The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras/Chapter I

Les Aventures du capitaine Hatteras - Première partie - 1

“To-morrow, at the turn of the tide, the brig Forward, K. Z., captain, Richard Shandon, mate, will clear from New Prince's Docks; destination unknown.”

This announcement appeared in the Liverpool Herald of April 5, 1860.

The sailing of a brig is not a matter of great importance for the chief commercial city of England. Who would take notice of it in so great a throng of ships of all sizes and of every country, that dry-docks covering two leagues scarcely contain them?

Nevertheless, from early morning on the 6th of April, a large crowd collected on the quays of the New Prince's Docks; all the sailors of the place seemed to have assembled there. The workingmen of the neighboring wharves had abandoned their tasks, tradesmen had left their gloomy shops, and the merchants their empty warehouses. The many-colored omnibuses which pass outside of the docks were discharging, every minute, their load of sight-seers; the whole city seemed to care for nothing except watching the departure of the Forward.

The Forward was a vessel of one hundred and seventy tons, rigged as a brig, and carrying a screw and a steam-engine of one hundred and twenty horse-power. One would have very easily confounded it with the other brigs in the harbor. But if it presented no especial difference to the eye of the public, yet those who were familiar with ships noticed certain peculiarities which could not escape a sailor's keen glance.

Thus, on the Nautilus, which was lying at anchor near her, a group of sailors were trying to make out the probable destination of the Forward.

“What do you say to her masts?” said one; “steamers don't usually carry so much sail.”

“It must be,” answered a red-faced quartermaster, “that she relies more on her sails than on her engine; and if her topsails are of that size, it's probably because the lower sails are to be laid back. So I'm sure the Forward is going either to the Arctic or Antarctic Ocean, where the icebergs stop the wind more than suits a solid ship.”

“You must be right, Mr. Comhill,” said a third sailor. “Do you notice how straight her stem is?”

“Besides,” said Mr. Cornhill, “she carries a steel ram forward, as sharp as a razor; if the Forward, going at full speed, should run into a three-decker, she would cut her in two.”

“That's true,” answered a Mersey pilot, “for that brig can easily run fourteen knots under steam. She was a sight to see on her trial trip. On my word, she's a swift boat.”

“And she goes well, too, under sail,” continued the quartermaster; “close to the wind, and she's easily steered. Now that ship is going to the polar seas, or my name is not Cornhill. And then, see there! Do you notice that large helm-port over the head of her rudder?”

“That's so,” said some of the sailors; “but what does that prove?”

“That proves, my men,” replied the quartermaster with a scornful smile, “that you can neither see nor think; it proves that they wanted to leave the head of the rudder free, so that it might be unshipped and shipped again easily. Don't you know that's what they have to do very often in the ice?”

“You are right,” answered the sailors of the Nautilus.

“And besides,” said one, “the lading of the brig goes to prove what Mr. Cornhill has said. I heard it from Clifton, who has shipped on her. The Forward carries provisions for five or six years, and coal in proportion. Coal and provisions are all she carries, and a quantity of woollen and sealskin clothing.”

“Well,” said Mr. Cornhill, “there's no doubt about it. But, my friend, since you know Clifton, has n't he told you where she's bound?”

“He could n't tell me, for he did n't know; the whole crew was shipped in that way. Where is he going? He won't know till he gets there.”

“Nor yet if they are going to Davy Jones's locker,” said one scoffer, “as it seems to me they are.”

“But then, their pay,” continued the friend of Clifton enthusiastically,—“their pay! it's five times what a sailor usually gets. If it had not been for that, Richard Shandon would not have got a man. A strangely shaped boat, going no one knows where, and as if it never intended coming back! As for me, I should not have cared to ship in her.”

“Whether you would or not,” answered Mr. Cornhill, “you could never have shipped in the Forward.”

“Why not?”

“Because you would not have answered the conditions. I heard that married men were not taken. Now you belong to that class. So you need not say what you would or would not do, since it's all breath thrown away.”

The sailor who was thus snubbed burst out laughing, as did his companions, showing in this way that Mr. Cornhill's remarks were true.

“There's nothing but boldness about the ship,” continued Cornhill, well pleased with himself. “The Forward,—forward to what? Without saying that nobody knows who her captain is.”

“O, yes, they do!” said a young sailor, evidently a green-hand.

“What! They do know?”

“Of course.”

“My young friend,” said Cornhill, “do you think Shandon is the captain of the Forward?”

“Why—” answered the boy.

“Shandon is only the mate, nothing else; he's a good and brave sailor, an old whaler, a good fellow, able to take command, but he's not the captain; he's no more captain than you or I. And who, under God, is going to have charge of the ship, he does not know in the least. At the proper time the captain will come aboard, I don't know how, and I don't know where; for Richard Shandon did n't tell me, nor has he leave to tell me in what direction he was first to sail.”

“Still, Mr. Cornhill,” said the young sailor, “I can tell you that there's some one on board, some one who was spoken of in the letter in which Mr. Shandon was offered the place of mate.”

“What!” answered Cornhill, “do you mean to tell me that the Forward has a captain on board?”

“Yes, Mr. Cornhill.”

“You tell me that?”

“Certainly, for I heard it from Johnson, the boatswain.”

“Boatswain Johnson?”

“Yes, he told me himself.”

“Johnson told you?”

“Not only did he tell me, but he showed him to me.”

“He showed him to you!” answered Cornhill in amazement.

“He showed him to me.”

“And you saw him?”

“I saw him with my own eyes.”

“And who is it?”

“It's a dog.”

“A dog?”

“A four-footed dog?”

“Yes.”

The surprise of the sailors of the Nautilus was great. Under any other circumstances they would have burst out laughing. A dog captain of a one hundred and seventy ton brig! It was certainly amusing enough. But the Forward was such an extraordinary ship, that one thought twice before laughing, and before contradicting it. Besides, Quartermaster Cornhill showed no signs of laughing.

“And Johnson showed you that new sort of captain, a dog?” he said to the young sailor. “And you saw him?”

“As plainly as I see you, with all respect.”

“Well, what do you think of that?” asked the sailors, turning to Cornhill.

“I don't think anything,” he answered curtly, “except that the Forward is a ship of the Devil, or of fools fit for Bedlam.”

Without saying more, the sailors continued to gaze at the Forward, which was now almost ready to depart; and there was no one of them who presumed to say that Johnson, the boatswain, had been making fun of the young sailor.

This story of the dog had already spread through the city, and in the crowd of sight-seers there were many looking for the captain-dog, who were inclined to believe that he was some supernatural animal.

Besides, for many months the Forward had been attracting the public attention; the singularity of its build, the mystery which enshrouded it, the incognito maintained by the captain, the manner in which Richard Shandon received the proposition of superintending its outfit, the careful selection of the crew, its unknown destination, scarcely conjectured by any,—all combined to give this brig a reputation of something more than strangeness.

For a thoughtful, dreamy mind, for a philosopher, there is hardly anything more touching than the departure of a ship; the imagination is ready to follow her in her struggles with the waves, her contests with the winds, in her perilous course, which does not always end in port; and if only there is something unusual about her, the ship appears like something fantastic, even to the least imaginative minds.

So it was with the Forward. And if most of the spectators were unable to make the ingenious remarks of Quartermaster Cornhill, the rumors which had been prevailing for three months were enough to keep all the tongues of Liverpool busy.

The brig had been built at Birkenhead, a suburb of the city on the left bank of the Mersey, and connected with it by numerous ferry-boats.

The builders, Scott & Co., as skilful as any in England, had received from Richard Shandon careful plans and drawings, in which the tonnage, dimensions, and model of the brig were given with the utmost exactness. They bore proof of the work of an experienced sailor. Since Shandon had ample means at his command, the work began, and, in accordance with the orders of the unknown owner, proceeded rapidly.

Every care was taken to have the brig made exceedingly strong; it was evidently intended to withstand enormous pressure, for its ribs of teak, an East Indian wood remarkable for its solidity, were further strengthened by thick iron braces. The sailors used to ask why the hull of a ship, which was intended to be so strong, was not made of iron like other steamers. But they were told that the mysterious designer had his own reasons for having it built in that way.

Gradually the shape of the brig on the stocks could be clearly made out, and the strength and beauty of her model were clear to the eye of all competent judges. As the sailors of the Nautilus had said, her stem formed a right angle with the keel, and she carried, not a ram, but a steel cutter from the foundry of R. Hawthorn, of Newcastle. This metallic prow, glistening in the sun, gave a singular appearance to the brig, although there was nothing warlike about it. However, a sixteen-pound gun was placed on her forecastle; its carriage was so arranged that it could be pointed in any direction. The same thing can be said of the cannon as of her bows, neither were positively warlike.

On the 5th of February, 1860, this strange vessel was successfully launched in the sight of an immense number of spectators,

But if the brig was not a man-of-war, nor a merchant-vessel, nor a pleasure-yacht, for no one takes a pleasure trip with provisions for six years in the hold, what could she be?

A ship intended for the search of the Erebus and the Terror and of Sir John Franklin? No; for in 1859, the previous year Captain MacClintock had returned from the Arctic Ocean, with convincing proof of the loss of that ill-fated expedition.

Did the Forward want to try again the famous Northwest Passage? What for? Captain MacClure had discovered it in 1853, and his lieutenant, Cresswell, had the honor of first skirting the American continent from Behring Strait to Davis Strait.

It was nevertheless absolutely certain to all competent observers that the Forward was preparing for a voyage to icy regions. Was it going to push towards the South Pole, farther than the whaler Wedell, farther than Captain James Ross? But what was the use, and with what intention?

It is easy to see that, although the field for conjecture was very limited, the imagination could easily lose itself.

The day after the launching of the brig her machinery arrived from the foundry of R. Hawthorn at Newcastle.

The engine, of one hundred and twenty horse-power, with oscillating cylinders, took up but little space; its force was large for a vessel of one hundred and seventy tons, which carried a great deal of sail, and was, besides, remarkably swift. Of her speed the trial trips left no doubt, and even the boatswain, Johnson, had seen fit to express his opinion to the friend of Clifton in these terms,—

“When the Forward is under both steam and sail, she gets the most speed from her sails.”

Clifton's friend had not understood this proposition, but he considered anything possible in a ship commanded by a dog.

After the engines had been placed on board, the stowage of provisions began; and that was no light task, for she carried enough for six years. They consisted of salted and dried meats, smoked fish, biscuit, and flour; mountains of coffee and tea were deposited in the store-room. Richard Shandon superintended the arrangement of this precious cargo with the air of a man who perfectly understood his business; everything was put in its place, labelled, and numbered with perfect precision; at the same time there was stowed away a large quantity of pemmican, an Indian preparation, which contains a great deal of nutriment in a small compass.

This sort of supply left no doubt as to the length of the cruise; but an experienced observer would have known at once that the Forward was to sail in polar waters, from the barrels of lime-juice, of lime lozenges, of bundles of mustard, sorrel, and of cochlearia,—in a word, from the abundance of powerful antiscorbutics, which are so necessary in journeys in the regions of the far north and south. Shandon had doubtless received word to take particular care about this part of the cargo, for he gave to it especial attention, as well as to the ship's medicine-chest.

If the armament of the vessel was small enough to calm the timid souls, on the other hand, the magazine was filled with enough powder to inspire some uneasiness. The single gun on the forecastle could not pretend to require so large a supply. This excited curiosity. There were, besides, enormous saws and strong machinery, such as levers, masses of lead, handsaws, huge axes, etc., without counting a respectable number of blasting-cylinders, which might have blown up the Liverpool custom-house. All this was strange, if not alarming, not to mention the rockets, signals, lights, and lanterns of every sort.

Then, too, the numerous spectators on the quays of the New Prince's Docks gazed with admiration at a long mahogany whale-boat, a tin canoe covered with gutta-percha, and a number of halkett-boats, which are a sort of india-rubber cloaks, which can be inflated and thereby turned into canoes. Every one felt more and more puzzled, and even excited, for with the turn of the tide the Forward was to set sail for its unknown destination.