The gale was now at its height, "blowing
like scissors and thumb-screws"; the captain was on deck; the
ship, which was light, rolling and pitching as though she would
shake the long sticks out of her, and the sails were gaping open
and splitting in every direction.
like scissors and thumb-screws"; the captain was on deck; the
ship, which was light, rolling and pitching as though she would
shake the long sticks out of her, and the sails were gaping open
and splitting in every direction.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v08 - Dah to Dra
Though Paul's walks had lain of
late in this direction, he was not enough acquainted with the
## p. 4297 (#59) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
4297
passage to find his way through it in the dark. Abel, who had
traversed it often in the night, alone and in terror, now took
heart at having some one with him at such an hour, and of
fered unhesitatingly to lead. "The boy winds round those
crags with the speed and ease of a stream," said Paul; "not so
fast, Abel. "
"Take hold of the root which shoots out over your head, sir,
for 'tis ticklish work getting along just here. Do you feel it,
sir? "
"I have hold," said Paul.
"Let yourself gently down by it, sir. You needn't be a bit
afraid, for 'twill not give way; man couldn't have fastened it
stronger. "
This was the first time Abel had felt his power, or had been
of consequence to any one, since the boys had turned him out
from their games; and it gave him a momentary activity, and
an unsettled sort of spirit, which he had never known since
then. He had been shunned and abhorred; and he believed him-
self the victim of some demoniac power. To have another in
this fearful bondage with him, as Paul had intimated, was a
relief from his dreadful solitariness in his terrors and sufferings.
"And he said that it was I who was to work a curse on him,"
muttered Abel. "It cannot be, surely, that such a thing as I
am can harm a man like him! " And though Abel remembered
Paul's kindness, and that this was to seal his own doom too, yet
it stirred the spirit of pride within him.
"What are you muttering to yourself, there in the dark,"
demanded Paul; "or whom talk you with, you withered wretch ? »
Abel shook in every joint at the sound of Paul's harsh voice.
"It is so dreadfully still here," said Abel; "I hear nothing
but your steps behind me, and they make me start. " This was
true; for notwithstanding his touch of instant pride, his terrors
and his fear of Paul were as great as ever.
"Speak louder then," said Paul, "or hold your peace. I like
not your muttering; it bodes no good. "
"It may bring a curse to you, worse than that on me, if a
worse can be," said Abel to himself; "but who can help it? "
Day broke before they cleared the ridge; a drizzling rain
came on; and the wind, beginning to rise, drove through the
crevices in the rocks with sharp whistling sounds which seemed
to come from malignant spirits of the air.
## p. 4298 (#60) ############################################
4298
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
They had scarcely entered the wood when the storm became
furious; and the trees, swaying and beating with their branches
against one another, seemed possessed of a supernatural madness,
and engaged in wild conflict, as if there were life and passion in
them; and their broken, decayed arms groaned like things in
torment. The terror of these sights and sounds was too much
for poor Abel; it nearly crazed him; and he set up a shriek that
for a moment drowned the noise of the storm. It startled Paul;
and when he looked at him, the boy's face was of a ghostly
whiteness. The rain had drenched him to the skin; his clothes
clung to his lean body, that shook as if it would come apart; his
eyes flew wildly, and his teeth chattered against each other. The
fears and torture of his mind gave something unearthly to his
look, that made Paul start back. "Abel-boy-fiend-speak!
What has seized you? "
"They told me so," cried Abel-"I've done it-I led the
way for you- they're coming, they're coming-we're lost! "
"Peace, fool," said Paul, trying to shake off the power he felt
Abel gaining over him, "and find us a shelter if you can. "
"There's only the hut," said Abel, "and I wouldn't go into
that if it rained fire. "
"And why not? "
"I once felt that it was for me to go, and I went so near
as to see in at the door. And I saw something in the hut - it
was not a man, for it flitted by the opening just like a shadow;
and I heard two muttering something to one another; it wasn't
like other sounds, for as soon as I heard it, it made me stop
my ears. I couldn't stay any longer, and I ran till I cleared
the wood. Oh! 'tis His biding-place, when He comes to the
wood. "
"And is it of His own building? " asked Paul, sarcastically.
"No," answered Abel; "'twas built by the two wood-cutters;
and one of them came to a bloody end, and they say the other
died the same night, foaming at the mouth like one possessed.
There it is," said he, almost breathless, as he crouched down and
pointed at the hut under the trees. "Do not go, sir,” he said.
catching hold of the skirts of Paul's coat,-"I've never dared go
nigher since. "-"Let loose, boy," cried Paul, striking Abel's
hand from his coat, "I'll not be fooled with. " Abel, alarmed at
being left alone, crawled after Paul as far as he dared go; then
taking hold of him once more, made a supplicating motion to
## p. 4299 (#61) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
4299
him to stop; he was afraid to speak. Paul pushed on without
regarding him.
The hut stood on the edge of a sand-bank that was kept
up by a large pine, whose roots and fibres, lying partly bare,
looked like some giant spider that had half buried himself in
the sand. On the right of the hut was a patch of broken
ground, in which were still standing a few straggling dried
stalks of Indian corn; and from two dead trees hung knotted
pieces of broken line, which had formerly served for a clothes-
line. The hut was built of half-trimmed trunks of trees laid on
each other, crossing at the four corners and running out at
unequal lengths, the chinks partly filled in with sods and moss.
The door, which lay on the floor, was of twisted boughs; and
the roof, of the same, was caved in, and but partly kept out
the sun and rain.
As Paul drew near the entrance he stopped, though the
wind just then came in a heavy gust, and the rain fell like a
flood. It was not a dread of what he might see within; but
it seemed to him that there was a spell round him, drawing
him nearer and nearer to its centre; and he felt the hand of
some invisible power upon him. As he stepped into the hut
a chill ran over him, and his eyes shut involuntarily. Abel
watched him eagerly; and as he saw him enter, tossed his arms
wildly shouting, "Gone, gone! They'll have me
me too-they're
coming, they're coming! " and threw himself on his face to
the ground.
Driven from home by his maddening passions, a perverse
delight in self-torture had taken possession of Paul; and his
mind so hungered for more intense excitement, that it craved
to prove true all which its jealousy and superstition had
imaged. He had walked on, lost in this fearful riot, but with
no particular object in view, and taking only a kind of crazed
joy in his bewildered state. Esther's love for him, which he
at times thought past doubt feigned, the darkness of the night,
and then the driving storm with its confused motions and
sounds, made an uproar of the mind which drove out all
settled purpose or thought.
The stillness of the place into which he had now entered,
where was heard nothing but the slow, regular dripping of the
rain from the broken roof upon the hard-trod floor; the lowered
and distant sound of the storm without; the sudden change
## p. 4300 (#62) ############################################
4300
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
from the whirl and swaying of the trees to the steady walls
of the building, put a sudden stop to the violent working of
his brain, and he gradually fell into a stupor.
When Abel began to recover, he could scarcely raise himself
from the ground. He looked round, but could see nothing of
Paul. "They have bound us together," said he; "and something
is drawing me toward him. There is no help for me; I must
go whither he goes. " As he was drawn nearer and nearer to
the hut he seemed to struggle and hang back, as if pushed on
against his will. At last he reached the doorway; and clinging
to its side with a desperate hold, as if not to be forced in, put
his head forward a little, casting a hasty glance into the building.
"There he is, and alive! " breathed out Abel.
Paul's stupor was now beginning to leave him; his recollec-
tion was returning; and what had passed came back slowly and
at intervals. There was something he had said to Esther before
leaving home-he could not tell what; then his gazing after her
as she drove from the house; then something of Abel,—and he
sprang from the ground as if he felt the boy's touch again about
his knees; then the ball-room, and a multitude of voices, and all
talking of his wife. Suddenly she appeared darting by him; and
Frank was there. Then came his agony and tortures again; all
returned upon him as in the confusion of some horrible trance.
Then the hut seemed to enlarge and the walls to rock; and
shadows of those he knew, and of terrible beings he had never
seen before, were flitting round him and mocking at him. His
own substantial form seemed to him undergoing a change, and
taking the shape and substance of the accursed ones at which he
looked. As he felt the change going on he tried to utter a cry,
but he could not make a sound nor move a limb. The ground
under him rocked and pitched; it grew darker and darker, till
everything was visionary; and he thought himself surrounded by
spirits, and in the mansions of the damned. Something like a
deep black cloud began to gather gradually round him. The
gigantic structure, with its tall terrific arches, turned slowly into
darkness, and the spirits within disappeared one after another,
till as the ends of the cloud met and closed, he saw the last of
them looking at him with an infernal laugh in his undefined
visage.
Abel continued watching him in speechless agony. Paul's
consciousness was now leaving him; his head began to swim
## p. 4301 (#63) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
4301
he reeled; and as his hand swept down the side of the hut,
while trying to save himself, it struck against a rusty knife that
had been left sticking loosely between the logs. "Let go, let
go! " shrieked Abel; "there's blood on 't-'tis cursed, 'tis cursed. "
As Paul swung round with the knife in his hand, Abel sprang
from the door with a shrill cry, and Paul sank on the floor,
muttering to himself, "What said They? »
When he began to come to himself a little, he was still sitting
on the ground, his back against the wall. His senses were yet
confused. He thought he saw his wife near him, and a bloody
knife by his side. After sitting a little longer his mind grad-
ually grew clearer, and at last he felt for the first time that his
hand held something. As his eye fell on it and he saw dis-
tinctly what it was, he leaped upright with a savage yell and
dashed the knife from him as if it had been an asp stinging
him. He stood with his bloodshot eyes fastened on it, his hands
spread, and his body shrunk up with horror. "Forged in hell!
and for me, for me! " he screamed, as he sprang forward and
seized it with a convulsive grasp. "Damned pledge of the
league that binds us! " he cried, holding it up and glaring
wildly on it. "And yet a voice did warn me of what, I know
not. Which of ye put it in this hand? Speak let me look on
you?
D'ye hear me, and will not answer? Nay, nay, what
needs it? This tells me, though it speaks not.
I know your
promptings now," he said, folding his arms deliberately; "your
work must be done; and I am doomed to it. "
-
## p. 4302 (#64) ############################################
T
4302
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
(1815-1882)
HE literary fame of Richard Henry Dana the younger rests on
a single book, produced at the age of twenty-five. Two
Years Before the Mast' stands unique in English literature:
it reports a man's actual experiences at sea, yet touches the facts
with a fine imagination. It is a bit of Dana's own life while on a
vacation away from college. The manner in which he got his
material was remarkable, but to the literature he came as by birth-
right, through his father, Richard Henry Dana the elder, then
a well-known poet, novelist, and essayist.
He was born in Cambridge in 1815, grow-
ing up in the intellectual atmosphere of
that university town, and in due course of
time entering Harvard College, where his
father and grandfather before him had been
trained in law and letters. An attack of
the measles during his third year at col-
lege left him with weakened eyes, and an
active outdoor life was prescribed as the
only remedy. From boyhood up he had
been passionately fond of the sea; small
wonder, then, that he now determined to
take a long sea voyage. Refusing a berth
R. H. DANA, JR.
offered him on a vessel bound for the East
Indies, he chose to go as common sailor before the mast, on a mer-
chantman starting on a two-years' trading voyage around Cape Horn
to California. At that time boys of good family from the New
England coast towns often took such trips. Dana indeed found a
companion in a former merchant's clerk of Boston. They left on
August 14th, 1834, doubled Cape Horn, spent many months in the
waters of the Pacific and on the coast of California, trading with the
natives and taking in cargoes of hides, and returned to Boston in
September, 1836. Young Dana, entirely cured of his weakness, re-
entered college, graduated the next year, and then went to study in
the law school of Harvard. During his cruise he had kept a journal,
which he now worked over into the narrative that made him famous,
and that bids fair to keep his name alive as long as boys, young or
old, delight in sea stories. It is really not a story at all, but
## p. 4303 (#65) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4303
describes with much vivacity the whole history of a long trading voy-
age, the commonplace life of the sailor with its many hardships,
including the savage brutality of captains with no restraint on passion
or manners, and scant recreations; the sea in storm and calm, and the
California coast before the gold fever, when but few Europeans were
settled there, and hides were the chief export of a region whose
riches lay still secreted under the earth. The great charm of the
narrative lies in its simplicity and its frank statement of facts. Dana
apparently did not invent anything, but depicted real men, men he
had intimately known for two years, calling them even by their own
names, and giving an unvarnished account of what they did and
said. He never hung back from work or shirked his duty. but
"roughed it" to the very end. As a result of these experiences, this
book is the only one that gives any true idea of the sailor's life.
Sea stories generally depend for their interest on the inventive skill
of their authors; Dana knew how to hold the attention by a simple
statement of facts. The book has all the charm and spontaneity of a
keenly observant yet imaginative and cultivated mind, alive to all
the aspects of the outer world, and gifted with that fine literary
instinct which, knowing the value of words, expresses its thoughts
with precision. Seafaring men have commented on his exactness in
reproducing the sailor's phraseology. The book was published in
1840, translated into several languages, and adopted by the British
Admiralty for distribution in the Navy. Few sailors are without a
copy in their chest. The Seaman's Friend,' which Dana published
in the following year, was inspired by his indignation at the abuses
he had witnessed in the merchant marine.
Dana did not follow up his first success, and his life henceforth
belongs to the history of the bar and politics of Massachusetts,
rather than to literature. The fame of his book brought to his law
office many admiralty cases. In 1848 he was one of the founders of
the Free Soil party; later he became an active abolitionist, and took
a large part in the local politics of his State. For a year he
lectured on international law in Harvard college. He contributed
to the North American Review, and wrote besides on various legal
topics. His one other book on travel, 'To Cuba and Back, a Vaca-
tion Voyage,' the fruit of a trip to that island in 1859, though well
written, never became popular. He retired from his profession in
1877, and spent the last years of his life in Paris and Italy. He
died in Rome, January 6th, 1882.
## p. 4304 (#66) ############################################
4304
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
A DRY GALE
From Two Years Before the Mast
WⓇ
E HAD been below but a short time before we had the
usual premonitions of a coming gale,- seas washing over
the whole forward part of the vessel, and her bows beat-
ing against them with a force and sound like the driving of
piles. The watch, too, seemed very busy trampling about decks
and singing out at the ropes. A sailor can tell by the sound
what sail is coming in; and in a short time we heard the top-
gallant-sails come in, one after another, and then the flying jib.
This seemed to ease her a good deal, and we were fast going
off to the land of Nod, when-bang, bang, bang on the scuttle,
and "All hands, reef topsails, ahoy! " started us out of our
berths, and it not being very cold weather, we had nothing
extra to put on, and were soon on deck. I shall never forget
the fineness of the sight. It was a clear and rather a chilly
night; the stars were twinkling with an intense brightness, and
as far as the eye could reach there was not a cloud to be seen.
The horizon met the sea in a defined line. A painter could not
have painted so clear a sky. There was not a speck upon it.
Yet it was blowing great guns from the northwest. When you
can see a cloud to windward, you feel that there is a place for
the wind to come from; but here it seemed to come from no-
where. No person could have told from the heavens, by their
eyesight alone, that it was not a still summer's night. One reef
after another we took in the topsails, and before we could get
them hoisted up we heard a sound like a short quick rattling of
thunder, and the jib was blown to atoms out of the bolt-rope.
We got the topsails set, and the fragments of the jib stowed
away, and the foretopmast staysail set in its place, when the
great mainsail gaped open, and the sail ripped from head to
foot. "Lay up on that main yard and furl the sail, before it
blows to tatters! " shouted the captain; and in a moment we
were up, gathering the remains of it upon the yard. We got it
wrapped round the yard, and passed gaskets over it as snugly
as possible, and were just on deck again, when with another
loud rent, which was heard throughout the ship, the foretopsail,
which had been double-reefed, split in two athwartships, just
below the reef-band, from earing to earing. Here again it was—
## p. 4305 (#67) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4305
down yard, haul out reef-tackles, and lay out upon the yard for
reefing. By hauling the reef-tackles chock-a-block we took the
strain from the other earings, and passing the close-reef earing,
and knotting the points carefully, we succeeded in setting the
sail, close reefed.
We had but just got the rigging coiled up, and were waiting
to hear "Go below the watch! " when the main royal worked
loose from the gaskets, and blew directly out to leeward, flap-
ping and shaking the mast like a wand. Here was a job for
somebody. The royal must come in or be cut adrift, or the mast
would be snapped short off. All the light hands in the starboard
watch were sent up one after another, but they could do nothing
with it. At length John, the tall Frenchman, the head of the
starboard watch (and a better sailor never stepped upon a deck),
sprang aloft, and by the help of his long arms and legs suc-
ceeded after a hard struggle,- the sail blowing over the yard-
arm to leeward, and the skysail adrift directly over his head,-
in smothering it and frapping it with long pieces of sinnet. He
came very near being blown or shaken from the yard several
times, but he was a true sailor, every finger a fish-hook. Hav-
ing made the sail snug, he prepared to send the yard down,
which was a long and difficult job; for frequently he was obliged
to stop and hold on with all his might for several minutes, the
ship pitching so as to make it impossible to do anything else at
that height. The yard at length came down safe, and after it
the fore and mizzen royal yards were sent down. All hands
were then sent aloft, and for an hour or two we were hard at
work, making the booms well fast, unreeving the studding sail
and royal and skysail gear, getting rolling-ropes on the yard,
setting up the weather breast-backstays, and making other prep-
arations for a storm. It was a fine night for a gale, just cool
and bracing enough for quick work, without being cold, and as
bright as day. It was sport to have a gale in such weather as
this. Yet it blew like a hurricane. The wind seemed to come
with a spite, an edge to it, which threatened to scrape us off the
yards. The force of the wind was greater than I had ever felt
it before; but darkness, cold, and wet are the worst parts of a
storm to a sailor.
-
Having got on deck again, we looked round to see what time
of night it was, and whose watch. In a few minutes the man.
at the wheel struck four bells, and we found that the other
VIII-270
## p. 4306 (#68) ############################################
4306
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
watch was out and our own half out. Accordingly the starboard
watch went below, and left the ship to us for a couple of hours,
yet with orders to stand by for a call.
Hardly had they got below before away went the foretop-
mast staysail, blown to ribands. This was a small sail, which
we could manage in the watch, so that we were not obliged to
call up the other watch. We laid upon the bowsprit, where we
were under water half the time, and took in the fragments of
the sail; and as she must have some headsail on her, prepared
to bend another staysail. We got the new one out into the net-
tings; seized on the tack, sheets, and halyards, and the hanks;
manned the halyards, cut adrift the frapping-lines, and hoisted
away; but before it was half-way up the stay it was blown all
to pieces. When we belayed the halyards, there was nothing
left but the bolt-rope. Now large eyes began to show them-
selves in the foresail; and knowing that it must soon go, the
mate ordered us upon the yard to furl it. Being unwilling to
call up the watch, who had been on deck all night, he roused
out the carpenter, sailmaker, cook, and steward, and with their
help we manned the foreyard, and after nearly half an hour's
struggle, mastered the sail and got it well furled round the
yard. The force of the wind had never been greater than at
this moment. In going up the rigging it seemed absolutely to
pin us down to the shrouds; and on the yard there was no such
thing as turning a face to windward. Yet there was no driving
sleet and darkness and wet and cold as off Cape Horn; and
instead of stiff oilcloth suits, southwester caps, and thick boots,
we had on hats, round jackets, duck trousers, light shoes, and
everything light and easy. These things make a great differ-
ence to a sailor. When we got on deck the man at the wheel
struck eight bells (four o'clock in the morning), and "All star-
bowlines, ahoy! " brought the other watch up, but there was no
going below for us.
The gale was now at its height, "blowing
like scissors and thumb-screws"; the captain was on deck; the
ship, which was light, rolling and pitching as though she would
shake the long sticks out of her, and the sails were gaping open
and splitting in every direction. The mizzen-topsail, which was
a comparatively new sail and close reefed, split from head to
foot in the bunt; the foretopsail went in one rent from clew to
earing, and was blowing to tatters; one of the chain bobstays
parted; the spritsailyard sprung in the slings, the martingale
## p. 4307 (#69) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4307
had slued away off to leeward; and owing to the long dry
weather the lee rigging hung in large bights at every lurch.
One of the main-topgallant shrouds had parted; and to crown
all, the galley had got adrift and gone over to leeward, and the
anchor on the lee bow had worked loose and was thumping the
side. Here was work enough for all hands for half a day. Our
gang laid out on the mizzen-topsailyard, and after more than
half an hour's hard work furled the sail, though it bellied out
over our heads, and again, by a slat of the wind, blew in
under the yard with a fearful jerk and almost threw us off
from the foot-ropes.
Double gaskets were passed round the yards, rolling tackles
and other gear bowsed taut, and everything made as secure as it
could be. Coming down, we found the rest of the crew just
coming down the fore rigging, having furled the tattered top-
sail, or rather, swathed it round the yard, which looked like a
broken limb bandaged. There was no sail now on the ship but
the spanker and the close-reefed main-topsail, which still held
good. But this was too much after-sail, and order was given to
furl the spanker. The brails were hauled up, and all the light
hands in the starboard watch sent out on the gaff to pass the
gaskets; but they could do nothing with it. The second mate
swore at them for a parcel of "sogers," and sent up a couple of
the best men; but they could do no better, and the gaff was
lowered down. All hands were now employed in setting up the
lee rigging, fishing the spritsail yard, lashing the galley, and
getting tackles upon the martingale, to bowse it to windward.
Being in the larboard watch, my duty was forward, to assist in
setting up the martingale. Three of us were out on the martin-
gale guys and back-ropes for more than half an hour, carrying
out, hooking, and unhooking the tackles, several times buried in
the seas, until the mate ordered us in from fear of our being
washed off. The anchors were then to be taken up on the rail,
which kept all hands on the forecastle for an hour, though every
now and then the seas broke over it, washing the rigging off to
leeward, filling the lee scuppers breast-high, and washing chock
aft to the taffrail.
Having got everything secure again, we were promising our-
selves some breakfast, for it was now nearly nine o'clock in the
forenoon, when the main-topsail showed evident signs of giving
way. Some sail must be kept on the ship, and the captain
## p. 4308 (#70) ############################################
4308
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
ordered the fore and main spencer gaffs to be lowered down,
and the two spencers (which were storm sails; brand-new, small,
and made of the strongest canvas) to be got up and bent; leav-
ing the main-topsail to blow away, with a blessing on it, if it
would only last until we could set the spencers. These we bent
on very carefully, with strong robands and seizings, and making
tackles fast to the clews, bowsed them down to the water-ways.
By this time the main-topsail was among the things that have
been, and we went aloft to stow away the remnant of the last
sail of all those which were on the ship twenty-four hours before.
The spencers were now the only whole sails on the ship, and
being strong and small, and near the deck, presenting but little
surface to the wind above the rail, promised to hold out well.
Hove-to under these, and eased by having no sail above the
tops, the ship rose and fell, and drifted off to leeward like a line-
of-battle ship.
It was now eleven o'clock, and the watch was sent below to
get breakfast, and at eight bells (noon), as everything was snug,
although the gale had not in the least abated, the watch was
set and the other watch and idlers sent below. For three days
and three nights the gale continued with unabated fury, and
with singular regularity. There were no lulls, and very little
variation in its fierceness. Our ship, being light, rolled so as
almost to send the fore yard-arm under water, and drifted off
bodily to leeward. All this time there was not a cloud to be
seen in the sky, day or night; no, not so large as a man's hand.
Every morning the sun rose cloudless from the sea, and set
again at night in the sea in a flood of light. The stars, too,
came out of the blue one after another, night after night, unob-
scured, and twinkled as clear as on a still frosty night at home,
until the day came upon them. All this time the sea was roll-
ing in immense surges, white with foam, as far as the eye could
reach, on every side; for we were now leagues and leagues
from shore.
## p. 4309 (#71) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4309
EVERY-DAY SEA LIFE
From Two Years Before the Mast
THE
HE sole object was to make the time pass on. Any change
was sought for which would break the monotony of the
time; and even the two-hours' trick at the wheel, which
came round to us in turn, once in every other watch, was looked
upon as a relief. The never-failing resource of long yarns,
which eke out many a watch, seemed to have failed us now; for
we had been so long together that we had heard each other's
stories told over and over again till we had them by heart; each
one knew the whole history of each of the others, and we were
fairly and literally talked out. Singing and joking we were in
no humor for; and in fact any sound of mirth or laughter would
have struck strangely upon our ears, and would not have been
tolerated any more than whistling or a wind instrument. The
last resort, that of speculating upon the future, seemed now to
fail us; for our discouraging situation, and the danger we were
really in (as we expected every day to find ourselves drifted
back among the ice), "clapped a stopper" upon all that. From
saying when we get home," we began insensibly to alter it "if
we get home," and at last the subject was dropped by a tacit
«<
consent.
struck out, and a
In this state of things a new light was
new field opened, by a change in the watch. One of our watch
was laid up for two or three days by a bad hand (for in cold
weather the least cut or bruise ripens into a sore), and his place
was supplied by the carpenter. This was a windfall, and there
was a contest who should have the carpenter to walk with him.
As "Chips" was a man of some little education, and he and I
had had a good deal of intercourse with each other, he fell in
with me in my walk. He was a Finn, but spoke English well,
and gave me long accounts of his country,- the customs, the
trade, the towns, what little he knew of the government (I found
he was no friend of Russia), his voyages, his first arrival in
America, his marriage and courtship; he had married a country-
woman of his, a dressmaker, whom he met with in Boston. I
had very little to tell him of my quiet sedentary life at home;
and in spite of our best efforts, which had protracted these yarns
through five or six watches, we fairly talked each other out, and
## p. 4310 (#72) ############################################
4310
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
I turned him over to another man in the watch and put myself
upon my own resources.
I commenced a deliberate system of time-killing, which united
some profit with a cheering-up of the heavy hours. As soon as
I came on deck, and took my place and regular walk, I began
with repeating over to myself in regular order a string of mat-
ters which I had in my memory,-the multiplication table and
the table of weights and measures; the Kanaka numerals; then
the States of the Union, with their capitals; the counties of
England, with their shire towns, and the kings of England in
their order, and other things. This carried me through my
facts, and being repeated deliberately, with long intervals, often
eked out the first two bells. Then came the Ten Command-
ments, the thirty-ninth chapter of Job, and a few other passages
from Scripture. The next in the order, which I seldom varied
from, came Cowper's 'Castaway,' which was a great favorite
with me; its solemn measure and gloomy character, as well as
the incident it was founded upon, making it well suited to a
lonely watch at sea. Then his 'Lines to Mary,' his address to the
Jackdaw, and a short extract from Table Talk' (I abounded in
Cowper, for I happened to have a volume of his poems in my
chest); 'Ille et nefasto' from Horace, and Goethe's 'Erl-König. '
After I had got through these, I allowed myself a more general
range among everything that I could remember, both in prose
and verse. In this way, with an occasional break by relieving
the wheel, heaving the log, and going to the scuttle-butt for a
drink of water, the longest watch was passed away; and I was
so regular in my silent recitations that if there was no inter-
ruption by ship's duty I could tell very nearly the number of
bells by my progress.
Our watches below were no more varied than the watch on
deck. All washing, sewing, and reading was given up, and we did
nothing but eat, sleep, and stand our watch, leading what might
be called a Cape Horn life. The forecastle was too uncomfort-
able to sit up in; and whenever we were below, we were in our
berths. To prevent the rain and the sea-water which broke over
the bows from washing down, we were obliged to keep the scut-
tle closed, so that the forecastle was nearly air-tight. In this little
wet leaky hole we were all quartered, in an atmosphere so bad
that our lamp, which swung in the middle from the beams,
sometimes actually burned blue, with a large circle of foul air
## p. 4311 (#73) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4311
about it. Still I was never in better health than after three'
weeks of this life. I gained a great deal of flesh, and we all ate
like horses. At every watch when we came below, before turn-
ing in, the bread barge and beef kid were overhauled. Each
man drank his quart of hot tea night and morning, and glad
enough we were to get it; for no nectar and ambrosia were
sweeter to the lazy immortals than was a pot of hot tea, a hard
biscuit, and a slice of cold salt beef to us after a watch on deck.
To be sure, we were mere animals, and had this life lasted a
year instead of a month, we should have been little better than
the ropes in the ship. Not a razor, nor a brush, nor a drop of
water, except the rain and the spray, had come near us all the
time: for we were on an allowance of fresh water-and who
would strip and wash himself in salt water on deck, in the snow
and ice, with the thermometer at zero?
A START; AND PARTING COMPANY
From Two Years before the Mast
THE
HE California had finished discharging her cargo, and was to
get under way at the same time with us. Having washed
down decks and got breakfast, the two vessels lay side by
side in complete readiness for sea, our ensigns hanging from the
peaks and our tall spars reflected from the glassy surface of the
river, which since sunrise had been unbroken by a ripple. At
length a few whiffs came across the water, and by eleven o'clock
the regular northwest wind set steadily in. There was no need
of calling all hands, for we had all been hanging about the fore
castle the whole forenoon, and were ready for a start upon the
first sign of a breeze. Often we turned our eyes aft upon the
captain, who was walking the deck, with every now and then a
look to windward. He made a sign to the mate, who came for-
ward, took his station deliberately between the knightheads, cast
a glance aloft, and called out, "All hands lay aloft and loose the
sails! " We were half in the rigging before the order came, and
never since we left Boston were the gaskets off the yards and
the rigging overhauled in a shorter time. "All ready forward,
sir! " "All ready the main! ” "Crossjack yards all ready, sir! "
## p. 4312 (#74) ############################################
4312
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
"Lay down, all hands but one on each yard! " The yard-arm
and bunt gaskets were cast off; and each sail hung by the jig-
ger, with one man standing by the tie to let it go. At the same
moment that we sprang aloft a dozen hands sprang into the
rigging of the California, and in an instant were all over her
yards; and her sails too were ready to be dropped at the word.
In the mean time our bow gun had been loaded and run out,
and its discharge was to be the signal for dropping the sails. A
cloud of smoke came out of our bows; the echoes of the gun
rattled our farewell among the hills of California, and the two
ships were covered from head to foot with their white canvas.
For a few minutes all was uproar and apparent confusion; men
jumping about like monkeys in the rigging; ropes and blocks
flying, orders given and answered amid the confused noises of
men singing out at the ropes. The topsails came to the mast-
heads with "Cheerly, men! " and in a few minutes every sail
was set, for the wind was light. The head sails were backed,
the windlass came round "slip-slap" to the cry of the sailors;
"Hove short, sir," said the mate; - "Up with him! - "Ay,
ay, sir. " A few hearty and long heaves, and the anchor showed
its head. "Hook cat! " The fall was stretched along the decks;
all hands laid hold; -"Hurrah, for the last time," said the
mate; and the anchor came to the cathead to the tune of
'Time for us to go,' with a rollicking chorus. Everything
was done quick, as though it was for the last time. The head
yards were filled away, and our ship began to move through
the water on her homeward-bound course.
>>>>
-
--
The California had got under way at the same moment,
and we sailed down the narrow bay abreast, and were just off
the mouth, and, gradually drawing ahead of her, were on the
point of giving her three parting cheers, when suddenly we
found ourselves stopped short, and the California ranging fast
ahead of us. A bar stretches across the mouth of the harbor,
with water enough to float common vessels; but being low in
the water, and having kept well to leeward, as we were
bound to the southward, we had stuck fast, while the Cali-
fornia, being light, had floated over.
We kept all sail on, in the hope of forcing over; but failing.
in this, we hove back into the channel. This was something
of a damper to us, and the captain looked not a little mortified
and vexed. "This is the same place where the Rosa got ashore,
## p. 4313 (#75) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4313
sir," observed our red-headed second mate, most mal-àpropos.
A malediction on the Rosa, and him too, was all the answer
he got, and he slunk off to leeward. In a few minutes the
force of the wind and the rising of the tide backed us into the
stream, and we were on our way to our old anchoring place,
the tide setting swiftly up, and the ship barely manageable in
the light breeze. We came-to in Our old berth opposite the
hide-house, whose inmates were not a little surprised to see us
return. We felt as though we were tied to California; and
some of the crew swore that they never should get clear of the
"bloody" coast.
In about half an hour, which was near high water, the
order was given to man the windlass, and again the anchor
was catted; but there was no song, and not a word was said
about the last time. The California had come back on finding
that we had returned, and was hove-to, waiting for us, off the
point. This time we passed the bar safely, and were soon up
with the California, who filled away, and kept us company.
She seemed desirous of a trial of speed, and our captain
accepted the challenge, although we were loaded down to the
bolts of our chain-plates, as deep as a sand-barge, and bound
so taut with our cargo that we were no more fit for a race
than a man in fetters; while our antagonist was in her best
trim. Being clear of the point, the breeze became stiff, and
the royal-masts bent under our sails, but we would not
take them in until we saw three boys spring aloft into the
rigging of the California; when they were all furled at once,
but with orders to our boys to stay aloft at the topgallant
mastheads and loose them again at the word. It was my duty
to furl the fore-royal; and, while standing by to loose it again,
I had a fine view of the scene. From where I stood, the
two vessels seemed nothing but spars and sails, while their
narrow decks, far below, slanting over by the force of the
wind aloft, appeared hardly capable of supporting the great
fabrics raised upon them. The California was to windward of
us, and had every advantage; yet, while the breeze was stiff,
we held our own. As soon as it began to slacken, she ranged
a little ahead, and the order was given to loose the royals.
In an instant the gaskets were off and the bunt dropped.
"Sheet home the fore royal! " "Weather sheets home! "—"Lee
sheets home! ” - "Hoist
is
away, sir! "
bawled from
-
aloft.
## p. 4314 (#76) ############################################
4314
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
"Overhaul your clew-lines! " shouts the mate.
"Ay, ay, sir!
all clear! " "Taut leech! belay! Well the lee brace; haul taut
to windward," and the royals were set. These brought us
up again; but the wind continuing light, the California set
hers, and it was soon evident that she was walking away from
us. Our captain then hailed and said that he should keep off
to his course; adding, "She isn't the Alert now. If I had
her in your trim she would have been out of sight by this
time. " This was good-naturedly answered from the California,
and she braced sharp up, and stood close upon the wind up
the coast; while we squared away our yards, and stood before
the wind to the
the south-southwest. The California's crew
manned her weather rigging, waved their hats in the air, and
gave us three hearty cheers, which we answered as heartily,
and the customary single cheer came back to us from over
the water. She stood on her way, doomed to eighteen months'
or two years' hard service upon that hated coast; while we
were making our way home, to which every hour and every
mile was bringing us nearer.
――――――
## p. 4314 (#77) ############################################
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224
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38082
## p. 4315 (#81) ############################################
4315
DANTE
(1265-1321)
BY CHARLES ELIOT NORTON
I
O ACQUIRE a love for the best poetry, and a just understand-
ing of it, is the chief end of the study of literature; for it
is by means of poetry that the imagination is quickened,
nurtured, and invigorated, and it is only through the exercise of his
imagination that man can live a life that is in a true sense worth
living. For it is the imagination which lifts him from the petty,
transient, and physical interests that engross the greater part of his
time and thoughts in self-regarding pursuits, to the large, permanent,
and spiritual interests that ennoble his nature, and transform him
from a solitary individual into a member of the brotherhood of the
human race.
In the poet the imagination works more powerfully and consist-
ently than in other men, and thus qualifies him to become the
teacher and inspirer of his fellows. He sees men, by its means,
more clearly than they see themselves; he discloses them to them-
selves, and reveals to them their own dim ideals. He becomes the
interpreter of his age to itself; and not merely of his own age is he
the interpreter, but of man to man in all ages. For change as the
world may in outward aspect, with the rise and fall of empires,-
change as men may, from generation to generation, in knowledge,
belief, and manners,-human nature remains unalterable in its ele-
ments, unchanged from age to age; and it is human nature, under its
various guises, with which the great poets deal.
The Iliad and the Odyssey do not become antiquated to us. The
characters of Shakespeare are perpetually modern. Homer, Dante,
Shakespeare, stand alone in the closeness of their relation to nature.
Each after his own manner gives us a view of life, as seen by the
poetic imagination, such as no other poet has given to us. Homer,
first of all poets, shows us individual personages sharply defined, but
in the early stages of intellectual and moral development, the first
representatives of the race at its conscious entrance upon the path of
progress, with simple motives, simple theories of existence, simple
and limited experience. He is plain and direct in the presentation
## p. 4316 (#82) ############################################
4316
DANTE
of life, and in the substance no less than in the expression of his
thought.
In Shakespeare's work the individual man is no less sharply
defined, no less true to nature, but the long procession of his per-
sonages is wholly different in effect from that of the Iliad and the
Odyssey. They have lost the simplicity of the older race; they are
the products of a longer and more varied experience; they have
become more complex. And Shakespeare is plain and direct neither
in the substance of his thought nor in the expression of it. The
world has grown older, and in the evolution of his nature man has
become conscious of the irreconcilable paradoxes of life, and more or
less aware that while he is infinite in faculty, he is also the quint-
essence of dust. But there is one essential characteristic in which
Shakespeare and Homer resemble each other as poets,—that they
both show to us the scene of life without the interference of their
own personality. Each simply holds the mirror up to nature, and
lets us see the reflection, without making comment on the show. If
there be a lesson in it we must learn it for ourselves.
Dante comes between the two, and differs more widely from each
of them than they from one another. They are primarily poets.
He is primarily a moralist who is also a poet. Of Homer the man,
and of Shakespeare the man, we know, and need to know, nothing;
it is only with them as poets that we are concerned. But it is need-
ful to know Dante as man, in order fully to appreciate him as poet.
He gives us his world not as reflection from an unconscious and
indifferent mirror, but as from a mirror that shapes and orders its
reflections for a definite end beyond that of art, and extraneous to it.
And in this lies the secret of Dante's hold upon so many and so
various minds. He is the chief poet of man as a moral being.
To understand aright the work of any great poet we must know
the conditions of his times; but this is not enough in the case of
Dante. We must know not only the conditions of the generation to
which he belonged, we must also know the specific conditions which
shaped him into the man he was, and differentiated him from his
fellows. How came he, endowed with a poetic imagination which
puts him in the same class with Homer and Shakespeare, not to be
content, like them, to give us a simple view of the phantasmagoria of
life, but eager to use the fleeting images as instruments by which to
enforce the lesson of righteousness, to set forth theory of existence
and a scheme of the universe?
The question cannot be answered without a consideration of the
change wrought in the life and thoughts of men in Europe by the
Christian doctrine as expounded and enforced by the Roman Church,
and of the simultaneous changes in outward conditions resulting from
## p. 4317 (#83) ############################################
DANTE
4317
the destruction of the ancient civilization, and the slow evolution of
the modern world as it rose from the ruins of the old. The period
which immediately preceded and followed the fall of the Roman
Empire was too disorderly, confused, and broken for men during its
course to be conscious of the directions in which they were treading.
Century after century passed without settled institutions, without
orderly language, without literature, without art. But institutions,
languages, literature and art were germinating, and before the end.
of the eleventh century clear signs of a new civilization were mani-
fest in Western Europe. The nations, distinguished by differences of
race and history, were settling down within definite geographical
limits; the various languages were shaping themselves for the uses
of intercourse and of literature; institutions accommodated to actual
needs were growing strong; here and there the social order was
becoming comparatively tranquil and secure. Progress once begun
became rapid, and the twelfth century is one of the most splendid
periods of the intellectual life of man expressing itself in an infinite
variety of noble and attractive forms. These new conditions were
most strongly marked in France: in Provence at the South, and in
and around the Île de France at the North; and from both these
regions a quickening influence diffused itself eastward into Italy.
The conditions of Italy throughout the Dark and Middle Ages
were widely different from those of other parts of Europe. Through
all the ruin and confusion of these centuries a tradition of ancient
culture and ancient power was handed down from generation to gen-
eration, strongly affecting the imagination of the Italian people,
whether recent invaders or descendants of the old population. Italy
had never had a national unity and life, and the divisions of her dif-
ferent regions remained as wide in the later as in the earlier times;
but there was one sentiment which bound all her various and con-
flicting elements in a common bond, which touched every Italian
heart and roused every Italian imagination,- the sentiment of the
imperial grandeur and authority of Rome. Shrunken, feeble, fallen
as the city was, the thought of what she had once been still occupied
the fancy of the Italian people, determined their conceptions of the
government of the world, and quickened within them a glow of patri-
otic pride. Her laws were still the main fount of whatsoever law
existed for the maintenance of public and private right; the imperial
dignity, however interrupted in transmission, however often assumed
by foreign and barbarian conquerors, was still, to the imagination,
supreme above all other earthly titles; the story of Roman deeds
was known of all men; the legends of Roman heroes were the famil-
iar tales of infancy and age. Cities that had risen since Rome fell
claimed, with pardonable falsehood, to have had their origin from her,
## p. 4318 (#84) ############################################
4318
DANTE
and their rulers adopted the designations of her consuls and her sen-
ators. The fragments of her literature that had survived the destruc-
tion of her culture were the models for the rude writers of ignorant
centuries, and her language formed the basis for the new language
which was gradually shaping itself in accordance with the slowly
growing needs of expression. The traces of her material dominion,
the ruins of her wide arch of empire, were still to be found from the
far West to the farther East, and were but the types and emblems
of her moral dominion in the law, the language, the customs, the
traditions of the different lands. Nothing in the whole course of
profane history has so affected the imaginations of men, or so influ-
enced their destinies, as the achievements and authority of Rome.
The Roman Church inherited, together with the city, the tradition
of Roman dominion over the world. Ancient Rome largely shaped
modern Christianity,- by the transmission of the idea of the author-
ity which the Empire once exerted to the Church which grew up
upon its ruins.
The tremendous drama of Roman history displayed
itself to the imagination from scene to scene, from act to act, with
completeness of poetic progress and climax,- first the growth, the
extension, the absoluteness of material supremacy, the heathen being
made the instruments of Divine power for preparing the world for
the revelation of the true God; then the tragedy of Christ's death
wrought by Roman hands, and the expiation of it in the fall of the
Roman imperial power; followed by the new era in which Rome
again was asserting herself as mistress of the world, but now with
spiritual instead of material supremacy, and with a dominion against
which the gates of hell itself should not prevail.
It was, indeed, not at once that this conception of the Church as
the inheritor of the rights of Rome to the obedience of mankind
took form.
late in this direction, he was not enough acquainted with the
## p. 4297 (#59) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
4297
passage to find his way through it in the dark. Abel, who had
traversed it often in the night, alone and in terror, now took
heart at having some one with him at such an hour, and of
fered unhesitatingly to lead. "The boy winds round those
crags with the speed and ease of a stream," said Paul; "not so
fast, Abel. "
"Take hold of the root which shoots out over your head, sir,
for 'tis ticklish work getting along just here. Do you feel it,
sir? "
"I have hold," said Paul.
"Let yourself gently down by it, sir. You needn't be a bit
afraid, for 'twill not give way; man couldn't have fastened it
stronger. "
This was the first time Abel had felt his power, or had been
of consequence to any one, since the boys had turned him out
from their games; and it gave him a momentary activity, and
an unsettled sort of spirit, which he had never known since
then. He had been shunned and abhorred; and he believed him-
self the victim of some demoniac power. To have another in
this fearful bondage with him, as Paul had intimated, was a
relief from his dreadful solitariness in his terrors and sufferings.
"And he said that it was I who was to work a curse on him,"
muttered Abel. "It cannot be, surely, that such a thing as I
am can harm a man like him! " And though Abel remembered
Paul's kindness, and that this was to seal his own doom too, yet
it stirred the spirit of pride within him.
"What are you muttering to yourself, there in the dark,"
demanded Paul; "or whom talk you with, you withered wretch ? »
Abel shook in every joint at the sound of Paul's harsh voice.
"It is so dreadfully still here," said Abel; "I hear nothing
but your steps behind me, and they make me start. " This was
true; for notwithstanding his touch of instant pride, his terrors
and his fear of Paul were as great as ever.
"Speak louder then," said Paul, "or hold your peace. I like
not your muttering; it bodes no good. "
"It may bring a curse to you, worse than that on me, if a
worse can be," said Abel to himself; "but who can help it? "
Day broke before they cleared the ridge; a drizzling rain
came on; and the wind, beginning to rise, drove through the
crevices in the rocks with sharp whistling sounds which seemed
to come from malignant spirits of the air.
## p. 4298 (#60) ############################################
4298
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
They had scarcely entered the wood when the storm became
furious; and the trees, swaying and beating with their branches
against one another, seemed possessed of a supernatural madness,
and engaged in wild conflict, as if there were life and passion in
them; and their broken, decayed arms groaned like things in
torment. The terror of these sights and sounds was too much
for poor Abel; it nearly crazed him; and he set up a shriek that
for a moment drowned the noise of the storm. It startled Paul;
and when he looked at him, the boy's face was of a ghostly
whiteness. The rain had drenched him to the skin; his clothes
clung to his lean body, that shook as if it would come apart; his
eyes flew wildly, and his teeth chattered against each other. The
fears and torture of his mind gave something unearthly to his
look, that made Paul start back. "Abel-boy-fiend-speak!
What has seized you? "
"They told me so," cried Abel-"I've done it-I led the
way for you- they're coming, they're coming-we're lost! "
"Peace, fool," said Paul, trying to shake off the power he felt
Abel gaining over him, "and find us a shelter if you can. "
"There's only the hut," said Abel, "and I wouldn't go into
that if it rained fire. "
"And why not? "
"I once felt that it was for me to go, and I went so near
as to see in at the door. And I saw something in the hut - it
was not a man, for it flitted by the opening just like a shadow;
and I heard two muttering something to one another; it wasn't
like other sounds, for as soon as I heard it, it made me stop
my ears. I couldn't stay any longer, and I ran till I cleared
the wood. Oh! 'tis His biding-place, when He comes to the
wood. "
"And is it of His own building? " asked Paul, sarcastically.
"No," answered Abel; "'twas built by the two wood-cutters;
and one of them came to a bloody end, and they say the other
died the same night, foaming at the mouth like one possessed.
There it is," said he, almost breathless, as he crouched down and
pointed at the hut under the trees. "Do not go, sir,” he said.
catching hold of the skirts of Paul's coat,-"I've never dared go
nigher since. "-"Let loose, boy," cried Paul, striking Abel's
hand from his coat, "I'll not be fooled with. " Abel, alarmed at
being left alone, crawled after Paul as far as he dared go; then
taking hold of him once more, made a supplicating motion to
## p. 4299 (#61) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
4299
him to stop; he was afraid to speak. Paul pushed on without
regarding him.
The hut stood on the edge of a sand-bank that was kept
up by a large pine, whose roots and fibres, lying partly bare,
looked like some giant spider that had half buried himself in
the sand. On the right of the hut was a patch of broken
ground, in which were still standing a few straggling dried
stalks of Indian corn; and from two dead trees hung knotted
pieces of broken line, which had formerly served for a clothes-
line. The hut was built of half-trimmed trunks of trees laid on
each other, crossing at the four corners and running out at
unequal lengths, the chinks partly filled in with sods and moss.
The door, which lay on the floor, was of twisted boughs; and
the roof, of the same, was caved in, and but partly kept out
the sun and rain.
As Paul drew near the entrance he stopped, though the
wind just then came in a heavy gust, and the rain fell like a
flood. It was not a dread of what he might see within; but
it seemed to him that there was a spell round him, drawing
him nearer and nearer to its centre; and he felt the hand of
some invisible power upon him. As he stepped into the hut
a chill ran over him, and his eyes shut involuntarily. Abel
watched him eagerly; and as he saw him enter, tossed his arms
wildly shouting, "Gone, gone! They'll have me
me too-they're
coming, they're coming! " and threw himself on his face to
the ground.
Driven from home by his maddening passions, a perverse
delight in self-torture had taken possession of Paul; and his
mind so hungered for more intense excitement, that it craved
to prove true all which its jealousy and superstition had
imaged. He had walked on, lost in this fearful riot, but with
no particular object in view, and taking only a kind of crazed
joy in his bewildered state. Esther's love for him, which he
at times thought past doubt feigned, the darkness of the night,
and then the driving storm with its confused motions and
sounds, made an uproar of the mind which drove out all
settled purpose or thought.
The stillness of the place into which he had now entered,
where was heard nothing but the slow, regular dripping of the
rain from the broken roof upon the hard-trod floor; the lowered
and distant sound of the storm without; the sudden change
## p. 4300 (#62) ############################################
4300
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
from the whirl and swaying of the trees to the steady walls
of the building, put a sudden stop to the violent working of
his brain, and he gradually fell into a stupor.
When Abel began to recover, he could scarcely raise himself
from the ground. He looked round, but could see nothing of
Paul. "They have bound us together," said he; "and something
is drawing me toward him. There is no help for me; I must
go whither he goes. " As he was drawn nearer and nearer to
the hut he seemed to struggle and hang back, as if pushed on
against his will. At last he reached the doorway; and clinging
to its side with a desperate hold, as if not to be forced in, put
his head forward a little, casting a hasty glance into the building.
"There he is, and alive! " breathed out Abel.
Paul's stupor was now beginning to leave him; his recollec-
tion was returning; and what had passed came back slowly and
at intervals. There was something he had said to Esther before
leaving home-he could not tell what; then his gazing after her
as she drove from the house; then something of Abel,—and he
sprang from the ground as if he felt the boy's touch again about
his knees; then the ball-room, and a multitude of voices, and all
talking of his wife. Suddenly she appeared darting by him; and
Frank was there. Then came his agony and tortures again; all
returned upon him as in the confusion of some horrible trance.
Then the hut seemed to enlarge and the walls to rock; and
shadows of those he knew, and of terrible beings he had never
seen before, were flitting round him and mocking at him. His
own substantial form seemed to him undergoing a change, and
taking the shape and substance of the accursed ones at which he
looked. As he felt the change going on he tried to utter a cry,
but he could not make a sound nor move a limb. The ground
under him rocked and pitched; it grew darker and darker, till
everything was visionary; and he thought himself surrounded by
spirits, and in the mansions of the damned. Something like a
deep black cloud began to gather gradually round him. The
gigantic structure, with its tall terrific arches, turned slowly into
darkness, and the spirits within disappeared one after another,
till as the ends of the cloud met and closed, he saw the last of
them looking at him with an infernal laugh in his undefined
visage.
Abel continued watching him in speechless agony. Paul's
consciousness was now leaving him; his head began to swim
## p. 4301 (#63) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR
4301
he reeled; and as his hand swept down the side of the hut,
while trying to save himself, it struck against a rusty knife that
had been left sticking loosely between the logs. "Let go, let
go! " shrieked Abel; "there's blood on 't-'tis cursed, 'tis cursed. "
As Paul swung round with the knife in his hand, Abel sprang
from the door with a shrill cry, and Paul sank on the floor,
muttering to himself, "What said They? »
When he began to come to himself a little, he was still sitting
on the ground, his back against the wall. His senses were yet
confused. He thought he saw his wife near him, and a bloody
knife by his side. After sitting a little longer his mind grad-
ually grew clearer, and at last he felt for the first time that his
hand held something. As his eye fell on it and he saw dis-
tinctly what it was, he leaped upright with a savage yell and
dashed the knife from him as if it had been an asp stinging
him. He stood with his bloodshot eyes fastened on it, his hands
spread, and his body shrunk up with horror. "Forged in hell!
and for me, for me! " he screamed, as he sprang forward and
seized it with a convulsive grasp. "Damned pledge of the
league that binds us! " he cried, holding it up and glaring
wildly on it. "And yet a voice did warn me of what, I know
not. Which of ye put it in this hand? Speak let me look on
you?
D'ye hear me, and will not answer? Nay, nay, what
needs it? This tells me, though it speaks not.
I know your
promptings now," he said, folding his arms deliberately; "your
work must be done; and I am doomed to it. "
-
## p. 4302 (#64) ############################################
T
4302
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
(1815-1882)
HE literary fame of Richard Henry Dana the younger rests on
a single book, produced at the age of twenty-five. Two
Years Before the Mast' stands unique in English literature:
it reports a man's actual experiences at sea, yet touches the facts
with a fine imagination. It is a bit of Dana's own life while on a
vacation away from college. The manner in which he got his
material was remarkable, but to the literature he came as by birth-
right, through his father, Richard Henry Dana the elder, then
a well-known poet, novelist, and essayist.
He was born in Cambridge in 1815, grow-
ing up in the intellectual atmosphere of
that university town, and in due course of
time entering Harvard College, where his
father and grandfather before him had been
trained in law and letters. An attack of
the measles during his third year at col-
lege left him with weakened eyes, and an
active outdoor life was prescribed as the
only remedy. From boyhood up he had
been passionately fond of the sea; small
wonder, then, that he now determined to
take a long sea voyage. Refusing a berth
R. H. DANA, JR.
offered him on a vessel bound for the East
Indies, he chose to go as common sailor before the mast, on a mer-
chantman starting on a two-years' trading voyage around Cape Horn
to California. At that time boys of good family from the New
England coast towns often took such trips. Dana indeed found a
companion in a former merchant's clerk of Boston. They left on
August 14th, 1834, doubled Cape Horn, spent many months in the
waters of the Pacific and on the coast of California, trading with the
natives and taking in cargoes of hides, and returned to Boston in
September, 1836. Young Dana, entirely cured of his weakness, re-
entered college, graduated the next year, and then went to study in
the law school of Harvard. During his cruise he had kept a journal,
which he now worked over into the narrative that made him famous,
and that bids fair to keep his name alive as long as boys, young or
old, delight in sea stories. It is really not a story at all, but
## p. 4303 (#65) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4303
describes with much vivacity the whole history of a long trading voy-
age, the commonplace life of the sailor with its many hardships,
including the savage brutality of captains with no restraint on passion
or manners, and scant recreations; the sea in storm and calm, and the
California coast before the gold fever, when but few Europeans were
settled there, and hides were the chief export of a region whose
riches lay still secreted under the earth. The great charm of the
narrative lies in its simplicity and its frank statement of facts. Dana
apparently did not invent anything, but depicted real men, men he
had intimately known for two years, calling them even by their own
names, and giving an unvarnished account of what they did and
said. He never hung back from work or shirked his duty. but
"roughed it" to the very end. As a result of these experiences, this
book is the only one that gives any true idea of the sailor's life.
Sea stories generally depend for their interest on the inventive skill
of their authors; Dana knew how to hold the attention by a simple
statement of facts. The book has all the charm and spontaneity of a
keenly observant yet imaginative and cultivated mind, alive to all
the aspects of the outer world, and gifted with that fine literary
instinct which, knowing the value of words, expresses its thoughts
with precision. Seafaring men have commented on his exactness in
reproducing the sailor's phraseology. The book was published in
1840, translated into several languages, and adopted by the British
Admiralty for distribution in the Navy. Few sailors are without a
copy in their chest. The Seaman's Friend,' which Dana published
in the following year, was inspired by his indignation at the abuses
he had witnessed in the merchant marine.
Dana did not follow up his first success, and his life henceforth
belongs to the history of the bar and politics of Massachusetts,
rather than to literature. The fame of his book brought to his law
office many admiralty cases. In 1848 he was one of the founders of
the Free Soil party; later he became an active abolitionist, and took
a large part in the local politics of his State. For a year he
lectured on international law in Harvard college. He contributed
to the North American Review, and wrote besides on various legal
topics. His one other book on travel, 'To Cuba and Back, a Vaca-
tion Voyage,' the fruit of a trip to that island in 1859, though well
written, never became popular. He retired from his profession in
1877, and spent the last years of his life in Paris and Italy. He
died in Rome, January 6th, 1882.
## p. 4304 (#66) ############################################
4304
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
A DRY GALE
From Two Years Before the Mast
WⓇ
E HAD been below but a short time before we had the
usual premonitions of a coming gale,- seas washing over
the whole forward part of the vessel, and her bows beat-
ing against them with a force and sound like the driving of
piles. The watch, too, seemed very busy trampling about decks
and singing out at the ropes. A sailor can tell by the sound
what sail is coming in; and in a short time we heard the top-
gallant-sails come in, one after another, and then the flying jib.
This seemed to ease her a good deal, and we were fast going
off to the land of Nod, when-bang, bang, bang on the scuttle,
and "All hands, reef topsails, ahoy! " started us out of our
berths, and it not being very cold weather, we had nothing
extra to put on, and were soon on deck. I shall never forget
the fineness of the sight. It was a clear and rather a chilly
night; the stars were twinkling with an intense brightness, and
as far as the eye could reach there was not a cloud to be seen.
The horizon met the sea in a defined line. A painter could not
have painted so clear a sky. There was not a speck upon it.
Yet it was blowing great guns from the northwest. When you
can see a cloud to windward, you feel that there is a place for
the wind to come from; but here it seemed to come from no-
where. No person could have told from the heavens, by their
eyesight alone, that it was not a still summer's night. One reef
after another we took in the topsails, and before we could get
them hoisted up we heard a sound like a short quick rattling of
thunder, and the jib was blown to atoms out of the bolt-rope.
We got the topsails set, and the fragments of the jib stowed
away, and the foretopmast staysail set in its place, when the
great mainsail gaped open, and the sail ripped from head to
foot. "Lay up on that main yard and furl the sail, before it
blows to tatters! " shouted the captain; and in a moment we
were up, gathering the remains of it upon the yard. We got it
wrapped round the yard, and passed gaskets over it as snugly
as possible, and were just on deck again, when with another
loud rent, which was heard throughout the ship, the foretopsail,
which had been double-reefed, split in two athwartships, just
below the reef-band, from earing to earing. Here again it was—
## p. 4305 (#67) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4305
down yard, haul out reef-tackles, and lay out upon the yard for
reefing. By hauling the reef-tackles chock-a-block we took the
strain from the other earings, and passing the close-reef earing,
and knotting the points carefully, we succeeded in setting the
sail, close reefed.
We had but just got the rigging coiled up, and were waiting
to hear "Go below the watch! " when the main royal worked
loose from the gaskets, and blew directly out to leeward, flap-
ping and shaking the mast like a wand. Here was a job for
somebody. The royal must come in or be cut adrift, or the mast
would be snapped short off. All the light hands in the starboard
watch were sent up one after another, but they could do nothing
with it. At length John, the tall Frenchman, the head of the
starboard watch (and a better sailor never stepped upon a deck),
sprang aloft, and by the help of his long arms and legs suc-
ceeded after a hard struggle,- the sail blowing over the yard-
arm to leeward, and the skysail adrift directly over his head,-
in smothering it and frapping it with long pieces of sinnet. He
came very near being blown or shaken from the yard several
times, but he was a true sailor, every finger a fish-hook. Hav-
ing made the sail snug, he prepared to send the yard down,
which was a long and difficult job; for frequently he was obliged
to stop and hold on with all his might for several minutes, the
ship pitching so as to make it impossible to do anything else at
that height. The yard at length came down safe, and after it
the fore and mizzen royal yards were sent down. All hands
were then sent aloft, and for an hour or two we were hard at
work, making the booms well fast, unreeving the studding sail
and royal and skysail gear, getting rolling-ropes on the yard,
setting up the weather breast-backstays, and making other prep-
arations for a storm. It was a fine night for a gale, just cool
and bracing enough for quick work, without being cold, and as
bright as day. It was sport to have a gale in such weather as
this. Yet it blew like a hurricane. The wind seemed to come
with a spite, an edge to it, which threatened to scrape us off the
yards. The force of the wind was greater than I had ever felt
it before; but darkness, cold, and wet are the worst parts of a
storm to a sailor.
-
Having got on deck again, we looked round to see what time
of night it was, and whose watch. In a few minutes the man.
at the wheel struck four bells, and we found that the other
VIII-270
## p. 4306 (#68) ############################################
4306
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
watch was out and our own half out. Accordingly the starboard
watch went below, and left the ship to us for a couple of hours,
yet with orders to stand by for a call.
Hardly had they got below before away went the foretop-
mast staysail, blown to ribands. This was a small sail, which
we could manage in the watch, so that we were not obliged to
call up the other watch. We laid upon the bowsprit, where we
were under water half the time, and took in the fragments of
the sail; and as she must have some headsail on her, prepared
to bend another staysail. We got the new one out into the net-
tings; seized on the tack, sheets, and halyards, and the hanks;
manned the halyards, cut adrift the frapping-lines, and hoisted
away; but before it was half-way up the stay it was blown all
to pieces. When we belayed the halyards, there was nothing
left but the bolt-rope. Now large eyes began to show them-
selves in the foresail; and knowing that it must soon go, the
mate ordered us upon the yard to furl it. Being unwilling to
call up the watch, who had been on deck all night, he roused
out the carpenter, sailmaker, cook, and steward, and with their
help we manned the foreyard, and after nearly half an hour's
struggle, mastered the sail and got it well furled round the
yard. The force of the wind had never been greater than at
this moment. In going up the rigging it seemed absolutely to
pin us down to the shrouds; and on the yard there was no such
thing as turning a face to windward. Yet there was no driving
sleet and darkness and wet and cold as off Cape Horn; and
instead of stiff oilcloth suits, southwester caps, and thick boots,
we had on hats, round jackets, duck trousers, light shoes, and
everything light and easy. These things make a great differ-
ence to a sailor. When we got on deck the man at the wheel
struck eight bells (four o'clock in the morning), and "All star-
bowlines, ahoy! " brought the other watch up, but there was no
going below for us.
The gale was now at its height, "blowing
like scissors and thumb-screws"; the captain was on deck; the
ship, which was light, rolling and pitching as though she would
shake the long sticks out of her, and the sails were gaping open
and splitting in every direction. The mizzen-topsail, which was
a comparatively new sail and close reefed, split from head to
foot in the bunt; the foretopsail went in one rent from clew to
earing, and was blowing to tatters; one of the chain bobstays
parted; the spritsailyard sprung in the slings, the martingale
## p. 4307 (#69) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4307
had slued away off to leeward; and owing to the long dry
weather the lee rigging hung in large bights at every lurch.
One of the main-topgallant shrouds had parted; and to crown
all, the galley had got adrift and gone over to leeward, and the
anchor on the lee bow had worked loose and was thumping the
side. Here was work enough for all hands for half a day. Our
gang laid out on the mizzen-topsailyard, and after more than
half an hour's hard work furled the sail, though it bellied out
over our heads, and again, by a slat of the wind, blew in
under the yard with a fearful jerk and almost threw us off
from the foot-ropes.
Double gaskets were passed round the yards, rolling tackles
and other gear bowsed taut, and everything made as secure as it
could be. Coming down, we found the rest of the crew just
coming down the fore rigging, having furled the tattered top-
sail, or rather, swathed it round the yard, which looked like a
broken limb bandaged. There was no sail now on the ship but
the spanker and the close-reefed main-topsail, which still held
good. But this was too much after-sail, and order was given to
furl the spanker. The brails were hauled up, and all the light
hands in the starboard watch sent out on the gaff to pass the
gaskets; but they could do nothing with it. The second mate
swore at them for a parcel of "sogers," and sent up a couple of
the best men; but they could do no better, and the gaff was
lowered down. All hands were now employed in setting up the
lee rigging, fishing the spritsail yard, lashing the galley, and
getting tackles upon the martingale, to bowse it to windward.
Being in the larboard watch, my duty was forward, to assist in
setting up the martingale. Three of us were out on the martin-
gale guys and back-ropes for more than half an hour, carrying
out, hooking, and unhooking the tackles, several times buried in
the seas, until the mate ordered us in from fear of our being
washed off. The anchors were then to be taken up on the rail,
which kept all hands on the forecastle for an hour, though every
now and then the seas broke over it, washing the rigging off to
leeward, filling the lee scuppers breast-high, and washing chock
aft to the taffrail.
Having got everything secure again, we were promising our-
selves some breakfast, for it was now nearly nine o'clock in the
forenoon, when the main-topsail showed evident signs of giving
way. Some sail must be kept on the ship, and the captain
## p. 4308 (#70) ############################################
4308
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
ordered the fore and main spencer gaffs to be lowered down,
and the two spencers (which were storm sails; brand-new, small,
and made of the strongest canvas) to be got up and bent; leav-
ing the main-topsail to blow away, with a blessing on it, if it
would only last until we could set the spencers. These we bent
on very carefully, with strong robands and seizings, and making
tackles fast to the clews, bowsed them down to the water-ways.
By this time the main-topsail was among the things that have
been, and we went aloft to stow away the remnant of the last
sail of all those which were on the ship twenty-four hours before.
The spencers were now the only whole sails on the ship, and
being strong and small, and near the deck, presenting but little
surface to the wind above the rail, promised to hold out well.
Hove-to under these, and eased by having no sail above the
tops, the ship rose and fell, and drifted off to leeward like a line-
of-battle ship.
It was now eleven o'clock, and the watch was sent below to
get breakfast, and at eight bells (noon), as everything was snug,
although the gale had not in the least abated, the watch was
set and the other watch and idlers sent below. For three days
and three nights the gale continued with unabated fury, and
with singular regularity. There were no lulls, and very little
variation in its fierceness. Our ship, being light, rolled so as
almost to send the fore yard-arm under water, and drifted off
bodily to leeward. All this time there was not a cloud to be
seen in the sky, day or night; no, not so large as a man's hand.
Every morning the sun rose cloudless from the sea, and set
again at night in the sea in a flood of light. The stars, too,
came out of the blue one after another, night after night, unob-
scured, and twinkled as clear as on a still frosty night at home,
until the day came upon them. All this time the sea was roll-
ing in immense surges, white with foam, as far as the eye could
reach, on every side; for we were now leagues and leagues
from shore.
## p. 4309 (#71) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4309
EVERY-DAY SEA LIFE
From Two Years Before the Mast
THE
HE sole object was to make the time pass on. Any change
was sought for which would break the monotony of the
time; and even the two-hours' trick at the wheel, which
came round to us in turn, once in every other watch, was looked
upon as a relief. The never-failing resource of long yarns,
which eke out many a watch, seemed to have failed us now; for
we had been so long together that we had heard each other's
stories told over and over again till we had them by heart; each
one knew the whole history of each of the others, and we were
fairly and literally talked out. Singing and joking we were in
no humor for; and in fact any sound of mirth or laughter would
have struck strangely upon our ears, and would not have been
tolerated any more than whistling or a wind instrument. The
last resort, that of speculating upon the future, seemed now to
fail us; for our discouraging situation, and the danger we were
really in (as we expected every day to find ourselves drifted
back among the ice), "clapped a stopper" upon all that. From
saying when we get home," we began insensibly to alter it "if
we get home," and at last the subject was dropped by a tacit
«<
consent.
struck out, and a
In this state of things a new light was
new field opened, by a change in the watch. One of our watch
was laid up for two or three days by a bad hand (for in cold
weather the least cut or bruise ripens into a sore), and his place
was supplied by the carpenter. This was a windfall, and there
was a contest who should have the carpenter to walk with him.
As "Chips" was a man of some little education, and he and I
had had a good deal of intercourse with each other, he fell in
with me in my walk. He was a Finn, but spoke English well,
and gave me long accounts of his country,- the customs, the
trade, the towns, what little he knew of the government (I found
he was no friend of Russia), his voyages, his first arrival in
America, his marriage and courtship; he had married a country-
woman of his, a dressmaker, whom he met with in Boston. I
had very little to tell him of my quiet sedentary life at home;
and in spite of our best efforts, which had protracted these yarns
through five or six watches, we fairly talked each other out, and
## p. 4310 (#72) ############################################
4310
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
I turned him over to another man in the watch and put myself
upon my own resources.
I commenced a deliberate system of time-killing, which united
some profit with a cheering-up of the heavy hours. As soon as
I came on deck, and took my place and regular walk, I began
with repeating over to myself in regular order a string of mat-
ters which I had in my memory,-the multiplication table and
the table of weights and measures; the Kanaka numerals; then
the States of the Union, with their capitals; the counties of
England, with their shire towns, and the kings of England in
their order, and other things. This carried me through my
facts, and being repeated deliberately, with long intervals, often
eked out the first two bells. Then came the Ten Command-
ments, the thirty-ninth chapter of Job, and a few other passages
from Scripture. The next in the order, which I seldom varied
from, came Cowper's 'Castaway,' which was a great favorite
with me; its solemn measure and gloomy character, as well as
the incident it was founded upon, making it well suited to a
lonely watch at sea. Then his 'Lines to Mary,' his address to the
Jackdaw, and a short extract from Table Talk' (I abounded in
Cowper, for I happened to have a volume of his poems in my
chest); 'Ille et nefasto' from Horace, and Goethe's 'Erl-König. '
After I had got through these, I allowed myself a more general
range among everything that I could remember, both in prose
and verse. In this way, with an occasional break by relieving
the wheel, heaving the log, and going to the scuttle-butt for a
drink of water, the longest watch was passed away; and I was
so regular in my silent recitations that if there was no inter-
ruption by ship's duty I could tell very nearly the number of
bells by my progress.
Our watches below were no more varied than the watch on
deck. All washing, sewing, and reading was given up, and we did
nothing but eat, sleep, and stand our watch, leading what might
be called a Cape Horn life. The forecastle was too uncomfort-
able to sit up in; and whenever we were below, we were in our
berths. To prevent the rain and the sea-water which broke over
the bows from washing down, we were obliged to keep the scut-
tle closed, so that the forecastle was nearly air-tight. In this little
wet leaky hole we were all quartered, in an atmosphere so bad
that our lamp, which swung in the middle from the beams,
sometimes actually burned blue, with a large circle of foul air
## p. 4311 (#73) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4311
about it. Still I was never in better health than after three'
weeks of this life. I gained a great deal of flesh, and we all ate
like horses. At every watch when we came below, before turn-
ing in, the bread barge and beef kid were overhauled. Each
man drank his quart of hot tea night and morning, and glad
enough we were to get it; for no nectar and ambrosia were
sweeter to the lazy immortals than was a pot of hot tea, a hard
biscuit, and a slice of cold salt beef to us after a watch on deck.
To be sure, we were mere animals, and had this life lasted a
year instead of a month, we should have been little better than
the ropes in the ship. Not a razor, nor a brush, nor a drop of
water, except the rain and the spray, had come near us all the
time: for we were on an allowance of fresh water-and who
would strip and wash himself in salt water on deck, in the snow
and ice, with the thermometer at zero?
A START; AND PARTING COMPANY
From Two Years before the Mast
THE
HE California had finished discharging her cargo, and was to
get under way at the same time with us. Having washed
down decks and got breakfast, the two vessels lay side by
side in complete readiness for sea, our ensigns hanging from the
peaks and our tall spars reflected from the glassy surface of the
river, which since sunrise had been unbroken by a ripple. At
length a few whiffs came across the water, and by eleven o'clock
the regular northwest wind set steadily in. There was no need
of calling all hands, for we had all been hanging about the fore
castle the whole forenoon, and were ready for a start upon the
first sign of a breeze. Often we turned our eyes aft upon the
captain, who was walking the deck, with every now and then a
look to windward. He made a sign to the mate, who came for-
ward, took his station deliberately between the knightheads, cast
a glance aloft, and called out, "All hands lay aloft and loose the
sails! " We were half in the rigging before the order came, and
never since we left Boston were the gaskets off the yards and
the rigging overhauled in a shorter time. "All ready forward,
sir! " "All ready the main! ” "Crossjack yards all ready, sir! "
## p. 4312 (#74) ############################################
4312
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
"Lay down, all hands but one on each yard! " The yard-arm
and bunt gaskets were cast off; and each sail hung by the jig-
ger, with one man standing by the tie to let it go. At the same
moment that we sprang aloft a dozen hands sprang into the
rigging of the California, and in an instant were all over her
yards; and her sails too were ready to be dropped at the word.
In the mean time our bow gun had been loaded and run out,
and its discharge was to be the signal for dropping the sails. A
cloud of smoke came out of our bows; the echoes of the gun
rattled our farewell among the hills of California, and the two
ships were covered from head to foot with their white canvas.
For a few minutes all was uproar and apparent confusion; men
jumping about like monkeys in the rigging; ropes and blocks
flying, orders given and answered amid the confused noises of
men singing out at the ropes. The topsails came to the mast-
heads with "Cheerly, men! " and in a few minutes every sail
was set, for the wind was light. The head sails were backed,
the windlass came round "slip-slap" to the cry of the sailors;
"Hove short, sir," said the mate; - "Up with him! - "Ay,
ay, sir. " A few hearty and long heaves, and the anchor showed
its head. "Hook cat! " The fall was stretched along the decks;
all hands laid hold; -"Hurrah, for the last time," said the
mate; and the anchor came to the cathead to the tune of
'Time for us to go,' with a rollicking chorus. Everything
was done quick, as though it was for the last time. The head
yards were filled away, and our ship began to move through
the water on her homeward-bound course.
>>>>
-
--
The California had got under way at the same moment,
and we sailed down the narrow bay abreast, and were just off
the mouth, and, gradually drawing ahead of her, were on the
point of giving her three parting cheers, when suddenly we
found ourselves stopped short, and the California ranging fast
ahead of us. A bar stretches across the mouth of the harbor,
with water enough to float common vessels; but being low in
the water, and having kept well to leeward, as we were
bound to the southward, we had stuck fast, while the Cali-
fornia, being light, had floated over.
We kept all sail on, in the hope of forcing over; but failing.
in this, we hove back into the channel. This was something
of a damper to us, and the captain looked not a little mortified
and vexed. "This is the same place where the Rosa got ashore,
## p. 4313 (#75) ############################################
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
4313
sir," observed our red-headed second mate, most mal-àpropos.
A malediction on the Rosa, and him too, was all the answer
he got, and he slunk off to leeward. In a few minutes the
force of the wind and the rising of the tide backed us into the
stream, and we were on our way to our old anchoring place,
the tide setting swiftly up, and the ship barely manageable in
the light breeze. We came-to in Our old berth opposite the
hide-house, whose inmates were not a little surprised to see us
return. We felt as though we were tied to California; and
some of the crew swore that they never should get clear of the
"bloody" coast.
In about half an hour, which was near high water, the
order was given to man the windlass, and again the anchor
was catted; but there was no song, and not a word was said
about the last time. The California had come back on finding
that we had returned, and was hove-to, waiting for us, off the
point. This time we passed the bar safely, and were soon up
with the California, who filled away, and kept us company.
She seemed desirous of a trial of speed, and our captain
accepted the challenge, although we were loaded down to the
bolts of our chain-plates, as deep as a sand-barge, and bound
so taut with our cargo that we were no more fit for a race
than a man in fetters; while our antagonist was in her best
trim. Being clear of the point, the breeze became stiff, and
the royal-masts bent under our sails, but we would not
take them in until we saw three boys spring aloft into the
rigging of the California; when they were all furled at once,
but with orders to our boys to stay aloft at the topgallant
mastheads and loose them again at the word. It was my duty
to furl the fore-royal; and, while standing by to loose it again,
I had a fine view of the scene. From where I stood, the
two vessels seemed nothing but spars and sails, while their
narrow decks, far below, slanting over by the force of the
wind aloft, appeared hardly capable of supporting the great
fabrics raised upon them. The California was to windward of
us, and had every advantage; yet, while the breeze was stiff,
we held our own. As soon as it began to slacken, she ranged
a little ahead, and the order was given to loose the royals.
In an instant the gaskets were off and the bunt dropped.
"Sheet home the fore royal! " "Weather sheets home! "—"Lee
sheets home! ” - "Hoist
is
away, sir! "
bawled from
-
aloft.
## p. 4314 (#76) ############################################
4314
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR
"Overhaul your clew-lines! " shouts the mate.
"Ay, ay, sir!
all clear! " "Taut leech! belay! Well the lee brace; haul taut
to windward," and the royals were set. These brought us
up again; but the wind continuing light, the California set
hers, and it was soon evident that she was walking away from
us. Our captain then hailed and said that he should keep off
to his course; adding, "She isn't the Alert now. If I had
her in your trim she would have been out of sight by this
time. " This was good-naturedly answered from the California,
and she braced sharp up, and stood close upon the wind up
the coast; while we squared away our yards, and stood before
the wind to the
the south-southwest. The California's crew
manned her weather rigging, waved their hats in the air, and
gave us three hearty cheers, which we answered as heartily,
and the customary single cheer came back to us from over
the water. She stood on her way, doomed to eighteen months'
or two years' hard service upon that hated coast; while we
were making our way home, to which every hour and every
mile was bringing us nearer.
――――――
## p. 4314 (#77) ############################################
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## p. 4315 (#81) ############################################
4315
DANTE
(1265-1321)
BY CHARLES ELIOT NORTON
I
O ACQUIRE a love for the best poetry, and a just understand-
ing of it, is the chief end of the study of literature; for it
is by means of poetry that the imagination is quickened,
nurtured, and invigorated, and it is only through the exercise of his
imagination that man can live a life that is in a true sense worth
living. For it is the imagination which lifts him from the petty,
transient, and physical interests that engross the greater part of his
time and thoughts in self-regarding pursuits, to the large, permanent,
and spiritual interests that ennoble his nature, and transform him
from a solitary individual into a member of the brotherhood of the
human race.
In the poet the imagination works more powerfully and consist-
ently than in other men, and thus qualifies him to become the
teacher and inspirer of his fellows. He sees men, by its means,
more clearly than they see themselves; he discloses them to them-
selves, and reveals to them their own dim ideals. He becomes the
interpreter of his age to itself; and not merely of his own age is he
the interpreter, but of man to man in all ages. For change as the
world may in outward aspect, with the rise and fall of empires,-
change as men may, from generation to generation, in knowledge,
belief, and manners,-human nature remains unalterable in its ele-
ments, unchanged from age to age; and it is human nature, under its
various guises, with which the great poets deal.
The Iliad and the Odyssey do not become antiquated to us. The
characters of Shakespeare are perpetually modern. Homer, Dante,
Shakespeare, stand alone in the closeness of their relation to nature.
Each after his own manner gives us a view of life, as seen by the
poetic imagination, such as no other poet has given to us. Homer,
first of all poets, shows us individual personages sharply defined, but
in the early stages of intellectual and moral development, the first
representatives of the race at its conscious entrance upon the path of
progress, with simple motives, simple theories of existence, simple
and limited experience. He is plain and direct in the presentation
## p. 4316 (#82) ############################################
4316
DANTE
of life, and in the substance no less than in the expression of his
thought.
In Shakespeare's work the individual man is no less sharply
defined, no less true to nature, but the long procession of his per-
sonages is wholly different in effect from that of the Iliad and the
Odyssey. They have lost the simplicity of the older race; they are
the products of a longer and more varied experience; they have
become more complex. And Shakespeare is plain and direct neither
in the substance of his thought nor in the expression of it. The
world has grown older, and in the evolution of his nature man has
become conscious of the irreconcilable paradoxes of life, and more or
less aware that while he is infinite in faculty, he is also the quint-
essence of dust. But there is one essential characteristic in which
Shakespeare and Homer resemble each other as poets,—that they
both show to us the scene of life without the interference of their
own personality. Each simply holds the mirror up to nature, and
lets us see the reflection, without making comment on the show. If
there be a lesson in it we must learn it for ourselves.
Dante comes between the two, and differs more widely from each
of them than they from one another. They are primarily poets.
He is primarily a moralist who is also a poet. Of Homer the man,
and of Shakespeare the man, we know, and need to know, nothing;
it is only with them as poets that we are concerned. But it is need-
ful to know Dante as man, in order fully to appreciate him as poet.
He gives us his world not as reflection from an unconscious and
indifferent mirror, but as from a mirror that shapes and orders its
reflections for a definite end beyond that of art, and extraneous to it.
And in this lies the secret of Dante's hold upon so many and so
various minds. He is the chief poet of man as a moral being.
To understand aright the work of any great poet we must know
the conditions of his times; but this is not enough in the case of
Dante. We must know not only the conditions of the generation to
which he belonged, we must also know the specific conditions which
shaped him into the man he was, and differentiated him from his
fellows. How came he, endowed with a poetic imagination which
puts him in the same class with Homer and Shakespeare, not to be
content, like them, to give us a simple view of the phantasmagoria of
life, but eager to use the fleeting images as instruments by which to
enforce the lesson of righteousness, to set forth theory of existence
and a scheme of the universe?
The question cannot be answered without a consideration of the
change wrought in the life and thoughts of men in Europe by the
Christian doctrine as expounded and enforced by the Roman Church,
and of the simultaneous changes in outward conditions resulting from
## p. 4317 (#83) ############################################
DANTE
4317
the destruction of the ancient civilization, and the slow evolution of
the modern world as it rose from the ruins of the old. The period
which immediately preceded and followed the fall of the Roman
Empire was too disorderly, confused, and broken for men during its
course to be conscious of the directions in which they were treading.
Century after century passed without settled institutions, without
orderly language, without literature, without art. But institutions,
languages, literature and art were germinating, and before the end.
of the eleventh century clear signs of a new civilization were mani-
fest in Western Europe. The nations, distinguished by differences of
race and history, were settling down within definite geographical
limits; the various languages were shaping themselves for the uses
of intercourse and of literature; institutions accommodated to actual
needs were growing strong; here and there the social order was
becoming comparatively tranquil and secure. Progress once begun
became rapid, and the twelfth century is one of the most splendid
periods of the intellectual life of man expressing itself in an infinite
variety of noble and attractive forms. These new conditions were
most strongly marked in France: in Provence at the South, and in
and around the Île de France at the North; and from both these
regions a quickening influence diffused itself eastward into Italy.
The conditions of Italy throughout the Dark and Middle Ages
were widely different from those of other parts of Europe. Through
all the ruin and confusion of these centuries a tradition of ancient
culture and ancient power was handed down from generation to gen-
eration, strongly affecting the imagination of the Italian people,
whether recent invaders or descendants of the old population. Italy
had never had a national unity and life, and the divisions of her dif-
ferent regions remained as wide in the later as in the earlier times;
but there was one sentiment which bound all her various and con-
flicting elements in a common bond, which touched every Italian
heart and roused every Italian imagination,- the sentiment of the
imperial grandeur and authority of Rome. Shrunken, feeble, fallen
as the city was, the thought of what she had once been still occupied
the fancy of the Italian people, determined their conceptions of the
government of the world, and quickened within them a glow of patri-
otic pride. Her laws were still the main fount of whatsoever law
existed for the maintenance of public and private right; the imperial
dignity, however interrupted in transmission, however often assumed
by foreign and barbarian conquerors, was still, to the imagination,
supreme above all other earthly titles; the story of Roman deeds
was known of all men; the legends of Roman heroes were the famil-
iar tales of infancy and age. Cities that had risen since Rome fell
claimed, with pardonable falsehood, to have had their origin from her,
## p. 4318 (#84) ############################################
4318
DANTE
and their rulers adopted the designations of her consuls and her sen-
ators. The fragments of her literature that had survived the destruc-
tion of her culture were the models for the rude writers of ignorant
centuries, and her language formed the basis for the new language
which was gradually shaping itself in accordance with the slowly
growing needs of expression. The traces of her material dominion,
the ruins of her wide arch of empire, were still to be found from the
far West to the farther East, and were but the types and emblems
of her moral dominion in the law, the language, the customs, the
traditions of the different lands. Nothing in the whole course of
profane history has so affected the imaginations of men, or so influ-
enced their destinies, as the achievements and authority of Rome.
The Roman Church inherited, together with the city, the tradition
of Roman dominion over the world. Ancient Rome largely shaped
modern Christianity,- by the transmission of the idea of the author-
ity which the Empire once exerted to the Church which grew up
upon its ruins.
The tremendous drama of Roman history displayed
itself to the imagination from scene to scene, from act to act, with
completeness of poetic progress and climax,- first the growth, the
extension, the absoluteness of material supremacy, the heathen being
made the instruments of Divine power for preparing the world for
the revelation of the true God; then the tragedy of Christ's death
wrought by Roman hands, and the expiation of it in the fall of the
Roman imperial power; followed by the new era in which Rome
again was asserting herself as mistress of the world, but now with
spiritual instead of material supremacy, and with a dominion against
which the gates of hell itself should not prevail.
It was, indeed, not at once that this conception of the Church as
the inheritor of the rights of Rome to the obedience of mankind
took form.
