I shall never forget the day when the sails were unfurled for the first time. For remember, up to this time I had never seen a real, sea-going ship under sail, and the whole thing was mysterious to me. I did not even know one sail from another, but I was so proud of the little Snark that I got in the dingy and made photographs of her from every conceivable position, not caring if the canvas did hang loose and wrinkled enough to make a sailor's heart sore. A few days before the decks were finished, we drew up alongside the wharf, and filled the gasolene tanks. Next day, all hands were down early for the first trial trip. The Snark's crew was aboard, and also little Johnny London, Jack's nephew. On the trial trip we went twelve miles out, and met as heavy a sea as will be encountered on an ocean voyage, owing to a heavy ground-swell coming into the Golden Gate. And we were seasick—oh! we were seasick! Everyone p034 aboard was seasick except little Johnny London, and he was not supposed to be a sailor at all.
But Mr. and Mrs. London declared they were not seasick, not the least bit sick. They were just rolled up on the deck enjoying themselves! And poor little Tochigi said nothing, because he had nothing to say. He did his best to smile, but force as he would, the smile wouldn't come. I asked Jack for the honour of bringing the Snark into the Golden Gate, and he granted the request, but I noticed that he sat close by and kept watch on me to see that I didn't run into the Cliff House. As we came back to the starting-point, we saw, in the mouth of the Oakland River, a mass of freakish yellow, green and other coloured lights, something on the order of Japanese lanterns hung out on the lawn during a summer church-festival. We made port that night, satisfied that we had seen something, we knew not what. Next day, we found that the Chinese battleship, the Whang-Ho, had anchored in the harbour, and I went with Jack and Mrs. London on board this most interesting craft. The Whang-Ho was over two hundred years old, and carried wooden cannons and torture implements of various kinds, that had been used on captives of war in the centuries gone by—such as a bird-cage and a back tickler.
During the short time that elapsed between the trial trip and the real voyage, many interesting things occurred. When it was my turn to sleep aboard, I would sit for hours on the Snark's deck, looking out over the p035 Bay; when tired of that, I would go below, and lying in my bunk, with a good-sized light over my head, would write letters home, or read and smoke. It seemed strange to feel the Snark tumbling and rolling with the wash of the sea. Sometimes it seemed as if she were tugging at her moorings, longing to be off on the long, long cruise. Because of her smallness, she responded to the heave and lunge of the ocean much more freely than would the ordinary ship. Even a tug-boat, passing many feet away, would jostle the Snark with its wash. Lying in my bunk, I could look up through a skylight and see the masts, and, higher yet, the scintillating stars. At last, after all my hopes and fears, after all the vexatious troubles and delays, the dream was coming true! The time was near at hand, when we should really shake the dust of California from our feet, and ride the little Snark round and about the earth!
And then, crash! bump! bump! the dream was rudely shattered. The noise was on every side of me. Two large lumber-scows had dragged their anchors and laid up against the sides of the Snark, nearly making a sandwich of our little boat. Nothing could be done. They bumped away at the Snark all night long, and when morning came the rail was flattened two inches on one side and bulged out rather more than two inches on the other side; and wherever she is, the Snark is lop-sided to this day.
On another night, when I was alone on board, I p036 went to my bunk early and fell asleep. About three in the morning I was awakened by the sound of the anchor-chain paying out of the hawsepipes, and I rushed up on deck to see what was happening. A terrible storm was raging, and the boat was just like a cork, bobbing and rolling on the waves. I made fast the chains and went back to bed. At four-thirty I again started up from my bunk. Something told me that all was not well with the Snark. When I went on deck, I found the boat was within a hundred yards of a pile wharf, heading straight for it, and travelling fast. I knew the anchor had slipped, and if the boat got on the piles it would be good-bye to our cruise. It was blowing a gale, and the rain was coming down in sheets. I lowered the kedge-anchor and stopped the boat for the time being, but knew she would not hold long. I ran below to start the engine, but could not do so because one of the machinists had taken it apart in one place to clean it, and so put it out of commission. I worked for half an hour, with desperate haste, to put the engine into running order; then started her, and went on deck. The kedge-anchor was now slipping, and again we started for the piles. Running to the cockpit, I turned on the propeller, and away went the boat out into the Bay, with the anchors dragging. When I stopped her, she started drifting back; and so I had it, back and forth, toward the piles and then out into the Bay, all the rest of the night, until eight o'clock brought the workmen in a rowboat. p037 The fight for life had continued nearly four terrible hours, but it had been worth it. About twenty-five vessels, many of them larger than the Snark, had been wrecked in that storm. Mr. London's remarks to me that morning were quite gratifying, and I felt I had made up for my mistake in letting the lumber-scows bump the Snark lop-sided.
There were always so many water-thieves around the Bay that it was necessary to keep a sharp lookout. One night when I was in my bunk I heard a noise, and crept up in my stocking feet to the deck, armed with a big 38-calibre revolver. But I could find no cause for alarm. The night was dark. Far over the Bay was San Francisco, from which the busy ferry-boats were plying, back and forth; and every few minutes, a revolving light from a lighthouse stationed on a nearby rock flooded the deck, making everything bright as day. As a rule, there were a number of large vessels, from various ports, within a short distance of the Snark, and I could see their lights, and hear their sailors singing as they worked. During the day, I would go aboard these ships and engage the sailors in conversation, as I was always desirous of hearing something about the places which later I would see.
The galley was now very nearly finished, and many hours I spent in it practising cooking. I made bread and cakes and pies, and fed them to the workmen. These products were of varying degrees of excellence, p038 but the workmen seemed to be able to get away with them, and so I baked all they could eat. I don't believe the men's digestions were very seriously deranged, either. Jack bought a bread-mixing machine a few days later, and then I was able to do in about thirty minutes what before I could only do in several hours. Before the buying was finished, there were few luxuries or facilities we did not have aboard the Snark.
Once when I was in the galley, the boat was invaded by the Famous Fraternity. The Famous Fraternity was a group of celebrated authors and artists, all hailing from California and most of them resident there. Among those who came were George Sterling, the man whom the Londons had pronounced one of the greatest of living poets, Martinez, the artist, Dick Partington, another artist, Johannes Reimers, writer, and Jimmie Hopper, famous first as a football hero and then as a writer of short stories, and others, whose names I have now forgotten. I did my very best to prepare them a good dinner; and if their expressions of satisfaction were any indication, I succeeded. I served up a whole gunny-sack full of steamed mussels, and some of my bread, which one and all declared the finest they had ever tasted. They almost beat the workmen eating. I began to think more than ever of my prowess as a cook. In such a glow of pride as possessed me, my misgivings disappeared utterly.
Now let me skim lightly over the troubles that followed p039 up to the very day of our sailing. I don't want this narrative to shape itself as a mere record of mishaps and vexations, for such a record would not reflect things truly. Taken all in all, our troubles were as nothing at all to our delights. But truth compels me to say that in the month preceding our departure, things that before had gone casually and desultorily wrong seemed to take on fresh energy in ill-doing, and to go systematically and diabolically wrong. Had a malevolent intelligence been directing events, they could not have been more discomfiting to the impatient crew of the Snark. When the boat was nearly ready for our sailing, she was placed upon the ways for a final overhauling. The ways spread, and the Snark fell stern-first into the mud. In the crash, the bedplate of the big engine splintered, and the engine, in falling, smashed some of its connections. When the windlass was tried out, its gears ground each other flat, and the castings which connected it with the engine broke into fragments. It took two steam-tugs a week, pulling on the Snark every high tide night and day, to get her out of the mud and into the water alongside the Oakland City Wharf. We gave up all hope of both engine and windlass until we should have reached Honolulu; and we packed away the broken parts as best we could, and lashed the engine tight to its foundations.
April 18 was now set for the sailing. We began provisioning and buying all kinds of photographic supplies, p040 done up in tropical form—that is, with the film wrapped in tin-foil and sealed in tins, and the paper triple-wrapped and protected with foil. There were a thousand and one things bought toward the last, which it is needless to enumerate here. We bought clothing, and we bought fishing tackle, and harpoons, and guns, and pistols, and we bought paper, paper for Jack's writing, and paper for the typewriter, hundreds of reams of it. I spent a whole day packing this paper behind sliding panels in the two staterooms forward, which were set aside for Jack and Mrs. London. We spent money like water; it took dray after dray to bring down to the wharf the things we purchased. Then there were dray-loads of the things brought from the London home, wood and coal, provisions, vegetables, blankets, other things, and still other things, and above all, books—five hundred of them, on every conceivable topic, selected from Jack's library of ten thousand volumes. The Snark was fairly ballasted with books. Mrs. London busied herself in directing the work, and showed a knowledge of stevedoring that astonished us. At last, after hours of toil and sweat, everything was safely aboard. But so much still had to be done that we decided to put off leaving until Sunday, April 21.
And then came one of the worst blows of all. It was Saturday afternoon, and Jack and Bert and I were on the Snark, packing things away. All about us, on the wharf, were reporters and photographers and sightseers. p041 Jack had brought his checque-book and several thousand dollars in paper money and gold, and was wishing Roscoe would hurry and come with the accounts of the various firms to which he was indebted, that he might make payment. Without any warning whatever, a United States marshal stepped aboard and pasted a little five-by-seven slip of paper to one of the masts. It was an attachment, issued from the office of the Marshal of the United States, of the Northern District of California, and stated that any person who removed or attempted to move the schooner-yacht, Snark, without the written permission of the marshal, would be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
We were all astounded. What could it mean? Jack hastened over to San Francisco to investigate. We had planned to sail at eleven o'clock on the morrow, so haste was imperative. After several hours Jack came back, accompanied by Mrs. London, and told us what had happened.
It seemed that a man named L. H. Sellers, of San Francisco, who was a ship-chandler, had placed the attachment on the Snark. Jack owed him something like two hundred and fifty dollars, and Sellers' account was one of those Jack had intended to close that very day.
"It is just a petty trick of a tradesman in a panic," Jack declared, as he gazed at the writ of attachment pasted on the mast of the Snark. "But it will not p042 delay me one minute in getting away on the trip I have planned. If the bill were one thousand dollars, I would pay it and feel the same way about it. I have done several thousands of dollars' worth of business with this L. H. Sellers, and with other firms, and this is the first time I have ever been attached. I do not dispute the bill of Sellers. I owe the claim, and intended to pay it. I never received a bill for the amount of the attachment, and suppose that when L. H. Sellers learned that I was about to sail, he became panic-stricken at the thought of not receiving what was due him. I have been endeavouring to communicate with some officer of the United States district court and settle the matter as soon as possible."
But the matter was not so easily to be settled. Someone had spread the word around that Jack London and his crew were preparing to sneak out of the Bay that night, leaving the statute of limitations to cancel all debts. Representatives of three other big firms, with claims aggregating nearly three thousand dollars, descended upon the Snark, and Jack promptly paid them. After that came a drove of smaller tradesmen—"All in a panic," Jack said—and each and every one received his money without delay.
Jack sent agents and lawyers all over San Francisco and Oakland, but the United States marshal could not be found. Then a search was made for the United States judge, but he, too, had disappeared; and after all hope was given up of discovering them, Jack set out p043 to find Mr. L. H. Sellers, but Mr. L. H. Sellers was nowhere to be found, nor Mr. Sellers' attorney. It was plain that the embargo could not be lifted that night.
A little old man, a deputy United States marshal, had been left in charge; and never did miser guard his treasure as that little old man guarded the Snark. He stayed on her constantly, to see that Jack London did not whisk her out of the Bay and start on the trip. Of course, we did not sail Sunday, April 21, as planned. The little old man would not allow it. The funny part of it was that Jack was obliged to pay this deputy marshal three dollars a day for his zealous custodianship of the Snark. But the old man earned it. He stuck to the boat like glue, even going without meals that the vigil might not be interrupted.
Saturday night all the Snarkites walked out on an opposite pier to take a look at the Snark and to make plans. Jack and Mrs. London were still smiling. It seemed impossible to dash their spirits.
From where we stood, the Snark showed up bravely. She was a little floating palace. Jack could not refrain from bragging to Mrs. London about her bow.
"Isn't it a beauty?" he asked again and again. "That bow was made to punch storms with! It laughs at the sea! Not a drop can come over her! We'll be as dry and comfortable as any craft afloat, with such a bow as that!" And Mrs. London would p044 laugh her assent, and find new virtues in the boat and in that bow.
"Well," I said at last. "We'll get away Tuesday, anyway."
"Yes, we'll get away Tuesday. Think of that!" Mrs. London cried in response. "It will be worth all the trouble, and all the expense. Once we're out on the ocean, we'll forget all our little worries, the accidents, and the Sellerses, and all the rest. Glorious? Glorious doesn't express it."
"And think of what we can do when we get the engine to running again," Jack went on. "Think of the inland work. With such an engine, there isn't a river in the world with current stiff enough to baffle us. We can see so much more by inland voyaging than we could by merely hanging around ports. Think of the people, and the natural scenery! The things we won't know about the various countries through which we pass won't be worth knowing."
"That reminds me," I broke in. "What do you think you'll write about?"
He smiled.
"Well, if we're boarded by pirates and fight it out until our deck becomes a shambles, I don't think I'll write about it. And if we're wrecked at sea, and are driven by starvation into eating one another I'll keep it quiet for the sake of our relatives. And if we're killed and eaten by cannibals, of course I shan't let the American public get an inkling of it."
"You won't starve," I assured him. "Think of all the food we have aboard—over three months' supply. And think of your cook! No, you will never starve aboard the Snark."
"The thing that's worrying me," Bert here broke in, "is how we're going to find room to get around on the boat. Since that windlass was set up, and the launch and life-boat lashed on deck, there is hardly room to turn around in." And Tochigi, who was always very quiet, said nothing at all.
For days, Jack and Captain Eames had been engaged in one of the most laughable arguments I have ever heard. Roscoe Eames stoutly maintained that the earth is concave of surface, and that we would all sail round on the inside of a hollow sphere; while Jack, who was willing to stick to orthodox cosmology, just as stoutly maintained that Roscoe was mistaken, and that we would sail round on the outside. Each had a number of proofs, which he adduced in the argument; and neither was to be shaken in his confidence. To this day, I think they hold divergent opinions on the subject. Captain Eames was also a vegetarian; and it was this fact that made me wonder how he was to get along satisfactorily on the Snark.
Though Jack had answered my question jestingly, I knew that he contemplated writing an extended series of articles on the home-life of the various peoples among whom we were to sojourn. He would treat of their domestic problems; social structures; problems p046 of living; cost of living as compared with the cost in the United States; education; opportunities for advancement; general tone of peoples; culture; morals; religion; how they amuse themselves; marriage and divorce problems; housekeeping, and a hundred other topics.
When we left the wharf that night, we felt more cheerful than ever. Mrs. London was right. That boat was well worth all the trouble and expense. "Barring wreck and worms," said Jack, "she'll be sailing the seas a hundred years from now."
All day Monday we worked on the Snark, besieged constantly by reporters and photographers. Jack paid Mr. L. H. Sellers his two hundred and fifty dollars, and lifted the embargo. In the afternoon we were towed out in the Bay, and an expert adjusted our compasses and other instruments for us. It was essential that these be in proper trim, the more so as not one of us knew anything about navigation except Captain Eames, and even his knowledge was of the experimental sort. Jack declared that the rest of us could learn after we were afloat. Thousands of people visited the wharf that day to take a look at us; and the photographers were busy taking snap-shots of the boat. Out in the Bay, we had with us a reporter for the Hearst papers. When he left, he took with him my last message ashore, a telegram to be sent to Independence announcing the imminence of our p047 departure. We worked all that night, stowing and packing, and getting things shipshape for our cruise to Hawaii. At high tide the next morning we were to up-anchor and away.
Daylight broke at last. That 23rd of April, 1907, I shall never forget. Thousands came down to the wharf to bid us good-bye and to wish us a pleasant and successful voyage. Photographers from a popular western magazine took what they announced would be the last views of the Snark and her crew. Among the dozens of telegrams I received was one from an Independence friend, which read: "Good-bye. Hope I may see you again." Surrounded by hundreds of people who were prophesying that we would never reach Honolulu, this telegram had a rather gruesome sound to me. Strangely enough, I never did see this friend again. I did not meet my death in the water, but he did. He drowned in one of the rivers near Independence.
Among those who came down to say the farewells were many members of the Bohemian Club of San Francisco, to which Jack belonged. There were writers and artists and newspaper men. George Sterling and James Hopper were on hand, as was also Martinez, the artist. Mrs. London's friends came in a body. Then there were Oakland Elks, and San Francisco Elks, and friends of Tochigi, and Bert's friends, and all the friends of the Eames', and others who came p048 merely out of curiosity to see the world-famous author and his crew sail off in one of the most unique little boats that ever rode the waves.
It was a beautiful, bright, sunshiny day when we passed out of the Golden Gate, with hundreds of whistles tooting us a farewell salute, passed the Seal Rocks, and turned her bow to the westward. My duties on the smallest boat, with only one or two exceptions, that ever crossed the Pacific Ocean, had begun; but instead of getting busy cooking meals, I sat in the stern looking gloomily toward the land, which was the last I would see of good old American soil for nearly three years. I was thinking of the friends and the home I was leaving, and wondering if we were really bound for the bottom of the sea as so many had foretold; and I could not altogether down a feeling that I would just a little rather be on the full-rigged ship that passed us on her way into the harbour. But on the Snark I was and on the Snark I must remain. Gloomy dreams soon ended, and we settled down to life on the high seas.
So it was that we put forth into the wide Pacific, in a mere cork of a boat, without a navigator, with no engineer, no sailors, and for that matter, no cook. This lack of a cook did not bother much just then, however, for soon we were all too seasick to care to eat.
When night came, land was out of sight, darkness wrapped us about on every side, and the Snark rose and fell rhythmically, the sport of every wave. p049
After we passed out of the Golden Gate and headed seaward on our voyage, there followed twenty-seven days that are almost beyond description. One cannot describe them by comparing them with anything else, for probably since the world began there has never been anything quite like them. Suffice it to say that these twenty-seven days were the most wild and chaotic that human beings ever experienced.
We headed south, hoping to pick up with the northeast trades. The port for which we were making lay approximately twenty-one hundred miles away, in a straight line. But while we ignored the straight line, and were in no particular hurry, we nevertheless fairly raced over the water. We couldn't help ourselves. The Snark tore along before the wind despite all handicaps.
"I wish some of the crack sailors of the Bohemian Club could see us now!" Jack exclaimed, exultantly. "They said the Snark could not run—that her lines wouldn't permit it. Well, here's something to make them sit up and revise their criticism—but unfortunately they can't see!"
The water began to get rough. A queer sensation kept asserting itself right in the region of my stomach, p050 and I knew only too well what it portended. As the moments went by, this feeling recurred more frequently, each attack a little more aggravated than the one before it. The sea grew boisterous. It began to lash itself into crested waves.
The galley or kitchen of the Snark was tucked away to one side, and was not large enough for two small men to enter, close the door, and then turn around. As a matter of fact, if I was handling a dish of any size, I had to back out of the door to turn around, myself. For the first meal, I decided that I would try some fried onions, a nice roast with dressing, some vegetables, and some pudding; so I got out about a half-peck of onions, and by the time I had finished peeling those onions in that little galley, I decided that onions were all that was needed for that meal. Did you ever peel onions in a kitchen cupboard? That is practically what I was doing. My eyes were watering so that I couldn't see, and my nostrils and throat were burning so that I couldn't talk. The entire crew was kind enough to say that they liked onions, anyway.
Tochigi served the dinner, and we all ate. Then I made for my bunk, feeling, as Captain Eames put it, "rather white around the gills." As soon as Tochigi had served the dinner, he got out his flute, played the most mournful piece I have ever heard, and as the last note died away, rushed precipitately up on deck and relieved his deathly sickness at the rail. p051 Mrs. London speedily joined him. But Jack and Bert and Captain Eames were as yet unaffected.
The boat was leaking like a sieve. Yes, the Snark, the famous Snark, that had cost thirty thousand dollars, that had been built by expert shipbuilders, and that was declared to be the tightest craft afloat, leaked! The sides leaked, the bottom leaked; we were flooded. Even the self-bailing cockpit quickly filled with water that could find no outlet. Our gasolene, stored in non-leakable tanks and sealed behind an air-tight bulkhead, began to filter out, so that we hardly dared to strike a match. The air was full of the smell of it. I got up from my bunk, staggering sick. Bert started the five-horse-power engine, which controlled the pumps, and by this means managed to get some of the sea out of our quarters below.
At intervals, I was obliged to spend some necessary moments at the rail. The rail was only a foot high; one was obliged to crouch down on deck, clinging tightly, and lean far out, confronted ever by the stern face of the waves. The unutterable, blind sickness of such moments it is beyond the province of words to portray.
Never had I known anything like it! My head ached, my stomach ached, every muscle in my body ached. There were times when it seemed impossible that I should live. When the sickness was at its height, I was blind, deaf, and—need I say it?—dumb. All stabilities were shattered. The universe p052 itself was rocking and plunging through the cold depths of space. And then, for a brief instant, the sickness would subside, and sight and speech and hearing return, and I knew I was on the Snark, the plaything of the waves, and that I, the most desperate of living creatures, was gurgling and babbling my troubles to the uncaring sea. Later, it was laughable, but ye gods! at the time laughter was a stranger to my soul.
It did not ease matters much to discover that the water pouring into the boat had ruined the tools in the engine room, and spoiled a good part of our three months' provisions in the galley. Our box of oranges had been frozen; our box of apples was mostly spoiled; the carrots tasted of kerosene; the turnips and beets were worthless; and last, but not least, our crate of cabbages was so far gone in decay that it had to be thrown overboard. As for our coal, it had been delivered in rotten potato-sacks, and in the swinging and thrashing of the ship had escaped, and was washing through the scuppers into the ocean. We found that the engine in the launch was out of order, and that our cherished life-boat leaked as badly as did the Snark. In one respect, however, I was especially marked out for discomfort. I had the misfortune to be somewhat taller than any of the rest; and so low was the ceiling of the galley and the staterooms downstairs that I could never stand upright, but was obliged to stoop. The only place where I could be really comfortable was on p053 deck, and even here things were so tightly packed that there never was room for a promenade.
We didn't discover all our handicaps at once. It took about a week for us to see all there was to see, and to get acquainted with our little floating home. One of our greatest drawbacks was the fact that never for a moment could we let go of one hold unless we were assured of another. To have let go would have meant being jerked off our feet and thrown sprawling until we fetched up against something stout enough to check the fall. Circus gymnastics is as nothing compared with it. I have seen many acrobatic feats, but nothing resembling in mad abandon the double handspring Mrs. London turned one day when her hand missed its hold and she landed down the companionway in the middle of the table, on top of a dinner which I had just cooked, and which Tochigi was serving.
Toward evening of the first day, we passed a steamer, but could not make her out. The air grew chilly as night set in, and the flying spray in the air made it worse. Our dynamo would not work, so we had nothing but the kerosene lamps to depend on for light. After considerable difficulty, we got the mizzen mainstay and jibsails set, and such of us as were not on watch turned in. Mrs. London's watch was from eight till ten; then I relieved her from ten till twelve, and was in turn relieved by Tochigi.
Bert and Tochigi and I occupied one cabin. Mine p054 was an upper bunk; Tochigi's bunk was beneath mine, and Bert slept across the room. Captain Eames had a room of his own, but just now he was unable to sleep in it, for the water and gasolene drove him out. (Captain Eames waxed facetious, and always referred to his room as "the gasolene chamber.") Each bunk had upholstered springs and mattresses and was fitted with an electric light globe and a fan. Such of the crew as were sleeping had to be packed tight in their bunks with pillows to prevent their being tossed across the room.
On the morning of the second day, Jack awoke me at six-thirty, and I got breakfast. He was the only one who could eat. Not much wind was stirring, but a big swell was running. The Snark was still racing.
"I gave no thought to speed in building the Snark," Jack said that morning. "Only safety and comfort were considered. But if the Snark has fallen below our expectations in some things, she has certainly exceeded them in that."
I hazarded a guess. "At this rate, we will compress seven years' travelling into a few months."
"Oh, we'll find a means to stop her," he was confident, and went upstairs to the wheel.
And now occurred another remarkable thing. Jack started to heave-to, in other words, to place the Snark bow-on to the wind. The first gust of a gale had started, and the Snark, with flying-jib, jib and mizzen taken in, and reefs in the big mainsail and the fore-staysail, p055 was rolling in the trough, the most dangerous position in which a ship can be placed. As Jack put the wheel down to heave-to, the flying jib-boom poked its nose into the water, and broke clean off. Jack put the wheel hard down, and the Snark never responded, but remained in the trough. The ship alternately buried her rails in the stiff sea. The mainsail was flattened down, but without avail. Then Bert tried slacking it off, but that had no effect whatever. Hoping to bring her bow up to the wind, they took in all canvas but the storm trysail on the mizzen, but still the Snark rolled in the trough. Jack declared he had never heard of such a thing before.
"And we must even lose faith in the Snark's wonderful bow," he said, regretfully. "It won't heave-to."
Meanwhile, I had gone back to my bunk, sicker than ever. Tochigi lay prostrate, seeing and hearing nothing. He had not moved since yesterday. Mrs. London and Bert and Captain Eames were able to stay on deck, but even they had occasional tremors and sudden rushes of sickness. Once, in the afternoon, I tried to fool my stomach by eating a cracker, but it was no go. By this time, the floors of stateroom and galley were slushy with water, and all the time more was seeping in. Bert had pumped it out yesterday, but already it was up to our knees. My sickness increased whenever I heard it swashing around on the floor. p056
Night was coming on, a night of storm and wind. The Snark was creaking and groaning, and still in that most dangerous of all positions, the trough. Jack got out his patent sea-anchor, warranted not to dive, and trailed it out a few yards into the sea, then made fast. Almost the minute the line drew taut, the anchor dived. The Snark still raced. Then Jack drew the anchor in, and tied a big timber to it. This time it floated, but it had no deterrent effect at all. The Snark continued to race. Do what they would, the little boat went right ahead, and remained in the trough of the sea, all the while pitching like a cork.
On Thursday, I prepared only two meals. Bert and Captain Eames and Jack ate. Tochigi lay motionless in his bunk, looking like one dead, and I made for my bunk at the first opportunity. Mrs. London was taken desperately sick, and we saw little of her that day. We were still heading south. Before leaving the Golden Gate, Jack had told us of the flying fish that we were sure to pick up with as soon as we got out to sea, and of the dolphin and porpoises and bonita, to say nothing of sharks. But despite his prediction, we saw nothing at all. The Snark headed farther and farther south, the days grew warmer and warmer, but never a shark nor porpoise nor even a flying fish showed up. On Sunday, April 28, we made one hundred and ten miles. The galley floor burst from the pressure of water, and we had a hard time repairing it. For days I wore thigh-boots in cooking, p057 and we kept the five-horse-power engine busy with the pumps. On April 30, one week after leaving Frisco, things looked worse than ever, and we were still sick. There were times when only Jack or Captain Eames could eat anything.
We all tried to keep one another cheered up as much as possible. Anyone who has been seasick can in some measure appreciate our predicament. There is something amusing about seasickness—when somebody else is afflicted. At first, you fear you will die; then, after it has a good hold on you, you fear you won't die; and you feel that you are all stomach, and that that stomach is emptying itself faster than it could possibly be filled. The person who is not actually in the throes of seasickness can have no sympathy with the person who is so afflicted. I used to go up to Mrs. London when she was at the wheel, and ask her if I should not prepare for her dinner a nice piece of fat pork with a string tied to it. The effect was magical. Immediately, she would clap her hands over her mouth and make for the rail. There is something infectious about seasickness. I would have to go join her myself, and sometimes Jack would come with us.
On one occasion, I almost gave up, and expressed to Jack the wish that I could see land. He replied: "Never mind, Martin, we are not over two miles from land now;" and when I asked him which way, he said: "Straight down, Martin, straight down."
One whole day I slept, or tried to sleep, in the life-boat. p058 But the life-boat was a joke. By this time we realised that if a really severe storm should strike us, the life-boat would be the first thing to go, and our only resource in case of foundering would be the launch, which is to say, that had the Snark gone down, we would have gone down with it. So our only hope was in fair weather and the pumps.
The bath-room had long since gone out of commission. The first day out, the big iron levers that controlled the sea-valves and the bath-pumps broke into splinters. Jack's heart was sore at this, for he had planned that bath-room carefully, and had been to much expense in fitting it up. Another thing that would have dashed most skippers' spirits was the fact that the specially ordered planking from Puget Sound, warranted to have no butts, was literally crowded with butts. But Jack did not let any of these things trouble him much; he merely commented on them, and then set himself to make the best of the voyage. Luckily, we were not becalmed. Had this misfortune been added to the rest, it might have taken us sixty days or more to reach Honolulu.
A little over a week out, a gale struck us, and carried away the jib and staysail. Everybody worked; the boat was creaking and groaning, water spouting in everywhere, and the cockpit filled with water. The engine wouldn't work, and nothing else worked. This gale was a wonderful experience for me. The little boat would go down in the trough of the wave, and p059 I would gaze up and see the water coming in a massive cone, a million tons of water, looking a hundred feet high. It seemed to overtop our mainmast several times and more. I felt absolutely certain that when that mass of water hit us, we would be gone; but each time our stout little craft would climb the side of the wave until we reached the top, and then would start down the opposite side so rapidly that it produced that peculiar feeling one experiences when going down a Shoot-the-Chutes or the steep incline of a Roller-Coaster. In fact, seasickness is nothing more than this sensation aggravated to a point where it is painful. We were pitched around with great violence—sometimes we would be away over on one side until the water came pouring in the scuppers; and again, the boat would rush downward at such a rate of speed that I just knew we were making for that bottom Mr. London had spoken of; then we would go up again, each time to my surprise, because I was satisfied that we were as good as dead at least twice to each wave we rode. During this storm, the thought came to me that just a year before, on May 1, I was on a big cattle-steamer, going east on the Atlantic; and here I was, a year later, on a fish-bobber, in the middle of the Pacific, going—where? But the sea was not in existence that could swamp us. When the storm broke away the next day, and the sun arose bright and clear, everyone seemed to feel better and to take renewed interest in life. p060
We had not been long out of port before we became convinced that we had no navigator aboard. Captain Eames was supposed to be the navigator, but the navigation of a small boat is difficult and Jack had to assist him in the work. On certain days we made splendid headway and seemed to have covered considerable distance but our observations and markings on the chart showed that we had not done nearly as well as we supposed. On the other hand, there were days when it had been practically calm, and our records would show that we had fairly whirled over the water. The principles of navigation are fairly simple—and misunderstood by most people. Before we had reached Honolulu, everyone in the boat was navigating, except Tochigi. Of course, most of our mistakes had their roots in the fact that the boat's tossing threw our observations out of line, and our eyes were rather too near to the water. Of course, too, our record of time on board was sadly perturbed, despite our turning the ship's clock back about ten minutes each day.
And still we saw no fish of any sort. Jack could not understand it. He had been in these latitudes before, and always had seen porpoises and dolphins and flying fish, as well as sharks and bonita. But the ocean was absolutely bare in every direction. We were in a watery desert. It was not until we got to latitude 19° that we saw the first flying fish, and he was all by himself.
On Thursday, May 2, we felt that we were certainly p061 in the trade winds. We went dead ahead of the breeze, with all the sails set except the mizzen, and doing what old sailors, men of forty years on the sea, declare cannot be done—racing along with no one at the wheel. We simply set the wheel over to suit the wind, without even lashing it; and then all went below to supper, and to play cribbage. By this time I had learned a number of new dishes. Tochigi showed me the Japanese way of preparing rice, and it beat anything I had yet cooked. All were feeling in high spirits. The sickness had left us, and the boat looked tidier than at any time since leaving Frisco, for we had spent the day in scrubbing the floors, and generally cleaning things up.
When it came to the actual test, we found that the provisions of the Snark were not exactly adapted to that kind of trip. The duty of provisioning the boat had been left to Mrs. London and myself, and I fear that in the buying we lost all sense of proportion. We had bought an enormous crate of cabbages (which, as I have said, speedily found its way into the sea), and a whole case of lemons; and I had made out the list of spices and seasonings, all of which were purchased, enough to run the Delmonico for a year. The amount of pepper we had aboard would last a good-sized family through several lifetimes. When we completed the voyage, we had pepper to throw overboard, and I'll bet the fish in that vicinity have been coughing and sneezing ever since. p062
But the cooking was a reasonably easy proposition, because most of the time over half the crew didn't care for anything to eat, and the others were kind enough to say that they particularly liked my method of preparing only one dish at a meal, and depending on the can-opener for the rest. And observe the security of my position—they could not fire me and hire a new cook, so they had to like it or do without eating.
The galley had a Primus kerosene stove, which burned without odour. On the galley shelves were all sorts of pots and pans, bottles, tins, and utensils. For each and every separate thing, a hole had been made in the shelves, of just the right size and shape, so that nothing could topple out. On the stove, there were racks to hold the skillets and pots and pans while I cooked; but the pots and pans had a trick of jumping out of their racks and banging down into the bilge-water on the floor. And what didn't leap off the stove slopped and splashed all over the galley and the cook. As for myself, I was flung back and forth from one side of the galley to the other, until my back was a mass of bruises from bumping against the bulkhead.
A few extracts from the diary I kept during this cruise to Hawaii will throw an interesting light on how we lived aboard the Snark. The entries in this diary reflect my feelings better than I could recollect them after the lapse of several years.
Evening.—I feel fine. So do all. Even Tochigi is smiling again, and that's nuff said. It's the prettiest evening I've seen in a long time. Bert, who is engineer, finds the dynamo won't work, so he is filling the oil lamps again. Just think of it—we have 19 big electric lights on the boat, and a searchlight, and not one of them working! Jack and Mrs. London are playing cribbage in the cockpit. Tochigi washing clothes over the rail. Ocean calm, except for the swell that is always felt. We had a fine time at supper, telling stories, and joking with one another. Well, I'm going to turn in. My bunk is five feet five inches long, two feet wide, and one foot six inches from the ceiling, but I feel as good in it as on feathers.
Queer that we have seen no fish. Jack can't account for it. Mr. Eames has gone back to his room—he was run out a few days ago by gasolene leaking under his bunk. Water still spouting in. Pumps p064 needed. Many of Tochigi's books are ruined by being water-soaked. Mrs. London has bad headache, and so have I, but a little sleep will cure that. So here's for the bunk.