Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1888-06-07
BOUND
By w. CLARK RUSSELL.
Author Of "The Wreck of the Grosvenor, u
Jacks Conrtship," My Watch Be-
lotc, "'The Lady Maud Etc.
CHAPTER XII.
A LONELY NIGHT.

Clipped off bowlful and fell a-puffing with
all the satisfaction OF hardened lover of
tobacco who has long been denied his favorite
relish.
My pipe being emptied, threw some more
Goals into the furnace, and putting a candle
in the lantern went aft to take another view
of the little cabins, in one of which re-
solved to sleep; for though tho cook room
would have served me best while the fire
burned, | reckoned upon it making colder
habitation when the furnace was black than
those small compartments in the stern. The
cold on deck gushed down so bitingly through
the open companion hatch that | was fain to
close it. | mounted the steps, and with much
ado shipped the cover and shut the door, by
which of course the great cabin, as call the
room in which Che two men were, was
plunged in darkness; but the cold was not
tolerable, and the parcels of candles in the
| larder rendered me Indifferent to the gloom.
On entering the passage in which were the
doors of the berths, / noticed an object that
had before escaped my observation-I mean
a small trap hatch, no bigger than a man
hole, with ring for lifting it, midway down
the lane l suspected this to be the entrance
to the lazarette, and putting both hands to
the ring pulled the hatch up. / shifted eau
/
| the lantern by the length of my arm peered
| down, and observed the outlines of casks,
bales, cases of white wood, chests, and so
forth. dropped through the hole ON to
cask, which left my head and shoulders
above the deck, and then with the utmost
caution stopped and threw the lantern light
/ around me. But the casks were not powder
barrels, which perhaps a little reflection
might have led me to suspect, since it was
not to be supposed that any man would stow
| his powder in the lazarette.
| AS was in the way of settling my mis-
| givings touching the stock of food in the
schooner, | resolved to push through with
this business at once, and fetching the chop
| per went to work upon these barrels and
| chests; and very briefly will tell you what
| found. First, | dealt with tierce that
| proved full of salt beef There was whole
row Of these tierces, and one sufficed to ex-
press the nature of the rest; there were up
| ward of thirty barrels Of pork; ono canvas
bale ripped open was full of hams, and of
these bales counted half score. The white
! cases held biscuit. There were several sacks
of peas, a number of barrels of flour, cases
of candles, cheeses, a quantity of tobacco,
| not to mention variety of jars of several
| shapes, some of which | afterward found to
contain marmalade and succadoes of differ
ent kinds. On knocking the head off one
cask / found it held frozen body that by
the light of the lantern looked as black as
ink; / Clipped off bit, sucked it, and found
it wine.
l Twas SO transported by the sight Of this
wonderful plenty that l fell upon my knees
in an outburst of gratitude, and gave hearty
thanks to God for his mercy. There was no
further need for me to dismally wonder
whether l was to starve or no; supposing the
provisions sweet, here was food enough to
last me three or four years. I was so over
joyed and withal curious that 1 forgot all
about the time, and fourishing the chopper
made the round of the lazarette, sampling its
freight by individual instances, so that by
the time was tired | had enlarged the list /
have given by discoveries of brandy, beer,
oatmeal, oil, lemons, tongues, vinegar, rum
| and eight or ten other matters, all slowed
very bunglingly, and in SO many different
kinds of casks, cases, jars and other vessels,
as disposed me to believe that several pratt
cal rummagings must have gone to the crea-
ton of this handsome and plentiful stock of
good things.
Well, thought |, even if there be no more
coal in the ship than what lies in the cook
house, enough fuel is here in the shape of
| casks, boxes and the like to thaw me pro-
visions for six months, besides what / may
come across in the hold, along with the ham,
| mocks, bedding, boxes, and SO forth, in the
forecastle, all which would be good to feed
my fire with. This was a most comforting
reflection, and l recollect of springing out
through the lazarette hatch with as spirited
q caper as ever | had cut at any time of my
life.
replaced the hatch cover, and having re-
| solved upon the almost of the four cabins
as my bedroom, entered it to see what kind
| of accommodation it would yield me. / hung
up the lantern, and looked into the cot that
was slung athwartshps, and spied couple
of rugs or blankets, which pulled out, hav-
| ing no fancy to lie under them. The deck
was like an old clothes shop or the wardrobe
Of a travelling troop of actors. From the
confusion in this and the adjoining cabins I
concluded that there had been rush at the
last--a wild overhauling and finging about
of clothes for articles of more value hidden
among them. But just as likely as not the
disorder merely indicated the slovenly iRdif-
| ference of plunderers to the fruits of pillage
! that had overstocked them.
| The first garment | picked up was a cloak
of a sort of silk material richly furred and
off, and that which remained was silver |
spread it in the cot, as it was soft thing to
| lie upon. Then l picked up coat of ths
fashion you will see in Hogarth's engravings
the coat collar broad fold, and the cuffs
to the elbow. This was as good as rug, and
| [ put it into the cot with the other
| | swept the huddle of things with my foot
into corner, and lifting the lids of the boxes
saw more clothes, some books, a collection of
small arms, couple of quadrants, and
sundry rolls of paper, which proved to be
charts of the islands of the Antilles and the
western South American coast, very i'll di-
! gested. There were no papers of any kind to
determine the vessels character, nor journal
to acquaint me with her story.
| was tired in my limbs rather than sleepy,
and went to the cook room to warm myself
at the fire and get me some supper, meaning
to sit there till the fire died out and then go
to rest; but when l put my knife to the ham
! found it as hard frozen as when had first
met with it--so with the cheese, and this
though there had been fire burning for
hours! l put the things into the oven to
thaw, as before, and sitting down fell very
pensive over this severity of cold, which had
power to freeze within yard or two of the
| furnace To be sure, the fire by my absence
had shrunk, and the sliding door being open
admitted the cold of the cabin; but the con-
sideration was, How was to resist the killing
embodiment of this atmosphere! / had slept
| in the boat, it is true, and was none the
worse, and now was under shelter, with the
| heat of plentiful bellyful Of meat and
| liquor to warm me; but if wine and ham and
! cheese froze in an air in which fire had
been burning, why not l in my sleep, when
| there was no fire, and life beat weakly, as it
/ does in slumber! Those figures in the cabin
were dismal warnings and assurances; they
/ had been men perhaps stouter and heartier
/ than ever | was in their day, but they had
/ been frozen into stony images, neverthe-
1 less under cover, too, with the ma
! terials to make fire, and as much strong
waters in their lazarette as would serve their
! schooner to float in.
1t strangely and approximately entered my
head to conceive that though those men were
frozen and stirleSs they were not dead as
| corpspS are INT as a stream whose current