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"But, with a ten-pound charge, now, they'd make a pretty fair hole in a six-inch plank, I tell ye." "How many of them, Mr Triggs," I asked, "have we got on board?" "Of these long 'uns?" he said, patting one affectionately on the breech as he spoke. "Well, we've jist fifteen here a-port and fifteen a-starboard, which makes thirty in all on this deck. A power o' metal, I tell ye!"
But it so happened that when the Noord Brabant, close-hauled to clear Beveridge Reef, was thrown on her beam ends by the violence of the squall, the whaling schooner John Bright was rolling easily along before it under shortened canvas, and the cook of the schooner, as he stood on the foc'scle, smoking his pipe, caught a sight of floating wreckage right ahead, with the indistinct figure of a man clinging to it, and bawled out 'Hard a-port! just in time, or else the schooner had run right on top of the drifting boat and finished this tale and Tom Masters as well.
The squall is already upon us port the helm, sir, and sheer the ship out of the smoke! Hard a-port with the helm, sir, at once! hard with it a-port I say." But the lazy motion of the vessel did not answer to the impatience of those who directed her movements nor did it meet the pressing exigencies of the moment.
Aren't we encouraging him and helping on a good show?" "Oh, get onto that hike!" "Gee whiz, Commodore, if you jibe over like that you'll go by the board." "Put your tiller hard a-port."
It was only endangering the ship and the lives of all on board to proceed; so the order was reluctantly given, 'Hard a-port. Round she went in her own length almost, and very soon we let go the anchor just outside our old moorings, and spent the night, after all, in the harbour of Alexandria.
Two men were placed at the wheel, as a matter of precaution, and we appeared to be steering straight for the shore, at full speed, till Tom suddenly gave the order 'Hard a-port! and the 'Sunbeam' instantly flew round and rushed swiftly past the dangerous spot into wider waters.
The man who was steering was trying, with all his might, to put his helm a-port, and when he found what was to pay there, to ship the tiller.
Indeed, I had the greatest difficulty in hauling the vessel round, and before I succeeded in doing anything beyond simply putting the helm a-port, the driving snow had surrounded me in its mist, and I lost sight of the boat. I could see it nowhere. I called aloud, but the wind whistling in the ropes overpowered my voice. I left the tiller and got the fog horn. But, alas!
Captain Solomon had such thoughts sometimes, but he didn't tell anybody about them, for they would think he was crazy, and the mates and the sailors wouldn't like to sail in any ship that he was the captain of. And while he was thinking these thoughts he was startled by the cry of the lookout who was on the forecastle near the bow. "Hard a-port! Hard a-port!"
'For Heaven's sake, tell me some of the words, whispered Herrick. An hour later, the Farallone was under all plain sail, the rudder hard a-port, and the cheerfully clanking windlass had brought the anchor home. 'All clear, sir, cried Herrick from the bow. The captain met her with the wheel, as she bounded like a stag from her repose, trembling and bending to the puffs.
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