The Pilot: A Tale of the Sea

“I shall pull into the surf and let go a grapnel; you will take Mr. Merry into your whale-boat, and try to drive her through the breakers on the beach.”

“Beach!” retorted Barnstable; “do you call a perpendicular rock of a hundred feet in height a beach!”

“We shall not dispute about terms,” said Griffith, smiling, “but you must manage to get on the shore; we have seen the signal from the land, and know that the pilot, whom we have so long expected, is ready to come off!”

Barnstable shook his head with a grave air, as he muttered to himself, “This is droll navigation; first we run into an unfrequented bay that is full of rocks, and sandpits, and shoals, and then we get off our pilot. But how am I to know him?”

“Merry will give you the password, and tell you where to look for him. I would land myself, but my orders forbid it. If you meet with difficulties, show three oar-blades in a row, and I will pull in to your assistance. Three oars on end and a pistol will bring the fire ofmy muskets, and the signal repeated from the barge will draw a shot from the ship.”

“I thank you, I thank you,” said Barnstable, carelessly; “I believe I can fight my own battles against all the enemies we are likely to fall in with on this coast. But the old man is surely mad, I would – –”

“You would obey his orders if he were here, and you will now please to obey mine,” said Griffith, in a tone that the friendly expression of his eye contradicted. “Pull in, and keep a lookout for a small man in a drab pea-jacket; Merry will give you the word; if he answer it, bring him off to the barge.”

The young men now nodded familiarly and kindly to each other, and the boy who was called Mr. Merry having changed his place from the barge to the whale-boat, Barnstable threw himself into his seat, and making a signal with his hand, his men again bent to their oars. The light vessel shot away from her companion, and dashed in boldly towards the rocks; after skirting the shore for some distance in quest of a favorable place, she was suddenly turned, and dashing over the broken waves, was run upon a spot where a landing could be effected in safety.

In the mean time the barge followed these movements, at some distance, with a more measured progress, and when the whale-boat was observed to be drawn up alongside of a rock, the promised grapnel was cast into the water, and her crew deliberately proceeded to get their firearms in a state for immediate service. Everything appeared to be done in obedience to strict orders that must have been previously communicated; for the young man, who has been introduced to the reader by the name of Griffith, seldom spoke, and then only in the pithy expressions that are apt to fall from those who are sure of obedience. When the boat had brought up to her grapnel, he sunk back at his length on the cushioned seats of the barge, and drawing his hat over his eyes in a listless manner, he continued for many minutes apparently absorbed in thoughts altogether foreign to his present situation. Occasionally he rose, and would first bend his looks in quest of his companions on the shore, and then, turning his expressive eyes toward the ocean, the abstracted and vacant air, that so often usurped the place of animation and intelligence in his countenance, would give place to the anxious and intelligent look of a seaman gifted with an experience beyond his years. His weather beaten and hardy crew, having made their dispositions for offence, sat in profound silence, with their hands thrust into the bosoms of their jackets, but with their eyes earnestly regarding every cloud that was gathering in the threatening atmosphere, and exchanging looks of deep care, whenever the boat rose higher than usual on one of those long heavy groundswells, that were heaving in from the ocean with increasing rapidity and magnitude.

Chapter II

“A horseman’s coat shall hide

thy taper shape and comeliness of side:

And with a bolder stride and looser air,

Mingled with men, a man thou must appear.”

    Prior.

When the whale-boat obtained the position we have described, the young lieutenant, who, in consequence of commanding a schooner, was usually addressed by the title of captain, stepped on the rocks, followed by the youthful midshipman, who had quitted the barge to aid in the hazardous duty of their expedition.

“This is, at best, but a Jacob’s ladder we have to climb,” said Barnstable, casting his eyes upward at the difficult ascent, “and it’s by no means certain that we shall be well received, when we get up, even though we should reach the top.”

“We are under the guns of the frigate,” returned the boy; “and you remember, sir, three oar-blades and a pistol, repeated from the barge, will draw her fire.”

“Yes, on our own heads. Boy, never be so foolish as to trust a long shot. It makes a great smoke and some noise, but it’s a terrible uncertain manner of throwing old iron about. In such a business as this, I would sooner trust Tom Coffin and his harpoon to back me, than the best broadside that ever rattled out of the three decks of a ninety-gun ship. Come, gather your limbs together, and try if you can walk on terra firma, Master Coffin.”

The seaman who was addressed by this dire appellation arose slowly from the place where he was stationed as cockswain of the boat, and seemed to ascend high in air by the gradual evolution of numberless folds in his body. When erect, he stood nearly six feet and as many inches in his shoes, though, when elevated in his perpendicular attitude, there was a forward inclination about his head and shoulders that appeared to be the consequence of habitual confinement in limited lodgings. His whole frame was destitute of the rounded outlines of a well-formed man, though his enormous hands furnished a display of bones and sinews which gave indication of gigantic strength. On his head he wore a little, low, brown hat of wool, with an arched top, that threw an expression of peculiar solemnity and hardness over his hard visage, the sharp prominent features of which were completely encircled by a set of black whiskers that began to be grizzled a little with age. One of his hands grasped, with a sort of instinct, the staff of a bright harpoon, the lower end of which he placed firmly on the rock, as, in obedience to the order of his commander, he left the place where, considering his vast dimensions, he had been established in an incredibly small space.

As soon as Captain Barnstable received this addition to his strength, he gave a few precautionary orders to the men in the boat, and proceeded to the difficult task of ascending the rocks. Notwithstanding the great daring and personal agility of Barnstable, he would have been completely baffled in this attempt, but for the assistance he occasionally received from his cockswain, whose prodigious strength and great length of limbs enabled him to make exertions which it would have been useless for most men to attempt. When within a few feet of the summit, they availed themselves of a projecting rock to pause for consultation and breath, both of which seemed necessary for their further movements.

“This will be but a bad place for a retreat, if we should happen to fall in with enemies,” said Barnstable. “Where are we to look for this pilot, Mr. Merry, or how are we to know him; and what certainty have you that he will not betray us?”

“The question you are to put to him is written on this bit of paper,” returned the boy, as he handed the other the word of recognition; “we made the signal on the point of the rock at yon headland, but, as he must have seen our boat, he will follow us to this place. As to his betraying us, he seems to have the confidence of Captain Munson, who has kept a bright lookout for him ever since we made the land.”

“Ay,” muttered the lieutenant, “and I shall have a bright lookout kept on him now we are on the land. I like not this business of hugging the shore so closely, nor have I much faith in any traitor. What think you of it, Master Coffin?”

The hardy old seaman, thus addressed, turned his grave visage on his commander, and replied with a becoming gravity:

“Give me a plenty of sea-room, and good canvas, where there is no occasion for pilots at all, sir. For my part, I was born on board a chebacco-man, and never could see the use of more land than now and then a small island to raise a few vegetables, and to dry your fish – I’m sure the sight of it always makes me feel uncomfortable, unless we have the wind dead offshore.”

“Ah! Tom, you are a sensible fellow,” said Barnstable, with an air half comic, half serious. “But we must be moving; the sun is just touching those clouds to seaward, and God keep us from riding out this night at anchor in such a place as this.”

Laying his hand on a projection of the rock above him, Barnstable swung himself forward, and following this movement with a desperate leap or two, he stood at once on the brow of the cliff. His cockswain very deliberately raised the midshipman after his officer, and proceeding with more caution but less exertion, he soon placed himself by his side.

When they reached the level land that lay above the cliffs and began to inquire, with curious and wary eyes, into the surrounding scenery, the adventurers discovered a cultivated country, divided in the usual manner, by hedges and walls. Only one habitation for man, however, and that a small dilapidated cottage, stood within a mile of them, most of the dwellings being placed as far as convenience would permit from the fogs and damps of the ocean.

“Here seems to be neither anything to apprehend, nor the object of our search,” said Barnstable, when he had taken the whole view in his survey: “I fear we have landed to no purpose, Mr. Merry. What say you, long Tom; see you what we want?”

“I see no pilot, sir,” returned the cockswain; “but it’s an ill wind that blows luck to nobody; there is a mouthful of fresh meat stowed away under that row of bushes, that would make a double ration to all hands in the Ariel.”

The midshipman laughed, as he pointed out to Barnstable the object of the cockswain’s solicitude, which proved to be a fat ox, quietly ruminating under a hedge near them.

“There’s many a hungry fellow aboard ofus,” said the boy, merrily, “who would be glad to second long Tom’s motion, if the time and business would permit us to slay the animal.”

“It is but a lubber’s blow, Mr. Merry,” returned the cockswain, without a muscle of his hard face yielding, as he struck the end of his harpoon violently against the earth, and then made a motion toward poising the weapon; “let Captain Barnstable but say the word, and I’ll drive the iron through him to the quick; I’ve sent it to the seizing in many a whale, that hadn’t a jacket of such blubber as that fellow wears.”

“Pshaw! you are not on a whaling-voyage, where everything that offers is game,” said Barnstable, turning himself pettishly away from the beast, as if he distrusted his own forbearance; “but stand fast! I see some one approaching behind the hedge. Look to your arms, Mr. Merry, – the first thing we hear may be a shot.”

“Not from that cruiser,” cried the thoughtless lad; “he is a younker, like myself, and would hardly dare run down upon such a formidable force as we muster.”

“You say true, boy,” returned Barnstable, relinquishing the grasp he held on his pistol. “He comes on with caution, as if afraid. He is small, and is in drab, though I should hardly call it a pea-jacket – and yet he may be our man. Stand you both here, while I go and hail him.”

As Barnstable walked rapidly towards the hedge, that in part concealed the stranger, the latter stopped suddenly, and seemed to be in doubt whether to advance or to retreat. Before he had decided on either, the active sailor was within a few feet of him.

“Pray, sir,” said Barnstable, “what water have we in this bay?”

The slight form of the stranger started, with an extraordinary emotion, at this question, and he shrunk aside involuntarily, as if to conceal his features, before he answered, in a voice that was barely audible:

“I should think it would be the water of the German Ocean.”

“Indeed! you must have passed no small part of your short life in the study of geography, to be so well informed,” returned the lieutenant; “perhaps, sir, your cunning is also equal to telling me how long we shall sojourn together, if I make you a prisoner, in order to enjoy the benefit of your wit?”

To this alarming intimation, the youth who was addressed made no reply; but as he averted his face, and concealed it with both his hands, the offended seaman, believing that a salutary impression had been made upon the fears of his auditor, was about to proceed with his interrogatories. The singular agitation of the stranger’s frame, however, caused the lieutenant to continue silent a few moments longer, when, to his utter amazement, he discovered that what he had mistaken for alarm was produced by an endeavor, on the part of the youth, to suppress a violent fit of laughter.

“Now, by all the whales in the sea,” cried Barnstable, “but you are merry out of season, young gentleman. It’s quite bad enough to be ordered to anchor in such a bay as this with a storm brewing before my eyes, without landing to be laughed at by a stripling who has not strength to carry a beard if he had one, when I ought to be getting an offing for the safety of both body and soul. But I’ll know more of you and your jokes, if I take you into my own mess, and am giggled out of my sleep for the rest of the cruise.”

As the commander of the schooner concluded, he approached the stranger, with an air of offering some violence, but the other shrank back from his extended arm, and exclaimed, with a voice in which real terror had gotten the better of mirth:

“Barnstable! dear Barnstable! would you harm me?”

The sailor recoiled several feet, at this unexpected appeal, and rubbing his eyes, he threw the cap from his head, before he cried:

“What do I hear! and what do I see! There lies the Ariel – and yonder is the frigate. Can this be Katherine Plowden!”

His doubts, if any doubts remained, were soon removed, for the stranger sank on the bank at her side, in an attitude in which female bashfulness was beautifully contrasted with her attire, and gave vent to her mirth in an uncontrollable burst of merriment.

From that moment, all thoughts of his duty, and the pilot, or even of the Ariel, appeared to be banished from the mind of the seaman, who sprang to her side, and joined in her mirth, though he hardly knew why or wherefore.