- end_line
- 4492
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:14.838Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 4426
- text
- CHAPTER XXIV.
HE BEGINS TO HOP ABOUT IN THE RIGGING LIKE A SAINT JAGO’S MONKEY
But we have not got to Liverpool yet; though, as there is little more
to be said concerning the passage out, the Highlander may as well make
sail and get there as soon as possible. The brief interval will perhaps
be profitably employed in relating what progress I made in learning the
duties of a sailor.
After my heroic feat in loosing the main-skysail, the mate entertained
good hopes of my becoming a rare mariner. In the fullness of his heart,
he ordered me to turn over the superintendence of the chicken-coop to
the Lancashire boy; which I did, very willingly. After that, I took
care to show the utmost alacrity in running aloft, which by this time
became mere fun for me; and nothing delighted me more than to sit on
one of the topsail-yards, for hours together, helping Max or the
Greenlander as they worked at the rigging.
At sea, the sailors are continually engaged in _“parcelling,”
“serving,”_ and in a thousand ways ornamenting and repairing the
numberless shrouds and stays; mending sails, or turning one side of the
deck into a rope-walk, where they manufacture a clumsy sort of twine,
called _spun-yarn._ This is spun with a winch; and many an hour the
Lancashire boy had to play the part of an engine, and contribute the
motive power. For material, they use odds and ends of old rigging
called _“junk,”_ the yarns of which are picked to pieces, and then
twisted into new combinations, something as most books are
manufactured. This “junk” is bought at the junk shops along the
wharves; outlandish looking dens, generally subterranean, full of old
iron, old shrouds, spars, rusty blocks, and superannuated tackles; and
kept by villainous looking old men, in tarred trowsers, and with yellow
beards like oakum. They look like wreckers; and the scattered goods
they expose for sale, involuntarily remind one of the sea-beach,
covered with keels and cordage, swept ashore in a gale.
Yes, I was now as nimble as a monkey in the rigging, and at the cry of
_“tumble up there, my hearties, and take in sail,” I_ was among the
first ground-and-lofty tumblers, that sprang aloft at the word.
But the first time we reefed top-sails of a dark night, and I found
myself hanging over the yard with eleven others, the ship plunging and
rearing like a mad horse, till I felt like being jerked off the spar;
then, indeed, I thought of a feather-bed at home, and hung on with
tooth and nail; with no chance for snoring. But a few repetitions, soon
made me used to it; and before long, I tied my reef-point as quickly
and expertly as the best of them; never making what they call a
_“granny-knot,”_ and slipt down on deck by the bare stays, instead of
the shrouds. It is surprising, how soon a boy overcomes his timidity
about going aloft. For my own part, my nerves became as steady as the
earth’s diameter, and I felt as fearless on the royal yard, as Sam
Patch on the cliff of Niagara. To my amazement, also, I found, that
running up the rigging at sea, especially during a squall, was much
easier than while lying in port. For as you always go up on the
windward side, and the ship leans over, it makes more of a _stairs_ of
the rigging; whereas, in harbor, it is almost straight up and down.
Besides, the pitching and rolling only imparts a pleasant sort of
vitality to the vessel; so that the difference in being aloft in a ship
at sea, and a ship in harbor, is pretty much the same, as riding a real
live horse and a wooden one. And even if the live charger should pitch
you over his head, _that_ would be much more satisfactory, than an
inglorious fall from the other.
I took great delight in furling the top-gallant sails and royals in a
hard blow; which duty required two hands on the yard.
- title
- Chunk 1