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Updated: June 21, 2025
I swam to the main topsail halyard block, got on it, and sat upon it, and then I rode. The fore, main, and mizen tops were all above water, as were a part of the bow-sprit, and part of the ensign-staff, with the ensign upon it.
Above her water-line emerged all round a half-floating fringe of fresh-green sea-weed, proving old neglect; an abortive attempt had apparently been made to lower, or take in, the larch-wood pram, for there she hung by a jammed davit-rope, stern up, bow in the water; the only two arms of the windmill moved this way and that, through some three degrees, with an andante creaking sing-song; some washed clothes, tied on the bow-sprit rigging to dry, were still there; the iron casing all round the bluff bows was red and rough with rust; at several points the rigging was in considerable tangle; occasionally the boom moved a little with a tortured skirling cadence; and the sail, rotten, I presume, from exposure for she had certainly encountered no bad weather gave out anon a heavy languid flap at a rent down the middle.
Without stopping to explore her and, indeed, after what I had found on the steamer, I had no fancy for explorations which might end in my stumbling upon still more horrors I went on to a trim little brig lying on the other side of her; a beautiful little vessel, with all her spars and rigging save her bow-hamper in perfect order for sea-going but showing by her broken bow-sprit that she had been in collision, and by her depth in the water that after the collision she had filled.
The leathern features of Captain Triplett twisted into a grin. "Bald's a badger!" he murmured. Everything had gone by the board. Mast, jigger, bow-sprit and running gear. Not a trace of block or tackle rested on the surrounding sea. We were clean-shaven. Of the chart, which had hung in a frame near the binnacle, not a line remained.
Forking out, however, directly over where I clung desperately to the wet hawser, my eyes were able to trace the bow-sprit, a massive bit of timber, with ropes faintly traced against the sky, the rather loosely furled jib flapping ragged edges in the gusts of wind.
When we had not men to enter, we plied our great ordinance much at them as high vp as they might be mounted, for otherwise we did them little harme, and by shooting a piece out of our forecastle being close by her, we fired a mat on her beak head, which more and more kindled, and ran from thence to the mat on the bow-sprit, and from the mat vp to the wood of the bow-sprit, and thence to the top saile yard, which fire made the Portugals abaft in the ship to stagger, and to make shew of parle.
I am moreover told that there is a little legendary book somewhere extant, written in Low Dutch, which says that the image of this renowned saint, which whilom graced the bow-sprit of the Goede Vrouw, was elevated in front of this chapel, in the center of what in modern days is called the Bowling Green on the very spot, in fact, where he appeared in vision to Oloffe the Dreamer.
The Capitana, one of their largest galleons, fouled with another vessel and broke her bow-sprit. She fell behind, and was left to her fate. In the morning Drake took possession of her, and found many casks of reals, and, what was of more importance, some tons of gunpowder, with which the Roebuck, the swiftest traveler of the fleet, flew to the lord admiral.
Nicholas, equipped with a low, broad-brimmed hat, a huge pair of Flemish trunk hose, and a pipe that reached to the end of the bow-sprit. Thus gallantly furnished, the staunch ship floated sideways, like a majestic goose, out of the harbor of the great city of Amsterdam, and all the bells that were not otherwise engaged, rung a triple bobmajor on the joyful occasion.
From their actions, suspecting some treachery, Samoa stood in the gangway, and warned them off; saying that no barter could take place until the captain's return. But presently one of the savages stealthily climbed up from the water, and nimbly springing from the bob-stays to the bow-sprit, darted a javelin full at the foremast, where it vibrated. The signal of blood!
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