The wind held at south-west for three days, blowing
heavily the whole time. By the second night-fall
the sea was clear of ice, and everything was carried
on the schooner that she could bear. About nine
o’clock on the morning of the fourth day out,
a speck was seen rising above the ragged outline of
the rolling waves; and each minute it became higher
and more distinct. An hour or two later, the
Sea Lion was staggering along before a westerly gale,
with the Hermit of Cape Horn on her larboard beam distant
three leagues. How many trying scenes and bitter
moments crowded on the mind of young Roswell Gardiner,
as he recalled all that had passed in the ten months
which intervened since he had come out from behind
the shelter of those wild rocks! Stormy as was
that sea, and terrible as was its name among mariners,
coming, as he did, from one still more stormy and
terrible, he now regarded it as a sort of place of
refuge. A winter there, he well knew, would be
no trifling undertaking, but he had just passed a
winter in a region where even fuel was not to be found,
unless carried there. Twenty days later the Sea
Lion sailed again from Rio, having sold all the sea-elephant
oil that remained, and bought stores; of which, by
this time, the vessel was much in want. Most of
the portions of the provisions that were left had
been damaged by the thawing process; and food was
getting to be absolutely necessary to her people, when
the schooner went again into the noble harbour of
the capital of Brazil. Then succeeded the lassitude
and calms that reign about the imaginary line that
marks the circuit of the earth, at that point which
is ever central as regards the sun, and where the
days and nights are always equal. No inclination
of the earth’s axis to the plane of its orbit
affected the climate there, which knew not the distinctions
of summer and winter; or which, if they did exist
at all, were so faintly marked as to be nearly imperceptible.
Twenty days later the schooner was standing among
some low sandy keys, under short canvass, and in the
south-east trades. By her movements an anchorage
was sought; and one was found at last, where the craft
was brought up, boats were hoisted out, and Roswell
Gardiner landed.
Chapter XXIX.
If every ducat in six thousand ducats
Were in six parts, and every part a ducat,
I would not draw them; I would have my
bond.
Shakspeare.
The earth had not stopped in its swift face round
the sun at Oyster Pond, while all these events were
in the course of occurrence in the antarctic seas.
The summer had passed, that summer which was to have
brought back the sealers; and autumn had come to chill
the hopes as as the body. Winter did not bring
any change. Nothing was heard of Roswell and his
companions, nor could anything have been heard
of them short of the intervention of a miracle.
Copyrights
The Sea Lions from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.
