Part 15

Speaking these words with breathless rapidity, Bart cut the rope with which Pat had bound himself, giving long slashes up and down. Bruce and Arthur seized him at the same moment, and as soon as the rope was severed, dragged him to where the boat was, ordering him on board, and threatening to throw him into the water if he refused. Pat was powerless. A few words of remonstrance were offered, but he was sternly silenced. He was thus overpowered, and so, yielding to necessity, he got on board the boat. There he seated himself in the stern, and, bowing his head, began a long, low, wailing Irish “keen,” which is a species of lamentation in the presence of death.

This scene appeared to produce some effect upon Wade. It roused him from his lethargy. It seemed as though this man was a mere machine; and though in ordinary circumstances he was able of going through certain routine duties, in any extraordinary case he was utterly helpless, and his dull and inert nature became hopelessly imbecile. But now an idea of his situation seemed at last to have penetrated to his brain, and accordingly, rising to his feet, he went to the boat. Then he slowly and solemnly passed over the Antelope’s side, and took his seat near Pat. He looked at the others with a dull stare, and then turning to Pat, he remarked, in a low, confidential tone, “My name’s Wade, an my ole ‘oman’s name’s Gipson; an you’ll not find many o’ that name in this country. No, sir.”

After which he heaved a sigh, and relapsed into himself. As to Pat, he took no notice of this confidence imparted to him, but went on with his Irish lamentation.

“Ow--O-o-o-o-ow--to only think--this bit ov a boat sure--an in the wide an impty say--an me a bindin meself to the only safety; for the ship-wracked sayman must always bind himsilf to a mast. And, O-o-o-b-o-o-o-w, but it was a bitter, crool thing, so it was, to tear a poor boy from his solitary rifuge--an dhrive him here into a bit ov a boat--to sail over the impty say--an from the last rifuge--where safety was, an O-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-ow! but it’s the croolty ov it that braks me heart!”

The summary treatment with which the boys had disposed of Pat, was not to be applied to Solomon, or to Captain Corbet. They tried to coax these, and persuade them.

Solomon, however, was obdurate.

“My ’vice to you, boys, an you, in tiklar, mas’r Bart,” said he, “is to clar out ob dis yer sinkin schooner, ef yer don want to git a duckin ob de wustest sort. She’s a goin down--you’d betta believe--dat’s so.”

“O, come, come, Solomon; we can’t wait. You’re making us all risk our lives,” said Bart, imploringly, coaxing him as he would coax an insane man. “Come along; don’t keep us here. The schooner’ll sink and drag the boat down, if we don’t keep farther away.”

“Darsn’t,” said Solomon. “Couldn’t, darsn’t--no how.”

“O, come.”

“Darsn’t--fraid ob dat ar ole woman, wid de broomstick, de tongs, de fence-pole, an de red-hot gridiron. Tell you what, it stings--it does, dreadful--it does so--”

“O, come. She shall never trouble you. Never.”

“Who’s to go skewrity for dat ar statement? Nobody can skewer her. No. Better be drown-ded, dan walloped to def with hay-forks. Nobody can skewer dat ar ole woman, dough; gracious sakes, she knows how to skewer me ebery time she lay hand on a pitchfork or a meat-skewer. Yah, yah, yah!”

At this ill-timed levity Bart and the others turned away in despair and disgust.

They hurried aft.

There stood the venerable Corbet. As they drew near he gave a start, and a smile came over his reverend countenance.

“Wal, boys,” said he, in a tone of kindly welcome, “how d’ye do? Pleased to see you.”

He spoke precisely as if he was receiving a call from some favorite guests. The tone pained the boys, and distressed them greatly.

“Captain,” said Bruce, hurriedly, “the Antelope’s sinking. A moment more and you’ll be lost. Come with us in the boat. Come.”

And, laying his hand on the captain’s arm, he sought to drag him away.

But the captain quietly though firmly, disengaged himself.

“Excuse me, young sir,” said the venerable navigator, very politely; “but I’m captain of this here craft; an, being sich, I ain’t got no call to leave her till the last man. You git to your boat, an I’ll retire when the time comes.”

The captain spoke with dignity. He announced a principle which involves the highest duty of every commander of a ship, and the boys knew it. His dignity overawed them.

“But come now, captain,” said Bart, “there isn’t a moment to lose.”

“I ain’t, a goin ever to hev it written on my tume,” said the captain, in a calm voice, “that me--Captain Corbet--ever desarted his post, or forgot his umble dooty as commander of a vessel. No, the Antelope’ll see that, her captain’s jist as much principle an honor as any of them swell navigators that sail in clipper ships over the boosom of the briny deep.”

At this moment there was a long-drawn, bubbling, gurgling sound, that came up from the hold of the Antelope, and startled the boys exceedingly.

“Come, come, captain,” cried Bruce. “She’s sinking now. There isn’t a moment to spare.”

“Wal, boys, you jist hurry off into that thar boat, an don’t mind me. I know my dooty. You can’t expect me to leave this here deck till the last man. It don’t signify argufyin. Hurry off.”

At this moment there was another sound; something between a gasp and a gurgle. It seemed like the death-rattle of the Antelope.

“She’s going down, boys!” cried Bart. Involuntarily they retreated towards the boat. But here they paused yet again, for there was a brief respite, and the Antelope was yet afloat.

“Won’t you come, captain?” cried Bart.

“O, all right,” said Captain Corbet, waving his hand; “all right. You jest get aboard the boat. Don’t you mind me. Remember, I’m the captain, an I’ve got to be the last man.”

This seemed to the boys like a promise to follow them.

“Come along, boys,” said Bart. “He’ll get into the boat if we do. He wants to be last.”

Saying this, the three boys clambered over the Antelope’s side, and it was with a feeling of relief that they found themselves once more in the boat.

“Now, captain,” cried Bruce, “hurry up. Come, Solomon. Captain, make Solomon come on board, and then you’ll be the last man.”

Captain Corbet smiled, and made no reply. As for Solomon, he merely muttered something about “dat ar ole woman” and “gridiron.”

The Antelope was low in the water. The deck was near the level of the sea. Instinctively, Tom, who was holding the rail, pushed away, and the boat moved off a little distance. Yet they could not leave those two infatuated men to their fate, though the instinct of self-preservation made them thus move away slightly.

“Captain! Solomon! Captain! Solomon! Make haste! O, make haste!” Such were the cries that now came from those in the boat.

Captain Corbet smiled as before, and nodded, and said,--

“O, it’s all right; all right. Don’t mind me. I’m all right. I know what I’m about.”

At this the Antelope gave a very unpleasant roll, and settled heavily on one side; then her bows sank down, and a big wave rolled over it.

“She’s sinking!” cried Tom, in a voice of horror. The other boys were silent. They seemed petrified.

But the Antelope struggled up, and gradually righted herself. Her deck was nearer the level of the sea than ever. This last incident, however, had been sufficient to shake the nerves of one of those two on board. As she settled on one side, Solomon sprang back, and, as the wave rolled over her bows, he gave one jump over the side and into the sea. He sank under, but a moment afterwards his woolly head emerged, and he struck out for the boat. There a dozen arms were outstretched to save him, and he was finally hauled in.

“Drefful times dese,” said he, as his teeth chattered, either from terror or from cold. “Drefful times. Didn’t ’gage in dis yer vessel to go swim-min about de Atlantic Oceum. Queer way to serve as cook--dis yer way. An dar ain’t a dry stitch ob clothin about--dat’s so; an what ebber I’se a goin to do beats me. S’pose I’se got to set here an shibber de next tree weeks. Catch me ebber a ’barkin aboard sieh a schooner as dis yer. Any ways, I ain’t goin to sail in dis yer Antelope agin. Cotch me at it--dat’s all.”

But the boys heard nothing of this.

All their attention was now taken up with Captain Corbet.

He stood at the stern at his usual post, holding the tiller with both hands. He looked at the boys. “Boys,” said he, “I’m the last aboard.”

“O, Captain Corbet! Come, come. Make haste!” they cried.

He shook his venerable head.

“This here,” said he, “boys, air the act an the doin of Fate. I did hope that the Antelope an me’d grow old, an finally die together, though not on the briny deep. It hev allus ben a favorite idee to me, that the lives of both of us, me and the Antelope, was kine o’ intermingled, an that as we’d ben lovely an pleasant in our lives, in death we’d be not divided. For the Antelope an me’s knowed each other long, an lived, an ben happy together, in fair weather an foul. The Antelope’s allus ben faithful and terew. She’s had all my confidences. She’s alius been gentle an kind, and you’ll never, never find a better friend than the old Antelope. Many’s the time she’s bore me through sleet an snow. Many’s the time she’s borne me through fog an rain. Many’s the time she’s bore me past rocks an reefs. So long as I stuck to old Fundy, so long the Antelope was safe an sound. I used to boast as to how I could navigate old Fundy. I was wrong. ’Twan’t me; it was the Antelope that navigated; for I never had a sexton aboard, nor a quadruped, nor a spy-glass, nor any of them newfangled gimcracks, savin an except a real old-fashioned, apostolic compass, as is mentioned by Paul in the Acts. And why? Why, cos the Antelope was allus able to feel her own way through rain an fog, an frost an snow--past shoals, an flats, an reefs, an was alius faithful. But, in a evil hour, I took her out of her native waters. I led her afar over the deep blue sea, up to the Gulf of St. Lawrence. There our woes began. But even there the Antelope was terew an tender. But it was too much. We come back. She had never ben thar before. She lost her way. Then she found it. We got to Sable Island an Chester. Then we put out agin. An then agin she lost her way. It was my fault, not hern. She lost her way in this fog, an she went aground. She couldn’t help it. In Fundy she never ran aground, ’cept when nessary; an it was me that brought her to this. An now what hev I got to do? I’ve got this to do--that if I’ve led my Antelope to ruin, I won’t survive her. No. We’ve been lovely an pleasant in our lives, an in death we ain’t goin to be divided.”

The boys did not hear one half of this, but interrupted the speaker constantly with their entreaties that he would save himself. Captain Corbet, however, was too much taken up with his own thoughts to notice what they said. He was like one who soliloquizes.

“O, captain!” cried Bart, with a final effort; “think of your wife--think of your, your, a--baby--”

“My babby!” said Captain Corbet. “My babby! Ah, young sir, when you mention my babby, you don’t know that you tetch a cord in this parentual heart that throbs responsive. That thar is the strongest emotion that inspires this aged breast; but, young sir, dooty air powerfuller than love, an even that pe-recious infant has less claims on me at this moment than my Antelope. For my Antelope has ben the friend that’s ben faithful in thousand perls; that’s ben my refuge an my solace in times of persecution. Yes, young sirs, in the days when a bold an violent woman disturbed my peace, by dash-in a pail full of cold water over my head--at such times the Antelope hav took me to her heart; an can I ever cease to be affectionate an kind to thee, who’s ben so terewly kind to me--my Antelope? No, no; young sirs. Go, an tell my beloved one--my offspring--my inspired babby--that his parent, the aged Corbet, died a marchure’s death; died like a hero, a standin’ at his post; which post was the rudder-post of the Antelope. Tell him that; an tell him, tew, that, though dooty bound the feyther to the Antelope, yet still that feyther’s last thoughts was of his belessed babe.”

At this point the Antelope gave another lurch, and rolled far over. Captain Corbet stopped abruptly, and stiffened his sinews, and clutched the tiller with a tighter grasp. The boys looked on with horror in their faces and in their hearts.

It was a moment of awful expectation.

They had cried, and bawled, and yelled till they were hoarse. They had prayed and entreated Captain Corbet to save himself. All in vain.

But now the time for entreaty had passed.

Suddenly the Antelope rolled back, and then her bows sank. A huge wave rolled over her, followed by others, which foamed from bow to stern. Then all the sea settled itself over the sinking schooner.

The Antelope was going down!

The hull disappeared!

The rail sank under water!

But Captain Corbet stood at his post, erect, rigid, his hands clasping the tiller. Beneath him the Antelope sank down into the sea. Around him the waters rolled.

They rolled about his knees; about his thighs; about his waist. His venerable hair fluttered in the breeze; his eyes were fixed, with a rapt and abstracted air, on vacancy.

The boys looked on in horror. Instinctively they pushed the boat back out of the reach of the waters that ingulfed the Antelope, so as to avoid being carried down into that vortex.

The waters rolled about the form of the aged navigator, and so he descended with his beloved Antelope, till they were above his waist.

The boys could no longer cry to him. They were petrified with horror. They sat, with white faces, awaiting the end.

XXIII.

_Watching with pallid Faces.--The Torso of Corbet.--A sudden and unaccountable Break in the Proceedings.--Great Reaction.--Unpleasant Discovery.--Pat and the salt Water.--The Rheu-matiz and kindred Diseases.--Where to go.--Where are we?--Sable Island.--Anticosti, Bermuda, Jamaica, Newfoundland, Cape Cod, or Owld Ireland.--A land Breeze.--Sounding for the Land.--Land ahead._

PAINFUL thing it was to see the Antelope thus sinking into the sea; to view the waters thus rolling over her familiar form from bows to stern; to see the boiling foam of the ingulfing billows; but how much more terrible it was to see the sacrifice of a human life; the voluntary self-destruction of a human being, and of one, too, who had been their guide, their revered and beloved friend! They had no cause for self-reproach. They had done all that they could. His own will had brought him to this. Still the spectacle was no less terrible to all of them, and there was no less anguish in their souls as they saw him,--the meek, the gentle, the venerable Corbet,--thus descending, by his own free will, and by his own act, into the dark abyss of this unknown sea.

And so they watched with pallid faces, and with angonized hearts for the end.

The ancient mariner sank down, as has been said, with his sinking schooner, and his feet were overwhelmed by the rushing flood, and his ankles, and his knees, and his thighs, and at length he stood there with the waters about his waist, and his mild eyes fixed upon vacancy.

Another moment, and they expected to see that venerable and beloved form disappear forever from their gaze.

But that venerable form did not, in fact, disappear.

That venerable form remained stationary,--the waters reaching as far as the waist: thus far, but no farther. The lower half had disappeared beneath the sea, but the upper half still remained to bless and cheer their eyes. Corbet still lived! But it was what an artist might call a Torso of Corbet.

Corbet thus had sunk into the unfathomable depth of ocean up to his waist, but after that he sank no more. Higher than that the waters did not rise. He stood in that rigid attitude already described, grasping the tiller, and thus steadying himself,--upright, firm as a rock, and so he stood after the waters had risen to his waist.

The hull of the Antelope had disappeared. But still her masts and rigging rose above the waters, and above the head of Corbet, and these sank no farther, but remained at the same height above the sea.

Astonishment seized upon all of them, Corbet included. What was it that had caused this wonder? Was it because the hull was too buoyant to sink any farther? Was it because there was still some air left inside the hull which prevented the schooner from sinking altogether? This they might have thought had they not been made wiser through their recent experiences. By these they now knew that on these seas there were sand banks and shoals; and, therefore, what was more natural than that, the Antelope had sunk in some place where there happened to be, just beneath her, a convenient shoal which had received her sinking hull? It was certainly a very curious sea,--a sea which seemed to abound in such shoals as these; but whatever might be the character of that sea, this fact remained, that the Antelope had sunk in less than a couple of fathoms of water.

And so it was that the heroic and devoted resolve of the venerable and high-minded captain was baffled, and his descent into the depths of the ocean was arrested. For there lay the Antelope, resting upon some place not far beneath the sea, with her masts still high above water, and with the person of her gifted commander half submerged and half exposed to view; and there stood that venerable commander up to his waist in water, but unable to descend any farther: a singular, a wonderful, an unparalleled spectacle; unaccountable altogether to those whose eyes were fastened upon it.

But the thought of a shoal or sand bank soon came, and so they began to understand the state of affairs. The Antelope had sunk, not into an unfathomable abyss in mid-ocean, but upon some sand bank. Where or what that sand-bank might be, they did not then take time to consider. Whether it was some part of one of the Banks of Newfoundland, or the slowly declining shore around Sable Island, or some other far different and far removed place, did not at that time enter into the sphere of their calculations. Enough it was for them that the terror had passed; that the grim spectacle of death and destruction before their very eyes had been averted; that Corbet was saved.

Till this moment they had not been aware of the greatness of their anguish. But now the reaction from that anguish made them acquainted with its intensity, and in proportion to their late sufferings was now their joy and rejoicing. At the first movement of the Antelope towards a descent into the sea, they had instinctively and very naturally moved their boat farther away, so as to avoid being sharers of the fate which Captain Corbet seemed to desire; but now, after the first danger was over, and the first emotions of amazement and wonder had subsided, they rowed nearer. They believed that now Captain Corbet would listen to reason, and that, having done so much in obedience to the call of duty, he would be willing to save himself.

And now, as they rowed nearer, the boat floated over the rail of the sunken schooner, and came close up to the half-submerged commander.

“Come, captain,” said Bart, in a voice that was yet tremulous with excitement, “jump in. There’s plenty of room. You--you--don’t--don’t want to be standing in the water this way any longer, of course.”

To this remark Captain Corbet made no reply in words, but he did make a reply in acts, which were far more eloquent. He seized the side of the boat at once, and scrambling in, sank down, wet and shivering, in the stern, alongside of those other obstinate and contumacious ones--Pat, Wade, and Solomon. And so it was that at last, after so much trouble, those four, who had at first been so unmanageable, now were assembled on board the boat into which they had once refused to enter.

The delight of the boys was as great as their grief had been a short time before, and no other thought came into their minds than that of the happy end that had occurred to a scene that had promised such disaster. The fact that their situation was one of doubt and uncertainty, perhaps peril, did not just then occur to them. It was enough joy for them that Captain Corbet had been snatched from a watery grave; and so they now surrounded him with careful attention. Bruce offered him a biscuit; Bart asked about his health; Tom urged him to wring out the water from his trousers; and Phil, who was next to him in the boat, fearing that he might feel faint, pressed upon him a tin dipper full of water.

Captain Corbet took the proffered draught and raised it to his lips. A few swallows, however, satisfied him, and he put it down with some appearance of haste.

“As a general thing,” said he, in a tone of mild remonstrance, “I don’t use sea water for a beverage. I kin take it, but don’t hanker arter it, as the man said when he ate the raw crow on a bet.”

“Sea water!” exclaimed Phil. “Did I?”

He raised the water to his own lips, and found that it was so.

“Then we’ve taken sea water in this keg,” he cried, “and we haven’t any fresh.”

At this dreadful intelligence consternation filled all minds.

“Who filled that keg?” asked Bruce, after a long silence.

“Sure I did,” said Pat.

“You! and how did you happen to make such a mistake?” cried Bart.

“Sure ye said to fill the kegs with wather, an didn’t say what kind; so I jist tuk the say wather, because it was most convaynient.”

At this amazing blunder the boys were dumb, and stared at Pat in silence. Words were useless. The mistake was a fatal one. The fresh water had gone with the Antelope to the bottom. Where or when could they hope to get any more? Who could tell how long a time, or how great a distance, might now separate them from the land? Bad enough their situation already had been, but this opened up before them the prospect of unknown sufferings.

“O, don’t talk to me about water,” said Captain Corbet, in lugubrious tones, squeezing his hands, as he spoke, over his thighs and shins, so as to force the water out of his clothes. “Don’t you go and talk to me about water. I’ve hed enough, an don’t want ever to see any agin. Why, it kem up as high as my waist if it kem a inch. An now what’s to hender me a fallin a helpuless victim to rheuma-tiz. O, I know it. Don’t tell me. I know what’s a goin to come to this ferrail body. Thar’s rheuma-tiz acute and chronic, an thar’s pleurisy, an thar’s lumbago, an thar’s nooralgy, an thar’s fifty other diseases equally agonizin. An dear, dear, dear, dear! But how dreadful wet it did feel, to be sure! dear, dear, dear, dear! An here am I now, with my tendency to rheumatiz, a settin here in my wet clothes, an not a dry stitch to be had for love or money. Wal, I never knowed anythin like this here, an I’ve lived a life full of sturrange vycissitudes--from bad to wuss has ben our fate ever sence we sot foot on this here eventfual vyge; an ef thar’s any lesson to be larned from sech doins an car’ns on as this here, why, I ain’t able to see it. An now what am I to do? What’s a goin to become of me? No dry clothes! No fire to dry myself! Rheumatiz before me! lumbago behind me! pleurisy on each side o’ me! such is the te-rific prospect of the blighted bein that now addresses you.”