The Crater, James Fenimore Cooper [good book club books TXT] 📗

none, though, to own the truth, the liturgy gave a good deal of scandal to a certain portion of their number. Reading prayers was so profane a thing, that these individuals could scarcely consent to be present at such a vain ceremony; nor was the discontent, on this preliminary point, fully disposed of until the governor once asked the principal objector how he got along with the Lord's Prayer, which was not only written and printed, but which usually was committed to memory! Notwithstanding this difficulty, the emigrants did get along with it without many qualms, and most of them dropped quietly into the habit of worshipping agreeably to a liturgy, just as if it were not the terrible profanity that some of them had imagined. In this way, many of our most intense prejudices get lost in new communications.

It is not our intention to accompany the Rancocus, day by day, in her route. She touched at Rio, and sailed again at the end of eight and forty hours. The passage round the Horn was favourable, and having got well to the westward, away the ship went for her port. One of the cows got down, and died before it could be relieved, in a gale off the cape; but no other accident worth mentioning occurred. A child died with convulsions, in consequence of teething, a few days later; but this did not diminish the number on board, as three were born the same week. The ship had now been at sea one hundred and sixty days, counting the time passed at Rio, and a general impatience to arrive pervaded the vessel. If the truth must be said, some of the emigrants began to doubt the governor's ability to find his islands again, though none doubted of their existence. The Kannakas, however, declared that they began to smell home, and it is odd enough, that this declaration, coming as it did from ignorant men who made it merely on a fanciful suggestion, obtained more credit with most of the emigrants, than all the governor's instruments and observations.

One day, a little before noon it was, Mark appeared on deck with his quadrant, and as he cleaned the glasses of the instrument, he announced his conviction that the ship would shortly make the group of the crater. A current had set him further north than he intended to go, but having hauled up to south-west, he waited only for noon to ascertain his latitude, to be certain of his position. As the governor maintained a proper distance from his people, and was not in the habit of making-unnecessary communications to them, his present frankness told for so much the more, and it produced a very general excitement in the ship. All eyes were on the look-out for land, greatly increasing the chances of its being shortly seen. The observation came at noon, as is customary, and the governor found he was about thirty miles to the northward of the group of islands he was seeking. By his calculation, he was still to the eastward of it, and he hauled up, hoping to fall in with the land well to windward. After standing on three hours in the right direction, the look-outs from the cross-trees declared no land was visible ahead. For one moment the dreadful apprehension of the group's having sunk under another convulsion of nature crossed Mark's mind, but he entertained that notion for a minute only. Then came the cry of "sail ho!" to cheer everybody, and to give them something else to think of.

This was the first vessel the Rancocus had seen since she left Rio. It was to windward, and appeared to be standing down before the wind. In an hour's time the two vessels were near enough to each other to enable the glass to distinguish objects; and the quarter-deck, on board the Rancocus, were all engaged in looking at the stranger.

"'Tis the Mermaid," said Mark to Betts, "and it's all right. Though what that craft can be doing here to windward of the islands is more than I can imagine!"

"Perhaps, sir, they's a cruising arter us," answered Bob. "This is about the time they ought to be expectin' on us; and who knows but Madam Woolston and Friend Marthy may not have taken it into their heads to come out a bit to see arter their lawful husbands?"

The governor smiled at this conceit, but continued his observations in silence.

"She behaves very strangely, Betts," Mark, at length, said. "Just take a look at her. She yaws like a galliot in a gale, and takes the whole road like a drunken man. There can be no one at the helm."

"And how lubberly, sir, her canvas is set! Just look at that main-taw-sail, sir; one of the sheets isn't home by a fathom, while the yard is braced in, till it's almost aback!"

The governor walked the deck for five minutes in intense thought, though occasionally he stopped to look at the brig, now within a league of them. Then he suddenly called out to Bob, to "see all clear for action, and to get everything ready to go to quarters."

This order set every one in motion. The women and children were hurried below, and the men, who had been constantly exercised, now, for five months, took their stations with the regularity of old seamen. The guns were cast loose--ten eighteen-pound carronades and two nines, the new armament--cartridges were got ready, shot placed at hand, and all the usual dispositions for combat were made. While this was doing, the two vessels were fast drawing nearer to each other, and were soon within gun-shot. But, no one on board the Rancocus knew what to make of the evolutions of the Mermaid. Most of her ordinary square-sails were set, though not one of them all was sheeted home, or well hoisted. An attempt had been made to lay the yards square, but one yard-arm was braced in too far, another not far enough, and nothing like order appeared to have prevailed at the sail-trimming. But, the of the brig was the most remarkable. Her general course would seem to be dead before the wind; but she yawed incessantly, and often so broadly, as to catch some of her light sails aback. Most vessels take a good deal of room in running down before the wind, and in a swell; but the Mermaid took a great deal more than was Common, and could scarce be said to look any way in particular. All this the governor observed, as the vessels approached nearer and nearer, as well as the movements of those of the crew who showed themselves in the rigging.

"Clear away a bow-gun," cried Mark, to Betts--"something dreadful must have happened; that brig is in possession of the savages, who do not know how to handle her!"

This announcement produced a stir on board the Rancocus, as may well be imagined. If the savages had the brig, they probably had the group also; and what had become of the colonists? The next quarter of an hour was one of the deepest expectation with all in the ship, and of intense agony with Mark. Betts was greatly disturbed also; nor would it have been safe for one of Waally's men to have been within reach of his arm, just then. Could it be possible that Ooroony had yielded to temptation and played them false? The governor could hardly believe it; and, as for Betts, he protested loudly it could not be so.

"Is that bow-gun ready?" demanded the governor.

"Ay, ay, sir; all ready."

"Fire, but elevate well--we will only frighten them, at first. We betide them, if they resist."

Betts did fire, and to the astonishment of everybody, the brig returned a broadside! But resistance ceased with this one act of energy, if it could be so termed. Although five guns were actually fired, and nearly simultaneously, no aim was even attempted. The shot all flew off at a tangent from the position of the ship; and no harm was done to any but the savages themselves, of whom three or four were injured by the recoils. From the moment the noise and smoke were produced, everything like order ceased on board the brig, which was filled with savages. The vessel broached to, and the sails caught aback. All this time, the Rancocus was steadily drawing nearer, with an intent to board; but, unwilling to expose his people, most of whom were unpractised in strife, in a hand-to-hand conflict with ferocious savages, the governor ordered a gun loaded with grape to be discharged into the brig. This decided the affair at once. Half a dozen were killed or wounded; some ran below; a few took refuge in the top; but most, without the slightest hesitation, jumped overboard. To the surprise of all who saw them, the men in the water began to swim directly to windward; a circumstance which indicated that either land or canoes were to be found in that quarter of the ocean. Seeing the state of things on board the brig, Mark luffed up under her counter, and laid her aboard. In a minute, he and twenty chosen men were on her decks; in another, the vessels were again clear of each other, and the Mermaid under command.

No sooner did the governor discharge his duties as a seaman, than he passed below. In the cabin he found Mr. Saunders, (or Captain Saunders, as he was called by the colonists,) bound hand and foot. His steward was in the same situation, and Bigelow was found, also a prisoner, in the steerage. These were all the colonists on board, and all but two who had been on board, when the vessel was taken.

Captain Saunders could tell the governor very little more than he saw with his own eyes. One fact of importance, however, he could and did communicate, which was this: Instead of being to windward of the crater, as Mark supposed, he was to leeward of it; the currents no doubt having set the ship to the westward faster than had been thought. Rancocus Island would have been made by sunset, had the ship stood on in the course she was steering when she made the Mermaid.

But the most important fact was the safety of the females. They were all at the Peak, where they had lived for the last six months, or ever since the death of the good Ooroony had again placed Waally in the ascendant. Ooroony's son was overturned immediately on the decease of the father, who died a natural death, and Waally disregarded the taboo, which he persuaded his people could have no sanctity as applied to the whites. The plunder of these last, with the possession of the treasure of iron and copper that was to be found in their vessels, had indeed been the principal bribe with which the turbulent and ambitious chief regained his power. The war did not break out, however, as soon as Waally had effected the revolution in his own group. On the contrary, that wily politician had made so many protestations of friendship after that event, which he declared to be necessary to the peace of his island; had collected so much sandal-wood, and permitted it to be transferred to the crater, where a cargo was already stored; and had otherwise made so many amicable demonstrations, as completely to deceive the colonists. No one had anticipated an invasion; but, on the contrary, preparations were making at the Peak for the reception of Mark, whose return had now been expected daily for a fortnight.

The Mermaid had brought over a light freight of wood from Betto's group, and had discharged at the crater. This done,