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prodigal, go home to my father.
These wise and sober thoughts continued all the while the storm continued, and indeed some time after; but the next day the wind was abated, and the sea calmer, and I began to be a little inured to it. However, I was very grave for all that day, being also a little sea-sick still; but towards night the weather cleared up, the wind was quite over, and a charming fine evening followed; the sun went down perfectly clear, and rose so the next morning; and having little or no wind, and a smooth sea, the sun shining upon it, the sight was, as I thought, the most delightful that ever I saw.
I had slept well in the night, and was now no more sea-sick, but very cheerful – looking with wonder upon the sea that was so rough and terrible the day before, and could be so calm and so pleasant in so little a time after: and now, lest my good resolutions should continue, my companion, who had indeed enticed me away, comes to me. “Well, Bob,” says he, clapping me upon the shoulder, “How do you do after it? I warrant you were frightened, weren’t you, last night, when it blew but a capful of wind?” “A’ capful d’ye call it?” said I, “‘twas a terrible storm.” “A storm, you fool you!” replies he, “do you call that a storm? why it was nothing at all; give us but a good ship and sea-room, and we think nothing of such a squall of wind as that; but you’re but a fresh-water sailor, Bob; come, let us make a bowl of punch, and we’ll forget all that: d’ye see what charming weather ‘tis now?” To make short this sad part of my story, we went the way of all sailors; the punch was made, and I was made half drunk with it, and in that one night’s wickedness I drowned all my repentance, all my reflections upon my past conduct, all my resolutions for the future. In a word, as the sea was returned to its smoothness of surface, and settled calmness, by the abatement of that storm, so, the hurry of my thoughts being over, my fears and apprehensions of being swallowed up by the sea being forgotten, and the current of my former desires returned, I entirely forgot the vows and promises that I made in my distress. I found, indeed, some intervals of reflection; and the serious thoughts did, as it were, endeavour to return again sometimes; but I shook them off, and roused myself from them, as it were from a distemper; and, applying myself to drinking and company, soon mastered the return of those fits (for so I called them); and I had, in five or six days, got a complete victory over my conscience, as any young fellow that resolved not to be troubled with it could desire. But I was to have another trial for it still; and Providence, as in such cases generally it does, resolved to leave me entirely without excuse; for if I would not take this for a deliverance, the next was to be such an one, as the worst and most hardened wretch among us would confess both the danger and the mercy.
The sixth day of our being at sea, we came into Yarmouth Roads; the wind having been contrary and the weather calm, we had made but little way since the storm. Here we were obliged to come to an anchor, and here we lay, the wind continuing contrary, namely, at south-west, for seven or eight days; during which time a great many ships from Newcastle came in to the same roads, as the common harbour where the ships might wait for a wind for the river.
We had not, however, rid here so long but we should have tided it up the river, but that the wind blew too fresh; and after we had lain four or five days, blew very hard. However, the roads being reckoned as good as a harbour, the anchorage good, and our ground tackle very strong, our men were unconcerned, and not in the least apprehensive of danger, but spent the time in rest and mirth, after the manner of the sea; but the eighth day, in the morning, the wind increased, and we had all hands at work to strike our top-masts, and make everything snug and close, that the ship might ride as easy as possible. By noon, the sea went very high indeed, and our ship rid forecastle in, shipped several seas, and we thought once or twice our anchor had come home; upon which our master ordered out the sheet-anchor; so that we rode with two anchors ahead, and the cables veered out to the better end.
By this time it blew a terrible storm indeed; and now I began to see terror and amazement in the faces even of the seamen themselves. The master, though vigilant in the business of preserving the ship, yet, as he went in and out of the cabin by me, I could hear him, softly to himself, say several times, “Lord, be merciful to us! we shall be all lost – we shall be all undone!” and the like. During these first hurries, I was stupid, lying still in my cabin, which was in the steerage, and cannot describe my temper. I could ill resume the first penitence which I had so apparently trampled upon, and hardened myself against: I thought the bitterness of death had been past; and that this would be nothing, too, like the first. But when the master himself came by me, as I said just now, and said we should all be lost, I was dreadfully frighted: I got up out of my cabin, and looked out; but such a dismal sight I never saw: the sea went mountains high, and broke upon us every three or four minutes; when I could look about, I could see nothing but distress round us. Two ships that rid near us, we found, had cut their masts by the board, being deep laden; and our men cried out that a ship, which rid about a mile ahead of us, was foundered. Two more ships, being driven from their anchors, were run out of the roads to sea, at all adventures, and that with not a mast standing. The light ships fared the best, as not so much labouring in the sea; but two or three of them drove, and came close by us, running away with only their sprit sail out before the wind.
Towards the evening, the mate and boatswain begged the master of our ship to let them cut away the foremast, which he was very unwilling to do; but the boatswain protesting to him, that if he did not the ship would founder, he consented; and when they had cut away the foremast, the mainmast stood so loose, and shook the ship so much, they were obliged to cut it away also, and make a clear deck.
Any one must judge what a condition I must be in at all this, who was but a young sailor, and who had been in such a fright before at but a little. But if I can express at this distance the thoughts I had about me at that time, I was in tenfold more horror of mind upon account of my former convictions, and the having returned from them to the resolutions I had wickedly taken at first, than I was at death itself; and these, added to the terror of the storm, put me into such a condition, that I can by no words describe it. But the worst was not come yet; the storm continued with such fury that the seamen themselves acknowledged they had never seen a worse. We had a good ship, but she was deep-laden, and wallowed in the sea, that the seamen every now and then cried out she would founder. It was my advantage, in one respect, that I did not know what they meant by founder, till I inquired. However, the storm was so violent, that I saw, what is not often seen, the master, the boatswain and some others more sensible than the rest, at their prayers, and expecting every moment when the ship would go to the bottom. In the middle of the night, and under all the rest of our distresses, one of the men that had been down on purpose to see, cried out we had sprung a leak; another said there was four feet water in the hold. Then all hands were called to the pump. At that very word, my heart, as I thought, died within me; and I fell backwards upon the side of my bed where I sat, into the cabin, However the men roused me, and told me, that I, that was able to do nothing before, was as well able to pump as another; at which I stirred up, and went to the pump and worked very heartily. While this was doing, the master, seeing some light colliers who, not able to ride out the storm, were obliged to slip and run away to the sea, and would come near us, ordered to fire a gun as a signal of distress. I, who knew nothing what that meant, was so surprised, that I thought the ship had broke, or some dreadful thing happened. In a word, I was so surprised that I fell down in a swoon. As this was a time when everybody had his own life to think of, nobody minded me, or what was become of me; but another man stepped up to the pump, and thrusting me aside with his foot, let me lie, thinking I had been dead; and it was a great while before I came to myself.
We worked on, but the water increasing in the hold, it was apparent that the ship would founder; and though the storm began to abate a little, yet as it was not possible she could swim till we might run into a port, so the master continued firing guns for help; and a light ship, who had rid it out just ahead of us, ventured a boat out to help us. It was with the utmost hazard the boat came near us; but it was impossible for us to get on board, or for the boat to lie near the ship’s side, till at last the men rowing very heartily, and venturing their lives to save ours, our men cast them a rope over the stern with a buoy to it, and then veered it out a great length, which they, after much labour and hazard, took hold of, and we hauled them close under our stern, and got all into their boat. It was to no purpose for them or us, after we were in the boat, to think of reaching to their own ship; so we all