The Crew of the Water Wagtail

Presently the rope began to jerk, then it tightened, soon the bight of it rose out of the sea and remained there—rigid.

“Well done, Paul,” exclaimed the skipper, when this was accomplished. “Now, Olly, you go first, you’re light.”

But the boy hesitated. “No, father, you first,” he said.

“Obey orders, Olly,” returned the skipper sternly.

Without another word Oliver got upon the rope and proceeded to clamber along it. The operation was by no means easy, but the boy was strong and active, and the water not very cold. It leaped up and drenched him, however, as he passed the lowest point of the bight, and thereafter the weight of his wet garments delayed him, so that on nearing the shore he was pretty well exhausted. There, however, he found Paul up to the waist in the sea waiting for him, and the last few yards of the journey were traversed in his friend’s arms.

By means of this rope was every man of the Water Wagtail’s crew saved from a watery grave.

They found that the island on which they had been cast was sufficiently large to afford them shelter, and a brief survey of it proved that there was both wood and water enough to serve them, but nothing of animal or vegetable life was to be found. This was serious, because all their provisions were lost with the wrecked portion of the ship, so that starvation stared them in the face.

“If only the rum-kegs had been saved,” said one of the men, when they assembled, after searching the island, to discuss their prospects, “we might, at least, have led a merry life while it lasted.”

“Humph! Much good that would do you when you came to think over it in the next world,” said Grummidge contemptuously.

“I don’t believe in the next world,” returned the first speaker gruffly.

“A blind man says he doesn’t see the sun, and don’t believe in it,” rejoined Grummidge: “does that prove that there’s no sun?”

Here Master Trench interposed.

“My lads,” he said, “don’t you think that instead of talking rubbish it would be wise to scatter yourselves along the coast and see what you can pick up from the wreck? Depend on’t some of the provisions have been stranded among the rocks, and, as they will be smashed to pieces before long, the sooner we go about it the better. The truth is, that while you have been wastin’ your time running about the island, Master Burns and I have been doin’ this, an’ we’ve saved some things already—among them a barrel of pork. Come, rouse up and go to work—some to the shore, others to make a camp in the bush.”

This advice seemed so good that the men acted on it at once, with the result that before dark they had rescued two more barrels of pork and a barrel of flour from the grasp of the sea, besides some cases of goods which they had not taken time to examine.

Returning from the shore together, laden with various rescued articles, Paul and Oliver halted and sat down on a rock to rest for a few minutes.

“Olly,” said the former, “what was that I saw you wrapping up in a bit of tarred canvas, and stuffing so carefully under the breast of your coat, soon after the ship struck?”

“Mother’s last letter to me,” said the boy, with a flush of pleasure as he tapped his breast. “I have it safe here, and scarcely damaged at all.”

“Strange,” remarked Paul, as he pulled a well-covered packet from his own breast-pocket; “strange that your mind and mine should have been running on the same subject. See here, this is my mother’s last gift to me before she died—a letter, too, but it is God’s letter to fallen man.”

With great care the young man unrolled the packet and displayed a well-worn manuscript copy of a portion of the Gospel of John.

“This is copied,” he said, “from the translation of God’s Word by the great Wycliffe. It was given to my mother by an old friend, and was, as I have said, her parting gift to me.”

The friends were interrupted in their examination of this interesting M.S. by the arrival of one of the sailors, with whom they returned to the encampment in the bush.

Chapter Three.

First Experiences on the Island

A wonderfully picturesque appearance did these shipwrecked mariners present that night when, under the shelter of the shrubbery that crowned their small island, they kindled several camp-fires, and busied themselves in preparing supper.

As there was no law in the island—and our skipper, having lost his ship, forbore to assert any right to command—every one naturally did what seemed right in his own eyes.

As yet there had arisen no bone of contention among them. Of food they had secured enough for at least a few days. Fire they had procured by means of flint, steel, and tinder. A clear spring furnished them with water, and ships’ buckets washed ashore enabled them to convey the same to their encampment. Fortunately, no rum-kegs had been found, so that evil passions were not stirred up, and, on the whole, the first night on the island was spent in a fair degree of harmony—considering the character of the men.

Those who had been kindred souls on board ship naturally drew together on shore, and kindled their several fires apart. Thus it came to pass that the skipper and his son, the two mates, and Paul Burns found themselves assembled round the same fire.

But the two mates, it is right to add, were only sympathetic in a small degree, because of their former position as officers, and their recent imprisonment together. In reality they were men of no principle and of weak character, whose tendency was always to throw in their lot with the winning side. Being a little uncertain as to which was the winning side that night, they had the wisdom to keep their own counsel.

Oliver presided over the culinary department.

“You see, I’m rather fond of cookin’,” he said, apologetically, “that’s why I take it in hand.”

“Ah, that comes of his bein’ a good boy to his mother,” said Master Trench in explanation, and with a nod of approval. “Olly was always ready to lend her a helpin’ hand in the house at anything that had to be done, which has made him a Jack-of-all-trades—cookin’ among the rest, as you see.”

“A pity that the means of displaying his powers are so limited,” said Paul, who busied himself in levelling the ground beside the fire for their beds.

“Limited!” exclaimed Trench, “you are hard to please, Master Paul; I have lived on worse food than salt pork and pancakes.”

“If so, father,” said Oliver, as he deftly tossed one of the cakes into the air and neatly caught it on its other side in the pan, “you must either have had the pork without the pancakes or the pancakes without the pork.”

“Nay, Master Shallowpate, I had neither.”

“What! did you live on nothing?”

“On nothing better than boiled sheepskin—and it was uncommon tough as well as tasteless; but it is wonderful what men will eat when they’re starving.”

“I think, father,” returned the boy, as he tossed and deftly caught the cake again, “that it is more wonderful what men will eat when they’re not starving! Of all the abominations that mortal man ever put between his grinders, I think the worst is that vile stuff—”

He was interrupted by a sudden outbreak of wrath at the fire next to theirs, where Big Swinton, Grummidge, and several others were engaged, like themselves, in preparing supper.

“There will be trouble in the camp before long, I see plainly enough,” remarked Paul, looking in the direction of the disputants. “These two men, Swinton and Grummidge, are too well-matched in body and mind and self-will to live at peace, and I foresee that they will dispute your right to command.”

“They won’t do that, Paul,” returned Trench quietly, “for I have already given up a right which I no longer possess. When the Water Wagtail went on the rocks, my reign came to an end. For the future we have no need to concern ourselves. The man with the most powerful will and the strongest mind will naturally come to the top—and that’s how it should be. I think that all the troubles of mankind arise from our interfering with the laws of Nature.”

“Agreed, heartily,” replied Paul, “only I would prefer to call them the laws of God. By the way, Master Trench, I have not yet told you that I have in my possession some of these same laws in a book.”

“Have you, indeed?—in a book! That’s a rare and not altogether a safe possession now-a-days.”

“You speak the sober truth, Master Trench,” returned Paul, putting his hand into a breast-pocket and drawing forth the packet which contained the fragment of the Gospel of John. “Persecution because of our beliefs is waxing hotter and hotter just now in unfortunate England. However, we run no risk of being roasted alive in Newfoundland for reading God’s blessed Word—see, there it is. A portion of the Gospel of John in manuscript, copied from the English translation of good Master Wycliffe.”

“A good and true man, I’ve heard say,” responded the skipper, as he turned over the leaves of the precious document with a species of solemn wonder, for it was the first time he had either seen or handled a portion of the Bible. “Pity that such a friend of the people should not have lived to the age o’ that ancient fellow—what’s his name—Thoosle, something or other?”

“Methuselah,” said Paul; “you’re right there, Master Trench. What might not a good man like Wycliffe have accomplished if he had been permitted to live and teach and fight for the truth for nine hundred and sixty-nine years?”

“You don’t mean to say he lived as long as that?” exclaimed the boy, looking up from his pots and pans.

“Indeed I do.”

“Well, well! he must have been little better than a live mummy by the end of that time!” replied Oliver, resuming his interest in his pots and pans.

“But how came you to know about all that Master Paul, if this is all the Scripture you’ve had?” asked Trench.