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- 2026-01-30T20:48:36.270Z
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- ship, and so proved himself that night. I owe this right hand, that is
this moment flying over my sheet, and all my present being to Mad Jack.
The ship’s bows were now butting, battering, ramming, and thundering
over and upon the head seas, and with a horrible wallowing sound our
whole hull was rolling in the trough of the foam. The gale came athwart
the deck, and every sail seemed bursting with its wild breath.
All the quarter-masters, and several of the forecastle-men, were
swarming round the double-wheel on the quarter-deck. Some jumping up
and down, with their hands upon the spokes; for the whole helm and
galvanised keel were fiercely feverish, with the life imparted to them
by the tempest.
“Hard _up_ the helm!” shouted Captain Claret, bursting from his cabin
like a ghost in his night-dress.
“Damn you!” raged Mad Jack to the quarter-masters; “hard down—hard
_down_, I say, and be damned to you!”
Contrary orders! but Mad Jack’s were obeyed. His object was to throw
the ship into the wind, so as the better to admit of close-reefing the
top-sails. But though the halyards were let go, it was impossible to
clew down the yards, owing to the enormous horizontal strain on the
canvas. It now blew a hurricane. The spray flew over the ship in
floods. The gigantic masts seemed about to snap under the world-wide
strain of the three entire top-sails.
“Clew down! clew down!” shouted Mad Jack, husky with excitement, and in
a frenzy, beating his trumpet against one of the shrouds. But, owing to
the slant of the ship, the thing could not be done. It was obvious that
before many minutes something must go—either sails, rigging, or sticks;
perhaps the hull itself, and all hands.
Presently a voice from the top exclaimed that there was a rent in the
main-top-sail. And instantly we heard a report like two or three
muskets discharged together; the vast sail was rent up and down like
the Vail of the Temple. This saved the main-mast; for the yard was now
clewed down with comparative ease, and the top-men laid out to stow the
shattered canvas. Soon, the two remaining top-sails were also clewed
down and close reefed.
Above all the roar of the tempest and the shouts of the crew, was heard
the dismal tolling of the ship’s bell—almost as large as that of a
village church—which the violent rolling of the ship was occasioning.
Imagination cannot conceive the horror of such a sound in a
night-tempest at sea.
“Stop that ghost!” roared Mad Jack; “away, one of you, and wrench off
the clapper!”
But no sooner was this ghost gagged, than a still more appalling sound
was heard, the rolling to and fro of the heavy shot, which, on the
gun-deck, had broken loose from the gun-racks, and converted that part
of the ship into an immense bowling-alley. Some hands were sent down to
secure them; but it was as much as their lives were worth. Several were
maimed; and the midshipmen who were ordered to see the duty performed
reported it impossible, until the storm abated.
The most terrific job of all was to furl the main-sail, which, at the
commencement of the squalls, had been clewed up, coaxed and quieted as
much as possible with the bunt-lines and slab-lines. Mad Jack waited
some time for a lull, ere he gave an order so perilous to be executed.
For to furl this enormous sail, in such a gale, required at least fifty
men on the yard; whose weight, superadded to that of the ponderous
stick itself, still further jeopardised their lives. But there was no
prospect of a cessation of the gale, and the order was at last given.
At this time a hurricane of slanting sleet and hail was descending upon
us; the rigging was coated with a thin glare of ice, formed within the
hour.
“Aloft, main-yard-men! and all you main-top-men! and furl the
main-sail!” cried Mad Jack.
- title
- Chunk 5