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All our baggage, as well as ourselves, was thoroughly wet with rain, which did not cease during the day; it continued, indeed, violently through the night, in the course of which the tide reached the logs on which we lay, and set them afloat. "November 11.
That'll keep yer little craft afloat until ye can unlade her; and the quicker ye get yer traps up here the better, if ye don't want 'em soaked." Acting upon these suggestions, Walkirk and I went vigorously to work, and passed up our belongings as rapidly as possible to the man above, who, by leaning over the rails, could easily reach them.
The very duty of the ship itself was an endless source of occupation and amusement to us, the commander keeping the men "at it" continually from sunrise to sunset, until he had so licked us all into shape that we were the smartest ship's company afloat, I think; for the discipline was such that the old Candahar might have been four years in commission instead of the brief three months that had elapsed from our hoisting the pen'ant to our casting anchor in Simon's Bay, a port to the eastward of the "Stormy Cape," where our men-of-war usually moor.
All sorts of dreadful rumors were afloat; later many were verified; whilst some proved to have been more or less exaggerated. In the afternoon word reached us that San Francisco was burning. My dear son, now in the employ of the Gorham Rubber Company was living there. I wondered if it had reached Haight Street: all I could do was to pray and wait, wait and pray.
There seemed now only one boat afloat. Far above it I saw a tiny black oblong that I knew was Mercer's platform. A swarm of other dots, with the tiny pencils of red light flashing from them, showed where the cloud of girls were swooping down to the attack. Now that we were out of the action, I had opportunity to watch what was going on more closely.
How constantly do we find people running into real danger to avoid imaginary evil! A mother will not permit her child to go to sea, lest it should be drowned, and a few days afterwards it is kicked to death by a horse. Had the child been permitted to go afloat, he might have lived and run through the usual term of existence.
From the same motive the boats were kept afloat that they might be less in fear of the vessel leaving her station. The landing-master had, however, repeatedly expressed his anxiety for the safety of the boats, and wished much to have them hoisted on board.
True it was there were revolting stories afloat, for which there was undoubtedly some foundation, though their exaggeration and malice were evident, of the ruthless conduct of the Inquisition; but these details were entirely confined to Spain, and were the consequences not of the principles of the Holy Office, but of the Spanish race, poisoned by Moorish and Jewish blood, or by long contact with those inhuman infidels.
Once afloat upon the mighty tide of sacred music she drifted on and on, now into a requiem, now a "Gloria," and at last the grand triumphant strains of the pastor's favourite "Jubilate" rolled through the silent house, out upon the calm lustrous summer night.
Moreover, every inquiry would prove that the idealistic value of such statements as are afloat among the masses to-day is reached only by a juggling with words.