After breakfast the next morning, the English doctor came aboard and went with Father to Adam’s cabin. He examined the place where Adam’s leg had been removed just above the knee and told Father that he had done a fine job. It was a clean cut and there was no sign of infection.
Mother had sat up for several nights with Adam. I suggested that I move into the empty upper bunk in his little cabin so that I could be there if he needed help in the night.
I had been made the new cabin boy, which meant that I would take over Adam’s duties. That required me to work each day as well as do my lessons. I could see that I wasn’t going to get a lot of time to myself or with Adam except at night.
Father said that Adam could go up on the main deck for the first time since the shark attack. In the afternoon, after I finished my chores and my lessons, I put a chair up on the deck. I was not sure how Adam was going to manage the ladder going up, but he was able to raise himself using his arms and his one good leg.
The crew, who had not been allowed to visit Adam until then, crowded around him. It was interesting to me that none of them knew quite what to say, but they talked with each other, and they all patted Adam on the back. It was clear they were happy to see him. When they were reassured that he was going to recover, they happily went on about their business.
Chips remained behind and took some measurements of the end of Adam’s leg, saying that he would make a wooden leg for him.
When we were alone together, Adam said that it was wonderful to be out in the fresh air. He asked me if he could talk with Francisco, so I went to find the harpooner. When I brought him back, Adam hugged him and thanked him for helping to save his life. Francisco looked pleased, even though I’m not sure he understood a word that Adam was saying. After that, Francisco visited Adam every day and we continued to work on knots.
In the late afternoon, the tide turned and began to go out of the harbor. The Angela slowly turned with the tide, pointed out of the harbor, and as sails were raised began to move forward with a strong breeze. Once out of the harbor, we headed south towards Cape Horn.
Cape Horn is at the very tip of South America. It can have frightful weather, especially when a ship is trying to go around it towards the west, for the winds there tend to blow very hard from west to east. In addition, because there is no land that far south to stop the ocean, huge swells sometimes roll from west to east. We knew we could have a difficult time when we tried to ‘Round the Horn’, that is, to go south of it in the Atlantic Ocean then west to the Pacific Ocean.
For the first few days, we had good sailing. We managed to catch two more sperm whales and soon had about 500 barrels of oil. Of course, we would need many more before the ship would be full.
After breakfast one morning, Father called me and Jessica into our cabin. Mother was sitting in a chair looking very happy, while Father was standing beside her. “Children,” he said, “your mother is going to have a baby.” Immediately, we began to ask questions: When? Where? How long do we have to wait? Do you want a boy or a girl? What will you name the baby?
Father held up his hand and said, “It will not be for a few months yet. We hope we will get to Honolulu before the baby is born, but that will depend on weather, our whaling luck, and many other things. I am glad you are excited, and we will keep you informed as time goes on. Now, Jeremiah, it is time for you to get to work while Jessica stays here for her lessons.” So off I went to work, which always came before my lessons.
As time passed, Mother was sometimes sick to her stomach in the morning. She kept a basin beside her and, as cabin boy, I had the rather unpleasant task of emptying the basin over the side of the ship. The first time I did it, I forgot to think about the wind, so when I dumped the basin, the wind blew its contents back onto me. I never made that mistake again.
In the nights, Adam and I would talk about the voyage, our futures, crew members, and anything else that occurred to us. One night I heard him moving about in his bunk. Thinking that he might be trying to get up in the night, I dropped from my bunk to the floor beside him. He was lying on his back, his blankets pushed down to his feet, his nightgown pulled up, stroking himself. Taking a breath, I did what I had thought about for weeks. I said, “Here, let me help with that,” and I took hold of his hard cock. Then, stroking gently as he began to breathe faster, I brought him to the point where he shot baby juice onto his stomach.
“Oh Lord,” he said. “That felt wonderful. Even better than when I do it myself.” Taking a rag which he apparently used for the purpose, he cleaned off his chest and stomach.
“Just part of the service your cabin boy provides,” I said, grinning in the dark.
Giggling, he responded, “I never knew that was one of my duties.”
I climbed back in my bunk and brought myself to shooting, wondering what it would feel like if Adam did that for me. Then I slept peacefully until morning. From then on, I helped him shoot every night.
On we sailed, stopping from time to time to chase whales. We were not always lucky. Sometimes the whaleboats would be down for hours or even days and were not able to get close enough to a whale to harpoon it. It seemed that most of the time, whaling mostly involved waiting, and very little time was spent catching whales. In the southern hemisphere it was spring, yet the days were becoming cooler as we moved farther south.
Chips fashioned a wooden leg for Adam, showing him how to use the leather straps to hold it on. At first, Adam’s stump was tender and the peg leg hurt, but he refused to give up and eventually his thump… thump… thumping became a familiar sound whenever he was on deck.
It seemed to take forever before Father finally said that we were close to Cape Horn. We could see distant land off to starboard, but sometimes there was fog and it was difficult to see. Father set a course that kept us well away from the land until it was time to turn the ship from sailing south to heading west.
On we went, and for a time it looked as if we would not have all the troubles we had heard about. But then quite suddenly, a gale force wind came up, blowing straight at us. Father ordered most of the sails taken in, as he quickly turned the ship away from the wind. The swells grew mountainous, sometimes towering over the ship, sometimes washing over the deck. At first, I was afraid that a swell would swamp the ship, but she just rode up and over them. The wind howled as it blew fiercely against the Angela. It was a sound that we would hear constantly for many days.
To take in the sails on the foremast and mainmast, men had to climb up to the yards from which the sails were hung. Then, leaning their waists on the yard while bracing their feet on a line that ran below it, they had to gather in the sail until it was all bundled up on the yard, where it was tied fast. This was called ‘furling the sail’. It all had to be done as the ship rose wildly up swells and then plunged down the other sides. It could be a dangerous job, especially in a high wind.
The work went well at first, until one of the men, Marcelo, lost his grip on the canvas and fell headfirst into the nearly furled sail. Somehow, he managed to grab hold of a line and hang on for dear life.
Another man, Miguel, climbed over to him crying out, “Hang on, man, I’ll git ya.”
“Oh, I’ll hang on all right,” Marcelo yelled back.
Those of us on deck all watched breathlessly, for if Marcelo fell and hit the deck, he would surely be killed. If instead he fell into the rough and cold water, he would not live five minutes. But Miguel crawled out on the yard and managed to pull Marcelo to safety.
So, for many days we sailed in circles waiting for the swells to calm and the screaming winds to die. It seemed to Adam and me that we might be stuck there forever!
From the deck we saw all sorts of wildlife, including albatrosses, other sea birds, and penguins. An albatross is a huge bird, whose wings can spread from 12 to 14 feet. Sailors also called it a gooney. It is so awkward that if it lands on the deck it cannot take off again. But the sailors say that gooneys can stay in the air for years. Some of the men tried to catch gooneys with a baited line pulled through the water. They did catch a few but discovered that the birds were not at all good to eat, so they soon gave up their sport.
I know that Father was fretting all the time we remained near Cape Horn, fearing that we would not get to Honolulu before the baby was born.
Then, one morning when I woke, I knew at once that the weather had finally changed, for the howling wind we had listened to for days and days was silent, and the swells were gently rocking the ship. Going on deck, I saw that it was a beautiful day with a cloudless blue sky.
I could see that Father had already ordered the sails to be set as a northeast wind blew us south and around the Cape. To the south of us, we could see huge icebergs. Francisco managed to fish some small pieces of ice out of the water. All he said was, “Dangerous,” before putting the ice in a glass of water. As he made gestures towards the ice, we could see for ourselves that nearly all of the ice was under the water. If a ship came too near what a sailor thought was a small iceberg, it could easily be sunk by all the ice just below the surface. Fortunately, there was plenty of room for us between Cape Horn and the ice, and soon we were in the Pacific Ocean sailing northwest.
Early one morning I heard shouting on deck and raced up to see what was happening. As I went, I hollered to Adam that we were onto whales. A large pod of sperm whales was spouting all around the ship. They were so close I wondered if the ship would hit one. Three whaleboats were lowered at once, and almost as soon as the boats hit the water, the harpooners were ready to throw their harpoons. One, then another, and then another were thrown, all hitting their targets.
The whales were not going to die quietly of course, and they raced off away from the ship. I ran down to the cabin and fetched my telescope. Adam was leaning on the rail and begging to borrow my scope. We passed it back and forth, as all three boats tore off on ‘Nantucket sleigh rides’. The boats seemed to grow smaller and smaller as we watched, until we could barely see them, even through the telescope!
Morning passed into afternoon with no sight of either whales or whaleboats. Finally, as it began to grow dark, we could just make out two boats towing whales towards the ship. Father had lanterns raised in the rigging so the boats could see us even in the dark. But where, we wondered, was the third boat?
When the boats came close enough, we could see that there were extra men in them. The men attached one of the whales to the side of the ship, while they lashed the other to the stern, to wait until they could work on it.
Climbing aboard they talked excitedly. We soon learned that when the mate in the third boat lanced his whale, the whale threw up its flukes and brought them down, smashing the boat. The men were thrown into the water, where they grabbed hold of floating pieces of the boat. As they gathered, they realized that one man was missing. Francisco had disappeared below the waves and never came up again.
While the men worked to strip the blanket piece and try out the blubber, Adam and I stood silently by the far rail.
“He saved my life and now he’s gone,” Adam said quietly, tears streaming down his face.
“I know,” I said, also crying. “He was a good friend to both of us.”
Neither of us felt like watching the cutting in, so we went to the bow of the ship. Without speaking we put our arms around each other’s shoulders and just stared out at the ocean and the thousands of stars becoming visible in the sky. Finally, we went to our bunks and tried to sleep. As I lay there, I thought about how kind and friendly Francisco was. He was the first man I knew who had been killed by a whale.
It took three days to try out the two whales. Each gave about a hundred barrels of oil. Adam and I talked a lot during those days, wondering whether 100 barrels of oil were worth Francisco’s life. Of course, Francisco knew the dangers. All the men did. They must have decided that catching the whales and the money involved was worth the risk. Adam, who had begun the trip so eager to catch whales, seemed much less eager now. I knew that while the sea life might be for me, whaling might not. Yet for some reason, I still ached to go in one of the whaleboats in the pursuit of a whale.
Because we had spent so long attempting to get around Cape Horn, we were low on supplies, especially fresh water. As soon as the trying out was done, Father headed the Angela for the harbor at San Carlos, Chile, where we anchored. We had a pretty miserable time there, as it rained seven of the eight days we were in port. Once again, casks were rafted together and floated to shore. Meanwhile, Father and a whaleboat crew took some items – calico, tobacco, and other things which Father thought he might use to buy food. He had packed these on board at the beginning of the trip for this purpose. Unfortunately, there was not as much food to be purchased as Father had hoped ─ very little besides potatoes.
Beyond the shore and some beautiful, fertile ground, high mountains rose whose peaks were snow covered year-round. I knew from my geography study that they were the southern end of the Andes Mountains. The houses were made of wood and were quite waterproof.
Since we were there for eight days, each watch had three days to explore the town, while Adam and I joined them. I’m afraid that some of the crew did not behave very well and a few even landed in the local jail.
When it came time to leave, Father found that four men had deserted. This created a problem manning the whaleboats while still keeping enough crew on board to manage the ship when the boats were down. Father appointed me as one of the ship-keepers, who managed the ship while the boats were out chasing whales. I wished he had placed me in a whaleboat, but that was not to be.
By that time I had turned 15 and was rapidly growing taller and stronger. I could easily climb the rigging to the top of the mainmast and never have a fear of falling. I could help furl and unfurl sails. I thought I was ready to row a whaleboat, but Father did not. However, on calm days when we saw no whales, he did lower a boat so I could practice with the rest of the men.
When Father made me a ship-keeper, Adam said he thought he could again take on the cabin boy duties. I still had my studies, and Adam and I still had our navigation lessons with Father. We did manage to find some free time together, which I really enjoyed. We were the best of friends. We shared thoughts about sailing, whales, and the crew members.
The first night Adam resumed his role, he said to me, “Now it’s time for me to perform my new cabin boy duty. Come here.” There was no way we could both lie in his narrow bunk, so he stood beside the bunk, and I climbed in. Even before he touched me, I was growing hard. I pulled up my nightgown and Adam reached down, taking my hard cock. Moving his hand gently around and up and down while I instinctively thrust upward, he brought me to an amazing shoot, harder than I had ever experienced before.
Without saying a word, he wiped me off and we changed places. When I finished him, he asked, “Have you ever wondered what baby juice tastes like?”
I shook my head.
“Well,” he said reaching towards his stomach, “I’m going to find out.” With that he scooped up some of the juice and put it in his mouth. “Hmm,” he said, “not bad. Try some.”
I did and agreed with him. Then I kissed him goodnight and climbed into my bunk, enjoying the lingering taste of the juice as I fell asleep almost immediately.
From San Carlos we made for some of the islands which belonged to Chile, for there were supposed to be good whaling grounds there. We sailed around the island of Juan Fernandez, where legend told that a Scottish seaman had been stranded and had become the source of the story of Robinson Crusoe. Leaving Juan Fernandez behind, we sailed around some of the other islands, but we found no whales near any of them. Father decided to head north for the port of Callao, Peru, where he hoped to do better buying food and to take on a few crew members.
The day before we arrived at the port, the lookouts called out that there were sharks all around us. We quickly realized that the fish were not sharks but swordfish. A boat was lowered, and the harpooner struck a swordfish, but the fish slipped off the harpoon and swam away. This happened two more times before the harpooner was able to throw his harpoon completely through a fish and bring it alongside the boat, where it was killed and hauled aboard. The crew quickly landed three more fish, making the whaleboat so low in the water that it nearly swamped, but they got back to the Angela safely. Cook and Steward cut up one for swordfish steaks, which we enjoyed that evening. The other three were cut up and salted in barrels so they wouldn’t spoil before we were ready to eat them.
As we neared Callao, we could again see the Andes Mountains, their snow-covered peaks gleaming in the sun, while nearer the shore golden sand seemed to flow right up to the mountains.
We anchored the next day in Callao Harbor, where there were several other ships. Father found one that was soon bound for New Bedford, so we all hastily wrote letters to friends and loved ones at home for them to be delivered by the ship. I wrote to both sets of grandparents. I knew that mail delivery by ships halfway around the world was not very dependable. I later learned that only one letter, the one to my mother’s parents, was actually delivered.
Callao is a Spanish town and the port for Lima, Peru, which is about nine miles inland. Father was able to sign up three new crewmen, two Americans and a Spaniard. One of the Americans was from New Hampshire and became a good friend of mine and Adam’s. His name was Henry Shaw. He was about 21 and had arrived in Callao on another whaling ship but had remained in the town when his ship departed. “Now,” he said, “I’ve had my fun with the ladies and I’m ready for further adventures.”
We only remained in Callao long enough to fill our water casks, sign on the men, and buy some food before we were off, heading in the general direction of the Hawaiian Islands and Honolulu, for Father was anxious to get there before the baby was born. However, that did not stop us from chasing whales when any were about.
One day, when the whaleboats had been lowered, two of the boats struck whales but the first mate’s boat did not. After towing the two whales to the ship, Mr. Trumble, the third Mate, accused Mr. Dwight, the first mate, of being a coward for not getting close enough to a whale to lance it. I thought that a fight might break out right there, for Mr. Dwight was furious. Father stepped between them and said, “There are no cowards on this ship.” The men parted and then got to work cutting in the whales, but I saw looks go back and forth between them which made it clear that the argument was not yet over.
About 600 miles from the coast of Peru, we came to the Galapagos Islands. There were animals on these islands that none of us had ever seen before. The islands are a volcanic group right on the equator. Only one small island has any water. Among other animals, there are giant tortoises, some most likely weighing several hundred pounds. Many sailors before us had carved their names or initials in the shells of the tortoises, which didn’t really hurt them. A few of the men from our ship tried riding them. When a man first mounted a tortoise, the animal drew in its head and feet, but if the man remained still, the tortoise would soon be walking about. The men captured some of the smaller ones and brought them aboard the ship to provide fresh meat to men who usually got nothing but salted meat and occasional fish.
As Jessica, Adam, and I explored, we decided that our favorites were birds called blue-footed boobies, which in fact had distinctly blue feet.
The night after we left the Galapagos Islands, we could see a strange, bright light behind us. At first we thought it was a ship trying out oil, but then we realized that the volcano on Albemarle, the largest of the Galapagos Islands, was erupting. We had just missed it.
One morning, as Jessica and I were doing our lessons, Mother said, “Jeremiah, I think you need to get your father.”
I nodded and went on deck where I found Father talking to Mr. Dwight. He was clearly annoyed, by what I did not know. When he noticed me, he asked, “What do you want? Can you not see I’m busy?”
“Yes, sir, but Mother said I should come and get you.”
It took a moment or two for Father to realize what I was saying before he turned to the cabin, calling back, “Get Chips,” and racing down the ladder to the cabin.
I found Chips working to adjust Adam’s peg leg. When I told him what had happened, he too immediately left for the cabin.
Very soon, Jessica appeared on deck telling me she didn’t know what was happening except that Father had told her to leave the cabin.
I was pretty sure I knew what was happening, but I said nothing. Of course, all the crew noticed the rush to the cabin and went about the deck silently, finding little tasks to keep themselves busy.
Finally, Father emerged on deck and said, “Jessica, Jeremiah, come and meet your new brother.”
Scurrying below we saw Mother holding a tiny form wrapped in a little blanket. She looked up, saw us, and said very softly, “Meet Daniel, your new brother. Isn’t he beautiful?” She unwrapped him so we could see. He was quite red. He clutched his little hands together while his feet waved in the air. Jessica said, “Ooooh.” I could not honestly say he was beautiful. I never thought babies were beautiful, but I did watch him for a bit before Father said, “You children go back on deck again. Your mother needs to rest.”
When we got on deck we were bombarded with questions: Was it a boy or a girl? Did it have a name? Did it have all its fingers and toes? Was Mother OK?”
We answered them all as best we could. The sailors hoisted the ship’s colors while the boatsteerers set their flags at the bows and sterns of their boats in honor of our newest crew member.
Since Mother and Daniel were both fine, Father was not in as much of a rush to get to the Hawaiian Islands, so we continued to cruise about searching for whales. Occasionally we spotted one or more. There continued to be bad blood between Mr. Dwight and Mr. Trumble, and one time, as they came back aboard from chasing a whale, I heard Mr. Trumble mutter, “Coward!” under his breath but loud enough so Mr. Dwight could hear him. Mr. Dwight turned and struck Mr. Trumble in the face with his fist, knocking him overboard. Lines were lowered and the mate was soon back aboard, but he scowled for the next two days.
Another time, when Mr. Dwight was unable to kill a whale before it got loose, Mr. Trumble called across from his boat, “Coward!” The men with Mr. Dwight thought for a few moments that their mate was going to drive the killing lance right through his tormentor, but they managed to calm him down enough to get him back to the ship.
It was now clear, however, that this situation could not go on much longer before someone got seriously hurt. Father decided to hold court to decide what to do. He listened carefully to both mates. Then he called the men of the two boats as witnesses. Clearly none of the men on either boat thought Mr. Dwight was a coward and the argument was Mr. Trumble’s fault. With that, Father decided he would lock the sputtering man below decks until we reached the Hawaiian Islands, where Father would dismiss him.
From that time on, peace returned to the ship. Henry Shaw, because of his experience, was made the third mate, and we then had to call him “Mr. Shaw”, but he remained as friendly and helpful as always.
It was a long trip to the Hawaiian Islands, but we finally arrived at the port of Honolulu, on the island of Oahu. A pilot guided us in through an opening in the coral reef which protected the harbor.
Here we would stay while some repairs were made to the ship, some new sails were raised, and new whaleboats were built to replace the ones which had been damaged by whales.
During our stay there, the crew was allowed on shore one watch at a time, while the other watch stayed with the ship.