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This living creature was the helmet of the Sea King. Next appeared the face of awful majesty and stern mien, as if with reluctant condescension, and then the jewel robes of the monarch. Next rose into view a huge haliotis shell, in which, on a bed of rare gems from the deep sea floor, glistened, blazed and flashed the two Jewels of the Tides.
Wardrop wrote up on the engine-room bulkhead. Fifteen days had gone fifteen days of killing labour and there was hope before them. It is curious that no man knows how the rods were straightened. The crew of the Haliotis remember that week very dimly, as a fever patient remembers the delirium of a long night.
"She's my boat, and I've had eight months to think in." No man saw the Haliotis depart, though many heard her. She left at two in the morning, having cut her moorings, and it was none of her crew's pleasure that the engines should strike up a thundering half-seas-over chanty that echoed among the hills. Mr. Wardrop wiped away a tear as he listened to the new song.
We'll get my stores out, and clear away the shores we don't need, and then we'll patch her up. My men will remember that they're in the Haliotis, under me." He went into the engine-room, and the others stared. They were used to the accidents of the sea, but this was beyond their experience.
He recalled that in the days when he wore trousers he had been Chief Engineer of the Haliotis. "Harland, Mackesy, Noble, Hay, Naughton, Fink, O'Hara, Trumbull." "Here, sir!" The instinct of obedience waked to answer the roll-call of the engine-room. "Below!" They rose and went. "Captain, I'll trouble you for the rest of the men as I want them.
He recalled that in the days when be wore trousers he had been Chief Engineer of the Haliotis. "Harland, Mackesy, Noble, Hay, Naughton, Fink, O'Hara, Trumbull." "Here, sir!" The instinct of obedience waked to answer the roll-call of the engine-room. "Below!" They rose and went. "Captain, I'll trouble you for the rest of the men as I want them.
This shell is called Midas's Ear, or Auricula Midæ." "I remember," said Charley, "that Midas was said to have ass's ears." "Just so," said Mr. Brown, "all the Auriculas and Haliotises, are a little turned in form. Here is a Haliotis, or Sea Ear.
The Haliotis was very hard to move, and the gunnery-lieutenant, who had fired the five-inch shell, had leisure to think upon consequences. Mr. Wardrop was the busy man. He borrowed all the crew to shore up the cylinders with spars and blocks from the bottom and sides of the ship.
The man-of-war was short-handed, and did not see the necessity for putting a prize-crew aboard the Haliotis. So she sent one sublieutenant, whom the skipper kept very drunk, for he did not wish to make the tow too easy, and, moreover, he had an inconspicuous little rope hanging from the stem of his ship. Then they began to tow at an average speed of four knots an hour.
That machinery began to revolve, and who so shocked and surprised as the Power that had captured the Haliotis? It explained that colonial governors and far-away men-of-war were difficult to control, and promised that it would most certainly make an example both of the Governor and the vessel.
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