The Battle and the Breeze | Page 2

time I was capsized after that, when nobody
was near me, but bein' always in shoal water, I managed to scramble
ashore."
As Bill Bowls began life so he continued it. He went to sea in good
earnest when quite a boy and spent his first years in the coasting trade,
in which rough service he became a thorough seaman, and was
wrecked several times on various parts of our stormy shores. On
reaching man's estate he turned a longing eye to foreign lands, and in
course of time visited some of the most distant parts of the globe, so
that he may be said to have been a great traveller before his whiskers
were darker than a lady's eyebrows.
During these voyages, as a matter of course, he experienced great
variety of fortune. He had faced the wildest of storms, and bathed in the
beams of the brightest sunshine. He was as familiar with wreck as with
rations; every species of nautical disaster had befallen him; typhoons,
cyclones, and simooms had done their worst to him, but they could not
kill him, for Bill bore a sort of charmed life, and invariably turned up

again, no matter how many of his shipmates went down. Despite the
rough experiences of his career he was as fresh and good-looking a
young fellow as one would wish to see.
Before proceeding with the narrative of his life, we shall give just one
specimen of his experiences while he was in the merchant service.
Having joined a ship bound for China, he set sail with the proverbial
light heart and light pair of breeches, to which we may add light
pockets. His heart soon became somewhat heavier when he discovered
that his captain was a tyrant, whose chief joy appeared to consist in
making other people miserable. Bill Bowls's nature, however was
adaptable, so that although his spirits were a little subdued, they were
not crushed. He was wont to console himself, and his comrades, with
the remark that this state of things couldn't last for ever, that the voyage
would come to an end some time or other, and that men should never
say die as long as there remained a shot in the locker!
That voyage did come to an end much sooner than he or the tyrannical
captain expected!
One evening our hero stood near the binnacle talking to the steersman,
a sturdy middle-aged sailor, whose breadth appeared to be nearly equal
to his length.
"Tom Riggles," said Bill, somewhat abruptly, "we're goin' to have dirty
weather."
"That's so, lad, I'm not goin' to deny it," replied Tom, as he turned the
wheel a little to windward:
Most landsmen would have supposed that Bill's remark should have
been, "We have got dirty weather," for at the time he spoke the good
ship was bending down before a stiff breeze, which caused the dark sea
to dash over her bulwarks and sweep the decks continually, while thick
clouds, the colour of pea-soup, were scudding across the sky; but
seafaring men spoke of it as a "capful of wind," and Bill's remark was
founded on the fact that, for an hour past, the gale had been increasing,

and the appearance of sea and sky was becoming more threatening.
That night the captain stood for hours holding on to the
weather-shrouds of the mizzen-mast without uttering a word to any one,
except that now and then, at long intervals, he asked the steersman how
the ship's head lay. Dark although the sky was, it did not seem so
threatening as did the countenance of the man who commanded the
vessel.
Already the ship was scudding before the wind, with only the smallest
rag of canvas hoisted, yet she rose on the great waves and plunged
madly into the hollows between with a violence that almost tore the
masts out of her. The chief-mate stood by the wheel assisting the
steersman; the crew clustered on the starboard side of the forecastle,
casting uneasy glances now at the chaos of foaming water ahead, and
then at the face of their captain, which was occasionally seen in the
pale light of a stray moonbeam. In ordinary circumstances these men
would have smiled at the storm, but they had unusual cause for anxiety
at that time, for they knew that the captain was a drunkard, and, from
the short experience they had already had of him, they feared that he
was not capable of managing the ship.
"Had we not better keep her a point more to the south'ard, sir?" said the
mate to the captain, respectfully touching his cap; "reefs are said to be
numerous here about."
"No, Mister Wilson," answered the captain, with the gruff air of a man
who assumes and asserts that he knows what