Captain Lanagan's Log: passages in the life of a merchant skipper, etc

Chapter I. Page

Salt-water Fever — Visions of Captain Baston— I run away to sea 1

Chapter II

i On board the Rover — The real Captain Baston — Fascinated by the mate — First blood — " So help me, James ! " — The convict crew — A wordy war — " Melbourne in eighty days " 0

Chapter VI. Pick

I desert from the Rover — Sad end of Captain Baston — I pass for mate and go home— O'Shaugnessy the shipowner — I join the Faugh-a-Ballagh — MacAuliffe again — The rocky road to Dublin — The skipper invites me ashore . . . .68

Chapter X

Music and dancing — The injured ham — A midnight ride — The prize watchman — I get a fright and steal pork — Thrown off a side-car — My medical advisers — Warned against pork and horses . . 112

Chapter XXVII

The skipper of the lost brig — Farewell to Fogarty — I make a journey by land — A heart-breaking sight — Welcomed by MacAuliffe — I am fairly bewildered ........ LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Fogarty's raft ...... Frontispiece The sea serpent To face page 5 "Stop that larking " „ . 9 Captain Baston on the warpath . . ,, . 59 The mutiny „ . 65 MacAuliffe again . . . . . . ,, . 75 The dry-goods' man . . . . . ,, . 91 The shipping-master .....,,. 149 My medical adviser „ 165 The sea-sick bo'sun ,, • 175 A beautiful sailor man .....,,. 223 " Smoked Irishmen '' . . . . „ . STORIES BY THE AUTHOR OF "CAPTAIN LANAGAN'S LOG." BRAYHARD : The Strange Adventures of One Ass and Seven Champions. Illustrated by Hakbt Fckniss. 2s. 6d. FROM THE GREEN BAG. Is. THE VOYAGE OF THE ARK. Is. THROUGH GREEN GLASSES. 3s. 6d. & Is.

IN ONE TOWN: A Story of a Seaport. 2s. ANCHOR WATCH YARNS : Pictures of Life in the Coasting Trade. Illustrated by M. Fitzgerald. 3s. 6d. A HOUSE OF TEARS. Is. CAPTAIN LANAGAN'S LOG.

Chapter I

Salt-water Fever — Visions of Captain Baston — I run away to sea. What made me join the sea ? I'll tell you, then. Like most boys who take to the water at an early age I thought I wasn't too comfortable at home, and believed the fo'c'sle or the foretop was the proper place for freedom, independence, adventure — everything that a youngster of fourteen has fond and foolish notions of. 'Tis mighty odd, too, when I come to look back upon it, that my first voyage didn't completely knock the taste for salt water out of me — but it didn't. Strangely enough, it scarcely ever does. No matter what hardships, dangers, difficulties, heart-scaldings, cruelties a boy endures in the start, it doesn't drive the love of the sea out of him B Captain Lanagan1 s Log. 2 once the fever gets a proper grip of him in the start.

Anyhow, to tell you about my first voyage : I suppose I wasn't a particularly tractable lad, but parents have sometimes a habit of expecting too much from a youth, especially if he happens to be an unremuuerative member of a large family. I suppose I got reading stories about the sea, and I know all the spare moments I could steal would find me listening to the wisdom that fell from the mouths of any of the old tars or long-shore folk that infested our quays at the time. I used to hear a good deal of a certain Captain Baston, who was in the Australian trade. He was seemingly regarded on all sides as the most daring, most powerful, most reckless skipper that ever crossed the line, doubled the Capes, took the sun, or did any other thing that fired the foolish imagi nation of a youthful land-lubber.

I used to picture Captain Baston to myself as a man who, ashore, was the pink of perfection, in regard of clothes — black frock coat, white shirt front blazing with diamonds, check trousers, coloured silk waist coat, and all surmounted by a silk hat that shone Captain Lanagaii s Log. 3 until it was dangerous to look at it for fear of a sunstroke. Of course I pictured him on board his ship in quite a different rig : crimson shirt, wide duck trousers fringed with daggers and revolvers, a Panama hat, and an eternal cigar as he paced the quarter-deck with all the proud majesty of a tiger in a travelling menagerie. His face used to be a sort of kaleidoscopic arrangement. Sometimes I used to fancy him as a man with beautiful, delicately cut nose, fine oval brow, a black moustache, and a chin pointed like that of a Spanish hidalgo in a picture gallery.

At another time I saw a repulsive, ferocious-looking monster, with a face as hairy as a fox, and eyes that glittered with the malice of a professional pirate — but whether I pictured him as devil or saint, as a tailor's dummy or a farmer's scarecrow, I felt that he was possessed of qualities of daring and prowess which made him a king among long-shoremen — a viking of the deep. I fear I'm beginning already to talk like a dime novel, and bore you with the day-dreams of a foolish young brat. So let me tackle my story — if I can call it a story — in a more straightforward and ship-shape fashicn. B Captain Lanagaiis Log. 4 One day, as I strolled down to the quays in my native town, St. John, I fell in with an old tar, who did odd jobs occasionally in the way of picking up sailors. " I say, young shaver," said he, "would you like to go a voyage in one of the finest ships afloat — plenty to eat and drink, lots of fun and adventure, and the bravest skipper that ever chewed a quid of tobacco — Captain Baston V I was struck all of a heap with the offer — I was only a fourteen-year-old colt then — and tremblingly asked for time to consider the matter.

" No time like the present, my boy," said the old chap. " Make up your mind to see Australia inside of four months; and have your bundle on board of the Rover by daybreak to-morrow — that is, if you'll take a friend's advice. I'm speaking for your good, my boy," continued the old tar — " 'tisn't every day a youngster like you gets the chance of joining such a ship and such a Captain." After some more parleying I made up my mind to accept the old sea-serpent's proposal, and to run away to sea. I expect if the real and original Serpent couldn't IHE SEA SERPEXT. Page 5. Captain Lanagaii s Log. 5 have tempted Eve with the apples he'd have tried to lead Adam astray (while he was a boy, of course) by showing him a f ull-i-igged ship, under all plain sail, with the sun glancing along her spars. Anyway, I got up pretty early next morning, and, putting a few odds and ends of clothes into a bundle, I stole out of the house and made my way for the quays, where I found my tempter.

He called me a good boy, and prophesied an excellent career for me in the maritime world. "To be struck under Captain Baston," said he, " is a thing any young fellow in the world might well be proud of, even if he were the only son of the Governor of the Dominion ! "

Chapter II

On board the Rover— The real Captain Baston— Fascinatrd by the mate — First blood— " So help me, James ! " — The convict crew — A wordy war — " Melbourne in eighty days." We g-ot down to the Hover in a small boat soon after daybreak. She was lying down the stream in a sheltered corner waiting for a crew. I learned from my old friend, the amateur shipping master, that the barque had sought her present anchorage owing to a row with the crew, aud that Captain Baston had sent them ashore and engaged fresh hands. It wasn't long until I was on the Rover's deck — or rather on the top of the deck-load — for her decks were packed with deals almost from stem to stern. I was taken, somewhat roughly it seemed to me, to the cabin by the old tar who had engaged me, and I soon found myself standing in front of the hero of my imagination.

I was terribly disappointed iu the man. He was neither old nor young, neither a dandy nor a scarecrow ; and to look at him quietly and unostenta tiously munching a junk of bread and butter and drinking coffee one couldn't fancy he had the pluck to be a devil, or the inclination to be a demigod. His face was certainly remarkably hairy — in fact he seemed all hairs except for the carefully-shaved upper lip. His arms were long, his nose flat, and his chest measurement would, I have no doubt, astonish any ordinary tailor or recruiting sergeant. His eyes were grey and leadeny ; but, as I found out later on, the leaden hue could vanish and a gleam like forked-lightning take its place. I was awfully disappointed, and no mistake, as I stared for the first time at Captain Baston ; but if I wasn't attracted by the skipper, I must confess I felt a holy and a wholesome thrill of admiration and terror as I gazed at the first mate — a young man of about twenty-five, a trifle short of six feet high, jet black hair and neatly-trimmed moustache, hooked nose, well-fitting clothes, and an eye like the eye of a hawk.

" Say, Tom," said Captain Baston familiarly addressing the first mate, who was also seated Captain Lanagaii s Log. at the long cabin table, coffee-drinking — " say, Tom, when are our new bauds to come aboard ? ' " There is one of them at your elbow," answered the mate — very saucily, it seemed to me. " Oh, the kid ! " growled Captain Baston, turning round and staring somewhat vacantly at myself and my introducer, both silent and caps in hand. "He'd best remain aft, anyhow, until this breeze blows over." What breeze the skipper was alluding to I could not guess, as it was perfectly calm when I came on board, and mighty cold, too, for the middle of April. " The other chaps ought to be here inside an hour," said the mate after a brief pause. " Well," said the skipper, " we may as well send old ' Shiver-the-Wind ' " (pointing to my shipping master, who bowed as if he was worked by springs or strings) "ashore; aud let us clear the decks for action."

So the old man was paid his fee, and, shaking me by the hand, and bowing most profoundly to Captain Baston, he edged himself backwards through the cabin door. TOP THAT LARKING Page I cannot well describe my feelings as I found myself alone with the two strange men, the last link in the home cable — I mean the old tar — cut. If I could have summoned up sufficient courage to bolt from the cabin and jump into the boat and get home perhaps I'd never have smelt salt water professionally,but I couldn't summon up the courage. I stood quaking, and with a peculiar sinking feeling all over my young carcase and a swelling in the throat which seemed about to choke me right off. I did my level best to pull myself together, but all to no purpose ; and in a few moments I suddenly burst out into a fit of sobbing and crying.

The mate, who had apparently been lost in thought, jumped to his feet at the sound of my sobs, came round by the back of Captain Baston's seat like a cat pouncing on a mouse, and gave me an unmerciful box on the les t ear, which sent me flying across the cabin. " Knock off your darned sniggering," he cried, as I rose to my feet. " It won't do iu this ship, you'd best believe." " Let me go ! Let me go home!" I bawled, infuriated with rage and pain. Captain Lanagatis Log. 10 " Let you go home ? " echoed the mate, with the laugh that would remind one of a hyena. "Yes, sonny," giving me a cuff on the right ear which again sent me flying across the cabin. " That's tho road home. There's luck in odd numbers," he continued, following me up. " Here's a sugar stick for you ! " And as I rose to my feet, he let fly a kick at me, which sent me right between Captain Baston's legs under the table.

The worthy skipper had been lost in a reverie, I suppose, while I was being flung about the cabin, for all he said was: "Stop that larking, Tom." Then finding that poor half-stunned me was rather in the way of his legs, he kicked me — not at all viciously — out on the cabin floor. " Bless my soul ! " he cried, opening wide his sleepy-looking eyes and staring down atop of me. " What have you been doing to the kid ? He's bleeding like a pig." Here he rose, and, stooping-, picked me off the floor as if he were lifting a kitten by the nape of the neck. " Serve him right ! " growled the handsome I 11 young mate. "We're not in the blubber business." " No, it don't serve him right," said Captain Baston, in a tone of voice I hadn't heard before. "Kicked him, you devil!" he hissed. "Now look here," he cried huskily — the variations in the skipper's voice were most astonishing — "you kick no more hoys aboard of my ship.

You hear that order, don't you, Tom MacAuliffe ? Kick no more boys — kick your own sort. D'ye hear me ? " he bellowed with sudden energy, and in .a tone that meant " I want an answer." "I hear you all right," growled Handsome Face. " Well, heed me too," bellowed Captain Baston, " or so help me, James ! " (he invariably, as I found afterwards, swore by this special saint when he was in a regular tearing rage) "you'll have to reckon with me, my son. — No, boy," he went on, addressing me, and staunching the blood that flowed from my temple, " we don't kick kids here. We kick men. We knock fits out of men, we do ; but we never kick boys." Here the worthy skipper gave a low unintel ligible growl and resumed his seat. There was dead silence in the cabin for several minutes after this ; and, with a handkerchief bound tightly round my temples, I was standing alongside Captain Baston, trembling in every limb.

" What's the exact muster aft ? " asked the skipper, as quietly as if he was addressing a Collector of Customs. " Five and the kid," answered the mate. " There's you and me, sir, the second mate, the carpenter, and the bo'sun." " All aboard and ready for action," asked the skipper, "and no one inclined to hang back ? " " All aboard and all square," answered the mate curtly. " Well, go out and receive your new crew ou deck," said Captain Baston. " I hear the clank of oars approaching us," — placing one hand behind a large flat ear. The mate started uneasily, and imitating his superior's attitude, muttered : "All right, sir. Shall I bring 'em aft ? " " Yes ; and mind you don't unshackle them. Rouse up the carpenter and the rest of our after guard, and let 'em all come here." When the mate had disappeared from the cabin Captain Baston turned to me, and, in a very mild voice, told me to be of good cheer ; he would see that the mate didn't try any further "larking" with me.

" 'Tis only his fun, you know," smiled the skipper — a pleasant smile that seemed to open his great mouth from ear to ear. " He's a devil, a born devil — but a grand sailor man, and no mistake." When I told him I was very much frightened, and that it was my first trip to sea, the skipper lifted one of his long arms, and tendei'ly laid his enormous hand on my head. "Poor little chap!" he sighed. "But don't be uneasy. I'll look after you. If Tom MacAuliffe starts any larking with you, come and tell me. I was always a father to my boys. Take heart, youngster, take heart ; and always take me properly. You should just have seen," he went on, by way of encouragement, no doubt, "the condition of the crew I put ashore here day before yesterday. Ribs, thigh bones, skulls, arms, — everything carried away — a regular mass of wreckage, and all because they wouldn't take me properly.

Smashed 'em all up we did ; and so we will the crowd that's coming now, if they don't take me properly. I only want sair treatment," explained the skipper ; " but fair treatment I must have, and discipline too. I give 'em fits, I do, if they try to lark with me ; but we don't hurt kiddies here. No, never, so help me, James ! " Here he came down a bang on the cabin table with his "Teat fist that sent the coffee mugs dancing jigs. When the noise he had created had subsided. Captain Baston turned his head quickly to one side, and then placed a hand behind his left ear — his hearing was wonderfully acute. " Hear that, my son ? " he cried ; and as I strained my ears I heard what seemed like the rattling of small chains. "Clank! clank! There you go!" chuckled Captain Baston. " Beauties, I have no doubt !

There you go ! Down among the deals ! Broke his leg may be. What odds ! Rouse him up again. A good drive from behind. No matter if he's scraped bis shin. Clank ! clank ! That's your sort. Beauties ! " There was a gleam cf delight in his eyes as he went on in this way, his hand still behind his ear. I didn't well know what to make of the whole business ; and most of my attention was occupied in watching Captain Baston's gestures. The sound of clanking chains now grew more distinct, and in a few moments the first mate entered the cabin, followed by twelve most awful looking creatures, all chained together in pairs by the legs and handcuffed likewise. After these twelve shaven and shorn convicts (or whatever they were) came the rest ofthe crew of the Rover — the second mate, carpenter, and bo'sun — big boned men all of them.

" Bring me the articles, Mr. Mate," said Captain Baston, " and place our twelve fo'c'sle hands round the table. By-the-way, where are the water police ? " " Gone back, sir," answered the mate ; " and glad to be clear of this crowd at any price," point ings to the handcuffed men. " Beauties, every mother's son of them ! " smiled Captain Baston, surveying the new hands as if they were entries at a barmaid show. I had now time to examine quietly the faces of the twelve new chums, three of them full-blooded Captain Lanagan s Log. negroes ; and certainly they were an evil-looking lot. It may have been the rags which covered, or rather didn't quite cover them, or the shaven heads ; but whatever it was, it was hard to look at them without a horribly uneasy feeling — at least, for a little kiddy like me.

The mate brought up the ship's articles as I stood transfixed, gaping at the twelve sailors round the table ; and he didn't fail to arouse me with a vicious pinch, which I bore without a squirm. " All hands here ? " shouted Captain Baston, running his eye over the articles which the twelve new hands had sigued in gaol the previous day. " All, sir," replied the mate. " I'll call you one by one, and let each answer to his name." When the operation was over, and each man had gruffly answered "here" to his name, the skipper turned to me and said : " Youngster, you sio-n here and make one of this distinguished company. What's your name ? Eh ! Luke Lanagan ? Irish I'll be bound. No ? " — as I scrawled my sio-nature hurriedly on the line which the first mate pointed out, and put down my place of birth.

Then Captain Baston apparently forgot my existence altogether, and, standing up, he addressed the crew in a voice that sounded as if he was speaking through a foghorn. "Now, my men," bellowed the skipper, " I have a few important words to say to you. All of you know me, I make no doubt ; and such of you as I don't know by sight I know by reputation, and a damnder set of scoundrels it would be hard to find, ashore or afloat. You twelve fellows in irons have been doing a spell in gaol for mutiny, and if you didn't murder poor old Captain Black right out, it was none of your fault : I'll give you that much credit. When I parted with my crew the day before yesterday I heard that you were trying to prove yourselves the terror of the gaol ashore, and that you boast you are the terror of the seas ; that no skipper dare get up and ask you to go aloft when you want to remain below.

When I heard this my blood got up to boiling point, and before it cooled down again I waited on the governor of the gaol, and offered to take you on board of the c Rover — lock, stock, and barrel. That's how you're here. I've got you, the whole twelve of you; and I hope we'll have a good time of it. What I want out of you is work and discipline — discipline and work — that's all. Do your work, and do as you're told, and you'll be well fed on board of the Rover, and no questions asked. But," — and here Captain Baston opened his mouth wide and gave vent to a short sigh, and lowered the pitch of his voice con siderably — "don't work, don't obey orders, give sauce to your superiors, aud you'll find we'll knock the stuffing out of you. That's fair and square, ain't it ? There's only five of us aft, but you'll find — and mark me well, that us five "^here he lifted his voice again — " can let the daylight into you twelve.

Any man who doesn't go aloft when he gets his orders I'll give him a taste of a handspike, if I'm within call, that'll rattle him along in fine style ; if I'm not handy, one of the mates will be. If it comes to knives or firearms we're your men here aft. YTou can have fight how you like, when you like, and where you like. If you decide for peace and quietness you can have it, and welcome. If you want the other thing you can have it, and welcome. Only make up your minds now and let us get to work. I'm a plain, straight man who keeps his word. If you want peace you can have it : if you want blue murder you can have it. — Knock off the leg shackles, carpenter ; open those bracelets, Mr. Mate. Now, then, say your minds, my bullies ! " Fora few moments the twelve men made no offer to reply to the skipper's tornado of a speech.

A few of them conversed together in whispers, and there seemed to be a tacit understanding that one of them — perhaps the ugliest and biggest of the crowd — was to do all the talking. Captain Baston saw this. " You're Jack Nagle," said he, eyeing the man curiously. " Well, Nagle, what have you got to say for yourself and your comrades, my son ? " " Cap'n," said Nagle, squaring himself, " what we've got to say is this. We're fairly shanghied aboard of this ship, and, as men, we object to that on principle, to start with. Then we're down at certain wages and on certain terms that, maybe, don't suit us. I won't say they do and I won't say they don't ; but on principle we object. There c isn't one amongst us selected for aft, but we're all going to be thrown into the fo'c'sle without a word of apology, and to that we object on principle.

If you know me, Captain Baston, you know I have got a first mate's ticket; and what we've got to say is this : my crowd is willing to sail square with you if you send one of your aft hands for'a'd and make me, on principle, your second mate." "I'd see you damned first, on principle," said Captain Baston. " Now, look you here, Mr. Sea Lawyer, I have given you a long spell to explain yourself and to give me an answer — a plain answer to a straightforward question ; instead of which you heave a lot of rubbishing jaw at me, and wind up by having the cheek to ask me to make an officer of you — you, who haven't got the motion of the treadmill out of your sea legs yet! All I want to know is, are you and your crowd going to arrange for peace and quietness, or for the other thing? That's all. It makes no difference to me."

The new hands looked woefully disappointed ; but they seemed to vote for peace and quietness, all but Jack Nagle, who, with the face of a perfect demon, stood facing Captain Baston, making gestures to his companions to say nothing " Come, answer the question, meu ! " bellowed the skipper. " Just one word," gasped Nagle, stretching out his hand. "Not a syllable from you" said the skipper. " Answer me as men to men, not on principle. What's your idea of the sort of voyage it would be best for all hands to make — Melbourne peaceably aud quietly in eighty days, or — ? " There was a quick movement among the men at the words, and a cheer, that half astonished and quite terrified me, rang through the cabin : — " Melbourne in eighty days ! " was the chorus from all sides ; and the faces of the whole crew were more like those of men stricken with the gold fever than the faces of a dozen very ordinary seamen.

It was the Melbourne in eighty days — the break ing of all previous records — that fired them ; and every man was cheerful-looking now as he spoke to his neighbour ; all but Jack Nagle, who had gone back from the table and was leaning in a corner, biting his yellow thumb-nail, and looking daggers at Captain Baston.

Chapter III

The anchor's weighed — Characteristics of Captain Baston — A storm brewing — The skipper applies a poultice — Quadrant and logarithms — How to box the compass. Well, we got to sea right enough that eventful day, for me ; and it was certainly a marvel to a greenhorn that the new hands fresh from gaol settled down to their work so quietly. We had some pretty heavy weather after getting clear of the Bay of Fundy ; but I was not long shipmates with Captain Baston before I learned that wind and weather had few terrors for him. Sails or spars he was, perhaps, a bit careful of in extra bad weather, but he certainly didn't spare his men. When the mates were tired of rousing the crew about Captain Baston used to take a spell of it himself. The only heed he ever paid to a growl was to give the growler a swinging blow of his great fist, or, if the man was out of reach of his fist at the moment, to fling a handspike or a capstan bar, or a bucket, or anything hard and handy at the offender.

He never spared himself, I must allow. Some skippers are free enough at working their crew all to pieces, and mighty shy of giving themselves any inconvenience or trouble, but the master of the Rarer wasn't one of that sort. He never even gave himself time for a proper sleep ; at least I, who lived aft, scarcely ever saw my skipper in his bunk. I often found him dosing in the cabin on a bench or a locker, but it was a dose a weasel might envy. " Who's that ? " he would cry in the middle of a heavy snore. Once I saw my beauty, the mate, creep into the cabin, and steal up noiselessly towards the skipper's state-room. It was dusk at the time, and I was doing up the cabin-lamp in my own room, which was a small rookery off the cabin. " Who's there ? I suddenly heard the skipper growl, as the mate approached.

"It's me, sir," answered the mate in a low husky voice. " All right, my son," snored Captain Baston. ,: Try her a point and a half more to the east'ard." " Ay, ay, sir," answered the mate ; and then I heard him hiss out an oath, as he crept from the cabin as noiselessly as he had entered it. My feelings towards the mate had gradually altered. The moment I first laid eyes on him I couldn't say whether terror or admiration was the feeling uppermost. After his brutal treatment of me I knew pretty well it was unadulterated terror. When we were a couple of weeks at sea the terror had developed into hatred ; the fellow seemed afraid to kick or cuff me, searing it would get to the skipper's ears, but I could often see by the gleam in his eyes that he'd give half a month's wages to make a football of me for about ten minutes.