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The Castaways of Disappointment Island

Chapter I. — The "Dundonald's" Last Voyage

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Chapter I.
The "Dundonald's" Last Voyage.

I always wanted to be a sailor—perhaps if I had known what being a sailor really means I should not have been so anxious to go to sea. It is not all fun and frolic, as some people seem to think; it is hard work and hard fare and hard study if you want to get on, and a lot of peril thrown in.

I would strongly advise my boy readers not to go to sea unless they mean to work hard. The loafer, or "stiff," soon gets spotted, both by the officers and the crew, and things are made very unpleasant for him.

Well, as I have said, I wanted to be a sailor, so my father bound me apprentice to the firm of John Stewart & Co., of London, and I started my life on the ocean wave in the barque Commonwealth; and no boy would have wanted a better ship to start in, nor better captain and officers to sail under.

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Of my first voyages I am not going to speak. I had to begin at the beginning—learn the A B C of the sailor's craft, find my own feet, and take my own part. I had my experiences of storms and hurricanes, especially when rounding the terrible Cape Horn; but after each voyage I came home smiling, and quite ready to start again after a spell on shore.

It is of my last voyage in the Commonwealth I must speak first, for if I had never taken that I should never have shipped in the ill-fated Dundonald, and so have never been cast away on Disappointment Island.

I had been on leave for seventeen days, when I received orders to rejoin the ship, which was lying in Rotterdam Harbour, and I crossed with another of the apprentices, Jim Meredith, bidding my friends farewell on Blackwall Jetty, and embarking on the ss. Batavia III.

We joined the ship, and found that orders had been received to go to Middlesbrough, and there take in a cargo of pig-iron for Port Adelaide, and two days after we were being towed back through a pretty rough sea—for it was in October, and that is not much of a month in the North Sea. We had lost one of our head sails before we reached port.

But all troubles come to an end at last, and we got safely in, took our cargo aboard, and then, one bitter cold morning, with a fresh breeze blowing, we were towed down the Tees, and our voyage had fairly commenced.

"Loose the fore and main topsails, and overhaul your leachlines and buntlines!" sang page 11out the mate—he was a fine old fellow named Williamson, and as good a sailor as ever trod a deck—and with an "Ay, ay, sir ! "—it must be confessed a rather half-hearted one, for most sailors seem to be a little downhearted at first starting—we prepared to hoist sail to a chanty. A chanty, I may say, is a song which the sailors sing as they haul on the ropes. There are a lot of them, and often the men make the words up as they go. I was chanty man that day—that is, I sang the words, and the men joined in the chorus. And this is what we sang:

"Blow the man down, bullies, blow the man down."
Chorus.
"Hey, hey, blow the man down."
"Whether he's a white man, a black man, or a brown."
Chorus.
"Give us some time to blow the man down."

But it soon seemed as if we were the ones who were to be blown down, for no sooner had we got well away, than we got a hard breeze, and on our third night out we lost both our top-gallant sails in a fierce squall.

And then we had real bad times, and the Commonwealth was as near going to the bottom as a ship well could be. As I have said, we were laden with pig-iron. Now, a pig of iron is a bar of about five inches wide and deep, two-and-a-half feet long, flat on top, but curved at the bottom where it has been in the mould, and each one weighs, roughly, about two hundred pounds.

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In the pitching and tossing of the ship these pigs broke loose, and they proved far more dangerous and troublesome than a cargo of four-footed flesh and blood pigs could ever have done.

We were labouring along in the heavy seas, when we heard them start—Bump ! Bang ! Crash! Bump! Every time the ship rolled we could hear them in the hold crashing against her sides, and threatening to knock her plates out; and then, to our dismay, the vessel listed over to port, and was soon almost on her beam-ends, with the lee bulwarks under water.

Pitch-dark above, icy cold, and wind almost a full gale, seas breaking over us every minute, and thousands of those iron pigs crashing about in the hold, it wanted cool heads and stout hearts then if we were not to go to the bottom.

Orders were given and obeyed, and after hard work the yards were got round, so that the wind was on our port bow—that is on the side to which the ship was listing—so that the weight of the wind on the sails somewhat counterbalanced the weight of the shifted iron.

And then, all of a sudden, out of the darkness there came a great black mountain of water. For one moment it hung over us, and then down it came with a crash on the starboard beam. It stove in the break of the poop, washed the cabin clear out, smashed up our big lifeboats, and shattered the skids right down to the deck. The skids are a sort of bridge running from one side of the deck to the other, about twenty feet wide, and made of four-inch teak, being supported page 13by ten solid iron stanchions, and it is on these skids that the lifeboats rest when not in use.

That was the effect of that one wave, but fortunately only one of the hands was hurt—and he was knocked clean through the skylight. That skylight was protected by iron bars two inches apart, but the force of the sea smashed the bars like matchwood and sent the man head first through.

But no sooner had the wave gone, than we saw a great piece of the broken skid, nearly twenty feet long, sweeping backwards and forwards across the wet deck as the vessel rolled, and threatening to carry the bulwarks away.

"Dump that overboard!" shouted the captain.

And the second mate, assisted by a seaman named Stobo and myself, rushed to secure it— no easy thing, for it was very heavy, and came with force as the deck inclined to this side or that. But, however, we succeeded, and ran it to the side to dump it over, when, just as we got it on the edge, smash came another big sea over the starboard rail, smothering us three, and carrying the piece of skid with it, and us hanging on to it, as there was nothing else to hang on to.

Swash ! I felt myself carried right overboard; but then the main brace got twisted round my leg and so I was saved; whilst Stobo gripped the mate round the waist and held on for all he was worth; and then the sea had gone, and the skid with it; and, panting and gasping, we managed to get our breath.

For ten or twelve days we were blown about, page 14expecting to go to the bottom every hour; but at last we were picked up by a tug and towed into Falmouth, where it took over three months to get things right again; for every bit of cargo had to be restowed, and any number of repairs had to be done.

But at last everything was right once more, and we set sail for Port Adelaide, which we reached in the middle of April, after a good run. We discharged our cargo, and proceeded in ballast to Newcastle, New South Wales, where we took in coal for Callao—a port on the west coast of South America. Newcastle is a big coaling port, and nearly all the coal goes to South America, where it is wanted for the saltpetre mines of Chili.

Whilst we were at Newcastle my time as apprentice expired—it was on July 6th, 1906 —but I signed on again; and at the beginning of August we set sail, and reached Callao after a somewhat wearisome voyage of sixty-five days.

Now, on the west coast of South America, the crew of a sailing ship have to work out their own cargo; and working coal by hand is a dirty job—a thirsty, grimy, dusty job, and hard work all the time. But at last it was done, everything was made clean and tidy, and we shifted out into the stream to await orders; and then came tidings that the old ship—the ship which some of us looked upon as our home—had been sold! That meant that everyone on board was out of a berth, and could go home as passengers at the owners' expense.

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But some of us did not want to go home—I, for one, did not. The captain, officers, carpenter and steward were the only ones who went; two apprentices who were not out of their time were sent aboard another ship belonging to the same company—the J. T. North. Some of the crew stopped ashore, but the majority joined a barque called the Ravenswood; amongst them being my old chum Stobo.

Now, there were three of us left aboard the Commonwealth, who were undecided what to do—namely, Walter Low, A.B., Harry Largerbloom, sailmaker, and myself; and we three noticed a grand, four-masted barque lying out in the stream. She looked a real clipper, and her name was the Dundonald.

Little did we think, as we stood admiring her lines, that in a few months she would find a grave in the dark, cold waters that beat in ceaseless anger against the black cliffs of Disappointment Island.

"That's a good ship," I said to Low, and he nodded.

"I wouldn't mind sailing in her," added Largerbloom; whilst I, having made up my mind, went to see the captain, and ask him whether he would try and get me taken on as one of the Dundonald's crew, if she wanted any hands.

"Certainly, I will," he answered, for he had always been most kind; and shortly afterwards he called me, and told me that they wanted three able seamen.

"If you like to go, Eyre," he said, "I have arranged that you shall berth aft."

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Now, that was a great boon to me, because every night, in my watch below, I studied some book on seamanship, so that I could pass for second mate later; and no matter how nice one's shipmates may be, a fo'c's'le is not the best place in the world to study in.

So I thanked the Captain, packed up my belongings, and went to tell my companions that I was going.

"They want two more A.B.'s," I said, "so you had better take the chance; for you won't find a better craft easily."

"Don't believe I shall," said Low; and Largerbloom seemed to think the same.

So we three, on November 24th, 1906, went to the British Consul to be paid off the Commonwealth, and to sign on the Dundonald, and Largerbloom signed himself A.B. as well as Low and myself, as they already had a sailmaker aboard the ship.

And that is how I came to be one of the crew of the Dundonald, when she started upon her last voyage.

The Dundonald was a good ship, but we three fellows were very sorry to leave the old Commonwealth, and it seemed to give us a lump in the throat as we took our last look at her, when at last we sailed, and left her there at her moorings.

It was early in December that we sailed, bound for Sydney. The Ravenswood had sailed ten days before, as well as another barque named the Annasona, they both being bound for Newcastle, N.S.W.

There were twenty-eight of us on board, page 17including the captain's son—he was a lad of sixteen, and was accompanying his father, as he was rather sickly, and the doctors had ordered him to take a voyage.

The Dundonald speedily proved her powers; she seemed to fly through the water. We were running free with a good strong breeze the whole time, only being braced sharp up once, and that only for a few hours; and we congratulated ourselves that, if we had been obliged to leave the old Commonwealth, we had got a good ship in exchange. As another of the old chanties has it:

We've a jolly fine ship, and a jolly fine crew,

A jolly fine mate, and a good skipper too,

And we're bound for the Rio Grande,

Only we were not bound for Rio, but for Sydney.

But for all the fine passage, we had one little shake up. For about six days before we reached port we ran into what. seamen know as a "southerly buster," and then, as another chanty says, "The ship was rolling."

Roll! It was more like a swing at a fair—we went over an angle of forty-five degrees each way; for the wind being right aft, the yards were square, and so she had nothing to steady her.

Now our port bow would be down, the sea over the bulwarks; then, with a jerk, she would right herself, sending the water tearing over the deck, and down she would go on the other side. Certainly, for excitement, a "southerly" wants a lot of beating.

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We had been kept going pretty busily, and I was not sorry when I heard eight bells strike (four o'clock), for that commenced my watch below. But I had scarcely got down and made myself comfortable, before the skipper himself appeared in the doorway.

"Eyre, my lad, will you just go down and give the second mate a hand ?" he said. "He is in the storeroom. A lot of things have broken loose, and he is lashing them up again."

"Ay, ay, sir !" I answered, and off I went. When I got below I found things were more lively there than on deck. There was Mr. Maclaghlan, hot and perspiring, and saying things, in the midst of a chaos of barrels and boxes of hams, bags of flour, tins of marmalade, and all sorts of things, which seemed as if they were bent upon throwing themselves at him from all sorts of places.

"Come on, Eyre, lend me a—— Look out!" Bang! A big barrel swept by me, nearly knocking me off my legs, whilst at the same time a ham caught me right in the wind.

Shouting, laughing, working, we sailed in, dodging things into corners, and then making a frantic rush at them. Flour-bags were torn open, oatmeal scattered about, vinegar upset, and we had about a couple of hours of the finest excitement. But at last we were the victors, and we came on deck smothered from head to foot, damp with vinegar, and sticky with marmalade, but leaving everything shipshape below once more.

The "buster" passed, and soon after we page 19arrived off Sydney Heads, and picked up our tug; and then we learnt that neither the Ravenswood nor the Annosana had arrived, though they had sailed ten days before us. We were pleased, from the captain down, for we had made a record passage—forty-five days— and it holds the record still, I believe.

The Ravenswood turned up a week later; but the Annasona never came in—she had run on to Middleton Reef and became a total wreck, though all her crew were saved.

Little did we on the Dundonald think, as we talked of that, that ere long our ship would meet a like fate, and we, instead of a few hours adrift in boats like the Annasona fellows, would be cast away for months on a terrible uninhabited island, to suffer such hardships as few men are called upon to undergo, and fewer still could survive.

We had our ballast out and our cargo in—we were taking grain—and then we moved out into stream and dropped anchor, awaiting our time of sailing for old England.

We were supposed to start on Saturday, February 16th, but as the captain was unable to get a tug, we lay there in Sydney Harbour and watched a big yacht race, and we hoped that no tugboat would come along until the Monday.

Not that we wanted to stay there, but no sailor likes putting to sea on a Sunday; he thinks it quite as unlucky as starting on a Friday. Of course, it is only superstition, but it makes no difference—sailors think putting to sea on Sunday is very unlucky; and certainly, in our page 20case, no vessel could have had worse luck from start to finish.

Everything looked bright and promising, and we were all in the best of spirits; but from the very first night Fortune frowned upon us. The wind shifted, and for the rest of the voyage we had head winds all the time, so that "By the wind" was the course passed along every time we relieved the wheel.

Let me explain that. When the wind is blowing directly from the direction in which the vessel wants to go it is a head wind, and no sailing-ship can possibly keep to her course. You cannot sail against the wind, but you can lay up very close to it.

When the order is "By the wind, "it means that the wind is not fair enough to let the ship lay her course; so the only thing to do is to keep as near to it as you can—that is to say, you keep the weather clew of the royal—or the topgallant sail, if the royal is furled—doing what a sailor calls "shaking in the wind."

For a whole week we had that sort of thing ever getting farther and farther from our course. And then, on Sunday, February 24th, when we were eight days out, we had a little bit of a change—a calm sea and very little wind; but it was still a head wind—that never altered once.

On that Sunday some of us were lounging about, and if the truth must be told, grumbling a bit—for this weather was terribly monotonous, —when out of the water there appeared a dark, triangular fin. We didn't need to be told what sort of fish was beneath it—every sailor knows a page 21shark, and hates him too; and he has good reason for it.

"That's a big one !"

"See him now—there ! The brute !"

"Wonder if the old man will have a try for him ?"

So we talked, and we took a squint now and again towards the poop, for we could not have a try for him ourselves unless the skipper gave us leave.

We could see him swimming round, eyeing us in a lazy sort of fashion, as if he was wishing that one of us would come over and talk to him there, and we were eyeing him as if we wished that we could have him on deck and talk to him there. And then there was a thrill of excitement, and a clustering closer to the rail, and a sending word down to the watch below to come and see the fun, for Captain Thorburne came along, his shark-hook in his hand, and he sang out to the "doctor," or, in plain English, the cook to fetch along a chunk of salt pork.

"He will give us a bit of sport, mister !" he said to the first mate, as he baited the hook. And then, splash ! over the pork went, and the old shark sheered off a bit, until his pilot fish had been to investigate.

It is very strange about those pilot fish. They are little fellows about twelve inches long, and of a bluish colour, with some dark bands on them, and there are always three or four swimming around a shark, who never attempts to harm them, although he would have no objection page 22to swallowing one of his own brothers if he got the chance.

Well, there came the pilots, nosing round the pork, and perhaps sampling it; and then the old shark came up, eyeing it with his great, glassy eyes, and he turned on his back—for, you know, the mouth of a shark is placed so far back, and his top jaw sticks out so much that he cannot bite at anything unless he turns right on his side. Well, he made a grab at the pork, and missed, and then all the performance had to be gone through again. He did that three or four times. He really was a shocking bad marksman; a stickleback would grab a worm far easier. But at last, whilst we were all standing by, and fairly trembling with excitement— whoop !—the pork disappeared down his throat, and we yelled, and hauled tight. My word, it was a tug of war ! for he was a big fellow, and did not mean to give in without a fight.

By the captain's orders, we passed the line outside the weather-jigger rigging down on to the main deck, whence we took it to the capstan, and started heaving him in, whilst he splashed angrily outside.

The line was a good three-inch rope, but it would never have held him by itself; so we got the end of one of the braces, put a running bowline round the line that was holding him, let it slip down over his head till it reached his middle, and then hauled taut, and it was all over with his lordship then.

And then, when we got him on deck, what a fight he made !—leaping high in the air, page 23thrashing like a flail with his powerful tail, one blow of which would have nigh cut a man in two, and snapping with his horrid jaws, with their triple row of teeth, with which he could have scrunched up a man's leg as though it had been an eggshell.

Standing around him, shouting, jumping, avoiding him, we got in all the blows we could. But it takes a lot to kill a shark in that way.

It was "Look out, Charlie !" "Now go for him, Judge !" "Now then, Pul! "and so on, as we shouted one to the other. And then in the midst of the pother up came one man who didn't mind sharks a bit, and that was Sam Watson, a black, who came from St. Helena, but who was married and had made his home in Bristol.

Sam came up, his eyes gleaming, his mouth one big grin, and his sharp sheath-knife in his hand.

"Go on, Sam, give him his dinner !" someone shouted. And Sam went on. He just darted in and ripped the shark right up, jumping back again out of reach of its tail with remarkable agility.

Now, perhaps some of you may think that very cruel, but the shark is the seaman's most bitter foe, and a merciless, greedy beast he is at the best. The shark never spares the sailor, and the sailor, when he has the chance, never spares the shark.

Well, the shark was dead, and the crew cut him up, some wanting his backbone, some pieces page 24of his skin, some his fins and slices of his flesh to cook—for shark-flesh is not bad eating for a change; and as for me, I got hold of his tail— that was what I wanted.

Perhaps you will smile when I tell you what I wanted it for. I have told you that we sailors are superstitious—well, one of our superstitions is that if you nail a shark's tail on to the end of the jibboom you will have a fair wind for the rest of the journey. We had all got sick of bad winds, so I gave the tail to one of the men, and he nailed it on to the end of the jibboom. Alas ! in our case, the superstition was not a true one. Instead of fair winds, it was the other way round, and we had regular rough weather all the time—rain and sleet, mist and heavy seas, and the wind always in the wrong quarter; and then, to make things worse, the steering compass went "crook," as we sailors say—that is, it would not work properly.

It is hard to explain the cause of this, but all sailors know what it means. One minute the vessel would seem to be on her course, and the next she would appear to have turned right round, and be going in the opposite direction. Of course, it was not the vessel, but the compass; and it gave a lot of trouble.

And so the days passed, and Wednesday, the 6th of March, dawned—the last day in the life of the Dundonald.

It was not very bad in the earlier part of the day, but it rained a good deal, and was so overcast that the captain could not get the sun. It was my trick at the wheel from eight until ten page 25and then I was relieved by an A.B. named Santiago Marino, who took my place and stayed there until 12.30, when our watch—the second mate's starboard watch—was relieved by the mate's port watch.

We were to turn out again at four for a couple of hours. The four hours from four to eight in the evening are called the dog watch. From four to six is the first dog watch, and from six to eight second dog watch.

It was our second dog watch, and during those two hours the weather grew very dirty. Our mainsail and crossjack were already in; and during our watch below the crowd on deck took in the upper top-gallant sails.

The fore and mizzen were already made fast, but there were three fellows working aloft at the main top-gallant sail; and just as we came on deck they sent one of their number—James Cromarty, a lad of sixteen, rated as deck boy— for more help.

The ratings on a sailing-ship are, starting at the bottom: D.B., deck-boy; O.S., ordinary seaman; and A.B., able seaman.

Well, Cromarty came down from aloft, and went up to the second mate.

"Please, sir, we want another gasket up there, for we cannot get the weather-clew of the top-gallant sail in."

Mr. Maclaghlan looked up.

"Who is up there, my lad ? "he asked.

"Ellis and Findlow, sir," the answer came.

"Very well. Eyre "—and he turned to me —"just take a gasket up and see what you page 26can do. You had better take another hand with you, though."

I took the gasket, and called to a young German, Herman Queerfelt, and up we went to relieve the other two fellows, Robert Ellis and Alf Findlow, and a hard job we had of it, what with the new canvas, all soaking wet, and the wind and rain.

It was now blowing great guns, and raining in torrents; and, to make matters worse, a dense mist came up on the wind, so that it was impossible to see a foot before you. And up there we toiled and tugged, and held on for dear life, until the job was done; and then we came down only to be met with another order.

"Clew up fore and mizzen lower top-gallant sails!"

Soaked with the rain and the spray, looming like ghosts in the mist, we obeyed the order; and after we had clewed them, it was away aloft again to make them fast. I remember that I was with Low and another fellow on the fore. Poor Low ! He was a good shipmate and sailor. Little did we think, either of us, as we worked away there, of the fate which was to be his ere another day had dawned.

The gaff topsail and the inner and outer jibs had already been taken in during the dog watch, for the wind kept increasing in fury.

Down at last we came for the second time, all dog tired, sick of the weather, and soaked to the skin; and then we started to coil all the running gear and make it fast to the sheer poles to prevent the heavy seas from washing it all page 27over the place, as they swept across the decks; and then, just about eleven o'clock, the captain gave the order to check her in a bit.

"Weather cro'jack brace ! "

The order was passed along, and we checked her in a couple of points, and had all the ropes coiled just after seven bells (11.30).

I had a little oilstove on board, and in cold weather, in the middle watches, if I had time, I used to make some tea for the second mate and myself, for he was a good fellow, and I was very friendly with him; and so now, having my hands free for the time, and being soaked through and chilled to the bone, I thought that a pannikin of good hot tea would not be half bad.

"What do you say to a drop ?" I asked the mate; and he nodded appreciatively.

"Wouldn't come amiss, Eyre," he said; and off I went.

I had the stove securely lashed up, and I soon had the water boiling, and the tea under way. My word, how good it was ! I carried some out to Mr. Maclaghlan, who was quite as much in want of it as I was, and we stood sipping it side by side, and growling at the weather; but little did either of us so much as dream that it would be the last tea which we were to taste for many a long, long month.

"Don't show any signs of clearing," he observed, as he stood there screening his pannikin with his hands, for the wind was strong enough to blow the tea clean out of it. "There is one comfort, it can't last for ever."

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Whew! screamed the blast through the cordage with a shrill sound.

Smash, splash ! the seas came dashing against our sides, sending showers of spray stinging into our faces.

"That puts a little warmth into one !" Mr. Maclaghlan gave a sigh of satisfaction as he handed me back the empty pannikin.

Ding, dong ! One bell—a quarter to twelve— gave the watch below notice that they would have to turn out and relieve us in a quarter of an hour's time; and I can honestly say that I wasn't a bit sorry to hear the signal given, for in all my voyaging I had never had a more miserable watch on deck.

Day after day we had not had a glimpse of the sun to cheer us up; it was leaden sky above and leaden sea below, and a grey mist around, until the greyness and gloom of it seemed to get right into one's body and weigh on one's spirits.

"Won't I just be glad to get my wet gear off and turn in!" I reflected, as I stood there waiting until the watch below came up. They were only a quarter of an hour after one bell, but that quarter of an hour seemed as long as a whole watch when a fellow felt dog tired and perished with the cold; and all the time the Dundonald was forging her way through the waves, and reeling from their great thundering blows.

Ah, at last the watch below tumbled up, and they didn't seem to move too quickly as if they enjoyed it. They mustered aft, and the mate page 29coming on duty took the second mate's report, and sent the relief to the forecastle and the wheel.

It did not take me long to change my wet clothes; but I think that I must have been very unlucky, for though I had plenty of good, warm vests in my chest, I picked up the first that came to hand, and it was an old one—the very oldest indeed that I possessed.

But on it went, and I lit my pipe and turned in, whilst outside the wind howled, and I could hear the wash of the water on the deck.

Now, it was always a habit of mine after turning in during the night watches to read for half an hour some book on seamanship, as I was working up for my second mate's examination, and that night I made no exception, tired out though I was.

There was another fellow berthed with me, a deck boy named George Ivimey. Poor fellow, it was his first voyage, and he was having a rough time of it. Well, I read for half an hour, according to custom, and then I laid aside my book and prepared for a snug three and a half hours' sleep, when all of a sudden came the cry, above the roar of the storm:

"All hands on deck."

Ivimey looked over at me. I thought that they wanted help to get the topsails in, and we neither of us liked the idea of turning out from our warm bunks. But turn out we did soon after, for I heard a cry again:

"Land on the weather bow, sir !"

Land ! I was out of my bunk like one thing.

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I made a grab at the first thing that came to hand, a pair of thin dungaree trousers, a big pair of sea-boots, a coat, an oilskin and sou'wester, and last of all my knife. That is a thing a sailor never forgets at such times, if he thinks at all. A knife may stand between him and death. A man may make clothes, as we made them, or he may go without clothes, but he can't make a knife or do without one.

Well, I grabbed these things—first come first taken. I did not stop to get them all on, but with an armful I raced out on to the deck to see what all this was about.

And then as I got outside the half-deck door I witnessed a sight such as I have never seen before, and which I pray I may never see again —a sight which has burnt itself into my memory, and will never be forgotten by me whilst I live.