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Redburn. His First Voyage

H >> Herman Melville >> Redburn. His First Voyage




Many similar scenes occurred every day; nor did a single day pass, but
scores of the poor people got no chance whatever to do their cooking.

This was bad enough; but it was a still more miserable thing, to see
these poor emigrants wrangling and fighting together for the want of the
most ordinary accommodations. But thus it is, that the very hardships to
which such beings are subjected, instead of uniting them, only tends, by
imbittering their tempers, to set them against each other; and thus they
themselves drive the strongest rivet into the chain, by which their
social superiors hold them subject.

It was with a most reluctant hand, that every evening in the second
dog-watch, at the mate's command, I would march up to the fire, and
giving notice to the assembled crowd, that the time was come to
extinguish it, would dash it out with my bucket of salt water; though
many, who had long waited for a chance to cook, had now to go away
disappointed.

The staple food of the Irish emigrants was oatmeal and water, boiled
into what is sometimes called mush; by the Dutch is known as supaan; by
sailors burgoo; by the New Englanders hasty-pudding; in which
hasty-pudding, by the way, the poet Barlow found the materials for a
sort of epic.

Some of the steerage passengers, however, were provided with
sea-biscuit, and other perennial food, that was eatable all the year
round, fire or no fire.

There were several, moreover, who seemed better to do in the world than
the rest; who were well furnished with hams, cheese, Bologna sausages,
Dutch herrings, alewives, and other delicacies adapted to the
contingencies of a voyager in the steerage.

There was a little old Englishman on board, who had been a grocer
ashore, whose greasy trunks seemed all pantries; and he was constantly
using himself for a cupboard, by transferring their contents into his
own interior. He was a little light of head, I always thought. He
particularly doated on his long strings of sausages; and would sometimes
take them out, and play with them, wreathing them round him, like an
Indian juggler with charmed snakes. What with this diversion, and eating
his cheese, and helping himself from an inexhaustible junk bottle, and
smoking his pipe, and meditating, this crack-pated grocer made time jog
along with him at a tolerably easy pace.

But by far the most considerable man in the steerage, in point of
pecuniary circumstances at least, was a slender little pale-faced
English tailor, who it seemed had engaged a passage for himself and wife
in some imaginary section of the ship, called the second cabin, which
was feigned to combine the comforts of the first cabin with the
cheapness of the steerage. But it turned out that this second cabin was
comprised in the after part of the steerage itself, with nothing
intervening but a name. So to his no small disgust, he found himself
herding with the rabble; and his complaints to the captain were
unheeded.

This luckless tailor was tormented the whole voyage by his wife, who was
young and handsome; just such a beauty as farmers'-boys fall in love
with; she had bright eyes, and red cheeks, and looked plump and happy.

She was a sad coquette; and did not turn away, as she was bound to do,
from the dandy glances of the cabin bucks, who ogled her through their
double-barreled opera glasses. This enraged the tailor past telling; he
would remonstrate with his wife, and scold her; and lay his matrimonial
commands upon her, to go below instantly, out of sight. But the lady was
not to be tyrannized over; and so she told him. Meantime, the bucks
would be still framing her in their lenses, mightily enjoying the fun.
The last resources of the poor tailor would be, to start up, and make a
dash at the rogues, with clenched fists; but upon getting as far as the
mainmast, the mate would accost him from over the rope that divided
them, and beg leave to communicate the fact, that he could come no
further. This unfortunate tailor was also a fiddler; and when fairly
baited into desperation, would rush for his instrument, and try to get
rid of his wrath by playing the most savage, remorseless airs he could
think of.

While thus employed, perhaps his wife would accost him--

"Billy, my dear;" and lay her soft hand on his shoulder.

But Billy, he only fiddled harder.

"Billy, my love!"

The bow went faster and faster.

"Come, now, Billy, my dear little fellow, let's make it all up;" and she
bent over his knees, looking bewitchingly up at him, with her
irresistible eyes.

Down went fiddle and bow; and the couple would sit together for an hour
or two, as pleasant and affectionate as possible.

But the next day, the chances were, that the old feud would be renewed,
which was certain to be the case at the first glimpse of an opera-glass
from the cabin.




LIII. THE HORATII AND CURIATII


With a slight alteration, I might begin this chapter after the manner of
Livy, in the 24th section of his first book:--"It happened, that in each
family were three twin brothers, between whom there was little disparity
in point of age or of strength."

Among the steerage passengers of the Highlander, were two women from
Armagh, in Ireland, widows and sisters, who had each three twin sons,
born, as they said, on the same day.

They were ten years old. Each three of these six cousins were as like
as the mutually reflected figures in a kaleidoscope; and like the forms
seen in a kaleidoscope, together, as well as separately, they seemed to
form a complete figure. But, though besides this fraternal likeness, all
six boys bore a strong cousin-german resemblance to each other; yet, the
O'Briens were in disposition quite the reverse of the O'Regans. The
former were a timid, silent trio, who used to revolve around their
mother's waist, and seldom quit the maternal orbit; whereas, the
O'Regans were "broths of boys," full of mischief and fun, and given to
all manner of devilment, like the tails of the comets.

Early every morning, Mrs. O'Regan emerged from the steerage, driving her
spirited twins before her, like a riotous herd of young steers; and made
her way to the capacious deck-tub, full of salt water, pumped up from
the sea, for the purpose of washing down the ship. Three splashes, and
the three boys were ducking and diving together in the brine; their
mother engaged in shampooing them, though it was haphazard sort of work
enough; a rub here, and a scrub there, as she could manage to fasten on
a stray limb.

"Pat, ye divil, hould still while I wash ye. Ah! but it's you, Teddy,
you rogue. Arrah, now, Mike, ye spalpeen, don't be mixing your legs up
with Pat's."

The little rascals, leaping and scrambling with delight, enjoyed the
sport mightily; while this indefatigable, but merry matron, manipulated
them all over, as if it were a matter of conscience.

Meanwhile, Mrs. O'Brien would be standing on the boatswain's locker--or
rope and tar-pot pantry in the vessel's bows--with a large old quarto
Bible, black with age, laid before her between the knight-heads, and
reading aloud to her three meek little lambs.

The sailors took much pleasure in the deck-tub performances of the
O'Regans, and greatly admired them always for their archness and
activity; but the tranquil O'Briens they did not fancy so much. More
especially they disliked the grave matron herself; hooded in rusty
black; and they had a bitter grudge against her book. To that, and the
incantations muttered over it, they ascribed the head winds that haunted
us; and Blunt, our Irish cockney, really believed that Mrs. O'Brien
purposely came on deck every morning, in order to secure a foul wind for
the next ensuing twenty-four hours.

At last, upon her coming forward one morning, Max the Dutchman accosted
her, saying he was sorry for it, but if she went between the
knight-heads again with her book, the crew would throw it overboard for
her.

Now, although contrasted in character, there existed a great warmth of
affection between the two families of twins, which upon this occasion
was curiously manifested.

Notwithstanding the rebuke and threat of the sailor, the widow silently
occupied her old place; and with her children clustering round her,
began her low, muttered reading, standing right in the extreme bows of
the ship, and slightly leaning over them, as if addressing the
multitudinous waves from a floating pulpit. Presently Max came behind
her, snatched the book from her hands, and threw it overboard. The widow
gave a wail, and her boys set up a cry. Their cousins, then ducking in
the water close by, at once saw the cause of the cry; and springing from
the tub, like so many dogs, seized Max by the legs, biting and striking
at him: which, the before timid little O'Briens no sooner perceived,
than they, too, threw themselves on the enemy, and the amazed seaman
found himself baited like a bull by all six boys.

And here it gives me joy to record one good thing on the part of the
mate. He saw the fray, and its beginning; and rushing forward, told Max
that he would harm the boys at his peril; while he cheered them on, as
if rejoiced at their giving the fellow such a tussle. At last Max,
sorely scratched, bit, pinched, and every way aggravated, though of
course without a serious bruise, cried out "enough!" and the assailants
were ordered to quit him; but though the three O'Briens obeyed, the
three O'Regans hung on to him like leeches, and had to be dragged off.

"There now, you rascal," cried the mate, "throw overboard another Bible,
and I'll send you after it without a bowline."

This event gave additional celebrity to the twins throughout the vessel.
That morning all six were invited to the quarter-deck, and reviewed by
the cabin-passengers, the ladies manifesting particular interest in
them, as they always do concerning twins, which some of them show in
public parks and gardens, by stopping to look at them, and questioning
their nurses.

"And were you all born at one time?" asked an old lady, letting her eye
run in wonder along the even file of white heads.

"Indeed, an' we were," said Teddy; "wasn't we, mother?"

Many more questions were asked and answered, when a collection was taken
up for their benefit among these magnanimous cabin-passengers, which
resulted in starting all six boys in the world with a penny apiece.

I never could look at these little fellows without an inexplicable
feeling coming over me; and though there was nothing so very remarkable
or unprecedented about them, except the singular coincidence of two
sisters simultaneously making the world such a generous present; yet,
the mere fact of there being twins always seemed curious; in fact, to me
at least, all twins are prodigies; and still I hardly know why this
should be; for all of us in our own persons furnish numerous examples of
the same phenomenon. Are not our thumbs twins? A regular Castor and
Pollux? And all of our fingers? Are not our arms, hands, legs, feet,
eyes, ears, all twins; born at one birth, and as much alike as they
possibly can be?

Can it be, that the Greek grammarians invented their dual number for the
particular benefit of twins?




LIV. SOME SUPERIOR OLD NAIL-ROD AND PIG-TAIL


It has been mentioned how advantageously my shipmates disposed of their
tobacco in Liverpool; but it is to be related how those nefarious
commercial speculations of theirs reduced them to sad extremities in the
end.

True to their improvident character, and seduced by the high prices paid
for the weed in England, they had there sold off by far the greater
portion of what tobacco they had; even inducing the mate to surrender
the portion he had secured under lock and key by command of the
Custom-house officers. So that when the crew were about two weeks out,
on the homeward-bound passage, it became sorrowfully evident that
tobacco was at a premium.

Now, one of the favorite pursuits of sailors during a dogwatch below at
sea is cards; and though they do not understand whist, cribbage, and
games of that kidney, yet they are adepts at what is called "High-low-
Jack-and-the-game," which name, indeed, has a Jackish and nautical
flavor. Their stakes are generally so many plugs of tobacco, which,
like rouleaux of guineas, are piled on their chests when they play.
Judge, then, the wicked zest with which the Highlander's crew now
shuffled and dealt the pack; and how the interest curiously and
invertedly increased, as the stakes necessarily became less and less;
and finally resolved themselves into "chaws."

So absorbed, at last, did they become at this business, that some of
them, after being hard at work during a nightwatch on deck, would rob
themselves of rest below, in order to have a brush at the cards. And as
it is very difficult sleeping in the presence of gamblers; especially if
they chance to be sailors, whose conversation at all times is apt to be
boisterous; these fellows would often be driven out of the forecastle by
those who desired to rest. They were obliged to repair on deck, and make
a card-table of it; and invariably, in such cases, there was a great
deal of contention, a great many ungentlemanly charges of nigging and
cheating; and, now and then, a few parenthetical blows were exchanged.

But this was not so much to be wondered at, seeing they could see but
very little, being provided with no light but that of a midnight sky;
and the cards, from long wear and rough usage, having become exceedingly
torn and tarry, so much so, that several members of the four suits might
have seceded from their respective clans, and formed into a fifth tribe,
under the name of "Tar-spots."

Every day the tobacco grew scarcer and scarcer; till at last it became
necessary to adopt the greatest possible economy in its use. The modicum
constituting an ordinary "chaw," was made to last a whole day; and at
night, permission being had from the cook, this self-same "chaw" was
placed in the oven of the stove, and there dried; so as to do duty in a
pipe.

In the end not a plug was to be had; and deprived of a solace and a
stimulus, on which sailors so much rely while at sea, the crew became
absent, moody, and sadly tormented with the hypos. They were something
like opium-smokers, suddenly cut off from their drug. They would sit on
their chests, forlorn and moping; with a steadfast sadness, eying the
forecastle lamp, at which they had lighted so many a pleasant pipe. With
touching eloquence they recalled those happier evenings--the time of
smoke and vapor; when, after a whole day's delectable "chawing," they
beguiled themselves with their genial, and most companionable puffs.

One night, when they seemed more than usually cast down and
disconsolate, Blunt, the Irish cockney, started up suddenly with an idea
in his head--"Boys, let's search under the bunks!" Bless you, Blunt! what
a happy conceit! Forthwith, the chests were dragged out; the dark places
explored; and two sticks of nail-rod tobacco, and several old "chaws,"
thrown aside by sailors on some previous voyage, were their cheering
reward. They were impartially divided by Jackson, who, upon this
occasion, acquitted himself to the satisfaction of all.

Their mode of dividing this tobacco was the rather curious one generally
adopted by sailors, when the highest possible degree of impartiality is
desirable. I will describe it, recommending its earnest consideration to
all heirs, who may hereafter divide an inheritance; for if they adopted
this nautical method, that universally slanderous aphorism of Lavater
would be forever rendered nugatory--"Expert not to understand any man
till you have divided with him an inheritance."

The nail-rods they cut as evenly as possible into as many parts as there
were men to be supplied; and this operation having been performed in the
presence of all, Jackson, placing the tobacco before him, his face to
the wall, and back to the company, struck one of the bits of weed with
his knife, crying out, "Whose is this?" Whereupon a respondent,
previously pitched upon, replied, at a venture, from the opposite corner
of the forecastle, "Blunt's;" and to Blunt it went; and so on, in like
manner, till all were served.

I put it to you, lawyers--shade of Blackstone, I invoke you--if a more
impartial procedure could be imagined than this?

But the nail-rods and last-voyage "chaws" were soon gone, and then,
after a short interval of comparative gayety, the men again drooped, and
relapsed into gloom.

They soon hit upon an ingenious device, however--but not altogether new
among seamen--to allay the severity of the depression under which they
languished. Ropes were unstranded, and the yarns picked apart; and, cut
up into small bits, were used as a substitute for the weed. Old ropes
were preferred; especially those which had long lain in the hold, and
had contracted an epicurean dampness, making still richer their ancient,
cheese-like flavor.

In the middle of most large ropes, there is a straight, central part,
round which the exterior strands are twisted. When in picking oakum,
upon various occasions, I have chanced, among the old junk used at such
times, to light upon a fragment of this species of rope, I have ever
taken, I know not what kind of strange, nutty delight in untwisting it
slowly, and gradually coming upon its deftly hidden and aromatic
"heart;" for so this central piece is denominated.

It is generally of a rich, tawny, Indian hue, somewhat inclined to
luster; is exceedingly agreeable to the touch; diffuses a pungent odor,
as of an old dusty bottle of Port, newly opened above ground; and,
altogether, is an object which no man, who enjoys his dinners, could
refrain from hanging over, and caressing.

Nor is this delectable morsel of old junk wanting in many interesting,
mournful, and tragic suggestions. Who can say in what gales it may have
been; in what remote seas it may have sailed? How many stout masts of
seventy-fours and frigates it may have staid in the tempest? How deep it
may have lain, as a hawser, at the bottom of strange harbors? What
outlandish fish may have nibbled at it in the water, and what
un-catalogued sea-fowl may have pecked at it, when forming part of a
lofty stay or a shroud?

Now, this particular part of the rope, this nice little "cut" it was,
that among the sailors was the most eagerly sought after. And getting
hold of a foot or two of old cable, they would cut into it lovingly, to
see whether it had any "tenderloin."

For my own part, nevertheless, I can not say that this tit-bit was at
all an agreeable one in the mouth; however pleasant to the sight of an
antiquary, or to the nose of an epicure in nautical fragrancies. Indeed,
though possibly I might have been mistaken, I thought it had rather an
astringent, acrid taste; probably induced by the tar, with which the
flavor of all ropes is more or less vitiated. But the sailors seemed to
like it, and at any rate nibbled at it with great gusto. They converted
one pocket of their trowsers into a junk-shop, and when solicited by a
shipmate for a "chaw," would produce a small coil of rope.

Another device adopted to alleviate their hardships, was the
substitution of dried tea-leaves, in place of tobacco, for their pipes.
No one has ever supped in a forecastle at sea, without having been
struck by the prodigious residuum of tea-leaves, or cabbage stalks, in
his tin-pot of bohea. There was no lack of material to supply every
pipe-bowl among us.

I had almost forgotten to relate the most noteworthy thing in this
matter; namely, that notwithstanding the general scarcity of the genuine
weed, Jackson was provided with a supply; nor did it give out, until
very shortly previous to our arrival in port.

In the lowest depths of despair at the loss of their precious solace,
when the sailors would be seated inconsolable as the Babylonish
captives, Jackson would sit cross-legged in his bunk, which was an upper
one, and enveloped in a cloud of tobacco smoke, would look down upon the
mourners below, with a sardonic grin at their forlornness.

He recalled to mind their folly in selling for filthy lucre, their
supplies of the weed; he painted their stupidity; he enlarged upon the
sufferings they had brought upon themselves; he exaggerated those
sufferings, and every way derided, reproached, twitted, and hooted at
them. No one dared to return his scurrilous animadversions, nor did any
presume to ask him to relieve their necessities out of his fullness. On
the contrary, as has been just related, they divided with him the
nail-rods they found.

The extraordinary dominion of this one miserable Jackson, over twelve or
fourteen strong, healthy tars, is a riddle, whose solution must be left
to the philosophers.




LV. DRAWING NIGH TO THE LAST SCENE IN JACKSON'S CAREER


The closing allusion to Jackson in the chapter preceding, reminds me of
a circumstance--which, perhaps, should have been mentioned before--that
after we had been at sea about ten days, he pronounced himself too
unwell to do duty, and accordingly went below to his bunk. And here,
with the exception of a few brief intervals of sunning himself in fine
weather, he remained on his back, or seated cross-legged, during the
remainder of the homeward-bound passage.

Brooding there, in his infernal gloom, though nothing but a castaway
sailor in canvas trowsers, this man was still a picture, worthy to be
painted by the dark, moody hand of Salvator. In any of that master's
lowering sea-pieces, representing the desolate crags of Calabria, with a
midnight shipwreck in the distance, this Jackson's would have been the
face to paint for the doomed vessel's figurehead, seamed and blasted by
lightning.

Though the more sneaking and cowardly of my shipmates whispered among
themselves, that Jackson, sure of his wages, whether on duty or off, was
only feigning indisposition, nevertheless it was plain that, from his
excesses in Liverpool, the malady which had long fastened its fangs in
his flesh, was now gnawing into his vitals.

His cheek became thinner and yellower, and the bones projected like
those of a skull. His snaky eyes rolled in red sockets; nor could he
lift his hand without a violent tremor; while his racking cough many a
time startled us from sleep. Yet still in his tremulous grasp he swayed
his scepter, and ruled us all like a tyrant to the last.

The weaker and weaker he grew, the more outrageous became his treatment
of the crew. The prospect of the speedy and unshunable death now before
him, seemed to exasperate his misanthropic soul into madness; and as if
he had indeed sold it to Satan, he seemed determined to die with a curse
between his teeth.

I can never think of him, even now, reclining in his bunk, and with
short breaths panting out his maledictions, but I am reminded of that
misanthrope upon the throne of the world--the diabolical Tiberius at
Caprese; who even in his self-exile, imbittered by bodily pangs, and
unspeakable mental terrors only known to the damned on earth, yet did
not give over his blasphemies but endeavored to drag down with him to
his own perdition, all who came within the evil spell of his power. And
though Tiberius came in the succession of the Caesars, and though
unmatchable Tacitus has embalmed his carrion, yet do I account this
Yankee Jackson full as dignified a personage as he, and as well meriting
his lofty gallows in history; even though he was a nameless vagabond
without an epitaph, and none, but I, narrate what he was. For there is
no dignity in wickedness, whether in purple or rags; and hell is a
democracy of devils, where all are equals. There, Nero howls side by
side with his own malefactors. If Napoleon were truly but a martial
murderer, I pay him no more homage than I would a felon. Though Milton's
Satan dilutes our abhorrence with admiration, it is only because he is
not a genuine being, but something altered from a genuine original. We
gather not from the four gospels alone, any high-raised fancies
concerning this Satan; we only know him from thence as the
personification of the essence of evil, which, who but pickpockets and
burglars will admire? But this takes not from the merit of our
high-priest of poetry; it only enhances it, that with such unmitigated
evil for his material, he should build up his most goodly structure. But
in historically canonizing on earth the condemned below, and lifting up
and lauding the illustrious damned, we do but make examples of
wickedness; and call upon ambition to do some great iniquity, and be
sure of fame.




LVI. UNDER THE LEE OF THE LONG-BOAT, REDBURN AND HARRY HOLD CONFIDENTIAL
COMMUNION


A sweet thing is a song; and though the Hebrew captives hung their harps
on the willows, that they could not sing the melodies of Palestine
before the haughty beards of the Babylonians; yet, to themselves, those
melodies of other times and a distant land were as sweet as the June dew
on Hermon.

And poor Harry was as the Hebrews. He, too, had been carried away
captive, though his chief captor and foe was himself; and he, too, many
a night, was called upon to sing for those who through the day had
insulted and derided him.

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