Ship chandler

“ During the latter part of Secretary Chandler's term I was abroad in command of the Wachusett, on the Pacific coast. Besides her, the squadron consisted of the Hartford, Farragut's old flag-ship, the Lackawanna, and my former ship, the Iroquois. They all dated, guns as well, from the War of Secession, or earlier. Had they been exceptional instances, on a station of no great importance, it might not have mattered greatly; but in fact they still remained representative components of the United States navy. ”

“ If more be needed in the course of the voyage, it should be sent out from England and transshipped. In the ports of the West Indies, of the Indian Ocean, or indeed on any tropical coast, though one may come across honest ship-chandlers—I have frequently been lucky enough to do so myself—it will be found that, even with them, prices are apt to be exorbitant; while their goods are often of inferior quality, or, when of good brands, old and damaged. With the dishonest ship-chandlers, who are not rare, one is likely to have still worse experiences. ”

“ Your chief from his home and his country dissever—
No! never will I be the conqueror's spoil
“Say! long didst thou wait for my coming, my mother?
Did ye bend o'er the desert, my sister, your eye?
And weep at the lengthen'd delay of your brother,
As each slow passing moment was chased by another,
And still he appear'd not a tear-drop to dry.
“But ye shall—yes, again ye shall fondly embrace me!
We will meet my young bride in the land of the blest:
Death, death once again in my country shall place me,
One bound shall forever from fetters release me!” ”

“ And if that threatened squall should burst its bonds and come shrieking and howling in fury across the surface of the sea, scourging it into a mad turmoil of foaming, leaping water and blinding spindrift, while the burnt-out crew of the schooner were making their passage across to the Mercury, it might be very bad for them; for even should they be fortunate enough to avoid capsizal, it might be exceedingly difficult, if not altogether impossible, for the ship, smitten and bowed down by the might of the tempest, to pause and pick them up. ”

“ The first of such vessels, the cruisers “Chicago,” “Boston,” and “Atlanta,” and a steel despatch-boat, “Dolphin,” with their armaments, were designed in this country and built in American workshops. The gun foundry board referred to above was originated, and its reports were printed with that of the department for 1884. A special message of 26 March, 1884, urged continued progress in the reconstruction of the navy, the granting of authority for at least three additional steel cruisers and four gun-boats, and the finishing of the four double-turreted monitors. ”

“ Fresh clothing was offered him, and he enjoyed the luxury of one of Captain Glynn’s clean shirts. It was explained that the Bird was uncommonly well adapted for fitting out as a pirate ship because she had flush decks for245 mounting guns and was sharply molded for fast sailing. Cocklyn and La Boise politely suggested that they keep her for their own use and give to Captain Snelgrave a merchant vessel of larger tonnage which had been recently captured. ”

“ With inward maledictions on their slowness, he departed, resolving in his own mind that nothing should keep him much longer from Nassau, come what would.
As he went out, Mr. Chandler remarked: "It's very much like him. He's always ready to gamble in anything."
"After all, I have my suspicion that he's got a clew to the mystery somehow, and that he expects to find those handsome wenches," said Mr. Bruteman. "I'd give a good deal to baffle him."
"It seems pretty certain that we cannot obtain any clew," rejoined
Mr. Ammidon, "and we have already expended considerable in the effort. ”

“ She was in full retreat, firing with her stern guns as she went. But Condell had no intention of permitting her to escape so easily. His ship would still steer, after a fashion, if she was not driven too hard, and he immediately took up a slow pursuit, hoping against hope that he might still be able to plump a lucky shell into her which should destroy either rudder or propeller, and so leave her at the mercy of the new arrivals, which were rapidly coming up, and which could now be plainly made out as being the Magellanes, gunboat, and the Chacabuco, corvette. ”

“ If we are not lively it will whip the masts out of her—indeed I am not sure but it will in any case! Here we are; lay hold, and drag—Grace, go back to your cabin—this is no place for you!”
Gurney sprang to one of the reef tackles, while Saunders and I dragged at the other, yelling our “Yo ho’s!” as we did so. Meanwhile the awful booming and crashing sounds seemed to be sweeping down toward us on the wings of the squall, and so heavy had they by this time become that we could actually feel the ship trembling with the reverberation of them. ”

“ The men, who saw what was coming, and had been expecting the call, sprang at once to their stations, let go the halliards, and then helped the revolving yards down by manning the topsail-clewlines, by which means the three topsails were snugly close-reefed by the moment that the squall burst upon them. There was no time to do more or Captain Blyth would have taken the courses off the ship. As it was she had to bear them; and so heavy was the squall that during its height the vessel was compelled to run dead before it. ”

“ Perhaps it was because Ensign Chandler, youngest man in the exploration party, was in the lounge listening to them. Chandler was a nice kid, clean-cut and right out of the finest tradition of Earth, but Chandler was, like all boys barely out of their teens, impressionable. He was particularly impressionable in these, his first months in space.
"When you're cautious it's as much to protect the natives as yourself," Purcell went on, and then put into simple words what Glaudot and Chandler should have learned at the Academy for Exploration, anyway. ”

“ Then it occurred to him that for the especial work which the new yacht was required to do she would need a first-rate crew, every man of whom must be absolutely to be depended upon under all circumstances. The eight or ten hands comprising the crew of the Lalage were all well-known to him, having indeed belonged to the cutter for years, while she was still the property of Jack’s father, and they would doubtless serve as the nucleus of the new ship’s crew: but of course they would go but a little way towards the manning of a steam-yacht of three hundred and forty tons measurement ”

“ That's the cry through the service, sir. We'd show mercy to anything else.'
'In spite of my father's objections to pirates, Captain Jackman,' said Ada Conway, leaning back in her chair, and beginning to laugh, and showing a fine set of white and even teeth, 'if I had your ship, I would equip her as a privateer, and sail away as a [Pg 50] sea-robber. What splendid luck should always attend such enterprises, seeing that your quarry is the clumsy, unprepared, easily-frightened merchantman! ”

“ He may perceive that we are sailing into danger, and wish to warn us from approaching any closer before it be too late.”
“Zounds, boy!” shouted Cavendish, “’fore Heaven I believe that you may be right in your assumption!”
Then, turning to the crew: “All hands stand by to veer ship!” he cried.
But even as he spoke there was a sudden check to the vessel’s way, and almost instantly she stopped dead, the sudden shock throwing more than one man prostrate on the deck. At the same moment the leadsman in the chains gave his warning cry: “Three fathoms only, and shoaling fast!” ”

“ Then an opportune puff, with a little more weight in it than the soft breathing off the land that had hitherto reached us, struck the broad expanses of our topsails, and, with a sudden jerk, the ground broke away and the anchor came home.
“Hurrah, lads! she’s away; heave, for your lives; heave, and raise the dead!” vociferated Forbes.
The windlass pawls clanked merrily, the chain came rattling in through the hawse-pipe, and the ship, gathering stern-way, began to pay off with her head to seaward. ”

“ No sooner was the anchor down than the creek abreast which the yacht was moored began to swarm with boats of all shapes and sizes, which came hurrying out to receive and transfer to the shore the cases of arms, ammunition, dynamite, lead, and supplies of all kinds which lay snugly stowed away beneath the floors of the ship’s saloons; while the entire strength of the yacht’s crew was employed upon the task of breaking out the packages and conveying them on deck. The boats’ crews were all coloured men, and mostly negroes ”

“ And, of the three alternatives, I really think I should prefer to remain on the surface of the sea, and watch all the wild commotion, if I could feel assured that we were quite safe.”
“You certainly may feel assured of that, my Lady,” exclaimed von Schalckenberg. “With this ship afloat and in the open sea, you may laugh to scorn the fiercest gale. The wind may smite her in its wildest fury, the waves sweep her from end to end, and she will still go unharmed and undeterred on her way.” ”

“ The sailing-master and gentlemen on the yacht sustain more or less fully the facts stated by Captain Lockwood. As usual, those on board on each side acquit their own and condemn the other vessel. The statement of Lockwood is also sustained by McQueen, the pilot of the Cayuga, and by Goodby, the pilot of the Peck Slip ferry-boats. They saw the collision-inculpate the schooner and exculpate the yacht. ”

“ In exchange for his story I briefly informed the rescued mate that I had sailed from Sydney, in ballast, for the Canton river, intending to cut a cargo of sandal-wood on the way; but that the bulk of my crew, a gang of desperadoes from the gold-diggings, had frustrated my purpose by attempting to take my ship away from me, and that I had therefore been compelled to leave them on an island; and further, that when I sighted the Golden Gate, we were on our way to the Sandwich Islands, hoping to there obtain men enough to navigate the barque to China. ”

“ She sat very deep in the water, and her decks, fore and aft, were packed with coal, in sacks so closely stowed that there was only a narrow gangway left between them from the foot of the ladder abaft the deck-house to the companion, and a similar gangway from the fore end of the bridge deck to the forecastle. If it was necessary for the men to pass to any other part of the ship, such as to the ensign staff, for instance, they had to climb over the sacks. ”

“ Cavendish, who had just walked forward to make sure that all was as it should be, heard the warning, and shouted an order for all on deck to prepare for the outfly, and then, seizing his speaking-trumpet, rushed up on the poop beside the boys, and roared out a warning to the only ship within hail. Then, turning, he told the two lads to get down off the poop on to the main-deck, where they would be sheltered to a certain extent by the high bulwarks of the ship. ”

“ The Skipper was dancing in rage on the poop.
"Now you've done it! Now you've done it!" he screamed. "You've made 'em so angry there's no telling what they'll do.—Are the boats all ready, Mr. Jones?"
"If we are going to run, we may as well show them a little Yankee spirit first," said Cynthia. "I wish I could make them hear me. I would tell them that the only man on board this vessel's a girl."
I had picked up the glass and was trying to get a sight on the long boat. She was a little way from the end of the ship, and Cynthia through sheer luck had struck her amidships. ”

“ The party then returned to the shed by the beach; and whilst Courtenay with three or four hands gave the place a thorough overhaul, Fidd, with the remainder of the men, turned to and broke up a very large yawl-built boat which was lying alongside the jetty, afterwards carrying her dismembered planking and timbers up to the shed, to be still more effectually destroyed with it by fire. A quantity of ship’s stores, such as rope, canvas, pitch, tar, paint, etcetera, was found, evidently showing that this was one of the many pirates’ rendezvous which were known to be in existence along this coast ”

“ Gurney and Saunders hove their rope’s-ends fair into the boat; but there was no need for them, the ship was bowed so steeply that the occupants were able to seize her rail and scramble inboard unaided. In as many seconds fourteen strange men had transferred themselves from the sinking longboat to our decks, while the boat, rasping astern along the ship’s side, capsized and turned bottom-up as she drove clear. ”

“ Do you expect him here? Oh, what fun! I say, Clay, here's the 'Vesta,' Reggie King's yacht, and he's no end of a sport. We can go all over the place now, and he can land us right at the door of the mines if we want to."
"Is it the King I met at dinner that night?" asked Clay, turning to Miss Langham.
"Yes," she said. "He wanted us to come down on the yacht, but we thought the steamer would be faster; so he sailed without us and was to have touched at Havana, but he has apparently changed his course. Doesn't she look like a phantom ship in the moonlight?" ”

“ No sign whatever of anything like a settlement could be anywhere seen from the deck; but Courtenay hailed us to the effect that he could see something like a vessel’s mast-head over the middle island of a group of three on our starboard beam. He further reported, on the question being put to him, that the water was very shoal all round the ship, but that there were indications of something like a channel to the southward and eastward; upon which sail was shortened to lessen the schooner’s speed through the water, and her head was put in the direction indicated. ”

“ And to think that it had all been intrusted to a bottom that, under the most favourable circumstances, could hardly be expected to get up a speed of ten knots, and that consequently was open to capture by the first fast-sailing picaroon that happened to fall in with her. It was positively frightful to merely contemplate such a very likely eventuality. “But, thank goodness,” thought I, “that danger is easily provided against!” And, going on deck, I immediately ordered the ship to be hove-to, and the launch hoisted out, and I also signalled the schooner to close. ”