Blown to Bits: The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago by R. M. Ballantyne (novels for teenagers .TXT) đź“•
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“Mind the step, we shall have more light on deck. There is a friend there who has just told me he met you on the Cocos-Keeling Island, Nigel Roy;—you start, Winnie?”
“Y–yes, father. I am so surprised, for it is his father who sails this ship! And I cannot imagine how he or you came on board.”
“Well, I was going to say that I believe it is partly through Nigel that you and I have been brought together, but there is mystery about it that I don’t yet understand; much has to be explained, and this assuredly is not the time or place. Here, Nigel, is your old Keeling friend.”
“Ay—friend! humph!” said old Roy softly to himself.
“My dear—child!” said young Roy, paternally, to the girl as he grasped her hand. “I cannot tell you how thankful I am that this has been brought about, and—and that I have had some little hand in it.”
“There’s more than pumice floating about in the sea, sir,” said Mr Moor, coming aft at the moment and speaking to the captain in a low tone. “You’d better send the young lady below—or get some one to take up her attention just now.”
“Here, Nigel. Sit down under the lee of the companion, an’ tell Kathy how this all came about,” said the captain, promptly, as if issuing nautical orders. “I want you here, Van der Kemp.”
So saying, the captain, followed by the hermit, went with the second mate to the place where the flaming tar-barrel was casting a lurid glare upon the troubled sea.
The sight that met their eyes was well calculated to shock and sadden men of much less tender feeling than Van der Kemp and Captain Roy.
The water had assumed an appearance of inky blackness, and large masses of pumice were floating past, among which were numerous dead bodies of men, women, and children, intermingled with riven trees, fences, and other wreckage from the land, showing that the two great waves which had already passed under the vessel had caused terrible devastation on some parts of the shore. To add to the horror of the scene large sea-snakes were seen swimming wildly about, as if seeking to escape from the novel dangers that surrounded them.
The sailors looked on in awe-stricken silence for some time.
“P’raps some of ’em may be alive yet!” whispered one. “Couldn’t we lower a boat?”
“Impossible in such a sea,” said the captain, who overheard the remark. “Besides, no life could exist there.”
“Captain Roy,” said Van der Kemp earnestly, “let me advise you to get your foresail ready to hoist at a moment’s notice, and let them stand by to cut the cable.”
“Why so? There seems no need at present for such strong measures.”
“You don’t understand volcanoes as I do,” returned the hermit. “This lull will only last until the imprisoned fires overcome the block in the crater, and the longer it lasts the worse will be the explosion. From my knowledge of the coast I feel sure that we are close to the town of Anjer. If another wave like the last comes while we are here, it will not slip under your brig like the last one. It will tear her from her anchor and hurl us all to destruction. You have but one chance; that is, to cut the cable and run in on the top of it—a poor chance at the best, but if God wills, we shall escape.”
“If we are indeed as near shore as you think,” said the captain, “I know what you say must be true, for in shoal water such a wave will surely carry all before it. But are you certain there will be another explosion?”
“No man can be sure of that. If the last explosion emptied the crater there will be no more. If it did not, another explosion is certain. All I advise is that you should be ready for whatever is coming, and ready to take your only chance.”
“Right you are, sir. Send men to be ready to cut the cable, Mr Moor. And stand by the topsail halyards.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
During the anxious minutes that followed, the hermit rejoined Winnie and Nigel on the quarterdeck, and conversed with the latter in a low voice, while he drew the former to his side with his strong arm. Captain Roy himself grasped the wheel and the men stood at their various stations ready for action.
“Let no man act without orders, whatever happens,” said the captain in a deep powerful voice which was heard over the whole ship, for the lull that we have mentioned extended in some degree to the gale as well as to the volcano. Every one felt that some catastrophe was pending.
“Winnie, darling,” said the hermit tenderly, as he bent down to see the sweet face that had been restored to him. “I greatly fear that there is soon to be another explosion, and it may be His will that we shall perish, but comfort yourself with the certainty that no hair of your dear head can fall without His permission—and in any event He will not fail us.”
“I know it, father. I have no fear—at least, only a little!”
“Nigel,” said the hermit, “stick close to us if you can. It may be that, if anything should befall me, your strong arm may succour Winnie; mine has lost somewhat of its vigour,” he whispered.
“Trust me—nothing but death shall sunder us,” said the anxious youth in a burst of enthusiasm.
It seemed as if death were indeed to be the immediate portion of all on board the Sunshine, for a few minutes later there came a crash, followed by a spout of smoke, fire, steam, and molten lava, compared to which all that had gone before seemed insignificant!
The crash was indescribable! As we have said elsewhere, the sound of it was heard many hundreds of miles from the seat of the volcano, and its effects were seen and felt right round the world.
The numerous vents which had previously been noticed on Krakatoa must at that moment have been blown into one, and the original crater of the old volcano—said to have been about six miles in diameter—must have resumed its destructive work. All the eye-witnesses who were near the spot at the time, and sufficiently calm to take note of the terrific events of that morning, are agreed as to the splendour of the electrical phenomena displayed during this paroxysmal outburst. One who, at the time, was forty miles distant speaks of the great vapour-cloud looking “like an immense wall or blood-red curtain with edges of all shades of yellow, and bursts of forked lightning at times rushing like large serpents through the air.” Another says that “Krakatoa appeared to be alight with flickering flames rising behind a dense black cloud.” A third recorded that “the lightning struck the mainmast conductor five or six times,” and that “the mud-rain which covered the decks was phosphorescent, while the rigging presented the appearance of Saint Elmo’s fire.”
It may be remarked here, in passing, that giant steam-jets rushing through the orifices of the earth’s crust constitute an enormous hydro-electric engine; and the friction of ejected materials striking against each other in ascending and descending also generates electricity, which accounts to some extent for the electrical condition of the atmosphere.
In these final and stupendous outbursts the volcano was expending its remaining force in breaking up and ejecting the solid lava which constituted its framework, and not in merely vomiting forth the lava-froth, or pumice, which had characterised the earlier stages of the eruption. In point of fact—as was afterwards clearly ascertained by careful soundings and estimates, taking the average height of the missing portion at 700 feet above water, and the depth at 300 feet below it—two-thirds of the island were blown entirely off the face of the earth. The mass had covered an area of nearly six miles, and is estimated as being equal to one and one-eighth cubic miles of solid matter which, as Moses expressed it, was blown to bits!
If this had been all, it would have been enough to claim the attention and excite the wonder of the intelligent world—but this was not nearly all, as we shall see, for saddest of all the incidents connected with the eruption is the fact that upwards of thirty-six thousand human beings lost their lives. The manner in which that terrible loss occurred shall be shown by the future adventures of the Sunshine.
Stunned at first, for a few minutes, by the extreme violence of the explosion, no one on board the Sunshine spoke, though each man stood at his post ready to act.
“Strange,” said the captain at last. “There seems to be no big wave this time.”
“That only shows that we are not as near the island as we thought. But it won’t be long of— See! There it comes,” said the hermit. “Now, Winnie, cling to my arm and put your trust in God.”
Nigel, who had secured a life-buoy, moved close to the girl’s side, and looking anxiously out ahead saw a faint line of foam in the thick darkness which had succeeded the explosion. Already the distant roar of the billow was heard, proving that it had begun to break.
“The wind comes with it,” said Van der Kemp.
“Stand by!” cried the captain, gazing intently over the side.
Next moment came the sharp order to hoist the foretopsail and jib, soon followed by “Cut the cable!”
There was breeze enough to swing the vessel quickly round. In a few seconds her stern was presented to the coming wave, and her bow cleft the water as she rushed upon what every one now knew was her doom.
To escape the great wave was no part of the captain’s plan. To have reached the shore before the wave would have been fatal to all. Their only hope lay in the possibility of riding in on the top of it, and the great danger was that they should be unable to rise to it stern first when it came up, or that they should turn broadside on and be rolled over.
They had not long to wait. The size of the wave, before it came near enough to be seen, was indicated by its solemn, deep-toned, ever-increasing roar. The captain stood at the wheel himself, guiding the brig and glancing back from time to time uneasily.
Suddenly the volcano gave vent to its fourth and final explosion. It was not so violent as its predecessors had been, though more so than any that had occurred on the day before, and the light of it showed them the full terrors of their situation, for it revealed the mountains of Java—apparently quite close in front, though in reality at a considerable distance—with a line of breakers beating white on the shore. But astern of them was the most appalling sight, for there, rushing on with awful speed and a sort of hissing roar, came the monstrous wave, emerging, as it were, out of thick darkness, like a mighty wall of water with a foaming white crest, not much less—according to an average of the most reliable estimates—than 100 feet high.
Well might the seamen blanch, for never before in all their varied experience had they seen the like of that.
On it came with the unwavering force of Fate. To the eye of Captain Roy it appeared that up its huge towering side no vessel made by mortal man could climb. But the captain had too often stared death in the face to be unmanned by the prospect now. Steadily he steered the vessel straight on, and in a quiet voice said—
“Lay hold of something firm—every man!”
The warning was well timed. In the amazement, if not fear, caused by the unwonted sight, some had neglected the needful precaution.
As the billow came on, the bubbling, leaping, and seething of its crest was apparent both to eye
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