When the wind came, it came with sudden fury; but Reuben Hawkshaw had heard of the sudden gales that ships sailing west had to encounter, and took precautions as soon as it began to rise--furling up all the great sails; passing lifelines along the sides, to which the men could cling, if the waves washed boisterously over her; and clearing the decks and closing up all hatchways and openings. So, though for a week she tossed and labored in the gale, she was none the worse when it ceased; and indeed, the seas she encountered were by no means so heavy as those with which she had battled, on her voyage home from Spain.
While the gale lasted, Reuben Hawkshaw took every precaution to enable him to keep his reckoning, heaving the log every half hour, and noting constantly each change in the direction of the wind; so that, when all was over, he could tell within fifty miles the spot where the gale left her--for in those days the instruments of navigation were in their infancy, and sailors relied chiefly on the compass, and dead reckoning, to bring them safe to port, however long their voyage might be. Reuben Hawkshaw knew of no other plan, but as far as these went he was an excellent navigator, and was seldom many miles out in making a landfall.
As soon as the gale abated, sail was again made on the ship, and she proceeded on her course. In another three weeks, the mates were seen frequently to ascend into the tops, and the news spread among the crew that the Spanish islands lay not far ahead. The justness of the captain's reckoning was soon proved; for at daybreak, one morning, land was perceived directly ahead; though still lying, like a patch of low cloud, on the horizon.
A cheer broke from those on deck, as soon as the mate proclaimed that to a certainty it was land they saw, and the watch below came pouring up. Another cheer saluted the captain as he came out from his cabin--a tribute to his seamanship, in thus bringing them straight across the ocean, on a path that no Englishman had ever before sailed.
He, with the two mates, at once ascended to the fore top. From here, as the morning brightened, two other points of land could be seen, far away on either hand.
"We are evidently approaching small islands. This is just what we hoped. My fear was that we might strike Hispaniola, or Porto Rico. When we get nearer land we will lower our topsails, so as not to be so easily made out from the land. Now we will go below, and try and mark off our place on the chart."
Chapter 4: Among The Islands.
"Now, let us go through our calculations again," the captain said when they entered his cabin.
"How long will you be, Captain?" the first mate asked.
"Half an hour, Standing."
"Then I will come again or, if you want me before that, send for me," and the first mate went out on deck again, for though well skilled to handle a ship in all weathers, and as brave and hardy a seaman as sailed out of Plymouth, James Standing could neither read nor write; and though in a rough sort of way he could reckon the course a ship should lie, and make allowance for leeway and currents and baffling winds, and could bring a ship into any port in England or the Low Countries, he was of no use in a matter of this kind.
Pengarvan was a good scholar, and Reuben had taught him what he knew of navigation, and always made him keep a log from the time when he first became a mate; at first comparing their calculations every day, and then but once a week; arguing over the allowances each had made for tide and leeway; and sometimes finding to his surprise, on arriving in port, that Pengarvan's calculations were even nearer to the truth than his own.
This was a great satisfaction to him, for he felt that, if aught should happen to himself when on a voyage, Pengarvan could be trusted to bring the Swan home, as safely and surely as he could himself. Roger had, for the last two years, been going through the same schooling; but as yet he was very far from attaining accuracy, being unwilling to make sufficient allowance for the great leeway that a vessel, in those days, made with the wind abeam.
"Now, Pengarvan," Reuben said in great glee, "bring out your log book. We have not compared notes since we started, for till we expected to reach land there was no occasion to do so, as our general course was clear enough. Now let us see where you put her.
"And you, too, Roger; let us see what hand you have made of it.
"I went through my calculations yesterday, and I am sure that there is no mistake in the figures. If I am right, this is the island that we see ahead, the one called Samona; while that we see dimly away on the port hand is Mariguana. I don't see, by this map, any land marked that could be that which we see on the starboard hand.
"Now, what do you make of it?"
"I put it more than a degree to the southeast, Captain; and believe that the three islands we see are those marked as the Caicos: the Great Caicos in the center, North and East on either hand."
"And you, Roger, what do you make of it?"
"According to my calculation, father, we ought to be full two hundred miles from land, and heading straight for Abaco, the northernmost of these islands."
The captain laughed, and even Pengarvan smiled.
"I fear, Roger, it would be hardly safe to leave the ship in your hands, at present. You are some six hundred miles away from Pengarvan's islands, and but seventy less from mine.
"Well, Pengarvan, whether you or I be right, we may congratulate ourselves; for we have made a near cast, indeed, seeing that it is eight weeks since we left England, and more than six since we sailed out of sight of Madeira; and that we traversed a sea altogether strange to us, and of whose currents we know nothing. We are both right, to a day, in our reckoning of distance; and neither of us need feel hurt, if the other turns out right, at finding himself but sixty miles out, on a voyage of such length as this.
"I headed for this point because, as I said, we must steer clear of the great islands; which are, as you know, wholly in the possession of the Spaniards, who have dispossessed the inhabitants, and use them as slaves for working the plantations and mines. As you see by the chart, they have no posts in all these islands, running from here northwest, nearly up to the mainland; except a small post at San Salvador. Now we will coast up through these islands, till we get within sight of Columbus Point, at the southerly end of San Salvador; for that was the island, you know, that was first discovered by him in '92. Then we will strike westward to Andros, and after that shape her course due west. This will take us north of the west end of Cuba, and well out of sight of land; but we must be careful of our navigation, for as you see it is written here:
"'Small islands, innumerable, scattered among those marked here; these being the principal. Many of these islands are low, and show but little above the water. Sailing is very perilous, and not to be attempted at night.'
"You see, in this course we shall have the advantage of being well out of the ordinary line of passage of the Spaniards, who shape their course more to the southward, make Porto Rico their first landfall, and then have the two great islands, Hispaniola and Cuba, lying straight before them; free, as it seems, by the chart, from any dangers to navigation.
"Roger, from this evening we will compare our log books day by day, so that you may learn where it is that you have gone wrong. But I can guess how it is. The wind is blowing chiefly from the east, and you will never make allowance enough for drift; and I have told you over and over again that, with a light wind on our beam, we drive a mile to leeward for every two we go on our course. There are many ships which will drift nigh a mile for every mile they sail, in light winds. When the wind is brisk, and we are going fast through the water, then we drift but little, not more perhaps than one mile to six or seven."
"But why is that, father? How is it that a light wind blows us away sideways; and that a strong wind, instead of blowing us more, blows us less?"
"That I cannot tell you, Roger.