We sailed out through the Golden Gate and set our course south toward that part of the Pacific where we could hope to pick up with the north-east trades.And right away things began to happen.Ihad calculated that youth was the stuff for a voyage like that of the Snark, and I had taken three youths--the engineer, the cook, and the cabin-boy.My calculation was only two-thirds OFF; I had forgotten to calculate on seasick youth, and I had two of them, the cook and the cabin boy.They immediately took to their bunks, and that was the end of their usefulness for a week to come.It will be understood, from the foregoing, that we did not have the hot meals we might have had, nor were things kept clean and orderly down below.But it did not matter very much anyway, for we quickly discovered that our box of oranges had at some time been frozen;that our box of apples was mushy and spoiling; that the crate of cabbages, spoiled before it was ever delivered to us, had to go overboard instanter; that kerosene had been spilled on the carrots, and that the turnips were woody and the beets rotten, while the kindling was dead wood that wouldn't burn, and the coal, delivered in rotten potato-sacks, had spilled all over the deck and was washing through the scuppers.
But what did it matter? Such things were mere accessories.There was the boat--she was all right, wasn't she? I strolled along the deck and in one minute counted fourteen butts in the beautiful planking ordered specially from Puget Sound in order that there should be no butts in it.Also, that deck leaked, and it leaked badly.It drowned Roscoe out of his bunk and ruined the tools in the engine-room, to say nothing of the provisions it ruined in the galley.Also, the sides of the Snark leaked, and the bottom leaked, and we had to pump her every day to keep her afloat.The floor of the galley is a couple of feet above the inside bottom of the Snark;and yet I have stood on the floor of the galley, trying to snatch a cold bite, and been wet to the knees by the water churning around inside four hours after the last pumping.
Then those magnificent water-tight compartments that cost so much time and money--well, they weren't water-tight after all.The water moved free as the air from one compartment to another; furthermore, a strong smell of gasolene from the after compartment leads me to suspect that some one or more of the half-dozen tanks there stored have sprung a leak.The tanks leak, and they are not hermetically sealed in their compartment.Then there was the bath-room with its pumps and levers and sea-valves--it went out of commission inside the first twenty hours.Powerful iron levers broke off short in one's hand when one tried to pump with them.The bathroom was the swiftest wreck of any portion of the Snark.
And the iron-work on the Snark, no matter what its source, proved to be mush.For instance, the bed-plate of the engine came from New York, and it was mush; so were the casting and gears for the windlass that came from San Francisco.And finally, there was the wrought iron used in the rigging, that carried away in all directions when the first strains were put upon it.Wrought iron, mind you, and it snapped like macaroni.
A gooseneck on the gaff of the mainsail broke short off.We replaced it with the gooseneck from the gaff of the storm trysail, and the second gooseneck broke short off inside fifteen minutes of use, and, mind you, it had been taken from the gaff of the storm trysail, upon which we would have depended in time of storm.At the present moment the Snark trails her mainsail like a broken wing, the gooseneck being replaced by a rough lashing.We'll see if we can get honest iron in Honolulu.
Man had betrayed us and sent us to sea in a sieve, but the Lord must have loved us, for we had calm weather in which to learn that we must pump every day in order to keep afloat, and that more trust could be placed in a wooden toothpick than in the most massive piece of iron to be found aboard.As the staunchness and the strength of the Snark went glimmering, Charmian and I pinned our faith more and more to the Snark's wonderful bow.There was nothing else left to pin to.It was all inconceivable and monstrous, we knew, but that bow, at least, was rational.And then, one evening, we started to heave to.
How shall I describe it? First of all, for the benefit of the tyro, let me explain that heaving to is that sea manoeuvre which, by means of short and balanced canvas, compels a vessel to ride bow-on to wind and sea.When the wind is too strong, or the sea is too high, a vessel of the size of the Snark can heave to with ease, whereupon there is no more work to do on deck.Nobody needs to steer.The lookout is superfluous.All hands can go below and sleep or play whist.
