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Updated: May 13, 2025
Mattresses that looked as if they came from the dump lay on the ground with tarpaulins stretched above them as roofs, and these were the only homes of whole families who lived and slept and ate in swarms of stinging flies. One of the few pleasant things was the Christian Center not very far away. Every morning its car chugged up to the jungle and carried off a load of children.
In the evening we sighted seven more sail steering out of the bay. On this, to deceive the enemy, we hung tarpaulins over the sides of the ship, set the sails in lubberly fashion, and, hauling our wind, stood away from the strangers till dark. We then again made sail and followed them.
As for men, there were fifty fellows as desperate as Hereward himself, to take service with him for that or any other quest. So they ballasted their ships with great pebbles, stowed under the thwarts, to be used as ammunition in case of boarding; and over them the barrels of ale and pork and meal, well covered with tarpaulins.
Through the opening I could hear the combers sweeping the bow and the down-swash of the overflow striking the deck below. With the outside roar came the captain, his tarpaulins glistening with spray, his cap pulled tight down to his ears, his storm-beaten face ruddy with the dash and cut of the wind. He looked like a sea Titan that had stepped aboard from the crest of a wave.
Next day, in the afternoon, though he perceived two sloops, he forbore chasing, that he might not risk a discovery; for the same purpose he hoisted Dutch colours, and disguised his ship with tarpaulins.
He saw fellows patching tarpaulins, mending harness making yokes, platting whips, fishing, pig-hunting, reading Ouida, yarning round fires, or trying to invent some new form of gambling; but he only saw their backs, and they did n't see him at all.
The overtaking of such a train was a thing of magnificent nothing for the long-strided engine, and as the flying express passed its weaker brother, one heard one or two feeble and immature puffs from the other engine, saw the fireman wave his hand to his luckier fellow, saw a string of foolish, clanking flat-cars, their freights covered with tarpaulins, and then the train was lost to the rear.
"Happy voyage, boss," they screamed, as the stout little vessel twisted around on her hawser and moved out on the blackened waters, throwing the yeasty spray high up with the saucy thrusts of her blunt bows. "Never mind that old trunk," cried Braun, as the sailors busied themselves with throwing tarpaulins over the traveller's half dozen boxes.
Over this was a row of thick planks or beams, with holes pierced through them in order to communicate the fire from above, and upon them were placed 340 carcases filled with grenadoes, cannon-balls, iron chains, firearms loaded with ball, large pieces of metal wrapped up in tarpaulins, and other combustible matters.
When the boats were stripped of their tarpaulins, and a few lockers and store-rooms examined, the only available hiding-places were the shaft tunnel, the holds, and the lazarette, a small space between decks, situated directly above the propeller, where a reserve supply of provisions is generally carried.
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