Hurricane deck

“ They sat by the hour in the shade of the pilot house on the hurricane deck and looked out over the curving expanses of the river sparkling in the sunlight. Sometimes the boat fought the mid-stream current, with a verdant world on either hand, and remote from both; sometimes she closed in under a point, where the dead water and the helping eddies were, and shaved the bank so closely that the decks were swept by the jungle of over-hanging willows and littered with a spoil of leaves ”

“ The prospect was not agreeable for a man who loved the sea. All day and most of the starry night the hurricane deck called to him, and his whole anatomy responded. And now to sit hunched up here like a rat in the hold was not to his taste. Suppose he should continue to frequent the deck, carrying with him his box, of course. He might never discover who owned the white serge skirt or who owned the voice which pronounced is as “iss.” ”

“ This hurricane-deck, if we are to give any credence to contemporary illustrations, was a fairly light affair raised on vertical supports of sufficient strength. In addition to the human ballast of the oarsmen, gravel, sand, and stone were used for trimming the ship. For instance, it might be necessary to get the bows deeper into the water so that the ram came into operation; or, after ramming and receiving damage, it might be found advisable to trim the ship by the stern so as to get the bows well out of water. To what extent these craft leaked one cannot say ”

“ I am not claiming that we encountered a hurricane; far from it, for it is doubtful if even the dream ship would have survived a full-fledged demon of the species. In these same latitudes I have seen turf torn from the face of the earth and rolled up like a carpet by sheer force of wind, and mile-wide swaths cut as cleanly as with a sickle through settlement, plantation, and jungle. But these exhibitions of ferocity were witnessed from terra firma. It is a totally different thing from the deck of a small boat at sea. ”

“ When the heat began to decline, we went to the hurricane deck to watch the beauty of evening stealing on; and, as no one but ourselves and our most esteemed acquaintance seemed to care for the wider view we here obtained, we had the place to ourselves, except that some giddy boys pursued their romps here, and kept us in a perpetual panic, lest, in their racing, they should run overboard. There is no guard whatever, and the leads overhang the water. ”

“ On the hurricane deck, under the lee of one of the boats swung inward and resting on chocks, leaning over the taffrail, stand two figures—one tall, powerful, masculine—wrapped in a long ulster, the other lithe, graceful, feminine—cloaked and hooded, for, if the atmosphere contains no chill, it holds a dampness which bids fair to do duty for the same. ”

“ I marched through the whole of the vessel; not a living soul was found on board. On returning on deck, I again looked out for the pirate—not that I had much hopes of seeing her. All appeared dark to leeward, the Charon’s stern lanterns only being visible just ahead of me. As I was peering into the gloom, suddenly a bright light burst forth, as it seemed, out of the ocean. Up it rose, increasing in size, a vast mass of flame into the air. I could distinguish, with the greatest clearness, the masts and spars and canvas of a schooner, lifting upwards high above the surface of the dark sea. ”

“ We went aloft to the hurricane deck, and such a sight I have never seen since! every man, woman, and child that we met there, was looking for something, if no more than a straw, to save themselves. We had now settled down even with the water, when I, 'spying a large trough floating near, made for it, and the gentleman taking the babe from its mother's arms, spread a few clothes in it, and lashed the little thing into this curious looking craft; both gave it one last kiss, and it was launched on the wide ocean. ”

“ On deck, the captain and the officers, cut off from all communication with below, know how the storm is going and how the ship is weathering it; but the unconscious passengers in their crowded quarters, treated like children by the rough seafaring men, can only sit below in hopeless ignorance, waiting to learn the fate in store for them when the tempest wills it. And indeed, the hurricane that night was quite enough to make even strong men feel their own utter and abject powerlessness. ”

“ Happily, sail is easily taken off a fore-and-aft-rigged vessel. The struggling and flapping sheets of canvas were rapidly secured, the gaffs were lowered down upon deck, and the schooner was speedily running under bare poles dead to leeward. The squall, meanwhile, increased until it became almost a hurricane: the great waves were beaten down flat by the sheer force of the wind. We rushed along, the tempest whistling and howling in the rigging in the centre of a roaring bed of foam, which the wind caught up and drove through the air in clouds which almost blinded us. ”

“ He had been standing there alone about five minutes, intently watching the set of the sea, so as to determine the best time for lowering a boat, when, amid the sustained shriek of the wind and the lashing of the spray, he heard sounds which told him that the forward port life-boat was being swung outward on the davits. The hurricane deck was a mass of confused figures. The two boats to starboard, a life-boat and the jolly-boat, had been carried across the deck in readiness to take the places of the port life-boats. ”

“ The yacht was now under bare poles, and left to the mercy of the hurricane. The roar of the coming tempest was now deafening, and the vessel began to pitch wildly, yet there was no sensible agitation of the air.
"Every man throw himself on his face to the deck!" cried the captain, suddenly, in a loud tone. "My lord, you will be safer below. Our decks will be swept clean as your hand." ”

“ Both pilots were in the lofty pilot-house, down from the breast-board of which a light line ran forward to the bell's tongue, but neither pilot touched the line or the helm. For the captain's use another cord from the bell hung over the hurricane deck's front and down to the boiler deck rail, but neither up there on the boiler deck nor anywhere near the bell on the roof above it was any captain to be seen.
At the front angle of the roof's larboard rail a youth, quite alone, leaned against one of the tall derrick posts to get its shade. ”

“ The crew uttered a hearty cheer as the captain descended on deck after the performance of this gallant and skilful act without the loss of a man. None cheered more loudly than the boatswain and his two mates.
The ship drove on before the hurricane, but, relieved of so much top hamper, she laboured far less than she had been doing. The storm had not abated its fury; the mad waves followed fiercely after the ship, and leaped up, foam-covered, on either side, threatening to fall down on her decks and sweep everybody from off them, or to send the stout bark herself to the bottom. ”

“ Back her! Stop her! She'll blow up when she strikes!” and a thousand-and-one undistinguishable sounds, but all indicative of intense excitement and alarm.
Stopping for nothing, I made one spring from my berth into the middle of the cabin, alighting on the deserted breakfast-table, amidst the crash of broken crockery, three jumps more were taken, which landed me up on the hurricane-deck, where I found nearly all the passengers, male and female, assembled in a fearful state of alarm, preventing by their outcry the necessary orders, for the preservation of the boat, from being heard. ”

“ The hurricane deck was filled with tent-makers and boat-builders, a carpenter's bench was put up amidships, and a blacksmith's forge puffed and glowed under the forward galley. Knapsacks, powder-horns, pick-axes, boatsails, hammocks, and gold-washers were made or refitted ”

“ Hinges have broken and chimneys fallen and crushed the decks; officers and men on the deck are exposed to danger at night in windy and stormy weather. The packet chimneys, weighing from 2500 to 3000 pounds, and five feet in diameter, require a different management. For lowering these, the only mode suggested is by the use of hinges at the hurricane deck. Let us consider, then, the condition of one of these packets in effecting its passage on high water. ”

“ Again the deck, the intermittent pacing, and resting in the chair. The gale became a hurricane in the occasional squalls; and at these times the seas were beaten to a level of creamy froth luminous with a phosphorescent glow, while the boat's rolling motion would give way to a stiff inclination to starboard of fully ten degrees. Then the squalls would pass, the seas rise the higher for their momentary suppression, and the boat resume her wallowing, rolling both rails under, and practically under water, except for the high forecastle deck, the funnels, and the companions. ”

“ The ship, the crew, all obeyed him implicitly. He was the will of the ship, and an iron will at that.
Finally the fury of the storm spent itself and the skies cleared, but the effect of the hurricane was still manifest in the sea. Great foam-covered swells rolled by, many of them breaking over the lower deck. But they were rhythmic and one always knew when to expect the next one. This was all right as long as the waves ran at the regulation height, but the combers were quite different. In them is an element of danger that no seamanship can guard against, no matter how skillful it may be. ”

“ More than half the boats, this April afternoon, flew from the jack-staff of each, to signify that it was her day to leave, a streaming burgee bearing her name. A big-lettered strip of canvas drawn along the front guards of her hurricane-deck told for what port she was "up," and the growing smoke that swelled from her chimneys showed that five was her time to back out.
In the midst of the scene, opposite the head of Canal Street—the streets that run to the New Orleans levee run up-hill and get there head first—lay a boat which specially belongs to this narrative. ”

“ The gun-deck was afloat with spray lashed on board with each pitch of the 544ship, while the foam flew high up upon the mast. The waves crossed each other in every direction, huge conical masses rising suddenly to a height of 25 or 30 feet, as far as one might guess, and then as suddenly subsiding. It was the genuine pyramidal sea of the true cyclone, of which vessels caught in these furious circular storms are even more apprehensive than the fury and strength of the hurricane. ”

“ The men on board the bark were very slow in seeking safety, and I was about to repeat my former call, when I saw two women appear on the rail by the mizzen rigging. Our hands hastened to their assistance, and as the bark was so low in the water they had no difficulty in getting them on our hurricane-deck. As soon as they were safely on board, the men poured in upon us without further delay. There was not one among them that would leave the wreck until the women were safe. The officers and seamen brought with them whatever they could carry of their personal property. ”

“ Just as you say, Tom. We have only our suspicions to guide us, and they mightn't interest the captain, who has problems of his own to wrestle with now that we're getting so close to the danger zone. So we'll call the incident closed; and after this take our walks on the hurricane deck by daylight only. ”

“ She certainly looked as unlike our notions of a man-of-war as anything could be, though, as Paul Truck observed, “she would crumple up the Minotaur in a few minutes with her four thirty-five ton guns, powerful as the five-masted ship appears.”
Though she looked only fit for harbour work, Paul said that she had been out in heavy weather, and proved a fair sea-boat. The only place that people live on, when not below, is the hurricane-deck. In this centre structure are doorways which can be closed at sea. ”

“ The third-class passengers, who were also lodged on the upper deck, aft, included Tatars and other Mohammedans from the Orient, who spread their prayer-rugs at sundown and went through their complicated devotions with an air of being quite oblivious to spectators. Several got permission from the admiral to ascend to the hurricane deck. But this, while unnecessary as a precaution against crowding or interference from their numerous Russian fellow-passengers, rendered them more conspicuous ”

“ The boys tried to speak, but their words were torn from their lips by the wind and sent scattering. In the dim light they could see the forms of the sailors hurrying about the decks fastening additional lashings to the deck cargo and making things as snug as possible.
Suddenly there came a shout forward, followed by a loud "bang!" that made itself audible even above the roar of the hurricane. ”

“ No answer was returned, and Bob was not to be seen. He was gone, and the pilots could not stop to look for him, for their own situation was becoming dangerous in the extreme. The boat was burned nearly in two, and portions of the hurricane deck were falling in every moment. They would run a great risk by going down among those frightened people on the forecastle, for they could not swim, and if they found anything to serve as a life-preserver, some one would be sure to take it away from them. ”

“ If a boat coming—especially down the stream—with high pressure and at full speed, making between twenty and thirty miles an hour, runs against one of these firmly-fixed, immoveable snags, it sustains a fearful shock. Not unfrequently a large hole is thus made in the bottom; and boat, cargo, crew, passengers, and all, sink in an instant. The danger is greatly increased by fogs, often so dense that the helmsman, though situated on the hurricane-deck and over the fore part of the vessel, can see nothing before him. ”