.

"I have got some!" I fairly shrieked. "Don't you remember the box I took from Puhze ? I put them in my pocket, and they are here now."

We gathered round, a clustering, eager throng, as I took them out. The box was all soaked with water—that was to be expected, seeing that I had been dragged under when the ship sank—but at the bottom there were some that did not seem very wet. They might light, perhaps.

"Thank God!" the words came from the mate's lips. Those matches might mean a fire, and a fire now was everything. Another night in that cold, and we should all die.

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But even with the matches how could we get a fire ? You try and start one with nothing but a match and wood, and see how hard it is!

Harry Walters took them from me, for I felt so done that I could not have struck one to save my life—my hands trembled too much. Walters had most go in him then, and, standing there, his keen eye detected some dead bushes down below, where some of the blackberry-like growth had withered away.

"That stuff ought to burn," he observed thoughtfully. "I will go and have a try."

And with two or three of the strongest at his heels, he went down to the spot, whilst the rest of us sat huddled up, staring after them with wild, hollow eyes, and hardly daring to hope that they would ever succeed.

But they did! After a long time—so it seemed to us—we saw smoke—a little thin wreath at first, and then denser masses—and we struggled to our feet and staggered down to the spot. They had a fire! How we clustered round it, holding out our perished fingers to the blaze !

"Get more wood—plenty of wood ! Tear up whole armfuls ! Let us have a fire—a blessed fire to warm us, to dry our clothes, to thaw our frozen blood !"

It seemed to wake us up. It wants such a little to rekindle hope ! Why, if we had a fire, we might have everything. And now that we had the fire we would not let it go out again.

"Now, lads," advised the second mate as we page 73sat there, "the day is getting on, and if we mean to try and get anything from the wreck we had better see about it at once."

"What can we get ? "asked one man. "There is nothing but her sticks standing above water."

"And the sticks have ropes, and spars, and good sails on them," was the answer. "And a sail makes a good tent, and that's better than lying out in the open as we did last night."

There was reason in that, and so most of us started off to the wreck, after having made up a big fire that would burn for a long time. I say most of us, because we were not all there—a lot had scattered all over the place, looking for food or water; but as they saw the smoke rising from the fire they began to make their way back, wondering how ever we had managed to get it going.

We got down close. to the wreck, though it was very dangerous work going down, especially for men as weak as we were, whose heads were, spinning round from the effects of that salt water, and when we got close to the place where we had corne ashore, we could see that the fore-topgallant yard—that is, the one across which we had got to the cliff—was now almost touching the cliff face, not more than a foot or two from it; so that, though it was not as easy as walking upstairs, we managed to get on to it, and we started right away to unbend the fore-topgallant sail. After which we started on the gaff-topsail.

It was risky business, for the ship was breaking up beneath the waves, and the masts might go page 74at any moment. Indeed, we could feel them tremble as the seas struck them.

But it was neck or nothing with us, and we dared that which, under other conditions, we should not have attempted; and, with a lot of hard work—hard, that is, for us in the condition we were in—we managed to get the two sails clear, and, having secured lines to them, we hauled them up on to the top of the cliff, and carried them round to the lee side, where we might hope for some sort of shelter from wind and rain. And it was raining again now as hard as ever, so that our fire hissed as the water fell upon it, and our clothes were once more saturated.

"Now, lads," directed the second mate, as brave and cheery as ever," we want to pull up a lot of sods as big as we can and build a wall."

The first mate lay there, sheltered by the sail, and the rest of us went to work with a will, tearing up great tufts of the coarse grass, and piling them up in a sort of wall about two feet high.

When we thought that the wall was high enough, we took the canvas and stretched it over from the top, to the ground. Then we piled more sods—a lot of them—on the canvas to prevent it being blown away, and there we had some sort of lean-to tent—not much of a shelter, truly, but something for which we were very thankful.

And all the time our fire was blazing away merrily, and the flames sounded quite cheerful as they roared in the wind.

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"That's the style!" we cried. "Now we have fire and mansion, and the next thing is to get dinner ready."

Dinner! That reminded us that we were hungry, for we had had nothing to eat all that day. There was no occasion to inquire what we were to have; the only things were mollyhawks, and we were thankful that there were plenty of them, and that they were so tame.

"Now then, who is coming bird catching ?" was the query; and off: some of us started to pay our respects to the mollyhawks, which sat on their nests and stared at us, or else opened their great hooked beaks and hissed angrily, as if informing us that they did not like our being there. However, stares and hisses were of no avail; we just grabbed them. Squark, squark ! they would go; and then they squarked no more, for we had wrung their necks. It was not very exciting; but, then, we were not out for excitement—we were looking for food.

When we had got enough we gathered up our spoils and bore them back to the camp, where the fellows, who had not been catching them, had to turn in and do their share by cooking them.

The cooking was rather primitive. We just skinned the birds, and stuck them on a pointed stick which lay on the embers, and left them there for about half-an-hour. The birds were rather burnt on the outside, but we were not particular. We did not grumble because we had no sauce or gravy or things of that kind; page 76nor because they were burnt on the outside, and somewhat underdone on the in. No, we just sat down and busied ourselves with getting as much mollyhawk into our bodies as we could; and we thought that it was a good deal better than eating them raw, as we had been compelled to do before.

Our precious matches we tried to dry. Some of them were useless, but others were all right, and they were now the most valued of all our scanty possessions.

Our meal finished, we tidied up, which meant that we were going to pitch the birds' skins away; but one of our crowd prevented us, saying that we might be very glad of those feathers presently. The motto for castaways on desert islands seems to be: "Don't waste anything, for you never know when you may be glad of it." At any rate, we did not throw away the skins; and presently, when we made rugs of them, we were very glad to have them to use in that way.

Well, our meal over, we got a whole lot of wood and piled it up by the fire, and then, as it was now growing dark, we determined to see about our sleeping arrangements—or rather, about our waking arrangements.

"It will never do for us all to turn in together," said the mate. "Some of us must keep by the fire, and see that it does not go down. A ship might pass in the night, though it is unlikely, and if our signal is seen, we may be rescued; whereas, if the fire goes out, they may remain in ignorance of our being here and so our chance may be lost."

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Well, there was good reason in that, and so we decided that we would take watches, two at a time, whilst the rest slept.

The mate would have taken his place, but we would not listen to that. He was far too ill— so ill that he could not eat the mollyhawk flesh like the rest of us. God help us ! We could do nothing for him, but we could let him rest in peace; and so we decided that he was not to take a watch, but get all the rest he could.

So, after making up the fire, we turned in, leaving two of our number on watch. And how grateful we were for that canvas ! Even if the rain did find its way through, and the wind howl and tear around it, we were a little better off than we had been in the piercing cold of the previous night.

My turn to watch came last, and I had an Australian, named Bob Ellis, an ordinary seaman, for my companion.

I shall never forget that watch. It was one of the most weird experiences that I ever had in my life.

We sat in the shelter of the tent, our sleeping companions inside, and at once there was a sense of silence and noise. I know that sounds strange, and yet I can only describe it in that way.

Noise there was. The wind moaned and sobbed, and then screamed again all around until it seemed like the cries of some demons in torment; and mingling with the wind came the deeper roar of the sea as it fretted and beat at the foot of the cliff.

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Then, again and again, rising above these deeper sounds, there would come the shrill screams of the night birds and seagulls—strange eerie sounds that made one start and shiver as they listened.

And yet with it all there was that oppressive, sense of solitude. We were a handful of poor castaways, far from the track of ships, away almost upon the Antarctic circle, with the wild seas stretching far around on all sides. We seemed shut away so far—so very far—from all our kind; and greater than the night winds, the murmuring sea, or the screaming birds, the brooded silence settled down upon us as we sat there, our faces red with the glare of the fire and listened to the deep breathing, or the restless moaning, of our companions in distress.

"Think we will ever get away, Bob? "I asked as we sat there; and he shook his head.

"God knows, Charles ! We are in a desperate plight, that is certain. If we could only make the other island !"

Ah, if! But that seemed impossible. The Island of Dreams mocked us, and the sea forbade our reaching it.

"The mate seems very bad," I said presently, as a moan came from our tent; and he nodded,

"He's a dying man, Charlie ! He is starving to death! God help him. He can't tackle the birds, and that water is just poison to him ! "

"It is to all of us," I answered. "If we don't find fresh water soon it will be a case with all of us!"

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Slowly the intense darkness melted, and dawn broke, cold, grey and cheerless; and then I got up, and went and killed half-a-dozen birds, bringing them to Bob Ellis, who cooked them.

"I saw a lot of seaweed a bit lower down," he said. "I have heard of fellows eating that, and finding it agree with them. Iceland moss is only a sort of seaweed. Suppose we try a bit, Charlie, to give the birds a flavour ?"

"Right you are ! "I agreed; and off I went and gathered a lot of it. "There now, we have vegetables with the poultry," I said. And Bob nodded, intimating that the birds were ready for eating.

Mollyhawk and seaweed is not as bad as it sounds when you are really hungry. The seaweed had a strange, salty, medicine-like taste, but we did not grumble at that; and when we had finished our meal, the other fellows came crawling out from under the canvas, and wanted to know whether we had got their breakfast ready.

But in this case it was "first catch your breakfast, and then cook it"; and so they started off to get their birds, and make up the fire, which was beginning to go down now.

But the great trouble was our want of water. That salt stuff seemed to send us off our heads and make us half stupid, and it did not really quench our thirst. Water we must find, or things would be very serious with us all.

"It is my belief that there is none on the island, and, therefore, we have got to leave it," page 80said Harry Walters; and some of us looked as if we thought that he had gone off his head.

"How can we leave it, man ? You tell us a way, and we will clear fast enough."

"Make a raft," suggested Walters; and the rest of us shook our heads.

"A raft means timber. Where are we to get it ? There is not a tree growing on the island, and you cannot make a raft out of this bramble wood which we are burning."

"There is timber there ! "retorted Walters stubbornly; and he jerked his thumb in the direction of the wreck. "There are good stout spars there, and we are sitting here, and letting the sea smash them up and carry them away, when they might mean everything to us ! "

"And how are we going to get them ?" I asked." It's no use talking like that, Walters. Suppose that we could manage to unparrel two or three of the yards and get them down—and it's a question whether we could even do that— how are we going to get them ashore ? There is no beach, and there is a big sea running."

"It might be done," he persisted. But the second mate shook his head.

"I am afraid not, lad. There are sixty fathoms of water here if there is a foot. I think Eyre is right. We could never get the spars ashore."

"We might try it. It is impossible to get them ashore here where the wreck is, I own; but if we could tow them round the point, we might manage it, for you can get down to the water's page 81edge on that side. It is only six miles to the other island, and I reckon that we ought to manage that distance on a raft."

"It is sheer madness to think of it!" I declared; and most of the others were of my opinion,

" Suppose that we managed to get them and make the raft, we couldn't steer it properly, and, as there is sure to be a strong current between the two islands, we should be away to the southward before we were half-way across."

"We have got to die if we stay here," Walters retorted. "I don't see it makes much difference which way the end comes, and, if there is a chance, I am for taking it."

"Shure, then, Walters is right there!" said Ellis. "We can't be worse off."

"That we can. We are on solid ground here, and we have food of a kind; whilst we are certain to find water if we are patient."

"Well, I can't do it by myself," Walters muttered, "and if no one will help me—why, the thing must fall through. But it is a shame to see those spars diifting out to sea, and not make an effort to get any of them."

"Walters is right there," said I. "I don't think much of the raft idea; but if we could get one of the spars, we might be very glad of it by-and-by."

"Well, I am ready to try it," Mr. Maclaghlan said. And so we rose and went down to have a look at things. By this time most of the stragglers had come in, but still no one had found fresh water.

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We stood there, regarding the wreck critically. As I have said, the fore-royal mast had gone, but after a lot of consultation we decided that it might. be possible to send down the fore-upper-top-gallant yard.

We knew that we had a hard and risky job before us. It is not a little matter to send down a big spar at any time; but now we were all weak, and our food was disagreeing with us, and, moreover, the ship, sunken as it was, was breaking up rapidly, and we did not know how long the mast would stand, or whether it might not go bodily, and carry us all down with it.

"It seems to me that we are taking a lot of trouble for nothing,' I said, "We shall never get that spar ashore, even if we manage to send it down."

"Well, it will, give us something to do," answered the second mate; "and if Walters thinks that there is a chance, let us take it."

So we all set to work, and hard work it was, too, not having a marline spike, or anything with which to unshackle the gear. We first of all had to cut away all the lines we could reach; and, if we did nothing more than secure these, we were getting something well worth our trouble. Then we bent a few lengths on the short end of the yard, and made them fast ashore. So far the work was light, but it would be heavier presently.

Our next step was to unshackle the halliards, lifts, foot-ropes, and all the rest of the gear, so that the yard was clear; and before this was done, night had come on, so we had to leave our page 83task, get back to the tent, get plenty of wood for the fire, and a supply of mollyhawks and seaweed for our evening meal.

The poor mate was now in a very weak state, and lay most of his time beneath the canvas, now moaning with pain, and now half delirious and talking of all manner of things. It was the most trying part of all to see him like that, and not be able to help him. We could not even boil some of the mollyhawk flesh, and give him the broth, for we had no vessel to do it in.

We went back to our task in the morning, and once more got to work on the yard, and it was not until the evening was drawing on that we had got everything ready and at last let it go with a run into the sea.

It went down with a tremendous splash, and was swirled round by the waves; and then we knew how fierce was the surging current which swept round the island, for it was all we could do to hold it, as the water strove to drag it away.

And now commenced what, in one way, was the most difficult part of all our task, for, as I have said, we could not have possibly got it ashore there. But if we could manage to get it round the other side of the point where there was something approaching a bay, and where you could get to the water's edge, we might be able to get it up.

But to get it round was a task which seemed beyond our strength, and, indeed, for men in health it would have been a hard job; and at last, as we were hauling on the line by which page 84we held it, and had indeed got it half-way round, the towline broke, and we had the mortification of seeing the spar, which had cost us two days' hard work and perilous labour, drift away to sea.

"I said so," I could help not saying. "We have had all the trouble for nothing." And then we sadly wended our way back to the camp, and all hopes of raft-building were at an end.