Waves Of The Great South Seas

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Title:     Waves Of The Great South Seas
Author: Juliana Horatia Ewing [More Titles by Ewing]

Cousin Peregrine's Wonder Stories: Waves of the Great South Seas (_Founded on Fact_.)

"Very likely the man who drew it had been nearly drowned by one himself."

"Very likely nothing of the sort!"

"How could he draw it if he hadn't seen it?"

"Why, they always do. Look at Uncle Alfred, he drew a splendid picture of a shipwreck. Don't you remember his doing it at the dining-room table, and James coming in to lay the cloth, and he would have a bit of the table left clear for him, because he was in the middle of putting in the drowning men, and wanted to get them in before luncheon? And Uncle Herbert wrote a beautiful poem to it, and they were both put into a real magazine. And Uncle Alfred and Uncle Herbert never were in shipwrecks. So there!"

"Well, Uncle Alfred drew it very well, and he made very big waves. So there!"

"Ah, but he didn't make waves like a great wall. He did it very naturally, and he draws a great deal better than those rubbishy old pictures in Father's _Robinson Crusoe_."

"Well, I don't care. The Bible says that when the Children of Israel went through the Red Sea the waters were a wall to them on their right hand and on their left. And I believe they were great waves like the wave in _Robinson Crusoe_, only they weren't allowed to fall down till Pharaoh and his host came, and then they washed them all away."

"But that's a miracle. I don't believe there are waves like that now."

"I believe there are in other countries. Uncle Alfred's shipwreck was only an English shipwreck, with waves like the waves at the seaside."

"Let's ask Cousin Peregrine. He's been in foreign countries, and he's been at sea."

The point in dispute between Maggie and her brother was this:--The nursery copy of _Robinson Crusoe_ was an old one which had belonged to their father, with very rough old wood-cuts, one of which represented Robinson Crusoe cowering under a huge wave, which towered far above his head, and threatened to overwhelm him. This wave Maggie had declared to be unnatural and impossible, whilst the adventure-book young gentleman clung to and defended an illustration which had helped him so vividly to realize the sea-perils of his hero.

It was the day following that of Cousin Peregrine's arrival, and when evening arrived the two children carried the book down with them to dessert, and attacked Cousin Peregrine simultaneously.

"Cousin Peregrine, you've been at sea: isn't that an impossible wave?"

"Cousin Peregrine, you've been at sea: aren't there sometimes waves like that in foreign places?"

"It's not very cleverly drawn," said Cousin Peregrine, examining the wood-cut; "but making allowance for that, I have seen waves not at all unlike this one."

"There!" cried the young gentleman triumphantly. "Maggie laughed at it, and said it was like a wall."

"Some waves are very like walls, but those are surf-waves, as they are called, that is, waves which break upon a shore. The waves I am thinking of just now are more like mountains--translucent blackish-blue mountains--mountains that look as if they were made of bottle-green glass, like the glass mountain in the fairy tale, or shining mountains of phosphorescent light--meeting you as if, they would overwhelm you, passing under you, and tossing you like the old woman in the blanket, and then running away behind you as you go to meet another. Every wave with a little running white crest on its ridge; though not quite such a curling frill as this one has which is engulfing poor Robinson Crusoe. But his is a surf-wave, of course. Those I am speaking of are waves in mid-ocean."

"Not as tall as a man, Cousin Peregrine?"

"As tall as many men piled one upon another, Maggie."

"It certainly is very funny that the children should choose this subject to tease you about tonight, Peregrine," said Mamma.

We are all apt to speak inaccurately. Mamma did not mean that the subject was a comical one, but that it was remarkable that the children should have started it at dessert, when the grown-up people had been discussing it at dinner.

They had not been talking about Robinson Crusoe's wave, but about the loss of an Australian vessel, in sad circumstances which were in every one's mouth. A few people only had been saved. They had spent many days in an open boat in great suffering, and the particular question discussed at dinner was, whether the captain of a certain vessel which had passed without rescuing them had been so inhuman as to see and yet to leave them.

"How could he help seeing them?" Mamma had indignantly asked. "It was daylight, and of course somebody was on the deck, even if the captain was still in bed. Don't talk to me, Peregrine! You would say black is white for the sake of argument, especially if it was to defend somebody. But little as I know about the sea, I know that it's flat."

"And that's flat!" interposed Papa.

"It's all very well making fun of me," Mamma had continued with good-humoured vehemence, "but there were no Welsh hills and valleys to block the view of castaway fellow-creatures not a mile off, and it was daylight, and he _must_ have seen them."

"I'm not quite sure about the hills and valleys," Cousin Peregrine had replied; "and hills of water are quite as troublesome to see through as hills of earth."

At this moment the dining-room door had opened to admit the children, Maggie coming first, and making her courtesy in the doorway, with the old fat, brown-calf-bound _Robinson Crusoe_ under her arm. It opened without the slightest difficulty at the picture of the big wave, and the children appealed to Cousin Peregrine as has been related.

Maggie was a little taken aback by a decision which was in favour of her brother's judgment. She was apt to think rather highly of her own, and even now she pondered, and then put another question--

"But if the waves were so very, very big, Cousin, they would swallow up the ships!"

"No, Maggie, not if the sailors manage their ship properly, and turn her about so that she meets the wave in the right way. Then she rides over it instead of being buried under it."

"It would be dreadful if they didn't!" said Maggie.

"I remember being in a ship that didn't meet one of these waves in the right way," said Cousin Peregrine.

"Tell us all about it," said Fred, settling himself with two or three severe fidgets into the seat of his chair.

"I _was_ going to have protested against the children asking you for another story so soon, Peregrine," said Mamma, "but now I feel selfish, for your wave-story will be quite as much for me as for the little ones."

"Where was it, Cousin Peregrine?"

"Where was the wave, do you mean? It was in the great South Seas. As to where I was, I was in a sailing-vessel bound for South Australia. To begin at the beginning, I must explain to you that this vessel was one of those whose captains accepted the instruments offered by the Board of Trade to any ship that would keep a meteorological log. I was fond of such matters, and I took the trouble off the captain's hands, by keeping his meteorological log for him."

"What is a meteorological log, Cousin?"

"A kind of diary, in which you put down the temperature of the sea and air, how cold or hot they are--the way the wind blows, how the barometer is, and anything special and interesting about the weather overhead or the currents in the sea. Now I must tell you that there had been a good deal of talk about currents of warm water in the Southern Ocean, like the Gulf Stream of the Atlantic, which keeps the west coasts of Great Britain so warm. But these South Sea currents had not been very accurately observed, and information on the subject was desired. Well, one day we got right into a warm current."

"How did you know, Cousin?"

"By drawing up a bucket of water out of the sea, and putting the thermometer into it. But I ought to tell you what a thermometer is--"

"We know quite well," said Maggie. "Nurse always put it into Baby's bath when he had fits, to see if the water was the right warmth."

"Very good, Maggie. Then let me tell you that the water of the sea got nearly thirty degrees warmer on that day between noon and midnight."

"How did you know about midnight?" Maggie inquired doubtfully; "weren't you in bed?"

"No, I was not, I was very busy all day 'taking observations' every hour or two, and it was at twelve o'clock this very night that the 'comber' broke on deck."

"What _is_ a 'comber'?"

"A 'comber' is the name for a large wave with a comb or crest of foam, a sort of wave over which our ship ought to have ridden; but I must tell you that it was no easy matter to meet them on this occasion, because (owing to the cross currents) the waves did not all go one way, but came at us from various points. The sea was very heavy, and the night was very dark. I tried the heat of the water for the last time that evening, and having bade good-night to the officer whose watch was just over, I stayed for a few minutes to talk to the officer whose watch was just beginning, before going below to go to bed. We were standing aft, and, fortunately for us, near one of the masts, when through the darkness we saw the sloping sides of a great South Sea wave coming at the fore part of the ship, but sideways. 'The rigging!' shouted the officer of the watch, and as we both clung to the ropes the wave broke on our bows, smashed the jib-boom, and swept the decks from stem to stern."

"And if you hadn't held on by the rigging you would have been washed away?"

"I am afraid we should, Fred, for every loose thing on deck was swept off in less than a minute. The bull kept his feet, by the bye; but then he had four, and I have only two."

"The bull! what bull?"

"We were taking some cattle out to Australia. There was a bull who lived in a stable that had been made for him on deck. When this comber broke over us it tore up the bull's house, and carried it overboard, but I met the bull himself taking a walk at large as I went below to change my clothes and get some sleep."

"Were you wet?"

"Drenched, my dear Maggie; but when I got to my cabin I found that there was no hope of rest for some hours. The wave had flooded the cabins, broken in doors, and washed everything and everybody about. So we all had to set to work to bale out water, and mop up our bed-rooms; and as the wave had also put out what lights there were, we had to work in the dark, and very uncomfortable work it was! What the women and children did, and the poor people who were sea-sick, I hardly know. Of course we who could keep our feet did the work."

"Weren't you ever sea-sick?"

"Never, I am thankful to say."

"Not when it's very, very rough?"

"Not in a gale. I have once or twice on that voyage been the captain's only companion at dinner, tied to the mast to keep myself steady, and with the sherry in one pocket and my wine-glass in another to keep _them_ steady, and quite ashamed of my appetite, for if the sea doesn't make you feel very ill it makes you feel very well."

"I had no idea there were such very big waves really," said Maggie, thoughtfully.

"I see that they are quite big enough to shelter the captain's character, Peregrine," said Mamma, smiling, "and I am much obliged to you for correcting my ignorance. I don't _wish_ to believe that any English sailor would pass a boat in distress without giving help, if he saw it."

"I am quite sure no English sailor would, and very few real sailors of any nation, I think. A real seaman knows too well what sea-perils are, and that what is another man's case one day may be his the next; and cowardice and cold-heartedness are the last sins that can be laid at Jack Tar's door as a rule. But I will finish my story by telling the children what happened next morning, as it goes to illustrate both my statements, that it is not easy to see an open boat in a heavy sea, and that sailors are very ready to risk their lives for each other."

"You're like Captain Marryat, Cousin Peregrine," said Fred.

"He's not a sailor captain, he's a soldier captain," said Maggie. "Go on, Cousin."

"As I told you, we had two or three hours of very disagreeable work before our cabins were even tolerably comfortable; but it made us more tired than ever, and when I did turn in I slept like a top, and the rolling of the ship only rocked me to sounder slumbers. I was awakened at seven o'clock next morning by a fellow-passenger, who popped in to cry, 'There's a man overboard!' 'Who?' shouted I as I jumped up. 'Giovanni,' he replied as he vanished, leaving me to follow him on deck as quickly as possible. Now, Fred, picture to yourself a grey morning, the damp deck of our vessel being rapidly crowded with everybody on board, and all eyes strained towards a heavy sea, with big blue-black mountains of water running at us, and under us, and away from us all along; every wave had a white crest: but there were some other patches of snowy white hovering over the dark sea, on which all the experienced eyes were soon fixed!"

"What were they?" whispered Fred.

"Albatross," said Cousin Peregrine. "They had been following us for days, hovering, swooping, and whirling those great white wings of theirs, which sometimes measure nine feet from tip to tip."

"What did they follow you for?"

"They came to pick up anything that may be thrown overboard, and they came now, as we knew, after poor Giovanni, whose curly black head kept ducking out of their way as he swam with desperate courage in our wake."

"Oh, Cousin Peregrine! Didn't the captain stop the ship?"

"Certainly, Maggie, though, quickly as it was done, it left the poor fellow far away behind. And heavy as the sea was, they were lowering a boat when I got on deck, and the captain had called for volunteers among the sailors to man it."

"Oh, I hope he got them!"

"I hope you won't insult a noble and gallant profession by having any doubt about it, Maggie. He might have had the ship's crew bodily if he had wanted them, and if the waves had run twice as high."

"Spare me!" said Mamma.

"As it was the few men needed were soon ready. The boat was launched without being upset, and the men got in without mishap. Then they laid themselves to their oars, we gave them a parting cheer, and they vanished from our sight."

"_Drowned_, Cousin Peregrine?"

"No, no. Though I can tell you we were as anxious for them as for Giovanni now. But when they had crossed the first water-mountains, and gone down into the water-valleys beyond, they were quite out of sight of the crowd on the deck of the ship, daylight though it was."

"I retract everything I ever said," cried Mamma impetuously.

"And not only could we not see them, but they could not see the man they were risking their lives to save. Those crested mountains which hid them from us hid him from them."

"What _did_ you do?"

"Men were sent up the masts to look out from such a height that they could look over the waves. _They_ could see both Giovanni and the boat, and as they were so high up the men in the boat could see them. So the men on the masts kept their eyes on Giovanni, and the men in the boat kept their eyes on the men on the masts, and steered their course according to the signals from the look-out."

"And they saved him?"

"Yes, they brought him back; and if we cheered when they went away, you may believe we cheered when they got safe to the ship's side again."

"And who was Giovanni? and did he get all right?"

"Giovanni was one of the sailors, an Italian. He was a fine young fellow, and appeared to think nothing whatever of his adventure. I remember he resolutely refused to go below and change his clothes till he had helped to haul up the boat. With his white teeth shining through a broad grin, he told us in his broken English that he had been overboard every voyage he had taken. He said he didn't mind anything except the swooping and pecking of the albatross. They obliged him to dive so constantly, to keep his eyes from their beaks."

"Was it a comber washed him overboard?"

"No. He was mending the jib-boom, and lost his hold and fell into the sea. He really had a very narrow escape. A less active swimmer might easily have been drowned. I always think, too, that he had an advantage in the fact that the water was warm."

"I am so glad the nasty albatross were disappointed."

"The nasty albatross were probably disappointed when they found that Giovanni was not a piece of spoilt pork. However, they set their beautiful wings, and went their way, and we set our sails, and went our way, which was to Adelaide, South Australia."

[The end]
Juliana Horatia G Ewing's short story: Waves Of The Great South Seas

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