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Updated: June 7, 2025
A buccaneer had slashed the halyard with his cutlass. The boarders were in possession, and on the upper deck groups of disarmed Spaniards stood huddled now like herded sheep. Suddenly Miss Bishop recovered from her nausea, to lean forward staring wild-eyed, whilst if possible her cheeks turned yet a deadlier hue than they had been already.
"And if I'd wanted to help 'em to get on deck, do you think I should ha' been such a fool as to tie a bit o' signal halyard to the spanker-boom, when I could ha' made a bit o' strong rope fast to the belaying-pins, and hung it over the stern?" Jarette growled out something we could not hear. "Then it must have been one of them two," said Bob Hampton; "or they chucked it up from the cabin-window."
Looking in the direction Bulger pointed, he saw that the foretopsail sheet block had fallen on deck, within an inch of where he would have been but for the intervention of Bulger's hook. Glancing aloft, he saw Parmiter grinning down at him. "Hitch that block to a halyard, youngster," said the man.
The topgallant men sprang up the rigging like so many cats, for all hands had been thoroughly waked up by the impending peril. "Let go the flying jib halyard! Haul down! Lay out and stow the flying jib!" "Man the topsail clewlines and buntlines!" "All ready, sir," replied the second lieutenant. "Let go the topsail sheets! Clew up! Settle away the halyards! Haul taut the braces!"
The train stopped; I swung myself aboard the last car, where a pleasant young fellow was sitting on the rear brake, chewing spruce and reading a letter. "Come aboard, sir," he said, looking up with a smile; "I guess you're the man in a hurry." "I'm looking for a man named Halyard," I said, dropping rifle and knapsack on the fresh-cut, fragrant pile of pine. "Are you Halyard?"
Grace of style it cannot claim; but neither "white ants" nor weather trouble it. And to what sweet uses has adversity made us familiar! When I bought a boat to bring hither I knew not the distinguishing term of a single halyard, save the "topping lift," and even that scant knowledge was idle, for I was blankly ignorant of the place and purpose of the oddly-named rope.
The first cast gave us a bare four fathoms; the next, a trifle over four fathoms; the next, four and a half fathoms; and the next, five fathoms; whereupon I gave the word to let go the anchor and haul down the staysail, at the same time abandoning the wheel and springing to the main topsail halyard, which I let run.
Priscilla treading on Miss Rutherford without remorse or apology, struggled with the halyard. The sail bellied hugely, dipped into the sea to leeward and was hauled desperately on board. The rain streamed down on them, each drop starting up again like a miniature fountain when it splashed upon the wood of the boat.
Then the next morning her doubts all vanished once more when the Winnebagos assembled on the front lawn for flag raising, and Veronica, whose turn it was to hoist the Stars and Stripes, stepped out with shining eyes, and with loving hands fastened the flag of her adopted country to the waiting halyard, carefully keeping it from touching the ground, and with an attitude both proud and humble sent it fluttering to the top of the pole.
As we hauled at halyard and sheet and brace, and sprang quickly about at Roger's bidding, I found no leisure to watch the dawn, nor did I think of aught save the duties of the moment, which in some ways was a blessed relief; but I presently became aware that David Paine, who seemed able to work without thought, had stopped and was staring intently across the heavy seas that went rolling past us.
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