White Jacket or, The World on a Man-of-War

by Herman Melville

  The theatrical outfit, therefore, was stowed down in the bottom of the sailors' bags, who little anticipated _then_ that it would ever be dragged out while Captain Claret had the sway.

  But immediately upon the announcement that the embargo was removed, vigorous preparations were at once commenced to celebrate the Fourth with unwonted spirit. The half-deck was set apart for the theatre, and the signal-quarter-master was commanded to loan his flags to decorate it in the most patriotic style.

  As the stage-struck portion of the crew had frequently during the cruise rehearsed portions of various plays, to while away the tedium of the night-watches, they needed no long time now to perfect themselves in their parts.

  Accordingly, on the very next morning after the indulgence had been granted by the Captain, the following written placard, presenting a broadside of staring capitals, was found tacked against the main-mast on the gun-deck. It was as if a Drury-Lane bill had been posted upon the London Monument.

  CAPE HORN THEATRE.

  * * * * * * * *

  _Grand Celebration of the Fourth of July_.

  DAY PERFORMANCE.

  UNCOMMON ATTRACTION.

  THE OLD WAGON PAID OFF!

  JACK CHASE… PERCY ROYAL-MAST.

  STARS OF THE FIRST MAGNITUDE.

  _For this time only_.

  THE TRUE YANKEE SAILOR.

  The managers of the Cape Horn Theatre beg leave to inform

  the inhabitants of the Pacific and Southern Oceans that,

  on the afternoon of the Fourth of July, 184-, they will

  have the honour to present the admired drama of

  THE OLD WAGON PAID OFF!

  Commodore Bougee… _Tom Brown, of the Fore-top_.

  Captain Spy-glass… _Ned Brace, of the After-Guard_.

  Commodore's Cockswain… _Joe Bunk, of the Launch_.

  Old Luff… _Quarter-master Coffin._

  Mayor…. _Seafull, of the Forecastle_.

  PERCY ROYAL-MAST… JACK CHASE.

  Mrs. Lovelorn…. _Long-locks, of the After-Guard_.

  Toddy Moll… _Frank Jones_.

  Gin and Sugar Sall… _Dick Dash_.

  Sailors, Mariners, Bar-keepers, Crimps, Aldermen, Police-officer's, Soldiers, Landsmen generally.

  * * * * * * * *

  Long live the Commodore!:: Admission Free.

  * * * * * * * *

  To conclude with the much-admired song by Dibdin,

  altered to suit all American Tars, entitled

  THE TRUE YANKEE SAILOR.

  True Yankee Sailor (in costume), Patrick Flinegan,

  Captain of the Head.

  Performance to commence with "Hail Columbia," by the Brass

  Band. Ensign rises at three bells, P.M. No sailor permitted

  to enter in his shirt-sleeves. Good order is expected to be

  maintained. The Master-at-arms and Ship's Corporals to be in

  attendance to keep the peace.

  At the earnest entreaties of the seamen, Lemsford, the gun-deck poet, had been prevailed upon to draw up this bill. And upon this one occasion his literary abilities were far from being underrated, even by the least intellectual person on board. Nor must it be omitted that, before the bill was placarded, Captain Claret, enacting the part of censor and grand chamberlain ran over a manuscript copy of "_The Old Wagon Paid Off_," to see whether it contained anything calculated to breed disaffection against lawful authority among the crew. He objected to some parts, but in the end let them all pass.

  The morning of The Fourth-most anxiously awaited-dawned clear and fair. The breeze was steady; the air bracing cold; and one and all the sailors anticipated a gleeful afternoon. And thus was falsified the prophecies of certain old growlers averse to theatricals, who had predicted a gale of wind that would squash all the arrangements of the green-room.

  As the men whose regular turns, at the time of the performance, would come round to be stationed in the tops, and at the various halyards and running ropes about the spar-deck, could not be permitted to partake in the celebration, there accordingly ensued, during the morning, many amusing scenes of tars who were anxious to procure substitutes at their posts. Through the day, many anxious glances were cast to windward; but the weather still promised fair.

  At last _the people_ were piped to dinner; two bells struck; and soon after, all who could be spared from their stations hurried to the half-deck. The capstan bars were placed on shot-boxes, as at prayers on Sundays, furnishing seats for the audience, while a low stage, rigged by the carpenter's gang, was built at one end of the open space. The curtain was composed of a large ensign, and the bulwarks round about were draperied with the flags of all nations. The ten or twelve members of the brass band were ranged in a row at the foot of the stage, their polished instruments in their hands, while the consequential Captain of the Band himself was elevated upon a gun carriage.

  At three bells precisely a group of ward-room officers emerged from the after-hatchway, and seated themselves upon camp-stools, in a central position, with the stars and stripes for a canopy. _That_ was the royal box. The sailors looked round for the Commodore but neither Commodore nor Captain honored _the people_ with their presence.

  At the call of a bugle the band struck up _Hail Columbia_, the whole audience keeping time, as at Drury Lane, when _God Save The King_ is played after a great national victory.

  At the discharge of a marine's musket the curtain rose, and four sailors, in the picturesque garb of Maltese mariners, staggered on the stage in a feigned state of intoxication. The truthfulness of the representation was much heightened by the roll of the ship.

  "The Commodore," "Old Luff," "The Mayor," and "Gin and Sugar Sall," were played to admiration, and received great applause. But at the first appearance of that universal favourite, Jack Chase, in the chivalric character of _Percy Royal-Mast_, the whole audience simultaneously rose to their feet, and greeted hire with three hearty cheers, that almost took the main-top-sail aback.

  Matchless Jack, _in full fig_, bowed again and again, with true quarter-deck grace and self possession; and when five or six untwisted strands of rope and bunches of oakum were thrown to him, as substitutes for bouquets, he took them one by one, and gallantly hung them from the buttons of his jacket.

  "Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah! — go on! go on! — stop hollering-hurrah! — go on! — stop hollering-hurrah!" was now heard on all sides, till at last, seeing no end to the enthusiasm of his ardent admirers, Matchless Jack stepped forward, and, with his lips moving in pantomime, plunged into the thick of the part. Silence soon followed, but was fifty times broken by uncontrollable bursts of applause. At length, when that heart-thrilling scene came on, where Percy Royal-Mast rescues fifteen oppressed sailors from the watch-house, in the teeth of a posse of constables, the audience leaped to their feet, overturned the capstan bars, and to a man hurled their hats on the stage in a delirium of delight. Ah Jack, that was a ten-stroke indeed!

  The commotion was now terrific; all discipline seemed gone for ever; the Lieutenants ran in among the men, the Captain darted from his cabin, and the Commodore nervously questioned the armed sentry at his door as to what the deuce _the people_ were about. In the midst of all this, the trumpet of the officer-of-the-deck, commanding the top-gallant sails to be taken in, was almost completely drowned. A black squall was coming down on the weather-bow, and the boat-swain's mates bellowed themselves hoarse at the main-hatchway. There is no knowing what would have ensued, had not the bass drum suddenly been heard, calling all hands to quarters, a summons not to be withstood. The sailors pricked their ears at it, as horses at the sound of a cracking whip, and confusedly stumbled up the ladders to their stations. The next moment all was silent but the wind, howling like a thousand devils in the cordage.

  "Stand by to reef all three top-sails! — settle away the halyards! — haul out-so: make fast! — aloft, top-men! and reef away!"

  Thus, in storm and tempest terminated that day's theatricals. But the sailors never recov
ered from the disappointment of not having the "_True Yankee Sailor_" sung by the Irish Captain of the Head.

  And here White-jacket must moralize a bit. The unwonted spectacle of the row of gun-room officers mingling with "the people" in applauding a mere seaman like Jack Chase, filled me at the time with the most pleasurable emotions. It is a sweet thing, thought I, to see these officers confess a human brotherhood with us, after all; a sweet thing to mark their cordial appreciation of the manly merits of my matchless Jack. Ah! they are noble fellows all round, and I do not know but I have wronged them sometimes in my thoughts.

  Nor was it without similar pleasurable feelings that I witnessed the temporary rupture of the ship's stern discipline, consequent upon the tumult of the theatricals. I thought to myself, this now is as it should be. It is good to shake off, now and then, this iron yoke round our necks. And after having once permitted us sailors to be a little noisy, in a harmless way-somewhat merrily turbulent-the officers cannot, with any good grace, be so excessively stern and unyielding as before. I began to think a man-of-war a man-of-peace-and-good-will, after all. But, alas! disappointment came.

  Next morning the same old scene was enacted at the gang-way. And beholding the row of uncompromising-looking-officers there assembled with the Captain, to witness punishment-the same officers who had been so cheerfully disposed over night-an old sailor touched my shoulder and said, "See, White-Jacket, all round they have _shipped their quarter-deck faces again_. But this is the way."

  I afterward learned that this was an old man-of-war's-man's phrase, expressive of the facility with which a sea-officer falls back upon all the severity of his dignity, after a temporary suspension of it.

  CHAPTER XXIV

  INTRODUCTORY TO CAPE HORN

  And now, through drizzling fogs and vapours, and under damp, double-reefed top-sails, our wet-decked frigate drew nearer and nearer to the squally Cape.

  Who has not heard of it? Cape Horn, Cape Horn-a _horn_ indeed, that has tossed many a good ship. Was the descent of Orpheus, Ulysses, or Dante into Hell, one whit more hardy and sublime than the first navigator's weathering of that terrible Cape?

  Turned on her heel by a fierce West Wind, many an outward-bound ship has been driven across the Southern Ocean to the Cape of Good Hope-_that_ way to seek a passage to the Pacific. And that stormy Cape, I doubt not, has sent many a fine craft to the bottom, and told no tales. At those ends of the earth are no chronicles. What signify the broken spars and shrouds that, day after day, are driven before the prows of more fortunate vessels? or the tall masts, imbedded in icebergs, that are found floating by? They but hint the old story-of ships that have sailed from their ports, and never more have been heard of.

  Impracticable Cape! You may approach it from this direction or that-in any way you please-from the East or from the West; with the wind astern, or abeam, or on the quarter; and still Cape Horn is Cape Horn. Cape Horn it is that takes the conceit out of fresh-water sailors, and steeps in a still salter brine the saltest. Woe betide the tyro; the fool-hardy, Heaven preserve!

  Your Mediterranean captain, who with a cargo of oranges has hitherto made merry runs across the Atlantic, without so much as furling a t'-gallant-sail, oftentimes, off Cape Horn, receives a lesson which he carries to the grave; though the grave-as is too often the case-follows so hard on the, lesson that no benefit comes from the experience.

  Other strangers who draw nigh to this Patagonia termination of our Continent, with their souls full of its shipwrecks and disasters-top-sails cautiously reefed, and everything guardedly snug-these strangers at first unexpectedly encountering a tolerably smooth sea, rashly conclude that the Cape, after all, is but a bugbear; they have been imposed upon by fables, and founderings and sinkings hereabouts are all cock-and-bull stories.

  "Out reefs, my hearties; fore and aft set t'-gallant-sails! stand by to give her the fore-top-mast stun'-sail!"

  But, Captain Rash, those sails of yours were much safer in the sail-maker's loft. For now, while the heedless craft is bounding over the billows, a black cloud rises out of the sea; the sun drops down from the sky; a horrible mist far and wide spreads over the water.

  "Hands by the halyards! Let go! Clew up!"

  Too late.

  For ere the ropes' ends can be the east off from the pins, the tornado is blowing down to the bottom of their throats. The masts are willows, the sails ribbons, the cordage wool; the whole ship is brewed into the yeast of the gale.

  An now, if, when the first green sea breaks over him, Captain Rash is not swept overboard, he has his hands full be sure. In all probability his three masts have gone by the board, and, ravelled into list, his sails are floating in the air. Or, perhaps, the ship _broaches to_, or is _brought by the lee_. In either ease, Heaven help the sailors, their wives and their little ones; and heaven help the underwriters.

  Familiarity with danger makes a brave man braver, but less daring. Thus with seamen: he who goes the oftenest round Cape Horn goes the most circumspectly. A veteran mariner is never deceived by the treacherous breezes which sometimes waft him pleasantly toward the latitude of the Cape. No sooner does he come within a certain distance of it-previously fixed in his own mind-than all hands are turned to setting the ship in storm- trim; and never mind how light the breeze, down come his t'- gallant-yards. He «bends» his strongest storm-sails, and lashes every-thing on deck securely. The ship is then ready for the worst; and if, in reeling round the headland, she receives a broadside, it generally goes well with her. If ill, all hands go to the bottom with quiet consciences.

  Among sea-captains, there are some who seem to regard the genius of the Cape as a wilful, capricious jade, that must be courted and coaxed into complaisance. First, they come along under easy sails; do not steer boldly for the headland, but tack this way and that-sidling up to it, Now they woo the Jezebel with a t'- gallant-studding-sail; anon, they deprecate her wrath with double-reefed-topsails. When, at length, her unappeasable fury is fairly aroused, and all round the dismantled ship the storm howls and howls for days together, they still persevere in their efforts. First, they try unconditional submission; furling every rag and _heaving to_: laying like a log, for the tempest to toss wheresoever it pleases.

  This failing, they set a _spencer_ or _try-sail_, and shift on the other tack. Equally vain! The gale sings as hoarsely as before. At last, the wind comes round fair; they drop the fore-sail; square the yards, and scud before it; their implacable foe chasing them with tornadoes, as if to show her insensibility to the last.

  Other ships, without encountering these terrible gales, spend week after week endeavouring to turn this boisterous world-corner against a continual head-wind. Tacking hither and thither, in the language of sailors they _polish_ the Cape by beating about its edges so long.

  Le Mair and Schouten, two Dutchmen, were the first navigators who weathered Cape Born. Previous to this, passages had been made to the Pacific by the Straits of Magellan; nor, indeed, at that period, was it known to a certainty that there was any other route, or that the land now called Terra del Fuego was an island. A few leagues southward from Terra del Fuego is a cluster of small islands, the Diegoes; between which and the former island are the Straits of Le Mair, so called in honour of their discoverer, who first sailed through them into the Pacific. Le Mair and Schouten, in their small, clumsy vessels, encountered a series of tremendous gales, the prelude to the long train of similar hardships which most of their followers have experienced. It is a significant fact, that Schouten's vessel, the _Horne_, which gave its name to the Cape, was almost lost in weathering it.

  The next navigator round the. Cape was Sir Francis Drake, who, on Raleigh's Expedition, beholding for the first time, from the Isthmus of Darien, the "goodlie South Sea," like a true-born Englishman, vowed, please God, to sail an English ship thereon; which the gallant sailor did, to the sore discomfiture of the Spaniards on the coasts of Chili and Peru.

  But perhaps the greatest hardships on record, in making this celebr
ated passage, were those experienced by Lord Anson's squadron in 1736. Three remarkable and most interesting narratives record their disasters and sufferings. The first, jointly written by the carpenter and gunner of the Wager; the second by young Byron, a midshipman in the same ship; the third, by the chaplain of the Centurion. White-Jacket has them all; and they are fine reading of a boisterous March night, with the casement rattling in your ear, and the chimney-stacks blowing down upon the pavement, bubbling with rain-drops.

  But if you want the best idea of Cape Horn, get my friend Dana's unmatchable "Two Years Before the Mast." But you can read, and so you must have read it. His chapters describing Cape Horn must have been written with an icicle.

  At the present day the horrors of the Cape have somewhat abated. This is owing to a growing familiarity with it; but, more than all, to the improved condition of ships in all respects, and the means now generally in use of preserving the health of the crews in times of severe and prolonged exposure.

  CHAPTER XXV

  THE DOG-DAYS OFF CAPE HORN

  Colder and colder; we are drawing nigh to the Cape. Now gregoes, pea jackets, monkey jackets reefing jackets, storm jackets, oil jackets, paint jackets, round jackets short jackets, long jackets, and all manner of jackets, are the order of the day, not excepting the immortal white jacket, which begins to be sturdily buttoned up to the throat, and pulled down vigorously at the skirts, to bring them well over the loins.

  But, alas! those skirts were lamentably scanty; and though, with its quiltings, the jacket was stuffed out about the breasts like a Christmas turkey, and of a dry cold day kept the wearer warm enough in that vicinity, yet about the loins it was shorter than ballet-dancer's skirts; so that while my chest was in the temperate zone close adjoining the torrid, my hapless thighs were in Nova Zembla, hardly an icicle's toss from the Pole.