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the pump will let us know it."
Although there is no duty to which seamen are so averse as pumping--none,
perhaps, that is actually so exhausting and laborious--it often happens
that they have recourse to it with eagerness, as the only available means
of saving their lives. Such was now the case, the harsh but familiar
strokes of the pump-break being audible amid the more solemn and grand
sounds of the grating of ice-bergs, the rushing of floes, and the
occasional scuffling and howling of the winds. The last appeared to have
changed in their direction, however; a circumstance that was soon noted,
there being much less of biting cold in the blasts than had been felt in
the earlier hours of the night.
"I do believe that the wind has got round here to the north-east," said
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Roswell, as he paced the quarter-deck with Daggett, still holding in his
hand the well wiped and dried sounding-rod, in readiness for another
trial. "That last puff was right in our teeth!"
"Not in our teeth, Gar'ner; no, not in _my_ teeth," answered Daggett,
"whatever it maybe in _your'n_. I shall try to get back to the island,
where I shall endeavour to beach the schooner, and get a look at her
leaks. This is the _most_ I can hope for. It would never do to think of
carrying a craft, after such a nip, as far as Rio, pumping every foot of
the way!"
"That will cause a great delay, Captain Daggett," said Roswell,
doubtingly. "We are now well in among the first great body of the ice; it
may be as easy to work our way to the northward of it, as to get back into
clear water to the southward."
"I dare say it would; but, back I go. I do not ask you to accompany us,
Gar'ner; by no means. A'ter the handsome manner in which you've waited for
us so long, I couldn't think of such a thing! If the wind has r'ally got
round to nothe-east, and I begin to think it has, I shall get the schooner
into the cove in four-and-twenty hours; and there's as pretty a spot to
beach her, just under the shelf where we kept our spare casks, as a body
can wish. In a fortnight we'll have her leaks all stopped, and be jogging
along in your wake. You'll tell the folks on Oyster Pond that we're
a-coming, and they'll be sure to send the news across to the Vineyard."
This was touching Roswell on a point of honour, and Daggett knew it very
well. Generous and determined, the young man was much more easily
influenced by a silent and indirect appeal to his liberal qualities, than
he could possibly have been by any other consideration. The idea of
deserting a companion in distress, in a sea like that in which he was,
caused him to shrink from what, under other circumstances, he would regard
as an imperative duty. The deacon, and still more, Mary, called him north;
but the necessities of the Vineyarders would seem to chain him to their
fate.
"Let us see what the pump tells us now," cried Roswell impatiently.
"Perhaps the report may make matters better than we have dared to hope
for. If the pump gains on the leak, all may yet be well."
"It's encouraging and hearty to hear you say this; but no one who was _in_
that nip, as a body might say, can ever expect the schooner to make a run
of two thousand miles without repairs. To my eye, Gar'ner, these bergs are
separating, leaving us a clearer passage back to the open water."
"I do believe you are right; but it seems a sad loss of time, and a great
risk, to go through these mountains again," returned Roswell. "The wind
has shifted; and the nearest bergs, from some cause or other, are slowly
opening; but recollect what a mass of floe-ice there is outside. Let us
sound again."
The process was renewed this time much easier than before, the boxes being
already removed. The result was soon known.
"Well, what news, Gar'ner?" demanded Daggett, leaning down, in a vain
endeavour to perceive the almost imperceptible marks that distinguished
the wet part of the rod from that which was dry. "Do we gain on the leak,
or does the leak gain on us? God send it may be the first!"
"God has so sent it, sir," answered Stimson, reverently; for he was
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holding the lantern, having remained on board the damaged vessel by the
order of his officer. "It is He alone, Captain Daggett, who could do this
much to seamen in distress."
"Then to God be thanks, as is due! If we can but keep the leak under, the
schooner may yet be saved."
"I think it may be done, Daggett," added Roswell. "That one pump has
brought the water down more than two inches; and, in my judgment, the two
together would clear her entirely." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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