G. A. Henty

“ The absence of Jack was always a great trial to her. When he was with her she felt that he was safe, for it is an almost unheard-of thing for a bawley to meet with an accident when fishing in the mouth of the Thames; but off Harwich the seas are heavy, and although even there accidents are rare—for the boats are safe and staunch and the fishermen handle them splendidly—still the risk is greater than when working at home.
The Leigh men themselves attribute their freedom from accident in no slight degree to the fact that their boats never go out on Sunday. ”

“ Jack exclaimed. "I should like that better than anything in the world, if mother will let me."
"I don't think that your mother will stand in the way of your good," Mr. Godstone said. "And she must see that the prospect is a far better one than any you can have here; for after all, the profits of a bawley are not large, and the life is an infinitely harder one than that of a sailor. ”

“ Jim Tucker said. "What do you think we had better do? Shall we get out at the back of the house and try and make a bolt of it?"
"I do not think that is any good," Jack replied. "I was at the back window just now, and could hear shouts and the report of firearms all over the place. No; if we go out into the streets we are safe to be murdered, if we stop here they may not search the house. Anyhow, at the worst we can make a better fight here than in the streets."
Two hours passed. At times large bodies of natives rushed along the streets, brandishing their sticks and shouting triumphantly. ”

“ Well, lads, this is a cyclone, and you may live a hundred years and never see such another. You had better stop in here, for you might get blown right away, and can be of no good on deck. There is nothing to do. The wind has got her and will take her where it likes; we can do nothing but keep her straight. There will be a tremendous sea up before long. The water at the upper part of the bay is shallow, and we shall have a sea like yours at the mouth of the Thames, Jack,—only on a big scale. ”

“ The long-boat alone remained lashed amidships on the deck. Jack pointed to her, but an old sailor shook his head and pointed to the sea. No boat could hope to live in it a minute. Once in the breakers it would be swamped instantly. The officers made their way forward.
"It is all over, lads!" the captain shouted; "but some of us may reach the shore on pieces of the wreck as she breaks up. We will get the long-boat ready for launching: some of you may cling to her. Now, lads, let us shake hands all round, and meet our fate as British sailors should do—calmly and bravely. ”

“ Joe exclaimed.
"Do you think we could wade along to the island, Bill?" Jack asked.
Bill shook his head. "No; there are deep channels where it would be over our heads. I can't swim a stroke, no more can Joe."
"Shall I swim to the boat, Bill, and try and get her back?"
Joe shook his head. "She is in deep water now, Jack, and the grapnel ain't holding her a bit; she will drift as fast as you can swim. But of course you can try if you like, it don't make any difference to us, for you could never beat back against this wind and tide. What fools we have been, to be sure!" ”

“ The boats are large and roomy, and are, as they need to be, good sea-boats; for they have at times to live in rough water that would swamp lighter craft like cockle-shells. Each boat carries two men and a boy, that being the regular crew of a bawley; although, perhaps, for rough winter work, they may sometimes take an extra hand. In the bow of the first boat that comes tearing along up to the wharf sits a good-looking lad, about fourteen years old. His face is bronzed with the sun and wind, his clothes are as rough and patched as those of the other fisher lads ”

“ Arthur Hill said in a hushed voice. "I've often thought I should like to see a sea-fight, but I never thought it would be as terrible as this."
"No more did I, Arthur," Jack agreed. "I feel just as I have done when I have been out in the bawley and a big thunder-storm has burst overhead. If it feels like this here, what must it be on board a ship?"
"I don't believe it is half so bad there," Jim Tucker said. "They are all hard at work there at those big guns, and haven't got much time to think about it. I wish we could see what harm the shot are doing them. ”

“ The wind is fair, and each boat hoists its sail, white or yellow or brown, and with the crew sitting up to windward comes flying along the shallow channel, making, as they always do, a race of it home. ”

“ Of course the work is very different here; still it is a capital apprenticeship, and men who can manage a bawley in such a sea as was on when the Petrel was wrecked are fine sailors, and would soon be at home on any craft that ever floated."
"I will do the best I can for him, Captain Murchison, and will make a sailor out of him—never fear. There is nothing for you to do on board yet, my boy, except to keep your eyes open. Watch all that is going on. This is a rigger's job; but it is well to learn how everything is done, because you may be called upon to do it any moment. ”

“ They had already made another meal, and had finished their maize and water. They stood by the boat waiting until it should become perfectly dark, and looking across the tranquil sheet of water at the distant town, over which the smoke still hung heavily, and as the sky darkened flashes of fire could be seen. They were at last just going to get on board when they heard an exclamation of surprise behind them. Looking round they saw two natives, who had evidently come down with the intention of going out in their boat. ”

“ Jack said. "I have read that one man can carry another across a stream that he couldn't get over alone."
"Jump up, young un," Bill said; "and you, Jack, get off your sea-boots. You stand just behind me [25] and hold on, I feel much steadier now that I have got Joe on my shoulders. If you feel that you are going, leave go of me, you will only pull me backward holding on; and as you can swim you are all right. You have only got to keep yourself afloat, the tide will drift you up to the island in no time." ”

“ The hardest part of a Leigh fisherman's life Jack had not yet encountered, for boys are seldom taken stow-boating. Stow-boating is really sprat catching, and no one can exactly explain the meaning of the term. It is carried on in winter at the edge of the sands, far down at the mouth of the river. Boats are out for many days together, frequently in terrible seas, when the boat is more under than above the water. The work of getting up the net is heavy and exhausting, and for all this hardship and labour the reward is often exceedingly slight. ”

“ There are not many boys about, for boys require more sleep than men, and a considerable portion of their time on shore is spent in bed.
It is ten o'clock in the day; the bawleys have returned from the fishing grounds, and scores of them have anchored in the Ray—a deep stretch of water lying between the spit of sand that extends from the end of Canvey Island close up to Southend Pier, and the mud-flats of Leigh. The flats are still uncovered, but the tide is rising fast in the winding channel leading up to the village. ”

“ The lads sprang up the ratlines with the men, for they took their share of duty aloft. Arthur's place was in the mizzen, Jim's in the main, and Jack's in the fore-top. The stunsails were first got in, then the royals and topgallant-sails. The men were working well, but the captain's voice came up loud from the quarter-deck, "Work steady, lads, but work all you can! Every minute is of consequence!" ”

“ Jack said; "we have got splendid disguises and might go anywhere."
"That is not a bad idea, Jack; but how are we to do it? Every one is coming the other way."
"Yes, I don't think we can go back by that road," Jack agreed; "but we might get round the other side of the lake, I should think."
"But how are we to do that, Jack? We do not know anything about the country."
"No, we do not know much about it, Jim; but I remember the day before we landed, when we were looking at that book Mr. Hoare lent us so as to get up something about Alexandria before we landed, there was a map of the town. ”

“ Jack said, "this pasha or whatever he is who has got us here is waiting to see how things go. If the Egyptians get the best of it he will hand us over to Arabi, or whoever comes to be their chief. If we get the best of it he will give us up, and say that he has saved our lives. That would account, you see, for this breakfast business. He only sent us bread and water by his Egyptian fellows, and he sent [106] us the fruit privately by that black slave of his, whom he can rely upon to hold his tongue." ”

“ Of the tens of thousands of excursionists who every summer travel down by rail to Southend, there are few indeed who stop at Leigh, or who, once at Southend, take the trouble to walk three miles along the shore to the fishing village. It may be doubted, indeed, whether along the whole stretch of coastline from Plymouth to Yarmouth there is a village that has been so completely overlooked by the world. ”

“ That is a nice bawley, that new one there; she only came in this tide. That is the boat Tom Parker has had built at Brightlingsea. He expects she is going to beat the fleet. She will want to be a rare good one if she does, and I don't think Tom is the man to get the most out of her anyhow."
"I don't reckon he is," Jack agreed. "He would never have bought that boat out of his own earnings, that is certain. It is lucky for him his uncle in town died and left him four hundred pounds. He is one of the lazy ones, he is. Half the times he never goes out at all. ”

“ Jack said. "I should be glad if we were going to coast up the whole way. Why, we have had nothing but a gentle regular wind ever since that storm off the Cape."
"Yes, but it may not last all the way, Jack," Mr. Timmins, as he walked past and overheard the lad's words, said. "There is no place in the world where they have more furious cyclones than in the Bay of Bengal. Happily they don't come very often. Perhaps there is only one really very bad one in four or five years; but when there is one the destruction is [189] awful. ”

“ They carry one mast.
The peculiarity of their rig is that they have no boom to their mainsail, which in shape somewhat resembles a barge-sail, and, like it, can in a moment be brailed completely up. They carry a lofty topmast and large topsails, and these they seldom lower, even when obliged to have two reefs in the mainsail. They are capital sea-boats, fast, and very handy; and it requires a good yacht to beat a bawley with a brisk wind blowing. The men are keen sailors, and when the trawls are taken up and their heads turned homewards it is always a race to be first back. ”

“ Godstone's fleet.
As Captain Murchison remarked to the owners when he saw that Joe was this voyage to form one of his crew: "The old fellow would be worth his pay if he never put his hand to work. He keeps a crew in good humour with his yarns and stories; and if there is a grumbler on board he always manages to turn the laugh against him, and to show him to the others in his true light as a skulker and a sneak. He looks after the boys and puts them up to their duty, and acts generally as a father to them. ”

“ Our lives are in God's hands, boys; don't forget to ask for help where alone it can be obtained. Now I must be going up again. Steward, give me a glass of weak grog and a biscuit. Do you know, lads, my sides fairly ache. Once or twice I was pressed against the wheel with such force that I could scarcely breathe, and if I had been pinned there by an elephant butting me I could not have been more powerless. That is right, steward, get me my oil-skin and sou'-wester from the cabin. You had better get a kettle on over the spirit-stove, so that we can have a cup of hot cocoa when we like. ”

“ The Bessy—for so Ben Tripper had named his bawley, after his favourite sister—was lying on the mud just above Leigh. A fishy smell pervaded the air, for close by were the boiling-sheds, with their vast heaps of white cockle-shells. These were dug [13] by the cocklers either from the sand at the end of the Canvey Island or on the Maplin Sands somewhere off Shoebury.
The large boats often return deeply laden with them. On reaching Leigh the cockles are thrown out in great heaps by the side of the creek, where they are covered at each tide. ”

“ Tom Hoskins was now at the helm. Tripper was standing beside him, and pointing at something broad away on the beam. Jack at once made his way aft.
"What is it, uncle?"
"I saw the flash of a gun. Ah! there it is again. There is a ship ashore on the Middle Sunk." Jack gazed in the direction in which his uncle was pointing. In a minute there was another flash.
"It is all over with her," Ben Tripper said solemnly. "The strongest ship that ever was built could not hold together long on that sand with such a sea on as there will be there now."
"Cannot we do something?" ”

“ There are snakes and elephants and all sorts of things."
"I certainly should not care to meet snakes, Jim, and I don't know that I should like wild elephants. Still, I should like a ramble on shore. I suppose there is no chance of our getting nearer to the land."
"Not a bit, Jack. I heard Mr. Hoare tell Arthur that it was very seldom we passed within sight of the island at all. Sailors are not fond of land except when they are actually going to make a port. The further they keep away from it the better they are pleased." ”

“ Then came ten sailors, a steward, two mates, and the captain.
"Is that all?" Ben asked as the captain stepped from the slings.
"I am the last," the captain said. "Thank God all are saved who were left on board when you came in sight. We all owe our lives to you and your men. I had little hope that one of us would live to see the night when we made you out coming towards us. But there is no time to talk. The ship cannot hold together many minutes longer, and when she breaks up in earnest some of the timbers will be sure to come this way." ”

“ Once every two days they were taken out under a guard of three men with swords and muskets, and allowed to sit down in the sun, with their backs against the wall, for an hour or two. The shipping still lay in the harbour, over which they commanded a good view; and after a few days they saw that several more vessels of war had entered it.
"I can see that the boats are going backwards and forwards to the shore," Jim said, "so there is no regular war begun yet."
"Look, Jim, over there to the right," Jack said. "There is a swarm of men at work. ”

“ CHAPTER IV. THE WRECK.
"I can see the buoy, uncle, over there on the weatherbow."
"That is right, Jack. I am always glad when we get that buoy; it is the hardest to find of any of them. We shall have to jibe going round it. You stand by to brail the sail up when I give the word; we might carry away the gaff at the jaws if we let the sail go over all standing now." As soon as they neared the buoy Tom Hoskins got in the oar with which the mainsail was boomed out. "Now, Jack, brail up the sail as she comes round. ”