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Therefore I resolved freely to open my heart to him; for that special purpose paying him a visit, when, like some old albatross in the air, he happened to be perched at the foremast-head, all by himself, on the lookout for whales never seen. Now this standing upon a bit of stick 100 feet aloft for hours at a time, swiftly sailing over the sea, is very much like crossing the Channel in a balloon.
"Elders, but not betters," said Hurd. "Have it your own way," answered Clancy, "but I go in the dory." The rescue was really a fine thing, but the important thing was that some of the rescued men had been exposed to the battering of the sea so long that they needed medical attention, and so we drove for home and cracked our foremast-head doing it.
There was now only one way of avoiding a disastrous collision, and that was by putting our helm hard up, and, at all risks, jibing round upon the other tack; and this we accordingly did, missing the brig by a hair's-breadth, but springing our foremast-head so badly as the trysail jibed over, that we had to get in the sail at once, and set a close-reefed main-staysail instead.
It wavered about for a minute or two, exactly like that thing just now, and then rolled, as it might be, down the spar until it met the topmast-stay, down which it travelled to the foremast-head, and from thence it came down the topsail sheet to the deck, where it bursted. Ten minutes after that happened, sir, we were struck by a squall that hove us over on our beam- ends.
"Well, we have had wonderfully fine weather," replied the captain. "But, after all she was but a cutter, handled by a lunatic." And he and Bob interchanged looks of despair as they ascended the companion ladder. "Bok, go to the foremast-head," ordered the captain. "Take the glass, and have a look around." The sailor slung the telescope over his shoulder and nimbly mounted the rigging.
Now the wind fell, and now it freshened; but the brig gained rapidly on the chase, which, by the little way it made, was soon suspected of being a raft. Then came all the horrible doubts and fears, naturally suggested to Fleetwood's mind but we will not dwell on them. "Sail, ho!" sung out the hand at the foremast-head.
During the day we steamed slowly along, a bright lookout being kept by the men at the foremast-head for suspicious steamers. Smoking is allowed aboard only when the smoking lamp is lighted, and as "Hay" was wont to say, it was lighted "when you did not want to smoke." At ten minutes past one "turn to" was piped by the boatswain's mates, followed by the call for sweepers.
It was my turn to stand at the foremast-head; and with my shoulders leaning against the slackened royal shrouds, to and fro I idly swayed in what seemed an enchanted air.
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