The Duncan surged forward under this piece of cloth
Two days after this conversation, John Mangles announced that the Duncan was in longitude 113° 37′, and the passengers found after consulting the chart that Cape Bernouilli was only twenty-five1 degrees off. Between this cape and Point d’Entrecasteaux, the Australian coast describes an arc over the 37th parallel. If the Duncan turned north now, and ascended toward the equator, she would soon have reached Cape Chatham, a hundred twenty miles to the north. They were sailing into that part of the Indian Ocean which was sheltered below the Australian continent, and in four days they should see Cape Bernouilli appear on the horizon.
The yacht had been favoured by a strong westerly breeze, but it had been slackening, little by little, for the past few days. On the 13th of December the wind fell entirely, and her inert sails hung limply from her masts. Without her powerful engine, the Duncan would have been chained by the calm of the ocean.
There was no saying how long these conditions might last. Glenarvan consulted with John Mangles. The young captain, seeing his coal bunkers emptying, was very much annoyed by this drop in the wind. He had covered his ship with sail, hoisting all his studsails and staysails to take advantage of the slightest breeze, but as the sailors said, there wasn’t enough wind to fill a hat.
“In any case, we shouldn’t complain, too much,” said Glenarvan. “It is better to have no wind than a contrary one.”
“Your Honour is right,” said John Mangles. “But these sudden calms can presage a change in the weather, and that is why I dread them. We are close to the boundary of the monsoon2 which blows from the northeast from October to April. If we are caught in it, our journey will be very delayed.”
“What are you worried about, John? If it happens, we will have to deal with it. It will only make our voyage a little longer.”
“Yes, if it does not bring a storm with it.”
“Do you think we are going to have bad weather?” Glenarvan examined the sky, which from horizon to zenith seemed absolutely cloudless.
“Yes,” said the captain. “I’m saying it to Your Honour, but I would not like to alarm Lady Glenarvan or Miss Grant.”
“You are acting wisely; but what makes you uneasy?”
“Some indications of heavy weather. Do not trust the appearance of the sky, My Lord. Nothing is more deceitful. For two days the barometer has been falling in a most disturbing manner, and is now at 27 inches.3 This is a warning I dare not ignore. There is nothing I dread more than the storms of the southern sea. I have struggled with them already. The vapours which condense in the immense glaciers at the South Pole produce a breath of air of extreme violence. Hence a struggle between the polar and equatorial winds, which results in hurricanes, tornadoes, and all those multiplied varieties of storm against which a ship is at a disadvantage.”
“Well, John,” said Glenarvan, “the Duncan is a good ship, and her captain is a skilful sailor. Let the storm come, we’ll meet it!”
John Mangles, in expressing his fears, obeyed his duty as a seaman. He had a keen weather sense. The persistent decline in the barometer made him take all the necessary precautions on board. He expected a violent storm. Even if the sky remained clear, his barometer was telling him otherwise. The atmospheric currents flow from places where the column of mercury is high toward those where it is lower. The greater the difference over a shorter distance, the faster the equilibrium is restored, and the greater the wind speed.
John stayed on deck all night. About eleven o’clock the sky began to darken in the south, and the crew were called up. All the sails hauled in, except the foresail, brigantine, topsail, and jibs. At midnight the wind freshened, and became very brisk, blowing at twenty knots.4 Before long, the creaking of the masts, the rattling of the cordage, the snapping of sails in sudden changes of wind, and the groaning of timbers awakened the passengers. Paganel, Glenarvan, the Major and Robert appeared on deck, some curious, others to help. When they had gone below the sky had been clear, and dotted with stars. Now it roiled with thick clouds, separated by clear bands spotted like a leopard skin.
“Hurricane?” asked Glenarvan simply.
“Not yet, but soon,” said the captain.
He gave the orders to reef the topsail. The sailors sprang into the rigging, and, not without difficulty, they reduced the area of the sail by winding it with its bats on the yard. John Mangles wanted to keep up as much canvas as possible in order to support the yacht, and soften her rolling in the rising sea.
With the sails reduced, he gave orders to Austin and the boatswain to make other preparations for the onslaught of the hurricane, which could not fail to break loose. The lashings of the boats and the moorings of the drome5 were doubled. The hoists on the side of the gun were reinforced. The shrouds and backstays were tightened. The hatches were battened. John stood on the quarterdeck like an officer in a breach, in the teeth of the wind. He gazed at the stormy sky, trying to snatch its secrets.
The barometer had fallen to 26 inches, a dip that rarely occurs in the barometric column, and the storm glass6 indicated a tempest.
It was one o’clock. Lady Helena and Miss Grant, violently shaken in their cabins, ventured to come on deck. The wind had increased to fifty knots. It whistled in the rigging with extreme violence. The metal stays hummed like the strings of giant musical instruments, stroked by some gigantic bow. The pulleys strained. Ropes ran with a sharp sound in their rough grooves. The sails cracked like cannons. Monstrous waves rolled to assail the yacht, which was tossed like a toy on their foaming crests.
When Captain John saw the passengers, he hurried toward them, and begged them to go below again, immediately. The waves were already beginning to dash over the side of the ship, and the sea might at any moment sweep right over her from stem to stern. The noise of the warring elements was so great that his words were scarcely audible.
“Are we in danger?” asked Lady Helena durning a slight lull.
“None, Madam,” said John Mangles. “But you cannot remain on deck! Nor you, Miss Mary!”
Lady Glenarvan and Miss Grant could not disobey an order that resembled a prayer, and they went back below deck as a wave, breaking over the transom, made the hatch windows shudder in their frames. At the same moment the wind redoubled its fury, making the masts bend under the pressure of the sails, and the yacht seemed to rise on the waves.
“Brail up the foresail!” shouted the captain. “Bring in the topsail and jibs!”
The sailors rushed to their maneuvering stations. The halyards were loosened, and the brails drawn in. The noise of the jibs descending was, for a moment, greater than that of the storm. The Duncan, her chimney vomiting torrents of black smoke, rolled in the heavy sea, and the blades of her screw broke the surface of the water.
Glenarvan, the Major, Paganel, and Robert contemplated the Duncan’s struggle against the waves with a mixture of admiration and wonder. They clung firmly to the railings without being able to exchange a single word, and looked at the flights of satanic petrels, those funereal birds of storms, which played in the wild winds.
Just then, a deafening whistle was heard over the hurricane. The steam was escaping violently, not by the funnel, but from the safety-valves of the boiler. The alarm whistle sounded unnaturally loud, and the yacht made a frightful pitch. An unexpected blow from the wheel overturned Wilson, who was at the helm. The uncontrolled Duncan turned broadside to the waves.
The captain rushed to the bridge. “What happened?”
“The ship is heeling over!” cried Wilson.
“Have we lost the rudder?”
“To the engine! To the engine!” shouted the engineer.
John rushed to the hatch, and down the ladder to the engine-room. A cloud of steam filled the compartment. The pistons were motionless in their cylinders, the connecting rods were not imparting any movement to the crankshaft, and the engineer, seeing them jammed and fearing for his boilers, was letting off steam.
“What’s wrong?” asked the captain.
“The screw is bent or entangled! It’s not turning at all!”
“Can’t you clear it?”
“Impossible!”
This was not a problem that could be fixed under the current conditions. It was in indisputable fact that the screw could not turn, and the steam had been released through the valves. John had to fall back on his sails, and seek to make an ally of his most powerful enemy, the wind.
He went back up on deck, and after explaining in a few words to Lord Glenarvan how things stood, begged him to retire to the cabin with the rest of the passengers. But Glenarvan wished to remain above.
“No, Your Honour,” said John Mangles firmly. “I must be alone here with my crew. Go into the saloon. The ship will have a hard fight with the waves, and they would sweep you over without mercy.”
“But we might be a help.”
“Go below, My Lord! Go below! I must insist on it. There are times when I must be the master on board, and you must retire! I order it!”
Their situation must indeed be desperate for John Mangles to speak in such a manner. Glenarvan realized it was up to him to set an example for the others. He left the bridge, followed by his three companions, and rejoined the ladies, who were anxiously awaiting the denouement of this war with the elements.
“He’s an energetic fellow, this brave John of mine!” said Lord Glenarvan, as he entered the saloon.
“Yes,” said Paganel. “He reminds me of your great Shakespeare’s boatswain in The Tempest, who says to the King whom he carries on board ‘What care these roarers for the name of King? To cabin! Silence! Trouble us not!’”7
John Mangles had not lost a second to pull his ship from the peril in which she was placed by the failure of her screw. He resolved to rely on the mainsail to keep the Duncan on course, as far as possible. It was therefore necessary to brace the sails obliquely to the wind. The topsail was reefed, a foresail was rigged on the mainstay of the mast, and the helm was crowded hard aport.
The nimble yacht wheeled about like a swift horse that feels the spur, and she turned to face the waves. Would this reduced sail hold? It was made of Dundee’s best canvas, but what fabric can withstand such violence?
The main advantage of keeping the mainsail up was that it presented the most solid portions of the yacht to the waves, and kept her on her original course. Still it involved some peril, for the vessel might get engulfed between the waves, and not be able to raise herself. But Mangles felt there was no alternative, and he resolved to keep the mainsail, as long as the masts and sails held. His crew stood there before his eyes, each man ready to go where he was needed. John, tied to the shrouds, watched the angry sea.
The remainder of the night was spent in this manner. It was hoped that the storm would diminish at dawn, but this was a vain desire. At eight o’clock the wind had increased to sixty-four knots: a hurricane.
John said nothing, but he trembled for his ship, and those on board. The Duncan made a frightful plunge forward. Her spars creaked, and the tips of the foresail whipped the crest of the waves. For an instant the men thought she would never rise again. Already they had seized their hatchets to cut away the shrouds from the mainmast, when the sails, torn from their ropes, flew away like gigantic albatrosses.
The Duncan had risen once more, but she now found herself entirely at the mercy of the waves, with nothing to steady or direct her. She pitched and tossed about so violently that the captain expected the masts might break off at their roots at any moment. She could not bear such a roll for long. She was tiring in this blast, and soon her disjointed planks, her shattered seams, would give passage to the waves.
John had no choice but to rig a storm jib, and run before the gale. But this was no easy task. It took hours of labour, undone by the storm twenty times over, so they had to start again. It was not until three o’clock that the jib was hoisted on the forestay and delivered to the action of the wind.
The Duncan surged forward under this piece of cloth
The Duncan surged forward under this piece of cloth, and began to flee the tailwind with incalculable speed. The hurricane pushed her to the northeast. Her safety lay in speed. Sometimes she would surge ahead of the waves which carried her along, and cutting through them with her sharp prow, plunge like a huge cetacean, and the ocean would sweep over her deck from stem to stern. At others, she would keep pace with the waves, her rudder lost all effect, and there was imminent danger of her being capsized. And sometimes the the waves would run faster than the yacht, and the seas would jump the transom and sweep over the deck from stern to stem with irresistible force.
December 15th and the ensuing night passed in this alarming situation amid dreadful alternations of hope and despair. John Mangles never left his post for a moment, not even to eat. Though his impassive face betrayed no symptoms of fear, he was tortured with anxiety, and his steady gaze was fixed on the north, as if trying to pierce through the thick mists that enshrouded it.
There was, indeed, great cause for fear. The Duncan was rushing toward the Australian coast with a speed which nothing could lessen. To John Mangles it seemed as if a thunderbolt were driving them along. Every instant he expected the yacht would be dashed into a thousand pieces against some rock. He reckoned the coast could not be more than twelve miles off. To make landfall now would mean the loss of the ship. It is a hundred times better to be out in the immense ocean, where a ship has a chance to defend herself, even if she may eventually yield. But when a storm throws her on land, she is lost.
John Mangles went to find Glenarvan, and had a private talk with him about their situation, telling him frankly the true state of affairs, stating the case with all the coolness of a sailor prepared for anything and everything and he wound up by saying he might, perhaps, be obliged to cast the Duncan on shore. “To save the lives of those on board, if it is possible, My Lord.”
“Then do it, John,” replied Lord Glenarvan.
“And Lady Helena? Miss Grant?”
“I will only warn them at the last moment, when all hope of keeping out at sea is lost. You will let me know?”
“I will, My Lord.”
Glenarvan rejoined his companions, who felt they were in imminent danger, though no word was spoken on the subject. Both ladies displayed great courage, fully equal to any of their companions. Paganel indulged in the most untimely theories as to the direction of the atmospheric currents. Robert made interesting comparisons between tornadoes, cyclones, and straight storms. The Major calmly awaited the end with the fatalism of a Muslim.
About eleven o’clock, the hurricane seemed to decrease slightly. The damp mist began to clear away, and a sudden gleam of light revealed a low-lying shore about six miles leeward. They were driving right down on it. Enormous breakers, fifty feet high, or more, were dashing over it. John knew that there must be shallow water before the shore to push the waves to such heights.
“There are sand bars,” he said to Austin.
“I think you’re right,” said the mate.
“We are in God’s hands,” said John. “If we cannot find any opening for the Duncan, and if she doesn’t find the way in herself, we are lost.”
“The tide is high at present, it is just possible we may ride over those benches.”
“But look at those breakers. What ship could stand them? God help us, my friend!”
The Duncan, under her storm jib, was approaching the coast with frightening speed. Soon she was within two miles of the sand banks, though the shore was still veiled in mist. John fancied he could see beyond the breakers a quiet basin, where the Duncan might find a haven, but how could she reach it?
All the passengers were summoned to the deck, for now that the hour of shipwreck was at hand, the captain did not wish anyone to be shut up below. Glenarvan and his companions looked at the dreadful sea. Mary Grant turned pale.
“John,” said Glenarvan softly to the captain, “I will try to save my wife, or I will perish with her. You take care of Miss Grant.”
“Yes, Your Honour,” replied John Mangles, raising his hand in a salute.
The Duncan was only a stone’s throw from the sand-banks. The tide was high. If it were calm, there would likely be enough water under the keel of the yacht to allow her to cross this dangerous bar; but the huge waves, alternately lifting her up, and then dropping her, would infallibly ground her. Was there any means of moderating the movement of these waves, of facilitating the sliding of their liquid molecules, of calming this tumultuous sea?
John Mangles had an idea.
“The oil!” he exclaimed. “My lads, get the oil! Get the oil!”
The crew understood him immediately. This was a known technique, that sometimes worked. The fury of the waves can be appeased by covering them with a sheet of oil. The sheet floats on the surface, and destroys the shock of water. Its effect is immediate, but it passes quickly. The moment after a ship has passed over the smooth surface, the sea redoubles its violence, and woe to anyone that follows.8
“It’s in God’s hands!” cried the captain. “Pour out!”
The barrels of seal oil were hauled up onto the forecastle by the crew, for danger seemed to have doubled the men’s strength. They were axed open, and hung over the port and starboard railings.
“Hang on!” shouted John, looking out for the right moment.
In twenty seconds the yacht reached the bar, carried by a roaring tidal bore. Now was the time.
“It’s in God’s hands!” cried the captain. “Pour out!”
The barrels were capsized, and streams of oil poured out. Instantly, the oily tablecloth levelled the frothy surface of the sea. The Duncan flew over the calmed waters, into a peaceful basin beyond the formidable bar. But the ocean, cleared of its fetters, burst forth again with all its fury, and the towering breakers dashed over the bar with increased violence behind her.
1. Verne has them five degrees from Cape Bernouilli, which is way off. I thought he might have meant five degrees from Point d’Entrecasteaux, but its longitude is 116° so that still doesn’t match — DAS
2. Extremely violent winds reigning in the Indian Ocean. Their direction varies according to the seasons, and the summer monsoons are generally in the opposite direction to the monsoons of the winter.
3. 686 millimetres. The normal height of the barometric column is 760 millimetres.
4. For some reason, Verne gives wind speeds in this chapter in fathoms per second. I’ve converted them to knots — DAS
5. The cache of spare parts, lumber, etc. needed for making repairs, kept lashed on deck. Another perfectly cromulent word, though when I finally tracked it down in a dictionary of nautical terms, its usage citation pointed back to Verne’s use of it here — DAS
6. Glasses containing a chemical mixture that changes appearance depending on the direction of the wind and the electrical voltage of the atmosphere. The best are made by Messrs. Negretti and Zambra, opticians of the British navy.
Storm Glasses don’t actually work, but they were popular in the 1860s, with many prominent advocates in the world’s navies, including Admiral FitzRoy — DAS
7. The Tempest, Act I, Scene I — DAS
8. Thus the maritime regulations forbid captains from using this desperate means, when another ship follows them.