“Ah, yes,” said the skipper. “Is she coming this way, think you?”
“I should fancy not, sir,” answered Ned. “It was Miss Stanhope who first sighted her; she has been steering by her for fully five minutes; and had yonder ship been coming this way I think we should see her more distinctly by this time than we do.”
“I’ll bet any money that it’s the Southern Cross!” exclaimed the skipper with animation. “Get your glass, Ned, my boy, and slip up as far as the fore royal-yard, and see what you can make of her. I’ll stay here, meanwhile, and see that Miss Stanhope doesn’t run away with the ship.”
And as Ned hurried away to execute his errand, Captain Blyth turned to Sibylla and laughingly began to banter her upon her new accomplishment.
Active as a cat, Ned soon reached the royal-yard, upon which he composedly seated himself, preparatory to bringing his telescope to bear upon the stranger. A little manoeuvring sufficed him to find her; but she was so far away—quite fifteen miles—that he could make out nothing beyond the fact that she was apparently a ship of about the same size as the Flying Cloud. He remained on his elevated perch watching her for fully a quarter of an hour, a period long enough to satisfy him that both ships were standing in the same direction, and then he descended.
“Well; what do you make of her?” demanded the skipper, as the lad joined him on the poop.
Ned stated fully all that he had seen and all that he surmised—for a sailor is often able to shrewdly guess at a great deal when he sees but little; and when he had replied to the somewhat severe cross-examination to which he was subjected, Captain Blyth reiterated his former opinion:
“It is the Southern Cross, for a cool hundred! Mr. Bryce”—to the mate—“be good enough to muster the watch, sir, and see if you cannot get those sails to set something less like so many bags than they are at present.”
There had been a pretty heavy shower earlier on in the evening, which had sensibly stretched the new canvas, and now that it was again dry it hung from the spars and stays, as the skipper had said, “like so many bags”—a terrible eye-sore to a smart seaman—yet the mate had apparently not noticed it; or, at all events, had made no attempt to have the matter rectified.
Mr. Bryce made no reply; but, rising nonchalantly from his seat, he went slowly down the poop ladder and sauntered into the waist, where he came to a halt, and shouted:
“For’ard, there! lay aft here, all hands, and take a pull upon these sheets and halliards, will ye!”
“Confound the fellow!” muttered Captain Blyth. “I told him to muster the watch; and he must needs set all hands to work.”
The men moved aft, very deliberately, clearly in no amiable mood at being given such a job in the second dog-watch, and began upon the main tack and sheet, gradually working their way upward, and from thence forward.
“What did I say, mates?” commented Williams, as they slowly brought the canvas into better trim. “This is the ‘old man’s’ work—this swigging away upon sheets and halliards just upon night-fall; and there he is upon the poop looking as black as thunder, because, I suppose, we’re not more lively over the job. And what’s it all for? Why, simply because that young sprig, Ned, happens to sight a sail ahead of us; and because we happen to be a smart ship the skipper won’t be satisfied until we’ve overhauled her. This is just the beginning of it; it’ll be like this every time we happen to see anything ahead; you mark my words.”
“D’ye twig the new helmsman?” laughed another, jerking his head aft to direct attention to Sibylla, who still held the wheel.
“Ay, ay, mate; we see her,” answered Williams, who seemed to think himself called upon to play the part of spokesman. “We see her; and a pretty creature she is. But do you think, mates, she’ll ever give any of us a spell when it’s our trick? Not she! It’s all very well when it’s a smart young sprig of an apprentice—or midshipman, as they call themselves—that she can laugh and talk with; but it’s a different matter with us poor shell-backs. The swells won’t have anything to say to its.”
“Now, you’re wrong there, Josh, old shipmate, as I can testify,” spoke up Jack Simpson, a smart young A.B. “Mrs. Henderson and Mrs. Gaunt has both spoke to me; and it was only a night or two ago that, when it was my wheel, Mr. Gaunt gived me a cigar; and a precious good one it was too, I can tell ye.”
“Ay; and I suppose when he handed it to you he made you feel as if you was a dog that he was giving a bone to; didn’t he?” said Williams.
“No, he didn’t; not by a long ways,” answered Jack. “He looked and spoke like a thorough-bred gentleman; but he was as perlite and civil as ever a man could be.”
“Civil!” grunted Rogers. “Well, I don’t make no account of that; it’s his business to be civil. He’s what they calls a civil engineer; though hang me if I know what an engineer wants aboard of a sailing ship.”
“How come you to know he’s a civil engineer?” demanded another man.
“Because, d’ye see, mate,” replied Rogers, “I was one of the hands as was told off to pass the dunnage up when the passengers came alongside; and I read on one of the boxes ‘Mr. William Gaunt, C.E.’ The mate saw it, too; and he says to the skipper, as was standin’ close alongside of him, says he:—
“ ‘Mr. William Gaunt, C.E.’—what does C.E. stand for? And the skipper, he says: ‘What, don’t you know? Why, C.E. stands for Civil Engineer, which is the gentleman’s purfession,’ says he. And that’s how I come to know it, matey.”
“Well, civil or not civil, I maintain he ain’t a bit better than any of us,” insisted Williams; “and I want to know by what right he or anybody else is to be allowed to give themselves airs over the likes of us. Can he do anything that any of us can’t do? Answer me that if you can,” he demanded defiantly.
“Ay, that can he, my lad,” spoke up Parsons, promptly. “Why, he’s one of them people that builds railroads and bridges and harbours, and the likes of that. Civil engineers is among a sailor’s best friends, shipmates. Look at the scores of snug harbours they’ve built where there was nothing but open roadsteads before. There’s Colombo, for instance. Look what a snug spot they’ve made of that. Why, mates, I was lying at Colombo once before that harbour was built, and we had to keep watch and watch all the time we was there, just the same as if we was at sea, just to take care that the ship didn’t strike adrift and go ashore. And now, look at the place! Why, you’re moored head and starn; and some ships don’t keep even so much as an anchor watch all the time they’re there. Don’t tell me! A civil engineer’s a man of eddication, boys; and that’s where he goes to wind’ard of chaps like us. Look at the skipper, again. Any one of us could take him up and toss him over the rail, so far as hard work’s concerned. But you give him his charts, and chronometers, and sextants, and things; put him aboard of a ship, and tell him to take her clear round the world and bring her back again to the same place, and he can do it. Why? Eddication again. It’s eddication, mates, that makes swells of men, that enables ’em to earn big pay, and makes ’em of consequence in the world. There’ll be no such thing as equality in this world, Josh, as long as one man lets another get ahead of him in the matter of eddication. Them’s my sentiments.”
And Parsons was right, lads. Simple, homely, and unpolished as was his language, he had succeeded in giving utterance to a grand truth; one which all boys will do well to lay to heart and profit by to the utmost extent of their opportunities.
It occupied the men fully until eight bells to get the canvas trimmed to Captain Blyth’s satisfaction; after which the watch below retired to the forecastle and to their hammocks.
During the night the wind freshened somewhat, hauled a trifle, and came a point or two free, in consequence of which, when the passengers made their appearance on deck next morning to get a