XXXIV.
These towns of the Antipodes, not so great then as they are now,
took an interest in the shipping, the running links with "home,"
whose numbers confirmed the sense of their growing importance.
They made it part and parcel of their daily interests. This was
especially the case in Sydney, where, from the heart of the fair
city, down the vista of important streets, could be seen the wool-
clippers lying at the Circular Quay--no walled prison-house of a
dock that, but the integral part of one of the finest, most
beautiful, vast, and safe bays the sun ever shone upon. Now great
steam-liners lie at these berths, always reserved for the sea
aristocracy--grand and imposing enough ships, but here to-day and
gone next week; whereas the general cargo, emigrant, and passenger
clippers of my time, rigged with heavy spars, and built on fine
lines, used to remain for months together waiting for their load of
wool. Their names attained the dignity of household words. On
Sundays and holidays the citizens trooped down, on visiting bent,
and the lonely officer on duty solaced himself by playing the
cicerone--especially to the citizenesses with engaging manners and
a well-developed sense of the fun that may be got out of the
inspection of a ship's cabins and state-rooms. The tinkle of more
or less untuned cottage pianos floated out of open stern-ports till
the gas-lamps began to twinkle in the streets, and the ship's
night-watchman, coming sleepily on duty after his unsatisfactory
day slumbers, hauled down the flags and fastened a lighted lantern
at the break of the gangway. The night closed rapidly upon the
silent ships with their crews on shore. Up a short, steep ascent
by the King's Head pub., patronized by the cooks and stewards of
the fleet, the voice of a man crying "Hot saveloys!" at the end of
George Street, where the cheap eating-houses (sixpence a meal) were
kept by Chinamen (Sun-kum-on's was not bad), is heard at regular
intervals. I have listened for hours to this most pertinacious
pedlar (I wonder whether he is dead or has made a fortune), while
sitting on the rail of the old Duke of S- (she's dead, poor thing!
a violent death on the coast of New Zealand), fascinated by the
monotony, the regularity, the abruptness of the recurring cry, and
so exasperated at the absurd spell, that I wished the fellow would
choke himself to death with a mouthful of his own infamous wares.
A stupid job, and fit only for an old man, my comrades used to tell
me, to be the night-watchman of a captive (though honoured) ship.
And generally the oldest of the able seamen in a ship's crew does
get it. But sometimes neither the oldest nor any other fairly
steady seaman is forthcoming. Ships' crews had the trick of
melting away swiftly in those days. So, probably on account of my
youth, innocence, and pensive habits (which made me sometimes
dilatory in my work about the rigging), I was suddenly nominated,
in our chief mate Mr. B-'s most sardonic tones, to that enviable
situation. I do not regret the experience. The night humours of
the town descended from the street to the waterside in the still
watches of the night: larrikins rushing down in bands to settle
some quarrel by a stand-up fight, away from the police, in an
indistinct ring half hidden by piles of cargo, with the sounds of
blows, a groan now and then, the stamping of feet, and the cry of
"Time!" rising suddenly above the sinister and excited murmurs;
night-prowlers, pursued or pursuing, with a stifled shriek followed
by a profound silence, or slinking stealthily along-side like
ghosts, and addressing me from the quay below in mysterious tones
with incomprehensible propositions. The cabmen, too, who twice a
week, on the night when the A.S.N. Company's passenger-boat was due
to arrive, used to range a battalion of blazing lamps opposite the
ship, were very amusing in their way. They got down from their
perches and told each other impolite stories in racy language,
every word of which reached me distinctly over the bulwarks as I
sat smoking on the main-hatch. On one occasion I had an hour or so
of a most intellectual conversation with a person whom I could not
see distinctly, a gentleman from England, he said, with a
cultivated voice, I on deck and he on the quay sitting on the case
of a piano (landed out of our hold that very afternoon), and
smoking a cigar which smelt very good. We touched, in our
discourse, upon science, politics, natural history, and operatic
singers. Then, after remarking abruptly, "You seem to be rather
intelligent, my man," he informed me pointedly that his name was
Mr. Senior, and walked off--to his hotel, I suppose. Shadows!
Shadows! I think I saw a white whisker as he turned under the
lamp-post. It is a shock to think that in the natural course of
nature he must be dead by now. There was nothing to object to in
his intelligence but a little dogmatism maybe. And his name was
Senior! Mr. Senior!
The position had its drawbacks, however. One wintry, blustering,
dark night in July, as I stood sleepily out of the rain under the
break of the poop something resembling an ostrich dashed up the
gangway. I say ostrich because the creature, though it ran on two
legs, appeared to help its progress by working a pair of short
wings; it was a man, however, only his coat, ripped up the back and
flapping in two halves above his shoulders, gave him that weird and
fowl-like appearance. At least, I suppose it was his coat, for it
was impossible to make him out distinctly. How he managed to come
so straight upon me, at speed and without a stumble over a strange
deck, I cannot imagine. He must have been able to see in the dark
better than any cat. He overwhelmed me with panting entreaties to
let him take shelter till morning in our forecastle. Following my
strict orders, I refused his request, mildly at first, in a sterner
tone as he insisted with growing impudence.
"For God's sake let me, matey! Some of 'em are after me--and I've
got hold of a ticker here."
"You clear out of this!" I said.
"Don't be hard on a chap, old man!" he whined pitifully.
"Now then, get ashore at once. Do you hear?"
Silence. He appeared to cringe, mute, as if words had failed him
through grief; then--bang! came a concussion and a great flash of
light in which he vanished, leaving me prone on my back with the
most abominable black eye that anybody ever got in the faithful
discharge of duty. Shadows! Shadows! I hope he escaped the
enemies he was fleeing from to live and flourish to this day. But
his fist was uncommonly hard and his aim miraculously true in the
dark.
There were other experiences, less painful and more funny for the
most part, with one amongst them of a dramatic complexion; but the
greatest experience of them all was Mr. B-, our chief mate himself.
He used to go ashore every night to foregather in some hotel's
parlour with his crony, the mate of the barque Cicero, lying on the
other side of the Circular Quay. Late at night I would hear from
afar their stumbling footsteps and their voices raised in endless
argument. The mate of the Cicero was seeing his friend on board.
They would continue their senseless and muddled discourse in tones
of profound friendship for half an hour or so at the shore end of
our gangway, and then I would hear Mr. B- insisting that he must
see the other on board his ship. And away they would go, their
voices, still conversing with excessive amity, being heard moving
all round the harbour. It happened more than once that they would
thus perambulate three or four times the distance, each seeing the
other on board his ship out of pure and disinterested affection.
Then, through sheer weariness, or perhaps in a moment of
forgetfulness, they would manage to part from each other somehow,
and by-and-by the planks of our long gangway would bend and creak
under the weight of Mr. B- coming on board for good at last.
On the rail his burly form would stop and stand swaying.
"Watchman!"
"Sir."
A pause.
He waited for a moment of steadiness before negotiating the three
steps of the inside ladder from rail to deck; and the watchman,
taught by experience, would forbear offering help which would be
received as an insult at that particular stage of the mate's
return. But many times I trembled for his neck. He was a heavy
man.
Then with a rush and a thump it would be done. He never had to
pick himself up; but it took him a minute or so to pull himself
together after the descent.
"Watchman!"
"Sir."
"Captain aboard?"
"Yes, sir."
Pause.
"Dog aboard?"
"Yes, sir."
Pause.
Our dog was a gaunt and unpleasant beast, more like a wolf in poor
health than a dog, and I never noticed Mr. B- at any other time
show the slightest interest in the doings of the animal. But that
question never failed.
"Let's have your arm to steady me along."
I was always prepared for that request. He leaned on me heavily
till near enough the cabin-door to catch hold of the handle. Then
he would let go my arm at once.
"That'll do. I can manage now."
And he could manage. He could manage to find his way into his
berth, light his lamp, get into his bed--ay, and get out of it when
I called him at half-past five, the first man on deck, lifting the
cup of morning coffee to his lips with a steady hand, ready for
duty as though he had virtuously slept ten solid hours--a better
chief officer than many a man who had never tasted grog in his
life. He could manage all that, but could never manage to get on
in life.
Only once he failed to seize the cabin-door handle at the first
grab. He waited a little, tried again, and again failed. His
weight was growing heavier on my arm. He sighed slowly.
"D-n that handle!"
Without letting go his hold of me he turned about, his face lit up
bright as day by the full moon.
"I wish she were out at sea," he growled savagely.
"Yes, sir."
I felt the need to say something, because he hung on to me as if
lost, breathing heavily.
"Ports are no good--ships rot, men go to the devil!"
I kept still, and after a while he repeated with a sigh.
"I wish she were at sea out of this."
"So do I, sir," I ventured.
Holding my shoulder, he turned upon me.
"You! What's that to you where she is? You don't--drink."
And even on that night he "managed it" at last. He got hold of the
handle. But he did not manage to light his lamp (I don't think he
even tried), though in the morning as usual he was the first on
deck, bull-necked, curly-headed, watching the hands turn-to with
his sardonic expression and unflinching gaze.
I met him ten years afterwards, casually, unexpectedly, in the
street, on coming out of my consignee office. I was not likely to
have forgotten him with his "I can manage now." He recognised me
at once, remembered my name, and in what ship I had served under
his orders. He looked me over from head to foot.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
"I am commanding a little barque," I said, "loading here for
Mauritius." Then, thoughtlessly, I added: "And what are you
doing, Mr. B-?"
"I," he said, looking at me unflinchingly, with his old sardonic
grin--"I am looking for something to do."
I felt I would rather have bitten out my tongue. His jet-black,
curly hair had turned iron-gray; he was scrupulously neat as ever,
but frightfully threadbare. His shiny boots were worn down at
heel. But he forgave me, and we drove off together in a hansom to
dine on board my ship. He went over her conscientiously, praised
her heartily, congratulated me on my command with absolute
sincerity. At dinner, as I offered him wine and beer he shook his
head, and as I sat looking at him interrogatively, muttered in an
undertone:
"I've given up all that."
After dinner we came again on deck. It seemed as though he could
not tear himself away from the ship. We were fitting some new
lower rigging, and he hung about, approving, suggesting, giving me
advice in his old manner. Twice he addressed me as "My boy," and
corrected himself quickly to "Captain." My mate was about to leave
me (to get married), but I concealed the fact from Mr. B-. I was
afraid he would ask me to give him the berth in some ghastly
jocular hint that I could not refuse to take. I was afraid. It
would have been impossible. I could not have given orders to Mr.
B-, and I am sure he would not have taken them from me very long.
He could not have managed that, though he had managed to break
himself from drink--too late.
He said good-bye at last. As I watched his burly, bull-necked
figure walk away up the street, I wondered with a sinking heart
whether he had much more than the price of a night's lodging in his
pocket. And I understood that if that very minute I were to call
out after him, he would not even turn his head. He, too, is no
more than a shadow, but I seem to hear his words spoken on the
moonlit deck of the old Duke--:
"Ports are no good--ships rot, men go to the devil!"
