news from home—a gam
shoregoing people have but little notion of the ease with which the heart of a jack-tar is made to rejoice when he is out on a long voyage. his pleasures and amusements are so few that he is thankful to make the most of whatever is thrown in his way. in the whale-fisheries, no doubt, he has more than enough of excitement, but after a time he gets used to this, and begins to long for a little variety—and of all the pleasures that fall to his lot, that which delights him most is to have a gam with another ship.
now, a gam is the meeting of two or more whale-ships, their keeping company for a time, and the exchanging of visits by the crews. it is neither more nor less than a jollification on the sea—the inviting of your friends to feast and make merry in your floating house. there is this difference, however, between a gam at sea and a party on land, that your friends on the ocean are men whom you perhaps never saw before, and whom you will likely never meet again. there is also another difference—there are no ladies at a gam. this is a great want, for man is but a rugged creature when away from the refining influence of woman; but, in the circumstances, of course, it can't be helped.
we had a gam one day, on this voyage, with a yankee whale-ship, and a first-rate gam it was, for, as the yankee had gammed three days before with another english ship, we got a lot of news second-hand; and, as we had not seen a new face for many months, we felt towards those yankees like brothers, and swallowed all they had to tell us like men starving for news.
it was on a fine calm morning, just after breakfast, that we fell in with this ship. we had seen no whales for a day or two, but we did not mind that, for our hold was almost full of oil-barrels. tom lokins and i were leaning over the starboard bulwarks, watching the small fish that every now and then darted through the clear-blue water like arrows, and smoking our pipes in silence. tom looked uncommonly grave, and i knew that he was having some deep and knowing thoughts of his own which would leak out in time. all at once he took his pipe from his mouth and stared earnestly at the horizon.
"bob," said he, speaking very slowly, "if there ain't a ship right off the starboard beam, i'm a dutchman."
"you don't mean it!" said i, starting with a feeling of excitement.
before another word could be uttered, the cry of "sail ho!" came ringing down from the mast-head. instantly the quiet of the morning was broken; sleepers sprang up and rubbed their eyes, the men below rushed wildly up the hatchway, the cook came tearing out of his own private den, flourishing a soup-ladle in one hand and his tormentors in the other, the steward came tumbling up with a lump of dough in his fist that he had forgot to throw down in his haste, and the captain bolted up from the cabin without his hat.
"where away?" cried he, with more than his usual energy.
"right off the starboard beam, sir."
"square the yards! look alive, my hearties," was the next order; for although the calm sea was like a sheet of glass, a light air, just sufficient to fill our top-gallant sails, enabled us to creep through the water.
"hurrah!" shouted the men as we sprang to obey.
"what does she look like?" roared the captain.
"a big ship, sir, i think," replied the lookout: "but i can only just make out the top of her main t-gallan' s'l."—(sailors scorn to speak of top-gallant sails.)
gradually, one by one, the white sails of the stranger rose up like cloudlets out of the sea, and our hearts beat high with hope and expectation as we beheld the towering canvas of a full-rigged ship rise slowly into view.
"show our colours," said the captain.
in a moment the union jack of old england was waving at the mast-head in the gentle breeze, and we watched anxiously for a reply. the stranger was polite; his colours flew up a moment after, and displayed the stripes and stars of america.
"a yankee!" exclaimed some of the men in a tone of slight disappointment.
i may remark, that our disappointment arose simply from the fact that there was no chance, as we supposed, of getting news from "home" out of a ship that must have sailed last from america. for the rest, we cared not whether they were yankees or britons—they were men who could speak the english tongue, that was enough for us.
"never mind, boys," cried one, "we'll have a jolly gam; that's a fact."
"so we will," said another, "and i'll get news of my mad irish cousin, terrence o'flannagan, who went out to seek his fortin in ameriky with two shillin's and a broken knife in his pocket, and it's been said he's got into a government situation o' some sort connected with the jails—whether as captain or leftenant o' police, or turnkey, i'm not rightly sure."
"more likely as a life-tenant of one of the cells," observed bill blunt, laughing.
"don't speak ill of a better man than yerself behind his back," retorted the owner of the irish cousin.
"stand by to lower the jolly-boat," cried the captain.
"aye, aye, sir."
"lower away!"
in a few minutes we were leaping over the calm sea in the direction of the strange ship, for the breeze had died down, and we were too eager to meet with new faces, and to hear the sound of new voices, to wait for the wind.
to our joy we found that the yankee had had a gam (as i have already said) with an english ship a few days before, so we returned to our vessel loaded with old newspapers from england, having invited the captain and crew of the yankee to come aboard of us and spend the day.
while preparation was being made for the reception of our friends, we got hold of two of the old newspapers, and tom lokins seized one, while bill blunt got the other, and both men sat down on the windlass to retail the news to a crowd of eager men who tried hard to listen to both at once, and so could make nothing out of either.
"hold hard, tom lokins," cried one. "what's that you say about the emperor, bill?"
"the emperor of roosia," said bill blunt, reading slowly, and with difficulty, "is—stop a bit, messmates, wot can this word be?—the emperor of roosia is——"
"blowed up with gunpowder, and shattered to a thousand pieces," said tom lokins, raising his voice with excitement, as he read from his paper an account of the blowing up of a mountain fortress in india.
"oh! come, i say, one at a time, if you please," cried a harpooner; "a feller can't git a word of sense out of sich a jumble."
"come, messmates," cried two or three voices, as tom stopped suddenly, and looked hard at the paper, "go ahead! wot have ye got there that makes ye look as wise as an owl? has war been and broke out with the french?"
"i do believe he's readin' the births, marriages, and deaths," said one of the men, peeping over tom's shoulder.
"read 'em out, then, can't ye?" cried another.
"i say, bill blunt, i think this consarns you," cried tom: "isn't your sweetheart's name susan croft?"
"that's a fact," said bill, looking up from his paper, "and who has got a word to say agin the prettiest lass in all liverpool?"
"nobody's got a word to say against her," replied tom; "but she's married, that's all."
bill blunt leaped up as if he had been shot, and the blood rushed to his face, as he seized the paper, and tried to find the place.
"where is it, tom? let me see it with my own two eyes. oh, here it is!"
the poor man's face grew paler and paler as he read the following words:—
"married at liverpool, on the 5th inst., by the rev. charles manson, edward gordon, esq., to susan, youngest daughter of admiral croft——"
a perfect roar of laughter drowned the remainder of the sentence.
"well done, bill blunt—mister blunt, we'll have to call him hereafter," said tom, with a grim smile; "i had no notion you thought so much o' yourself as to aim at an admiral's daughter."
"all right, my hearties, chaff away!" said bill, fetching a deep sigh of relief, while a broad grin played on his weather-beaten visage. "there's two susan crofts, that's all; but i wouldn't give my susan for all the admirals' daughters that ever walked in shoe-leather."
"hallo! here come the yankees," cried the captain, coming on deck at that moment.
our newspapers were thrown down at once, and we prepared to receive our guests, who, we could see, had just put off from their ship in two boats. but before they had come within a mile of us, their attention, as well as ours, was riveted on a most extraordinary sight.
not more than a hundred yards ahead of our ship, a whale came suddenly to the surface of the water, seeming, by its wild motions, to be in a state of terror. it continued for some time to struggle, and lash the whole sea around it into a white foam.
at once the boats were lowered from both ships, and we went after this fish, but his motions were so violent, that we found it utterly impossible to get near enough to throw a harpoon. when we had approached somewhat closely, we discovered that it had been attacked by a killer fish, which was fully twenty feet long, and stuck to it like a leech. the monster's struggles were made in trying to shake itself free of this tremendous enemy, but it could not accomplish this. the killer held him by the under jaw, and hung on there, while the whale threw himself out of the water in his agony, with his great mouth open like a huge cavern, and the blood flowing so fast from the wound that the sea was dyed for a long distance round. this killer fought like a bulldog. it held on until the whale was exhausted, but they passed away from us in such a confused struggle, that a harpoon could not be fixed for an hour after we first saw them. on this being done, the killer let go, and the whale, being already half dead, was soon killed.
the yankee boats were the first to come up with this fish, so the prize belonged to them. we were well pleased at this, as we could afford to let them have it, seeing that we could scarcely have found room to stow away the oil in our hold. it was the yankee's first fish, too, so they were in great spirits about it, and towed it to their ship, singing "yankee-doodle" with all their might.
as they passed our boat the captain hailed them.
"i wish you joy of your first fish, sir," said he to the yankee captain.
"thank you, stranger. i guess we're in luck, though it ain't a big one. i say, what sort o' brute was that that had hold of him? never seed sich a crittur in all my life."
"he's a killer," said our captain.
"a killer! guess he just is, and no mistake: if we hadn't helped him, he'd have done the job for himself! what does he kill him for?"
"to eat him, but i'm told he only eats the tongue. you'll not forget that you've promised to gam with us to-night," cried our captain, as they were about to commence pulling again.
"all right, stranger, one half will come to-night, before sundown; t'other half to-morrow, if the calm holds. good day. give way, lads."
the men dipped their oars, and resumed their song, while we pulled back to our ship. we did not offer to help them, because the fish was a small one, and the distance they had to go not great.
it was near sunset when, according to promise, the yankees came on board, and spent a long evening with us. they were a free, open-hearted, boastful, conceited, good-humoured set of fellows, and a jolly night we had of it in the forecastle, while the mates and captains were enjoying themselves and spinning their yarns in the cabin.
of course, we began with demands for home-news, and, when we had pumped out of them every drop they had, we began to songs and spinning yarns. and it was now that my friend tom lokins came out strong, and went on at such a rate, that he quite won the hearts of our guests. tom was not noisy, and he was slow in his talk, but he had the knack of telling a good story; he never used a wrong word, or a word too many, and, having a great deal of humour, men could not help listening when he began to talk.
after this we had a dance, and here i became useful, being able to play scotch reels and irish jigs on the fiddle. then we had songs and yarns again. some could tell of furious fights with whales that made our blood boil; others could talk of the green fields at home, until we almost fancied we were boys again; and some could not tell stories at all. they had little to say, and that little they said ill; and i noticed that many of those who were perfect bores would cry loudest to be heard, though none of us wanted to hear them. we used to quench such fellows by calling loudly for a song with a rousing chorus.
it was not till the night was far spent, and the silver moon was sailing through the starry sky, that the yankees left us, and rowed away with a parting cheer.
