The Land of the Hibiscus Blossom
James Hume Nisbet (1888)
Country of origin: Australia
Available texts by the same author here
XV. The Storm.
A STORM at sea, under a smiling sky, with sweltering decks, seems as great an inconsistency as to see a married couple quarreling; that is, the husband raving like a madman, and the wife looking her most aggravating sweetest.In the Bay of Biscay it is all in harmony--the slaty sky, driving rain deluging the sheets and making the furious waves appear to smoke as they rise and tumble in the distance steel grey, or break over the decks bottle-green and flecked with foam like the froth driven from the fangs of a mad dog.
We picture misty outlines, all blurred and broken, when the ocean rises up in its wrath not to be driven along and pitched from side to side under the flaming lustre of a tropic sun, which licks up the brine as it recedes after each mad leap, and makes prismatic flashes of the liquid drippings, while the mountains behind and around, snow-crested, are mountains of emerald and sapphire, all shot with molten gold.
Captain Collins and Hector clung to the wheel as the Coral Seas staggered along and shook amongst those tumbling furies.
They were alone on that raging ocean, for the wind had not lessened, and when they dashed together out from the protection of the reefs, no man could attempt to curb the schooners or keep them together. The Sunflower went out of sight ahead like an express train, dropping behind the horizon as if she had suddenly swamped, and leaving her consort to follow as she best could.
They had agreed to meet, if possible, at Uibu, where they would once more find shelter and smooth waters inside the Fly River, Niggeree giving full directions, and leaving behind him a chart of his own making, where all the dangers were marked out, before he started.
That night he had gone alone to the island. Somehow his little yarn inspired neither Collins nor Hector with any desire to see more closely the scene of that tragedy or the survivors, and they asked no questions about them when he returned the next morning.
At present both men have enough to do, for, with that furious hot gale trying to push them westward and their united efforts to keep her head towards the north, all their strength was required to manage the wheel and keep their feet.
The men clung to whatever they could cling to, all loose articles being firmly lashed before starting; they had nothing to do except wait and battle for life with the sea.
Every moment the green sparkling waves broke over them with a shriek like horrid laughter, and the light little vessel heeled over before that overwhelming strength until the bare yard touched the rising waves on the lee side, hardly having time to right herself before the next swamping mass came down upon her.
But she was light, and water-tight, and the crew being well accustomed to the Papuan waters, although never before so far west, did not suffer much uneasiness. So long as the vessel obeyed the helm and the wheel did not break, all they concerned themselves about was to ease her off as much as they could while keeping their course.
Now and again they saw ahead portions of the waters where it seemed quieter, but on the east side of these quiet places the foam rose up like straight walls, and these places they tried to keep clear of; but as long as the waves rose and fell steadily they felt easy.
Inside some of these pool-like places they saw little islands, some bare strips of yellow sand surrounded by deep blue spaces, with pelicans and other sea-birds backing against the wind or rising with ungainly motion and flapping wings, as if protesting against the unusual commotion which disturbed their mid-day siesta.
On other and larger islands they saw the first approach to fertilization in the shape of scrubby trees and distorted wind-beaten-down branches; yet even there were the strips of golden sunny sands and smooth girdle of blue waters surrounded with that straight, up-spouting wall of snowy foam which fringed the tumbling mountains outside--golden sands and smooth waters where elves might have disported themselves or mermaids might have waited on the coming of the ships, only that orthodox mermaids like the storm-beaten rocks of the North Sea, as elves and fairies like the gas-lit pavements of large cities--this is the condition of Titania's court in this unimaginative nineteenth century.
It was getting on towards night, and still the waves broke as wildly as ever, and not a sign of the Sunflower or of the wind slackening down. The night they dreaded most, for there was no moon, and unless they found an anchorage soon they would have to drive about all in the dark, and take their chance of reefs and shipwreck.
Eagerly they looked ahead, seeing many coral-walled lakes, but without a break in their white walls, and they knew well what an approach to these meant.
Meanwhile, the sun went down all yellow, crimson, and violet, making golden seams run down the sides of those blue waves, like melted metal running out of a half-closed furnace; and when the vessel rose on the crest of a wave, all dripping wet, that metal lustre seemed to bronze over the hull and decks with sharp edges of burnish. Then the twilight spread beyond those solid-looking gigantic masses which appeared when they rolled into the trough of the waves like iron ridges against a lighted-up transparent tinted screen. Then the darkness grew like an opaque green curtain behind a black and rumpled pall. During the night, countless stars glittered like angry eyes within a deep pit. The brave sailors held on, with drooping lids and wearied arms, ever staring ahead and trying to evade those awful walls, now tarnished silver in the blackness, where the howling became horrible shrieks, while around them blazed phosphorescent lights as the waves hissed past them or broke over them emitting flashes and sparkles like unholy corpse-candles.