Under Sail 19

Under Sail 19

Captain Nichols came aboard with the port warden, and the top layer

of cargo was examined. We carried a hundred tons of blacksmith coal on

top of a general cargo, the coal being separated from what was below

by old canvas and tarpaulins. One of the inspectors jumped down and

tasted the coal for salt. Indeed it would have been mighty hard to

tell whether the cargo had been damaged or not and, in a way, it was a

bit of strategy on the part of the South Street stevedores. After some

discussion, the state of things seemed to pass muster, and a great many

smart looking young men from the offices of the agent came down and

looked over the ship. Most of them carried papers of some sort, and

in their white duck trousers and their fancy silk shirts, brilliant

neckties, and spotless shoes, we seemed to behold some favored species.

No doubt they looked at us too, though without interest, we being

merely a lot of lean and leathery deepwater sailors dressed in common

dungaree.

 

The captain himself was no slouch when it came to dressing and on this

occasion he upheld the dignity of the ship, and the great American

Merchant Service, by sporting a wine colored cutaway suit. His shoes

were shined like the galley stove on a Sunday afternoon, and his heavy

watch chain and fob dangled across his vest, which was buttoned to

the very top in spite of the heat. Of course he wore a boiled shirt,

and his black derby was of a square topped model, conservative and

dignified.

 

Inspection over and the island steamer out of our berth at the Brewer

Wharf, we cast off and again warped our ship across the harbor. This

took up the remainder of the first day. The boss stevedore came aboard

and we learned that the crew was to work aboard ship, breaking out and

slinging the cargo. The "hatch man" and the "dolly man" were to be

natives of the shore gang; two important posts, as upon them depended

largely the speed of unloading.

 

[Illustration: AT BREWER'S WHARF]

 

Word was passed forward that the captain would allow those of us who

wished to, to draw against their pay on Saturday afternoon. In the

meantime, it being Wednesday, we were alongside and free to explore

the city in so far as such investigation could be carried on without

the expenditure of coin. However we found the Chinamen ready to take

"chits" for modest amounts.

 

After pumping out, and before knocking off for supper, the mate called

Charlie Horse aft and appointed him night watchman. He was delighted

with this billet, and except for a good deal of grumbling about not

being told earlier and having a chance to get some sleep in the

afternoon, he was well pleased. Charlie Horse had once been mate on

a schooner, a fact that he never allowed us to forget, much to the

amusement of such men as Australia and Hitchen. Jimmy Marshall resented

all mention of it and more than once made cracks about the kind of

"schooner" Charlie Horse was most familiar with. Charlie Horse, and

no one ever forgot the Horse part of his name, which I believe was

Horstman or something like that, never ventured an opinion without a

great deal of deliberation, a trait that has much to recommend it,

especially when at times he was referred to during heated arguments.

 

The long night shifts in Honolulu were well suited for one inclined to

secluded thinking and deep contemplation. Besides this, Charlie Horse

was to have the laugh on us after our second night in port.

 

That first blessed night of supreme rest while our ship lay in the

stream, swept by a cool sea breeze, was followed by a sweltering night

of discontent. Most of us turned in early, after a short stroll ashore,

and in our ignorance of the customs of the place, slumbered in innocent

exhaustion without a thought of the perils of the night.

 

Parts of New Jersey and Long Island are noted for their mosquitoes.

Alaska is also somewhat remembered on this account by unfortunates who

have summered along the southern shores, but Honolulu in the historic

year 1898 could boast of one of the most vicious swarms of torturers

lining the shores of the seven seas. We were ripe for them, our skins

spiced with the salt horse and pea soup fluid that coursed through our

veins. We were tired from the labors of the day, and slumbered unmoved

while the enemy put all that was exposed of us to the bayonet. I lay

stripped in my bunk gasping for breath, and in the morning found I was

a mass of bumps, red and unsightly. The next day the china merchants

along Nuuanu Street did a big business in mosquito bars, supplying

us on the strength of our "chits" after the captain had verified the

statement that each man was to be paid five dollars, on account, at the

end of the week.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER XIV

 

UNLOADING--WITH A BIT OF POLITICS

 

 

All hands working together made us better acquainted with the men of

the starboard watch. Axel and I developed a lasting friendship, and

of course Old Smith joined the higher councils of our watch. Hitchen

and Mike and Tommy proved to be a great team of kidders, and with

Australia, of our side, formed a dandy quartette, singing such old

time favorites as "Tom Bowling" and "All in the Downs." Hitchen, a

very superior sort of sailor, an Englishman, reticent about himself,

but a volume of information about the ports of the world, was a great

addition to our life aboard. In fact the men of both watches were sea

worn and tired of each other, and we welcomed the new contact with our

shipmates. Add to this the unusual sights of the shore and the fresh

provisions, as well as the possibility for rational sleep, and sailors

will know what I mean when I say that we were a very happy lot of men

aboard the _Fuller_.

 

Scouse had a large mouth organ, "Made in Germany," a gaudy tin affair

well fitted for his capacious maw. Tony had an accordion, and no one

could deny that we were a lively crowd forward. On the other hand the

people aft were shrouded in gloom. The mate lived very much alone and

Captain Nichols was separated by more than a bulkhead from his first

officer. Chips was also a lonesome figure, dining in dreary state at

the second table. Tommy said that since the second mate had gone, the

Jap boy felt it beneath his dignity to wait on Chips, and the lanky

carpenter found the table set with all that he was to have at one load,

soup, meat, dessert, etc. "I wisht they'd let me at it once," said Joe,

his mouth watering at the mention of dessert.

 

The second mate did not return on board the night following his racket

with the mate, and we were in hopes he would quit the ship. Our wishes

were realized, for the afternoon of the second day in port, while

we were in the midst of breaking out the coal in the main hatch,

Mr. Stoddard came to the coaming and looked down on the grimy crowd

shoveling coal. He carried a dilapidated satchel and had evidently been

paid off by the skipper.

 

"So long, you dirty bums!" he called down, sending a squirt of tobacco

juice into the midst of the coal-dust and sweat-covered gang.

 

Tony, who was in the hatch, dropped his round-nosed shovel, and picking

up a lump of coal hove it at Mr. Stoddard, just missing him as he

dodged back from the coaming.

 

"Wait until I get you ashore, you dirty ---- ---- ---- ----," shouted

our ex-officer, shaking his fist at the hatch as he ran over the

gangway.

 

"Thank heaven he's gone," I remarked to Frenchy, both of us looking

down at the play from our perch on the fore tops'l yard where we were

unreeving the downhauls.

 

"A good thing he's done with us, and the ship saves thirty dollars a

month while we are in port," was Frenchy's wise comment.

 

That night Tony and Tommy went ashore for the purpose of finding Mr.

Stoddard and beating him up. The ex-second mate was boarding in a

Chinese house in Beretania Street, according to reports from some of

the Kanakas, and the two avengers trailed him from that place to the

Criterion saloon.

 

The true story of what happened was long obscured, for both Tony and

Tommy came aboard very late and turned in refusing to say anything

until the next morning, when they were given the third degree by

the exacting masters of fo'c'sle affairs in the persons of Jimmy and

Australia.

 

The stories did not tally and for a long time it was thought that Mr.

Stoddard had given them more than they counted on. The truth came out

when Chips told the yarn to some cronies on the beach. It seems that

Mr. Stoddard met Tony and Tommy as he was leaving the saloon. Their

determined manner, and clenched fists, at once warned him of trouble.

With a knowledge of sailor psychology, nothing short of masterly, he

advanced toward them in true "come on" style, greeting them with a

warmth of cordiality entirely unexpected, and a moment later Tony and

Tommy were with him at the bar drinking imported beer at two bits a

glass, and wondering how they had ever been so mistaken in him.

 

No doubt Mr. Stoddard would have got his licking had he remained in

port, but we learned that he shipped before the mast on the bark _W. H.

Dimond_ bound for San Francisco.

 

A day at the coal got us rid of that objectionable part of the cargo,

and when we took up the tarpaulins we found a large consignment of

case oil filling most of the 'tween decks. Case oil, let it be known,

is kerosene in large square cans, packed two in a case, and nicely

calculated as to weight so that a good husky sailor man can just about

lift one of them without straining himself too much. However, I can

vouch for the fact that these cases are very hard to handle and get

heavier and heavier as the exercise is continued.

 

The stevedores ashore, so we learned later, were Republicans, a jolly

lot of progressive Kanakas, demons for work and constantly chattering

like crazy brown magpies. On the other hand, the donkey crew, the

man at the dolly, and the hatch man, a lively Kanaka named Nigger,

were Royalists of the bluest strain compatible with their swarthy

complexions. The Royalists did their level best to send the case oil

out on the wharf so fast that the lowly Republicans could not handle

it. Below decks, in the stifling heat, we labored in gangs, running the

cases to the square of the hatch from two sides, while Old Smith and

Frenchy adjusted the slings about the stacks of twelve cases and up

they would shoot. It seemed that the cargo hook was constantly dangling

in the hatch like a hungry black worm while that demon Nigger raised a

hell of sweat and hurry with his constant shouting to "_Hook her up!

Hook her up!_" and every few minutes the mate would bend over the

hatch and roar down his bit of encouragement.

 

My job was to help hand the cases down from the tiers, lifting them to

small trucks upon which we rushed them to the hatch opening. A half day

of this exertion found us pretty well blown, and when the noon whistle

sounded over the harbor we got on deck, bolted our dinner and stretched

out on anything that was handy and relaxed. Some of the boys slept, but

I was too sore to sleep and had a feeling that it was better to stay

awake, anyhow, as the rest would seem longer.

 

When we turned to at one o'clock the gang on the wharf started to howl

defiance at Nigger and his men, and the cruel ball began again with the

mate, as king driver, egging along the performance. Being rid of the

second mate and with the captain ashore, he was thoroughly enjoying

himself.

 

The cases of oil were hard to grab hold of, and as I have said, got

heavier and heavier as the weary day advanced. Cursing and sweating in

hot 'tween deck, we strove like mad to keep up our end of the fight.

 

"Don't let them niggers beat us," shouted Brenden, as he dug in with

renewed energy, the sweat dripping into his eyes as he began slinging

down the cases like a madman.

 

"The dirty black bastards!" shouted Jimmy. "I hopes they croaks afore I

sees the last o' this place."

 

By the time the afternoon was half over my arms and back were numb with

pain. I had ceased to sweat and every effort was made by super-force

of will. We were red-eyed with the labor and the heat; swearing had

ceased, and we plugged along doggedly as the damnable Nigger kept up

his constant bawling to "_Hook her up!_" or "_Liki! Liki!_" (meaning"the same").