Saved by the Lifeboat by the Lifeboat by R. M. Ballantyne (top ten ebook reader TXT) 📕

them all. While this was going on a third vessel was driven ashore on the Battery Rock. The South Shields lifeboat made towards her, succeeded in getting alongside, and rescued the crew.

A mile west of Folkestone Harbour a brigantine, laden with rum and sugar, went ashore, broadside-on, near Sandgate Castle. The ever-ready coastguardsmen turned out. A Sandgate fisherman first passed a small grapnel on board, then the coastguard sent out a small line with a lifebuoy attached and one by one the crew were all saved—the men of the coastguard with ropes round their waists, standing in the surf as deep as they dared to venture, catching the men who dropped, and holding their heads above water until they were safe. But the gallant coastguardsmen had other work cut out for them that night. Besides saving life, it was their duty to protect property. The cargo was a tempting one to many roughs who had assembled. When the tide receded, these attempted to get on board the wreck and regale themselves. The cutlasses of the coastguard, however, compelled them to respect the rights of private property, and taught them the majesty of the law!

Elsewhere along the coast many vessels were wrecked, and many lives were lost that night, while many more were saved by the gallant lifeboat crews, the details of which, if written, would thrill many a sympathetic breast from John o’ Groat’s to the Land’s End; but passing by these we turn to one particular vessel which staggered in the gale of that night, but which, fortunately for those on board, was still at some distance from the dangerous and dreaded shore.

It was the Ocean Queen. Mr Webster was seated in her cabin, his face very pale, and his hands grasping the arms of the locker tightly to prevent his being hurled to leeward. Annie sat beside him with her arms round his waist. She was alarmed and looked anxious, but evidently possessed more courage than her father. There was some reason for this, however, for she did not know that Mr Webster’s fortunes had got into such a desperate case, that for the retrieving of them he depended very much on the successful voyage of the Ocean Queen.

“Don’t be so cast down, father,” said Annie; “I heard the captain say that we shall be in sight of land to-morrow.”

“Heaven forbid,” said Mr Webster. “Better to be in mid-ocean than near land on such a night.”

Annie was about to reply when the door opened, and the captain looked in. He wore a sou’-wester, and was clad in oilcloth garments from head to foot, which shone like black satin with the dripping spray.

“We’re getting on famously,” he said in a hearty tone, “the wind has shifted round to the sou’-west, and if it holds—we shall—”

“Sprung a leak, sir!” cried the first mate in a deep excited voice as he looked down the companion.

“What!” exclaimed the captain, rushing upon deck.

“Plank must have started, sir, there’s three foot water in—”

His voice was drowned by distance and the roaring of the gale, but Mr Webster and Annie had heard enough to fill them with alarm.

The Ocean Queen had indeed sprung a leak, and so bad was it that when all the pumps available were set a-going, they failed to reduce the depth of water in the hold. Still, by constantly changing hands and making strenuous exertions, they prevented it from increasing rapidly. All that night and next day they wrought with unflagging energy at the pumps. No man on board spared himself. The captain took his spell with the rest. Even Mr Webster threw off his coat and went to work as if he had been born and bred a coal-heaver. The work, however, was very exhausting, and when land appeared no one seemed to have any heart to welcome it except Annie and her old nurse Mrs Niven.

Towards evening of the next day the captain came up to Mr Webster, who was seated on the cabin skylight with his head resting wearily on his hands.

“We cannot make the port of Liverpool, I find,” he said. “The pilot says that if we wish to save the ship we must run for the nearest harbour on the coast, which happens, unfortunately, to be the very small one of Covelly.”

“Then by all means run for it,” said Mr Webster. “Strange,” he muttered to himself, “that fate should lead me there.”

The head of the Ocean Queen was at once turned towards the shore, and as they neared it Mr Webster stood talking to Annie about the time “long, long ago,” when she had been rescued by a lifeboat there, and remarking on the curious coincidence that she should happen to come to the same place in distress a second time.

The gale, although somewhat more moderate, was still blowing strong, and an “ugly sea” was rolling on the bank where the Swordfish had gone ashore many years before. This, however, mattered little, because the direction of the wind was such that they could steer well clear of it. But the channel leading to the harbour was very sinuous, and, as the pilot observed, required careful steering. In one part this channel was so crooked that it became necessary to go on the other tack a short distance. In ordinary circumstances the captain would have thought nothing of this, but he felt anxious just then, because some of the stores and cordage furnished by mistake to him had been intended for the Ruby. Now the Ruby was one of the vessels of Webster and Company which had been sent away with the hope, if not the intention, that it should be wrecked! The mistake had been discovered only after the Ocean Queen had set sail.

“Ready about,” cried the pilot.

The men leaped to their respective places.

“Take another pull at that fores’l sheet,” said the pilot.

This was done. At sea this would not have been necessary, because the ship was lively and answered her helm well, but in the narrow channel things had to be done more vigorously. The extra pull was given. The tackle of the foresail sheet had been meant for the Ruby. It snapped asunder, and the ship missed stays and fell away.

Instantly all was desperate confusion. A hurried attempt was made to wear ship, then two anchors were let go, but almost before the startled owner was aware of what had occurred, the good ship received a shock which made her quiver from stem to stern. She lifted with the next wave, and in another minute was fast on the shoal which had proved fatal to the Swordfish, with the waves dashing wildly over her.

Long before this occurred, our hero, Harry Boyns, had been watching the vessel with considerable anxiety. He little knew who was on board of her, else would his anxiety have been infinitely increased. But Harry was one of those men who do not require the spur of self-interest to keep them alive to duty. He had observed that the ship was in distress, and, as the honorary secretary of the Lifeboat Branch, he summoned together the crew of his boat. Thus all was in readiness for action when the disaster occurred to the Ocean Queen.

Instantly the lifeboat was run down to the beach, where hundreds of willing hands were ready to launch her, for the people had poured out of the town on the first rumour of what was going on. The crew leaped into the boat and seized the oars. The launching-ropes were manned. A loud “Huzzah” was given, and the lifeboat shot forth on her voyage of mercy, cutting right through the first tremendous billow that met her.

At that time Old Jacob, the coxswain of the boat, happened to be unwell; Harry himself therefore took the steering-oar, and Bob Gaston was in the bow. Mr Joseph Dowler chanced to be among the spectators on shore. That fussy and conceited individual, conceiving it to be a fitting occasion for the exercise of his tremendous powers, stood upon an elevated rock and began a wildly enthusiastic speech to which nobody listened, and in which he urged the lifeboatmen to do their duty in quite a Nelsonian spirit. Fortunately a sudden gust of wind blew him off his perch. He fell on his head so that his hat was knocked over his eyes, and before he was thoroughly extricated from it, the lifeboat was far from shore, and the men were doing their duty nobly, even although Mr Dowler’s appeal had failed to reach their ears!

It was a tough pull, for wind, waves, and tide combined to beat them back, but they combined in vain. Inch by inch they advanced, slowly and laboriously, although it was so bitterly cold that the men had little feeling in the benumbed hands with which they pulled so gallantly.

At last they reached the vessel, pulled well to windward, cast anchor, and eased off the cable, until they passed her stern and got under her lee. Just then Harry looked up and felt as if he had received a shock from electric fire, for he beheld the pale face of Annie Webster gazing at him with glowing eyes! No longer did he feel the chilling blast. The blood rushed wildly through his veins as he shouted—

“Look alive, Bob,—heave!”

Bob Gaston stood up in the bow, and, with a beautiful swing, cast a line on board, by means of which the boat was hauled alongside. Just at that moment the mainyard came down with a thundering crash upon the ship’s deck, fortunately injuring no one. At the same time a tremendous billow broke over the stern of the Ocean Queen, and falling into the lifeboat in a cataract completely sunk her. She rose like a cork, keel uppermost, and would have righted at once, but a bight of the mainsail, with some of the wreck, held her down. Her crew, one by one, succeeded in clambering upon her, and Harry shouted to the men in the ship to hand him an axe. One was thrown to him which he caught, and began therewith to cut the wreck of cordage.

“Slit the sail with your knife, Bob Gaston,” he cried, but Bob did not reply. All the other men were there; Bob alone was missing. The difficulty of acting in such turmoil is not to be easily estimated. Twenty minutes elapsed before the boat was cleared. When this was accomplished she righted at once, and Bob Gaston was found sticking to the bottom of her, inside, having found sufficient air and space there to keep him alive!

Another moment and Harry Boyns was on the deck of the wreck.

Perhaps the most earnest “Thank God” that ever passed his lips burst from them when he seized Annie’s hand and entreated her to go with him at once into the boat.

“Stay! hold!” cried Mr Webster, seizing Harry wildly by the sleeve and whispering to him in quick earnest tones, “Can nothing be done to save the ship? All is lost if she goes!”

“Hold on a minute, lads,” cried Harry to the men in the boat; “are the pumps working free,—is your ground tackle good?” he added, turning hastily to the captain.

“Ay, but the men are used up—utterly exhausted.”

“Jump aboard, lads,” cried Harry to his men.

The men obeyed, leaving four of their number in the boat to keep her off the ship’s side. Under Harry’s orders some of them manned the pumps, while others went to the windlass.

“Come, boys, make one more effort to save the ship,” cried Harry to the fatigued crew; “the tide will rise for another hour, we’ll save her yet if you have pluck to try.”

Thus appealed to they all set to work, and hove with such goodwill that the ship was soon hauled off the sands—an event which was much accelerated by the gradual abating of the gale and rising of the tide. When it was thought safe to do this, the sails were trimmed, the cables cut, and, finally,