A good SEAMAN is able to make all the various knots, splices, and other arrangements in hempen or wire rope, without which a ship cannot be rigged; he can make a sail, send up or down yards and masts, and do many other things, the sum total of which need several years of steady application to learn, although a good seaman is ever learning.
Such seamen are fast becoming extinct.They are almost totally unnecessary in steamships, except when the engines break down in a gale of wind, and the crowd of navvies forming the crew stand looking at one another when called upon to set sail or do any other job aloft.THEN the want of seamen is rather severely felt.
But even in sailing ships--the great, overgrown tanks of two thousand tons and upwards--mechanical genius has utilized iron to such an extent in their rigging that sailor-work has become very largely a matter of blacksmithing.I make no complaint of this, not believing that the "old was better;" but, since the strongest fabric of man's invention comes to grief sometimes in conflict with the irresistible sea, some provision should be made for having a sufficiency of seamen who could exercise their skill in refitting a dismasted ship, or temporarily replacing broken blacksmith work by old-fashioned rope and wood.
But, as the sailing ship is doomed inevitably to disappear before steam, perhaps it does not matter much.The economic march of the world's progress will never be stayed by sentimental considerations, nor will all the romance and poetry in the world save the seaman from extinction, if his place can be more profitably filled by the engineer.From all appearances, it soon will be, for even now marine superintendents of big lines are sometimes engineers, and in their hands lie the duty of engaging the officers.It would really seem as if the ship of the near future would be governed by the chief engineer, under whose direction a pilot or sailing-master would do the necessary navigation, without power to interfere in any matter of the ship's economy.Changes as great have taken place in other professions; seafaring cannot hope to be the sole exception.
So, edging comfortably along, we gradually neared the Sandwich Islands without having seen a single spout worth watching since the tragedy.At last the lofty summits of the island mountains hove in sight, and presently we came to an anchor in that paradise of whalers, missionaries, and amateur statesmen--Honolulu.As it is as well known to most reading people as our own ports--better perhaps--I shall not attempt to describe it, or pit myself against the able writers who have made it so familiar.
Yet to me it was a new world.All things were so strange, so delightful, especially the lovable, lazy, fascinating Kanakas, who could be so limply happy over a dish of poe, or a green cocoa-nut, or even a lounge in the sun, that it seemed an outrage to expect them to work.In their sports they could be energetic enough.I do not know of any more delightful sight than to watch them bathing in the tremendous surf, simply intoxicated with the joy of living, as unconscious of danger as if swinging in a hammock while riding triumphantly upon the foaming summit of an incoming breaker twenty feet high, or plunging with a cataract over the dizzy edge of its cliff, swallowed up in the hissing vortex below, only to reappear with a scream of riotous laughter in the quiet eddy beyond.
As far as I could judge, they were the happiest of people, literally taking no thought for the morrow, and content with the barest necessaries of life, so long as they were free and the sun shone brightly.We had many opportunities of cultivating their acquaintance, for the captain allowed us much liberty, quite one-half of the crew and officers being ashore most of the time.Of course, the majority spent all their spare time in the purlieus of the town, which, like all such places anywhere, were foul and filthy enough; but that was their own faults.I have often wondered much to see men, who on board ship were the pink of cleanliness and neatness, fastidious to a fault in all they did, come ashore and huddle in the most horrible of kennels, among the very dregs and greaves of the 'long-shore district.It certainly wants a great deal of explanation; but I suppose the most potent reason is, that sailors, as a class, never learn to enjoy themselves rationally.They are also morbidly suspicions of being taken in hand by anybody who would show them anything worth seeing, preferring to be led by the human sharks that infest all seaports into ways of strange nastiness, and so expensive withal that one night of such wallowing often costs them more than a month's sane recreation and good food would.All honour to the devoted men and women who labour in our seaports for the moral and material benefit of the sailor, passing their lives amidst sights and sounds shocking and sickening to the last degree, reviled, unthanked, unpaid.Few are the missionaries abroad whose lot is so hard as theirs.
We spent ten happy days in Honolulu, marred only by one or two drunken rows among the chaps forward, which, however, resulted in their getting a severe dressing down in the forecastle, where good order was now kept.There had been no need for interference on the part of the officers, which I was glad to see, remembering what would have happened under such circumstances not long ago.
Being short-handed, the captain engaged a number of friendly islanders for a limited period, on the understanding that they were to be discharged at their native place, Vau Vau.There were ten of them, fine stalwart fellows, able bodied and willing as possible.They were cleanly in their habits, and devout members of the Wesleyan body, so that their behaviour was quite a reproach to some of our half-civilized crew.Berths were found for them in the forecastle, and they took their places among us quite naturally, being fairly well used to a whale-ship.
