Harry Escombe | Page 8

was an apprentice at the
time aboard a fine, full-rigged iron clipper ship called the Joan of Arc.
We were outward bound, from London to Sydney, full up with general
cargo, and carried twenty-six passengers in the cuddy, and nearly forty
emigrants in the 'tween decks. We had just picked up the north-east
trades, blowing fresh, and the `old man', who was a rare hand at
carrying on, and was eager to break the record, was driving her along
to the south'ard under every rag that we could show to it, including
such fancy fakements as skysails, ringtails, water-sails, and all the rest
of it. It was a fine, clear, starlit night, with just the trade- clouds
driving along overhead, but there was no moon, and consequently,
when an exceptionally big patch of cloud came sweeping up, it fell a bit
dark. Still, there was no danger--or ought to have been none--for we
were well out of the regular track of the homeward-bounders, and in
any case, with a proper look-out, it would have been possible to see
another craft plenty early enough to give her a good wide berth. But
after Jack has got as far south as we then were he is apt to get a bit
careless in the matter of keeping a look-out--trusts rather too much to
the officer of the watch aft, you know, and is not above snatching a
cat-nap in the most comfortable corner he can find, instead of posting
himself on the heel of the bowsprit, with his eyes skinned and searching
the sea ahead of him.
"Now, it happened--although none of us knew it until it was too late--
that our chief mate had rather too strong a liking for rum; not that he
was exactly what you might call a drunkard, you know, but he kept a
bottle in his cabin, and was in the habit of taking a nip just whenever

he felt like it, especially at night time; and on this particular night that
I'm talking about he must have taken a nip too many, for when he came
on deck at midnight to keep the middle watch he hadn't been up above
an hour before he coiled himself down in one of the passenger's
deck-chairs and--went to sleep. Of course, under such circumstances as
those of which I am speaking--the weather being fine and the wind
steady, with no necessity to touch tack or sheet--the watch on deck
don't make any pretence of keeping awake; they're on deck and at hand
all ready for a call if they're needed, and that's as much as is expected
of 'em at night time, since there's no work to be done; and the
consequence was that all hands of us were sound asleep long before the
mate; and there is no doubt that the look-out--who lost his life, poor
chap! through his carelessness--fell asleep too. As to the man at the
wheel, well he is not expected to steer the ship and keep a look-out at
the same time, and, if he was, he couldn't do it, for his eyes soon grow
so dazzled by the light of the binnacle lamps that he can see little or
nothing except the illuminated compass card.
"That, gentlemen, was the state of affairs aboard the Joan of Arc on the
night about which I'm telling ye; the skipper, the passengers, the
second mate, and the watch below all in their bunks; and the rest of us,
those who were on deck and ought to have been broad awake, almost if
not quite as sound asleep as those who were below. I was down on the
main deck, sitting on the planks, with my back propping up the front of
the poop, my arms crossed, and my chin on my chest, dhreaming that I
was back at school in dear old Dublin, when I was startled broad
awake by a shock that sent me sprawling as far for'ard as the coaming
of the after- hatch, to the accompaniment of the most awful crunching,
ripping, and crashing sounds, as the Joan sawed her way steadily into
the vitals of the craft that we had struck. Then, amid the yelling of the
awakened watch, accompanied by muffled shrieks and shouts from
below, there arose a loud twang-twanging as the backstays and
shrouds parted under the terrific strain suddenly thrown upon them,
then an ear-splitting crash as the three masts went over the bows, and I
found myself struggling and fighting to free myself from the raffle of the
wrecked mizenmast. I felt very dazed and queer, and a bit sick, for I
was dimly conscious of the fact that I had been struck on the head by

something when the masts fell, and upon putting up my hand