Page:In bad company and other stories.djvu/218

 with the flat of his sword, and to draw a rope across the deck parallel with the mainmast, warning the crew to pass it at their peril.

'The captain then, calling his officers around him, instituted a trial, and the whole of Spratt's conduct being 'calmly considered, he was unanimously sentenced to three dozen lashes.

'One dozen was immediately inflicted, and the prisoner was then asked if he repented of his misconduct, and would faithfully promise obedience for the remainder of the period that he should be permitted to remain on board. This promise being given, and the greatest contrition being expressed, he was unbound, and the remainder of his sentence commuted. As, however, he was considered a dangerous character, orders were issued that he should be treated as a prisoner (having the liberty of the deck abaft the mainmast) till he could be landed at New Georgia (the island from which he shipped), or elsewhere, if he thought fit.

This émeute, which might have ended easily enough in a second Mutiny of the Bounty,—or as did happen when the crew of a whale-ship threw the captain overboard on the coast of New Zealand,—having been quelled by the use of strong measures promptly applied, the ordinary course of events went on uninterruptedly. On September 8 (Sunday, as it happened) two whales were killed. The canoes came off and hailed as usual. A violent gale seems to have come on directly the boiling was finished. They were alternately running under close-reefed topsails, wearing ship every four hours, being at 5 close under the high land under Cape St. Mary. Pumps going every watch, sea very high, ship labouring heavily—then close to Ford's Group. The gale lasted from Monday to the following Friday at midnight. One fancies that from the 'captain bold' downwards, they must have had 'quite a picnic of it.

Spratt was what is known to South Sea mariners as a 'beach-comber'—one of a proverbially troublesome class of seamen. He had, probably, left the Cadmus for no good reason. However, the treatment seems to have cured him, as on September 1 we find the entry:—'Returned Spratt to his duty at his own request, he having promised the utmost civility, attention, and obedience. Fresh breeze and head sea till midnight,' etc.