Merchant sailor

“ As I write, the actual head of the greatest shipping concern the world has ever known, is a Wall Street banker, whose knowledge of the sea was gained from the deck of a private steam yacht or the cabin de luxe of a fast liner, and who has applied to the shipping business only the same methods of stock manipulating that made him the greatest railroad director in the world before he thought to control the ocean as well. With steam, the sailor has become a mere deckhand; the captain a man of business and a disciplinarian, who may not know the names of the ropes on a real ship ”

“ Seas,—in short, the whole story of the American merchant marine has been worth consideration here because it sets forth unmistakably that the superior intrinsic efficiency of the American sailor of the sail, during the contest that culminated with the perfection of the ship of the sail, gave supremacy to the American flag. We can buy ships—whole fleets of them—if we are willing to pay the price, and we can maintain them upon the high seas in like manner ”

“ Instead of enjoying a pleasant spell ashore they would be hurried aboard a King’s ship, to all the miseries of a gun-deck. It was the custom to say that a sailor was better situated on a man-of-war than on a merchant-vessel; that he had better food, better treatment, and better [Pg 123] money. As a matter of fact the merchant-seamen regarded the Royal Navy with dread and loathing. There can be little doubt that the thought of the press-gangs, and the fear of service in the navy, drove many of our best merchant-seamen into American ships, where they were rather less subject to impressment. ”

“ The maritime nations of Europe have long ago recognized the importance of having some definite record of a seaman's service, some means whereby it could be told at a glance whether he was a sailor or not. So that each French, or German, or Italian sailor has a little book wherein is entered what manner of man he is in appearance, and the date of every shipping and discharge he has experienced during his seafaring career. ”

“ Boys are not allowed grog in the Royal Navy, and there is no absolute rule among merchant-vessels. In the American navy there is a coin allowance in lieu of rum, and every nation has its own peculiarities in this matter. In the French navy, wine, very ordinaire, and a little brandy is issued.
There are shadows, too, in the sailor’s life—as a rule, he brings them on himself, but by no means always. If sailors are “but men,” officers rank in the same category, and occasionally act like brutes. ”

“ Then—as later, in the keen sailing days of our clipper ships—their hardest taskmasters were foremast hands, watchmates, the men they lived with and ate with and worked with—bitter critics, unpersuadable, who saw only menace and a threat to their own safety in the shipping of a man who could not do man's work. On the decks and about the spars of a merchant vessel, each man of the few seamen carried two lives—his own and a shipmate's—in his ability to 'hand, reef, and steer.' There was no place on board for a 'waister,' a 'swabber,' longshoreman, or sea labourer. ”

“ The shipping reports of the daily newspaper prove more fascinating than the ticker tape, and the tidings of a successful voyage thrill one with a sense of personal gratification. For the sea has not lost its magic and its mystery, and those who go down to it in ships must still battle against elemental odds—still carry on the noble and enduring traditions of the Old Merchant Marine. ”

“ One thinks of the old merchant marine in terms of the clipper ship and distant ports. The coasting trade has been overlooked in song and story; yet, since the year 1859, its fleets have always been larger and more important than the American deep-water commerce nor have decay and misfortune overtaken them. ”

“ A full-grown man must ship for boy's wages upon his first voyage. It is not unusual to see a man receiving boy's wages and rated as a boy, who is older and larger than many of the able seamen.
The crews are not rated by the officers after they get to sea, but, both in the merchant service and in the navy, each man rates himself when he ships. The shipping articles, in the merchant service, are prepared for so many of each class, and a man puts his name down and contracts for the wages and duty of a seaman, ordinary seaman, or boy, at his pleasure. ”

“ The primary reason for the existence of a merchant ship is, of course, her ability to pay her way and earn money for her owners. When a ship ceases to be able to do this, the sooner she is converted into a hulk or broken up, the better. So the true measure of a nation's merchant marine is its earning capacity, not merely the number or tonnage of its ships; and judged by this standard, the merchant marine of the United States was at this time far in advance of the merchant shipping of the whole British Empire. ”

“ I add, to the end that all men should understand somewhat of the great masses of treasure daily employed upon our Navy, how there are few merchant ships of the first and second sort, that being apparelled and made ready to sail, are not worth one thousand pounds, or three thousand ducats at the least, if they should presently be sold. What then shall we think of the Navy-Royal, of which some one vessel is worth two of the other, as the shipwright has often told me. ”

“ The golden age of the American merchant marine was that of the square-rigged ship, intricate, capricious, and feminine in her beauty, with forty nimble seamen in the forecastle, not that of the metal trough with an engine in the middle and mechanics sweating in her depths. ”

“ On the other hand, the Mercantile Marine remained, and still remains, individualistic, each merchant ship-owner, or company of ship-owners, building the sort of vessel best adapted to the particular enterprise in hand. Thus we have sailing from our ports, ships of all descriptions, ocean-going liners carrying passengers, cargoes and mails, as well as tramps, colliers, cold-storage vessels, and an infinity of other types. ”

“ Almost all ships of the largest class carry a sail-maker, although usually the older seamen are sufficiently skilled in the trade to make and mend sails, and the master or chief mate should know how to cut them out. ”

“ A sloop detaches from the flotilla and rounds-to off the landing-stage. Her decks are crowded by men not of her crew. Merchant seamen are grouped together at the stern, and a small body of Uncle Sam's coloured troops line the bulwarks in attitudes of ease and comfort. They are a happy crowd, and roar jest and catchword to the passengers on the crossing ferries. The merchantmen are less boisterous. They watch the preparations of the bluejackets for mooring at the stage with a detached professional interest; some of them gaze out to the nor'ard where the transports of the convoy are approaching. ”

“ It is true that the American mercantile marine is not so bad as it was. These things do not occur in all vessels, but even yet they occur so frequently that an English sailor would, [Pg 266] as a general rule, rather sail with the devil himself than an American skipper. ”

“ Merchant seamen have always been what they are now, from their earliest days, before the Royal Navy had been fashioned out of the material they furnished for the hands of kings and statesmen. Their work has made them, as work undertaken with single-minded devotion makes men, giving to their achievements that vitality and continuity in which their souls are expressed, tempered and matured through the succeeding generations. In its simplest definition the work of merchant seamen has been to take ships entrusted to their care from port to port across the seas ”

“ The captain receives payment, whether in cash or commodities, and weighs the camwood, or measures the palm-oil, at the merchant's store. If credit be given, the merchant is responsible, and receives a perquisite of five per cent on all sales. The captain takes up his residence on shore, and sends for goods from his vessel, as they are wanted; while the mate and crew remain on board, to despatch and receive the cargo. Every vessel has in its employ several Kroomen, by whom all the boat-service is performed. ”

“ This Consort, he pretended, was a 40 Gun Ship, and cruising therabouts.
After this the Delivery proceeded to Hispaniola; near the West End of the Island she met with a French Sloop loaden with Wine and Brandy; aboard of this Vessel went Captain Massey, as a Merchant, and ask’d the Price of one Thing, and then another, bidding Money for the greatest Part of the Cargo; but after he had trifled a while, he whisper’d a Secret in the French Man’s Ear, viz. That they must have it all without Money. ”

“ A vessel was a community venture, and the custom still survives in the ancient ports of the Maine coast where the shapely wooden schooners are fashioned. The blacksmith, the rigger, the calker, took their pay in shares. They became part owners, as did likewise the merchant who supplied stores and material; and when the ship was afloat, the master, the mates, and even the seamen, were allowed cargo space for commodities which they might buy and sell to their own advantage. Thus early they learned to trade as shrewdly as they navigated, and every voyage directly concerned a whole neighborhood. ”

“ If the sail-maker ships also for seaman, he must do an able seaman’s duty, if called upon; and if he does not so ship, he will still be required to assist in all-hands work, according to his ability; and in bad weather, or in case of necessity, he may be put with a watch, and required to do ship’s duty with the rest. ”

“ Rival merchants sometimes drove the work of preparation night and day, when virgin markets had favors to be won, and ships which set out for unknown ports were watched when they slipped their cables and sailed away by night, and dogged for months on the high seas, in the hopes of discovering a secret, well kept by the owner and crew. Every man on board was allowed a certain space for his own little venture. ”

“ The partners in the great mercantile houses, whose shipbroking is there carried on, cannot understand it, and the men in the tall fluffy hats, the frock-coats, and the shepherd's plaid trousers, whom no one would suspect to be the captains of merchant vessels fully certificated, long-serviced, and ready to sail on any navigable water in the world, shrug their shoulders and mutter hoarsely to each other in the luncheon-room at Lloyd's, that 'something must be up with Mr. ”

“ TRANSPORTS LEAVING SOUTHAMPTON ON THE NIGHT PASSAGE TO FRANCE V MANNING
SEA-LABOUR cannot be likened to employment on shore. Once signed and boarded and to sea, there can be no dismissal and replacement of the men such as may be seen any morning at the street gates of a workshop or shipyard. Good or bad, we are bound as shipmates for a voyage. Ordinary laws and regulations cannot reach us in our sailing; we are given the Merchant Shipping Act for our guidance, the longest and wordiest Act on the Statute Book, a measure that presupposes a discipline that no longer exists. ”

“ Is it in human nature that the conscience of the good Shipowner will remain tender? He sees a vessel of much less strength, and not nigh so efficiently manned, go to sea, perhaps a foot deeper than his, earning the same rate of freight, and carrying a Government certificate of competency. ”

“ In the merchant ship the rigging is different, the method is different, and instead of his having any set duties, he is at everybody's beck and call, given tasks to accomplish single-handed that he has been taught to do man-of-war fashion—that is, with so many hands that the work was done like magic, and in a few seconds a sail was furled or set, or a mast was sent up or down. ”

“ The increase of the bounty on sailing-ships was made in the expectation that it would check their falling off, which had been rapid since the development of steamship building; merchant sailing-ships were regarded as the best school for seamen, all of whom in French commerce, up to the age of forty-five, are subject at any time to draft into the national navy. ”

“ Admiral, 10s. per day; captain, 18d. per day; lodesman (pilot) , 20s. per month; sailors, 5s. per month and 5s. worth of victuals. [340] The subordinate officers were paid the same as the sailors and, in addition, divided among themselves a number of ‘deadshares’ proportionate to the size of the ship. In merchant vessels private trading by all members of the crew, at any rate on long voyages, was a recognized custom, and they were allowed a certain amount of space in the hold for their goods. ”

“ When we are confronted with a declining merchant marine, when the carrying trade is passing into the hands of foreigners, when we remember that our whaling fleet, which twenty years ago numbered 600 ships with 18,000 sailors, the best sailors on the globe, disciplined and educated in voyages of three and four year's duration—is now reduced to 163 vessels with less than 5,000 men, we may well inquire, where are we to look for experienced seamen to man our navy in case of foreign war? ”

“ Now, the sailmaker's first duty is to keep these sails in repair; and since they have a great deal of wear, it will usually be found that he has not only quite sufficient to do himself, but can find constant employment for some favoured seaman out of each watch at sewing seams. Generally speaking, [Pg 177] he is a man who has served his apprenticeship to the trade, although a good discharge from his last ship where he has been engaged in a similar capacity is all that a skipper looks for from him upon engagement. ”

“ On board our ships of every type, from the largest Dreadnought down to the smallest Patrol Boat are to be found Officers and men of the Merchant Navy who have combined with those of the Royal Navy in fighting the enemy and defeating his nefarious methods of warfare at sea. ”