The Captain's Bath

by DAVID W. BONE

THE poop, the post of command, of the fullrigged ship City of Florence was always a reserved enclosure. No one but the Captain and the officers stepped briskly, sauntered, or loitered on its planks — according to their several degrees. Occasionally, an apprentice would be posted to leeward, immobile, as punishment fulsome delinquency. But the wheel stood on it and that had to be manned. At two hours interval an alien from the main deck appeared, mounted the lee ladder, buttoned his jacket, and relieved the steersman. Sometimes there were moments of hurried action. The shrouds of the mizzen rigging led to the chains at the fore part, and when sail had to be made or reduced there was a rush of seamen to lay aloft. But the normal state of the poop was one of quiet movement, for it was the Captain’s rooftree and he slept lightly, as a commanding sailor should.

In the early morning hours though, there was a minor activity. It was the duty of the apprentices on watch to fill the Captain’s bath. For this, a spar and a canvas bucket had to be rigged, the blue salt water drawn from overside and poured through a pipe inlet in the deck above his quarters. Close to this inlet and not dissimilar to it there was another “flush-head” through which the carpenter could lower his sounding rod to determine the content of precious fresh water in the tank far below. Both had brass screw caps, lilted to close the pipes when not in use. These were loitered to distinguish them, one from the Other.

On a day of calms and light airs in the South Atlantic, advantage was taken of the dry weather to shift canvas. From the first sign of daybreak the watch had been hard at work unbending the heavy sails of 00 Storm that had brought us round the Horn, and setting in their place the older lighl canvas suit that could still serve its turn in the settled trade winds. The Second Mate was ambitious to do well before handing over to his senior at eight bells, and the routine of a normal morning watih was maybe disrupted. Somewhat late, he realized that the Captain’s bath was not yet drawn and both apprentices were aloft. He ordered two men of the small deck party to attend to it, then resumed his supervision of what he may have thought the more important work. I nfamiliar with the job, the Belgian lamp-trimmer (who could not read) unscrewed the wrong pipe-head and poured the statutory twenty full buckets of Neptune’s salty best into the fresh-water tank!

Had that tank been nearly full the saline content would not have mattered very much, for squarerigged sailors are hardy, but we were long out from San Francisco and its level was low. Except for a small emergency container of about ten days’ normal supply and the barrecas in the lifeboats, it was our last reserve. Its water was now heavily brackish and just barely potable; the end of the voyage was still far distant.

But the “sweet little Cherub” who sends wind to fill the sails has his own way of watering a sailing ship at sea, and it would be in the hope of torrential rains in the doldrums — the zone of baffling weather that lies between the influence of the constant trades — the Captain stood on northward through the southeast trades, dismissing any thought he may have had of putting in to Montevideo to replenish.

As the days wore on, preparations were made. The spare lank, already exhausted, was cleaned and limewashed: the poop was scrubbed as never beiore; brine tubs, charred by tire and scraped anew, were held in readiness; old sails were patched and lilted as catchwaters. We were all ready. But the rains did not come as we worked ship from the petering southeast trades to the Line. This was sufficiently unusual to arouse disquiel. If we had no rains, what then? The ration, now reduced to one hallpint per man per day, that had been drawn from the emergency container, was now exhausted and we had no recourse but to the salted tank. Curiously, it did not taste as vile as when the Belgian’s error was first discovered. Had we grown casehardened to it or was the rusty floor of the tank effecting some chemical reaction? The few sips that could be saved from cooking purpose were red-rusty and thick like syrup. Maybe old iron had its merit. But there was not enough.

What Captain Leask thought of it we did not know. As he strode briskly on the poop there seemed no special anxiety in the eyes he turned to windward at each end of his thirty paces. Was he confident that, the rains would come, as so often he had found them there; or had he the hope of speaking other ships at the known Line crossing in 28 degrees West Longitude? We could not know.

“Doldrums” was not in character with its description in Findlay’s Atlantic: it was not the seaman’s purgatory so often doggedly endured. Calms there were, and light wayward airs, but not the black nights of incessant downpour, the thunder of weeping skies, or the interludes of brazen breathless heat, broken by sudden fierce squalls of wind — and rain. Nor was the watch, now enfeebled and distressed, called upon to haul yards and trim sail continually to meet each capful of a furthering wind. The days stayed fair. Infrequently and at night, there was vivid lightning and the rumble of distant thunder; a few light showers fell but did no more than wet the canvas and ihe decks. The tubs stood empty when the drizzle had cleared. But we made progress. The Florence — built for the tea trade — had the quality of ghosting in lighl airs. By what seemed little more than the thr-r-rap of her canvas she carried some quirk of steerage way and we reached the parallel of 2 degrees North.

It was there we sighted the first ship we had seen since Vootgert’s adventure with the Captain’s bath. Only from high aloft was the stranger seen, and it was late afternoon then. Almost a flat calm prevailed, and we spent an anxious night wondering whether she would still be there at daybreak. She was, and appeared even to have drawn nearer. We guessed that she was outward bound although there was nothing other than her enlargement on the horizon to warrant that assumption.

A day later, the ships had closed perceptibly and signals wore exchanged. She was the Mermerus, outward bound, right enough, for Melbourne. The business of flag signaling — that started with such uncommon ardor became a long and exhausting task as we made known our plight. The flags hung limp in the windless air and had to be jiggled and flaunted in the efforts of recognition. It was nearly dark when we were fully understood, and the ships were then over live miles distant.

Darkness or no, we were athirst, and when the Mermerus showed a light in her rigging we lowered and manned the longboat and pushed off to get our drink. The Mate was in charge and we were six oarsmen, but the heavy and leaky old craft — she was used for loading guano at the Chineha Islands and stank of il — taxed all our powers. It was illsitting on the thwarts too, for we had encumbered the boat with the awkward tubs and could find no proper purchase for foot grip as we laid back at the oars. A long back-breaker of a journey! But the Mate was understanding and did not press us. At frequent intervals we lay to—gazing ahead at the lamp that seemed no brighter for all the effort we had made.

2

WE WERE in poor shape when, just before midnight, we paddled wearily alongside the good Samaritan. Captain Cole was he indeed. Our Mate, always to the fore, had his program to advance; but the Captain of the Mermerus would have none of it when, in his cozy cabin, he had one look at us. There was no sign of wind, he said: if it did come, We-ell, he could then work the nearer to our ship. No! His “people” would bail out the longboat and they would also attend to the watering during the nighl. It would be time enough at daybreak for us to return. Meantime —

By all the standards, we should have slept and rested in anticipation of the greater labor on the return journey with the longboat deeper and heavier under her load of fresh water the Captain had promised, but there was little sleep when, after a good meal and water, water, we snuggled down on the main hatch covers under the stars. The activity and excitements of the day, the realization that our plight was at length relieved, promoted a state of wakeful well-being, and that encouraged by the sound of new voices as the crew of the Mermerus gathered around to “pass a word” with us.

There were many words. Although hailing from Greenock on the Clyde, the ship was engaged in the lordly trade between London and Melbourne and was manned largely from Ralchcliffe Highway — and we of the Florence were mainly Scots. But we found at least one compatriot: her carpenter was from Port Glasgow. He was our first visitor, and with him as occasional interpreter we got on famously with the London men. Three of our boatmen were foreigners, shipped under duress at San Francisco. These slept heavily throughout the night, undisturbed by the talk and the laughter, the knocking out of pipes, the striking of matches, that went on from time to time, but with Grainger and me and a Bluenose sailor from Lunenburg the people of the Mermerus could not find enough to say, to discuss, to inquire. The transfer of our precious cargo, completed without haste, was not a task for exhausted boatmen and we were left at liberty to further the friendships we had formed with the men from the Mermerus. Foremost among them, their Scots carpenter strove to make the most of his visit. Quickly he discovered a townsman in our young sailmaker and nolliing could exceed the native dialectics — with the r’s rolling like thunderbursts between them. Although “Sails” was eighteen months from home, he could remember the state of aclivily in the Scottish shipyards and even the names of ships then under construction. But ii was of steamships he spoke, for few if any sailing ships were being built. Such talk led inevitably to condemnation of the new steam seafaring and of those who engaged in it. We had our line conceit, but more than one looked al his bloodied and blistered hands with private reservations.

A ship visit in mid-ocean is sufficiently unusual to arouse interest in any event, and rumor had spread to enlarge our sufferings far beyond the real truth of scarcity and discomfort — but not quite the st ress and agony they presumed. Curiously, there was little argument and no controversy in the babel of talk that was mostly reminiscent. Statements that would have been hotly challenged in a tavern on shore were calmly accepted on the main hatch in 2 degrees North Latitude. We all lied famously concerning the respective merits of our ships, the fast passages they had made, the gales they had encountered. There was little said of the news of the day and happenings ashore. In 1893, Britain stood out peaceful and serene, the embodiment of unchallenged strength and power. It was that way when the ships put to sea, it would be that way when they returned. Of what use to talk about il w hen there was so much to be said of ships and passages, of landfalls and departures — with ever and anon the big Scots carpenter breaking in to ask again what ships were building on the Clyde?

That night on the main hatch of a friendly ship had all the elements of a pleasant dream. I suppose we must have slept at intervals, for I was strangely refreshed. At times, orders sounded out from the poop to haul yards or trim sail to meet some wayward breath of wind, and I found myself, sheepish and but half-awake, tailing on with the people of the Mermerus at brace or halyard in the darkness. But quickly back again to my nest on the hatch cover, to court another cat nap while gazing up at the mastheads and the stars they pointed. It was a pleasant night, for all the distractions and fitful slumbers. Nor was the awakening, when the gray of day came flooding from the eastward, portent of the hard task we had so lightly forgotten in the concert of the night. By some miraculous agency, the ships had closed to a distance of about three miles and the sea was still flat calm.

Under broad of day we sailors so strangely met at sea took stock of one another. In contrast with the cleanly appearance of the London men, we of the Florence, tanned and ragged, stood no comparison at all as we lined the starboard bulwarks to gaze outboard at our ship before spitting on our hands to reach her. It was over a month since wc had had fresh water to indulge even a cal wash; our beards in the interval had grown to Biblical proportions. Only twenty-five days from the Downs, the people of the Mermerus had not lost the landward habit of personal lustration. Ample water supply was available and they had made use of it. But, despite our grimy appearance, we seemed the harder in the grain, and when it was clear that Captain Cole was on the point of enlarging his benefaction by sending away his cutter laden with brimful water barrecas, there seemed the prospect of a tost in that convoy.

As with the men, so with the ships. Around her decks the Mermerus was immaculate in fresh paint and well-stoned planking; even the brace coils were flemished down in readiness for any sudden call to trim the yards: she had an order and formality about her that would not have disgraced a frigate. I could see that our Mate, talking with Captain Cole on the poop, had eyes for all this. He would be thinking of our sorry state and the effort he would have to make to remedy it before the Shore Captain of the City Line, the arbiter of promotion, met the ship at a homeward port. Looking outboard, I could see the dingy red-rusted hull of our shift as she lay, windless and heading southerly in the calm. There was movement on the sea — a long and gentle swell from eastward that swayed her to expose the slimy growt h on her underbody. There and on her weather-beaten topsides she showed the scars of long voyaging, but she swayed buoyant and seaworthy as we viewed her when shoving off from the smooth unblemished plating of the outbound Mermerus.

Any thought we might have had of making a match of the distance was quickly dispelled as we got under way. The longboat was deepened like a dumb barge, and the fulcrum of such a low gunwale was productive of many mis-strokes and feeble puffets. Had she been fitted with outboard crutches, we could have stood upright and facing forward, the way the Latins do, and have made better progress digging our blades deep for purchase. But these had been unshipped long ago and left as jetsam in the Chincha Islands beach. Our hands too, that we had thought hardened by ship labor, proved flabby at the unaccustomed frictions, and painful broken blisters bloodied our palms. No! It was no occasion for friendly competition as the cutter of the Mermerus forged ahead. But she too was burdened, and the flashy stroke at which she passed us was not long maintained. At intervals, growing more frequent as we labored on, a halt was called and we lay within hearing, shouting out catchwords for mutual encouragement. It look over two hours to make the distance, and we were barely able to mount the pilot ladder when we blundered alongside.

The signal of recall was hoisted in their distant ship all too soon, and we cheered them away with hearty thanksgiving. The calm still held, but the slight easterly swell I had remarked at daybreak seemed more pronounced as the cutter left us — bowing to it with a slight upsurge of broken water. The wind could not be far away.

It came in late afternoon, perhaps conjured by the wesling sun. fix rising was not the dramatic glooming of squalls or even an overcast of the unclouded sky. It grew oul of thin air, and in both ships there was much hauling ol yards and trim of sail to capture if. Being to windward, Mermerus was the first to start afoot when there appeared the shadow line on the eastern horizon — the darkling that seamen pray for in light weather. We watched it creep toward her, saw her canvas lift and flutter, then blow a-taut as she backed foreyards to pay off on her southerly course. Soon we too were working ship as the breeze carried down to us and it was no time for sight-seeing. When next I saw her, the Mermerus was leaning away before a fine quarterly wind while we stood full and by towards home.