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Updated: July 19, 2025
So there's a ghost story for you, and I believe that all others will be found, like mine, to end in moonshine. Now, suppose we turn in, for we shall weigh at three o'clock in the morning." We all tumbled into the standing berths in the fore-peak; I dreamt of black tom cats all night.
The sea roared over the fore-peak, and gurgled out of the scuppers, and still we held on. I turned to my companion and said: "Let us drive her for the shore and have done with it; she cannot live in this. We will jump when she touches." But he, having a chest of oak, and being bound three times with brass, said: "Drive her through it. It is not often we have such a fair-wind."
And he turned and walked forward, wearing a most ferocious scowl, and hissing execrations between his set teeth. A minute or two later Henderson returned to the deck with the intelligence that he had found a fine store-room abaft the fore-peak which could be cleared out in a few minutes, and which would afford ample room for such of the prisoners as it would be necessary to put under restraint.
He looked as if he were half asleep already. "We had better go and lie down in the cabin, so that we may be ready to help the captain," I answered; "but I'll tell you what, we'll take a look into the fore-peak first, to see how the leaks are going on there." "Oh, they are all right," said Jim. "We shouldn't have lessened the water so much if anything had given way."
It is true, there was the old gaff-topsail still in the fore-peak, as well as a spare jib; but they had nothing to spread them out to the wind with, or affix them to. They were, in fact, oar-less, sail-less, helpless! "I don't see what we can do," said Bob, when they had looked over all the boat, in case something perchance might have escaped their notice. "We can only hope and pray!"
At six o'clock that morning the usual routine of duty was resumed on board, the hands being turned up to wash-decks and generally perform the ship's toilet before breakfast, and I noticed with satisfaction, as I went forward to get my usual shower-bath under the head-pump, that Carter had caused the four prisoners to be released from the fore-peak.
"That only makes the matter worse," replied Collins; "for while we are to be peppered this way, I think the shorter the chase the better. However, you may do as you please, but I'm not so fond of it; so here's down below to the fore-peak!" "Ben, you're a sensible chap, and gives good advice; we'll just follow you," said Hillson.
The second mate tried, and he got a devil of a bite, and came up from the fore-peak without the cat, looking very blue indeed. And then the first mate went down, and he tried; but the cat flew at him, and he came up as white as a sheet.
Again we shouted, in the faint hope that some of them might be lying concealed forward. No one answered. "Maybe that they have gone down into the fore-peak," said Jim; "I'll go and knock on the hatch. They can't hear our shouts from where we are." I tried to persuade Jim not to make the attempt till daylight, for a sea might break on board and wash him away.
At the fore end there was a place for the crew to live in, called the fore-peak, and at the after-end rooms or cabins for the captain and officers. All the rest of the ship was filled with cargo and stores. To the masts were hung across spars, or poles, as big as large larches, and on these were stretched the sails, made of stout canvas.
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