Surfboard

“ When there is a wreck in the surf and the lifeboat must be used, the first thing to do is to watch for a favorable opportunity and a favorable spot. The big waves break upon the beach in threes. This is not a superstition but a fact. When the third giant wave has thundered ashore and there is a small sea as far out as possible, then watch for the good moment and seize it when it comes. The three elements of success, once you have left the beach and are in the surf, are headway, speed, and strength. It is tremendously important to have powerful, skillful men in the bow. ”

“ And now for another phase of the physics of surf-riding. All rules have their exceptions. It is true that the water in a wave does not travel forward. But there is what may be called the send of the sea. The water in the overtoppling crest does move forward, as you will speedily realize if you are slapped in the face by it, or if you are caught under it and are pounded by one mighty blow down under the surface panting and gasping for half a minute. The water in the top of a wave rests upon the water in the bottom of the wave. ”

“ Whenever, from stormy weather, or any extraordinary swell at sea, the impetuosity of the surf is increased to its utmost height, they choose that time for this amusement, which is performed in the following manner: twenty or thirty of the natives, taking each a long narrow board, rounded at the ends, set out together from the shore. The first wave they meet, they plunge under, and suffering it to roll over them, rise again beyond it, and make the best of their way, by swimming, out into the sea. ”

“ How the brave boat ever got through that first half-mile of surf is a mystery to me. Every wave seemed as though it would pitch it like a plaything across to the next. Now we shot up till we looked down on the coxswain below us as from the top of a mast, and next instant we looked up at him till it seemed a marvel how he held to his place, and did not drop on to us. All the while the men tugged doggedly at the oars, heeding neither the waves that broke over them and flooded the boat, nor the surf that often nearly knocked the oars from their hands. ”

“ On approaching the shore, a surf when seen from seaward never looks so bad as it really is. Where possible, a landing should not be attempted until opposite a village where the natives will be ready to assist the moment the boat touches the beach. When the surf is heavy, [297] the boat should be backed in, pulling a few strokes to meet each heavy sea, and then backing in again until the shore is reached. The great thing to avoid is, letting the boat get broadside to the sea, as she will then capsize; a steer-oar should always be used, as a rudder is of little use in a surf, when backing in. ”

“ These last stages of the process are very disagreeable, for every time the surf reaches the boat, it raises her up and lets her fall again, with a violent jerk. When at last she is high enough to remain beyond the wash of the surf, you either jump out, or more frequently descend by means of a ladder, as you would get off the top of a stage-coach; and, turning about, you look with astonishment at what you have gone through, and thank Heaven you are safe!
The return passage from the shore to a ship, in a masullah boat, is more tedious, but less dangerous, than the process of landing. ”

“ What they seek is a very high swell, before which they place themselves, lying or kneeling on the surf-board. The great wave dashes onward, but as its bottom strikes the ground, the top, unretarded in its speed and force, breaks into a huge comber, and directly before this the surf-board swimmer is propelled with a speed which we timed and found to exceed forty miles per hour. In fact, he goes like lightning, always just ahead of the breaker, and apparently downhill, propelled by the vehement impulse of the roaring wave behind him, yet seeming to have a speed and motion of his own. ”

“ Soon after eleven the Kinta appeared, a black shadow on a silver sea, roaring for a boat, but the surf was so heavy that it was some time before the police boat was got off; and then Mr. Maxwell, whose cheery, energetic voice precedes him, and Mr. Walker landed, bullying everybody, as people often do when they know that they are the delinquents! It was lovely in the white moonlight with the curving shadows of palms on the dewy grass, the grace of the drooping casuarinas, the shining water, and the long drift of surf. It was hard to get off, and the surf broke into the boat ”

“ Isn’t the surf too heavy?”
[140] “The surf’s good fun, even if you don’t do any swimming in it, Bessie. It picks you up and throws you around, and it’s splendid sport. But down at Plum Beach you can have either still water or surf. You see, there’s a beach and a big cove—and on that beach the water is perfectly calm, unless there’s a tremendous storm, and we’re not likely to run into one of those.”
“How is that, Dolly? I thought there was always surf at the seashore.”
“There’s a sand bar outside the cove, and it’s grown so that it really makes another beach, outside. ”

“ The force of the big comber is rather unexpected. There are mix-ups in which board and rider are torn apart and separated by several hundred feet. The surf-rider must take care of himself. No matter how many riders swim out with him, he cannot depend upon any of them for aid. The fancied security I had in the presence of Ford and Freeth made me forget that it was my first swim out in deep water among the big ones. I recollected, however, and rather suddenly, for a big wave came in, and away went the two men on its back all the way to shore. ”

“ It is in this manner that most boats are upset in a surf, especially on flat coasts, and in this way many lives are annually lost. Hence it follows that the management of a boat, when landing through a heavy surf, must, as far as possible, be assimilated to that when proceeding to seaward against one, at least so far as to stop her progress shoreward at the moment of being overtaken by a heavy sea, and then enabling it to pass her. ”

“ On the other hand, on the steep beach, it is the general practice, in a boat of any size, to retain speed right on to the beach, and in the act of landing, whether under oars or sail, to turn the boat’s bow half round towards the direction from which the surf is running, so that she may be thrown on her broadside up the beach, when abundance of help is usually at hand to haul her as quickly as possible out of reach of the sea. In such situations, we believe, it is nowhere the practice to back a boat in stern foremost under oars, but to row in under full speed as above described. ”

“ Then we came in sight of a broad beach and pounding surf.
I was ordered to take a surf boat and investigate for a landing and an anchorage. The swell was running high. We rowed back and forth, puzzled as to how to get ashore with all the freight it would be necessary to land. The ship would lie well enough, for the only open exposure was broken by a long reef over which we could make out the seas tumbling. But inshore the great waves rolled smoothly, swiftly—then suddenly fell forward as over a ledge, and spread with a roar across the yellow sands. The fresh winds blew the spume back to us. ”

“ For miles together the surf breaks almost directly against the base of the terraced rampart which forms the coast-line, and even where streams have cut deep V-shaped notches in the rocky wall, the strips of beach formed at their mouths are wholly unsheltered and afford safe places of landing only when the sea is smooth and the wind at rest. Often, for days at a time, they are lashed by a heavy and dangerous surf, which makes landing upon them in small boats extremely difficult, if not absolutely impracticable. ”

“ As soon as they have gained, by these repeated efforts, the smooth water beyond the surf, they lay themselves at length on their board, and prepare for their return. As the surf consists of a number of waves, of which every 135third is remarked to be always much larger than the others, and to flow higher on the shore, the rest breaking in the intermediate space, their first object is to place themselves on the summit of the largest surge, by which they are driven along with amazing rapidity toward the shore. ”

“ There, looking downwards, the white edge of the surf recedes in hollow crescents, curve after curve for a mile or more, one succeeding before the first can disappear and be replaced by a fresh wave. A faint mistiness hangs above the beach at some distance, formed of the salt particles dashed into the air and suspended. At night, if the tide chances to be up, the white surf rushing in and returning immediately beneath has a strange effect, especially in its pitiless regularity. If one wave seems to break a little higher it is only in appearance, and because you have not watched long enough. ”

“ Yet all in good time the beach is strewn with the logs, great square-cut baulks of red timber with their owners' marks upon their butts and covered generally with a thatch of cocoa-nut palm fronds to keep them from the all-powerful sun. The steamer will call for them some day, but it is no easy thing to get them through the surf, and steamer after steamer calls, whistles, decides that the surf is too heavy to embark such timber, and passes on. And where they have been cut and trimmed, the mammies come with baskets to gather pieces of the priceless wood to build their fires. ”

“ Two alpine axes were added to the outfit, and a coil of rope, together with the complicated instruments necessary for biological and geological work. The landing was effected without mishap, although the beach was both steep and stony, and big, noisy rollers were breaking thereon with a stern determination and soul-curdling roars. Still, surf-bathing is a hobby with some people, so we managed to dodge the worst of the white-crested combers, running in between them, thus getting ashore with no serious wetting. ”

“ At intervals during the summer, often enough when the tides are high and the moon is near the full, the surf along the beach turns from a churn of empty moonlit water to a mass of panic life. Driven in by schools of larger fish, swarms of little fish enter the tumble of the surf, the eaters follow them, the surf catches them both up and throws them, mauled and confused, ashore. ”

“ The quick succession in which the rollers followed each other, their irregularity, and the sharp coral rocks just below the surface made the surf here particularly dangerous. Skill and courage were necessary to pass safely through the boiling waters.
For ten or fifteen minutes after the boy was ready he stood silently watching the breakers, waiting for a lull, and then sprang forward, keeping his surf-board extended before him. The skill and ease with which he ascended the perpendicular rollers as they came towering on, and the courage which he displayed throughout, were the admiration of all. ”

“ Owing to the sharp declivity of the beach, the rollers break with great force, and the surf is very high. At one point is grouped a cluster of rocks, half in the water, half on the beach, among which, as the tide comes in, the waves break with furious force, dashing high over the outermost barrier, and then plunging and leaping forward, like a troop of wild horses, their white manes flung high in air, as they leap forward over one and another of the obstacles in their path. ”

“ Being an open roadstead, with the wind from a certain direction a very heavy sea tumbles into the harbor, and there is at all times a considerable surf breaking on the beach. On going ashore you have to employ Portuguese surf-boats, which are much better constructed for purposes of landing than our own. On either side, not far from the keel, they have projecting pieces resembling the side-fins of a dolphin, which gives them much steadiness in a sea-way, while head and stern they have perpendicular handles as it were. ”

“ Still the life of the surfmen has its merry, as well as its serious moods. Each station is provided with a small but well selected library, and the men find it a constant source of instruction and delight. Then there is always in every crew one or two who can play a violin, flute or accordion, and often when the weather is fine and the wind off shore, the surfmen gather in the messroom and listen to the music of their companions or sing songs and spin yarns, the latter couched in a quaint and awkward vernacular, yet full of life and spirit, and redolent of the sea and the waves. ”

“ We were now in the belt of surf that always surrounds the whirl; and I thought, of course, that another moment would plunge us into the abyss—down which we could only see indistinctly on account of the amazing velocity with which we were borne along. The boat did not seem to sink into the water at all, but to skim like an air-bubble upon the surface of the surge. Her starboard side was next the whirl, and on the larboard arose the world of ocean we had left. ”

“ The masoolah-boats are, with great propriety, under the sole management of the master-attendant, or the beach-master. None can put off without licence; and no person can be admitted to serve on board who is not an expert and bold swimmer. I believe, that instances of individuals of any description being lost are extremely rare: such as are enumerated, took place chiefly at the outer surf, (there being usually three following waves to pass, or to accompany,) where the water is very deep, and where immense numbers of ground-sharks are ever on the watch for what accident may throw in their way. ”