Down the Rhine; Or, Young America in Germany by Oliver Optic (life books to read .TXT) 📖

finally suspended by the efforts of the excited officers, who took hold of the bars with their own hands, and counteracted the efforts of the rogues.

The young rascals in the steerage pretended to be hurt more seriously than they were, though some of them had struck the steps or the floor below with force enough to make them feel a little sore. They began to limp, and to rub their shins and shoulders, their heads and arms, very vigorously, as though they believed that friction was a sovereign remedy for aching bones.

"Why didn't you stop, Hunter, when I ordered you to do so?" demanded Leavitt, indignantly.

"I couldn't, sir," replied the lamb, speaking only the simple truth.

"Yes, you could! I will report you for disobedience."

"I was right over the hatch, and I had either to go down or jump over: I couldn't stop there."

"And you did the same thing, Hyde," added the officer.

"I couldn't help it, sir," replied he. "When Hunter got over, he dragged me so far that I couldn't stop."

"Why didn't you let go, then?" demanded Leavitt, angrily.

"I was afraid the next bar would hit me in the head."

Both of these boys were ordinarily models of propriety, and they had not, for an instant, intended to do anything out of order. The real culprits were all at the foot of the stairs, rubbing their limbs and making the most terrible contortions, as though their legs, arms, and heads were actually broken. The officers had all seen Hunter and Hyde pushing along the bars after the order had been given to stop. They seemed to be guilty, and they were required to report at the mainmast to the first lieutenant, for discipline. The second lieutenant then went down the fore-hatch, where the appalling spectacle of a crowd of sufferers was presented to his view.

"Are you hurt, Little?" he asked, turning to the most prominent victim of the catastrophe.

"Yes, sir," groaned Little, twisting his back-bone almost into a hard knot, and trying to reach the seat of his injury with both hands at the same time.

"How happened you to fall through?" inquired Leavitt, more gently than he had spoken on deck, for the sight of all this misery evidently affected him.

"I don't know, sir," answered Little, with one of his most violent contortions. "I was looking up at the fore-yard arm, and—ugh!—the first thing I knew, I was—O, dear!—I was down here, with that—ugh!—with that plank on top of me."

"Are you much hurt?"

"I don't know. It aches first rate," cried Little, with a deep, explosive sigh.

"Well, go aft, and report to the surgeon."

"I don't want to go to the surgeon. He mauls me about to death. I shall be better soon."

"On deck, all who are able to do so!" added Leavitt. "Bennington, you will ask Dr. Winstock to attend to those who are hurt, and report to the first lieutenant."

But it did not appear that any one was so much injured as to require the services of the surgeon, for the whole party went on deck at the order. Little still writhed and twisted. Howe rubbed his knee, and Spencer nursed his elbow. Commodore Kendall, who had witnessed the whole affair, did not see how it was possible for them to tumble down the hatchway without injuring themselves, and he was willing to believe that the appearance was not deceitful. He had kept his eyes fixed upon the crew as they walked round the capstan, but he was unable to determine whether the mishap was the result of accident or intention.

Again the captain came forward; but after consulting with Paul, he returned to the quarter-deck without making any comments. The two lambs had reported to the first lieutenant, and the matter had gone to Captain Shuffles, who directed the culprits to be sent to the principal. They went into the steerage, and knocking at the door of the main cabin, Mr. Lowington came out, and heard their statement. They were ordered to their mess-rooms to await an investigation.

The hatchway was closed, and the order to man the capstan was given a third time. The injured seamen had in a measure recovered the use of their limbs, and though they still limped and squirmed, they took their places in the line. Either their will or their ingenuity to do mischief failed them, the third time, for the form of heaving up the anchor to a short stay was regularly accomplished. The commodore and all the officers in the forward part of the ship watched the operation with the keenest scrutiny, and when it was successfully finished, they hoped the end of all the mishaps had come.

"Pawl the capstan! Unship the bars! Stations for loosing sail!" continued the first lieutenant. "Lay aloft, sail-loosers!"

The nimble young tars, whose places were aloft, sprang up the rigging.

"Man the boom-tricing lines!"

But the boom-tricing lines appeared to be in a snarl, and it was some time before they were ready for use, being manipulated by some of the mischief-makers.

"Trice up!" shouted Goodwin, the executive officer.

Up went the inner ends of the studding-sail booms.

"Lay out!" added Goodwin.

"Lay out!" repeated the midshipmen in the tops; and the seamen ran out on the foot-ropes to their several stations for loosing sail.

At the same time, the forecastle hands were loosing the fore-topmast staysail, jib, and flying jib, and the after-guard, or quarter-deck hands, were clearing away the spanker.

"Loose!" said the executive officer; and the hands removed the gaskets, stoppers, and other ropes, used to confine the sails when furled.

"Stand by—let fall!" was the next order.

At this command all the square sails should have dropped from the yards at the same instant, but as a matter of fact, not half of them did drop. Sheets, buntlines, bowlines, lifts, reef-pendants, and halyards were fearfully snarled up. Some of the seamen on the yards were pulling one way, and some another; some declared the snarl was in one place, others in another place. The rogues had realized an undoubted success in the work they had undertaken. Vainly the midshipmen in the tops tried to bring order out of confusion. Those who were actually laboring to untangle the ropes only increased the snarl.

The condition of affairs was duly reported to the captain, who had become very impatient at the long delay. The masters were then sent aloft to help the midshipmen unravel the snarl, but they succeeded no better. It was evident enough to all the officers that this confusion could not have been created without an intention to do it. An accident might have happened on the main or the mizzen-mast, but not on every yard on all three of the masts.

"What are you about?" asked Perth, who had been sent into the main-top, as he met Howe.

"We have come to the conclusion that Bob Shuffles can't handle this ship," whispered the ringleader of the mischief, with a significant wink.

"You are getting us into a scrape."

"Well, we all are in the same boat."

"Don't carry it too far," suggested Master Perth.

"Carry what too far?" demanded Robinson, the midshipman in the top, who had heard a word or two of the confidential talk—enough to give him an idea of what was in the wind.

"Dry up, old fellow," said Perth, with some confusion, as Howe, who had come down from the yard to cast off a line, sprang back to his place.

"What did you mean by that remark of yours?" inquired the midshipman.

"I told Howe not to carry the end of the buntline too far. It was wound three times around the topsail sheet."

"Was that what you meant?" asked Robinson, suspiciously.

"Don't you see that buntline?" replied Perth. "It is fouled in the sheet, and he was pulling it through farther, so as to snarl it up still worse."

"All right," replied the inferior, who, however, was far from being satisfied with the explanation.

"All right!" retorted Perth, smartly. "Is that the way you address your superior officer. One would think I was responsible to you for my words and actions."

"I didn't mean that," added Robinson.

"What did you mean?"

"I only said all right to your explanation."

"You did—did you?" said Perth, severely. "Then you called me to an account, and now you acquit me!"

"I beg your pardon. Whatever I said, I did not mean anything disrespectful," pleaded Robinson.

"Is this the kind of discipline among the officers? If it is, I don't wonder that the crew get snarled up. I don't like to blow on a fellow, but I'm tempted to send you to the mainmast."

"I didn't mean anything."

Master Perth turned from his abashed inferior, ascended the main rigging, and with a few sharp orders, compelled the topmen to unsnarl the ropes. He was afraid the midshipman would report what he had said to the captain, and he had attempted to intimidate him into silence by threatening him with a similar fate.

"On deck!" hailed Perth from the top. "All ready in the main-top, sir," he added, when the third lieutenant answered his hail from the waist.

After a delay of half an hour, a like report came down from the fore and mizzen-tops. The masters returned to their stations on deck, and everything was in readiness to continue the manœuvre. Captain Shuffles was in earnest conversation with Commodore Kendall. A more unsatisfactory state of things could not exist than that which prevailed on board of the Young America. The conduct of the crew amounted almost to mutiny. Those who had maliciously made the mischief, and those who had been engaged in it from a love of fun, had succeeded in confounding those who meant to do their duty. It was impossible to tell who were guilty and who were innocent; for three quarters, at least, of the crew seemed to be concerned in the confusion.

"It is clear enough that they are hazing me," said Captain Shuffles, sadly. "I don't know that I have done anything to set the fellows against me."

"Certainly not," replied Paul, warmly. "You have only done your duty. I have no doubt those fellows who ran away in the Josephine are at the bottom of it. If I am not very much mistaken, I saw Howe, on the main-topsail yard, tangling up the buntlines and sheets."

"I have heard that these fellows intended to get even with me," added Shuffles, with a smile, as though he had not much fear of them.

"I should keep the crew at work until they did their duty. I would keep them at it night and day, till they can get the ship under way without any confusion," added Paul, earnestly.

"I intend to do that, but I do not like to be hard upon them."

"There is no danger of your being too hard."

"Whether I am hard or not, I'm going to have the work done in ship-shape style, if we drill till morning. All hands, furl sails," said he to the first lieutenant.

The boatswain's call sounded through the ship. The necessary orders were given in detail, and after considerable confusion, the sails were all furled, and the ship restored to its original condition.

"Pipe to muster," continued the captain.

Under this order all the officers assembled on the quarter-deck. Captain Shuffles addressed them in the mild tones in which he usually spoke, as though he was not seriously disturbed by the ill conduct of the crew. Assigning a lieutenant, a master, and a midshipman to each mast, he directed them to set each sail separately, without regard to others. They were to set the topsails first, then the other sails up to the royals. Other officers were directed to drill the seamen stationed at the head sails and the spanker.

During this conference Howe and his associates were congratulating themselves upon the success of their vicious schemes, and encouraging each other to persevere if another drill was ordered. They were curious to know what the captain was doing with the officers on the quarter-deck; but they concluded that it was only a meeting to "howl" over the miserable discipline of the ship. But their wonderings were soon set at rest