XXXV
I AM READY FOR A FRESH HAZARD OF FORTUNE
For a while after this black thought came to me I was pretty muchbeaten by it; but when I got steadier--and had finished kicking myselffor a fool because I had not foreseen it all along--I perceived thatthe odds were not wholly against me, after all. I had, at least, asea-worthy boat in which to make my venture, and therefore was as welloff as I had hoped to be when I had set about looking for one; and ifthe plan that I had formed worked out in practice--if I could manageto force a passage through the tangle by alternately working over thebow of my boat to break up the weed, and over the sides to pole myboat forward--I was a great deal better off than I had hoped to be:for should I win my way to open water I would have steam as well assail power at my command.
But while this more reasonable view of the situation comforted me, itdid not satisfy me. The difficulty of working myself along in thatslow fashion I foresaw would be so enormous that I very well might dieof sheer exhaustion before I got clear of the weed-tangle--whichmust extend outward, as I knew from my guess at the time that I hadtaken in drifting in through it, for a very long way. What I had beencounting upon ever since I had found the launch was in having part ofthe work, and the heaviest part, done by her engine; my part to be thebreaking of a passage, while the motive power was to be supplied bythe screw. But of course if the screw fouled, as it certainly wouldfoul with the loose weed all around it, that would be the end of myhopeful plan.
This consideration of the matter reduced it to a definite problem.What was needed was some sort of protection for the screw that wouldkeep the weed away from it and yet would allow it to work freely: and,having the case thus clearly stated, the thought presently occurred tome that I could secure this protection by building out from the sternof the boat, so that the screw would be enclosed in it, some sort ofan iron cage. That arrangement, I conceived, would meet therequirements of the case fully; and being come to my conclusion Iresigned myself to still another long delay while I carried my planinto execution, and so went to bed at last hopefully--but well knowingthat this fresh piece of work that I had cut out for myself would behard to do.
I certainly did not overestimate the amount of labor involved in mycage-building. I was a good three weeks over it. But I was kept up tothe collar by my conviction that without the cage I had no chance ofsucceeding in my project; and so I got it finished at last. And then Iconsidered that my boat really was ready to take the water; and thecat and I had another banquet in celebration of the long step that wehad taken toward our deliverance--only this time I did not give analtogether free rein to my rejoicing, being fearful that some otherdifficulty might present itself suddenly and bring me up again with around turn.
The boat being ready--for I could think of nothing more to do toher--I had still to launch her, and the first step toward that end wasbreaking out a section in the steamer's side. Luckily the stock ofcold-chisels aboard the _Ville de Saint Remy_ was a good one; but Idulled them all twice over--and weary work at the grindstone I hadsharpening them again--before I had chipped away the bindings of thoseendless rivets and had the satisfaction of seeing the big section ofiron plate between two of her iron ribs pitch outboard and splash downthrough the weed into the sea.
As I have said, the bow compartment of the steamer was full of water,and this brought her main-deck so low down forward that the boat hadonly to be slid out almost on a level through the hole that I hadmade. But to slide her that way--which seems easy, because I havehappened to put it glibly--was quite a different thing. With steampower to work the capstan I could have got the boat overboard in notime; but without steam power the launching went desperately slowly,and was altogether the hardest piece of work that I had to do in thewhole of my long hard job.
The boat had stood all along in the cradle that had been built to holdher steady for the voyage. This was a very stout wooden frameworkbuilt up from two heavy beams joined by cross-pieces, and all so wellbolted together that it was very solid and firm. In this the boatrested snugly and was held fast by rope lashings; and the cradleitself--resting on the lower hatch and projecting on each side ofit--was lashed to the hatch ringbolts so as to be safe againstshifting in a heavy sea. I could have removed the cradle by taking itto pieces, but that would not have helped matters; and the plan that Idecided upon--liking it better because all this wood-work around andunder the boat would protect her from harm as she went overboard--wasto weight the cradle with iron bars that would cause it to sink awayfrom beneath the boat when they took the water, and then to work it upwith jack-screws until I could get rollers under it and so send themboth together over the side.
How long I worked over this job I really do not know; but I do knowthat at the time it seemed as though it never would come to an end.First of all I had the rollers to make from another topgallant mastthat I got down, and when these were finished I had to go at the frameof the cradle with a pair of jack-screws and raise it, by fractions ofan inch, until I could get my rollers under it one at a time. I thinkthat it was the deadly dullness of this jack-screw work that I mostresented--the stupid monotony of doing precisely the same sort ofutterly wearying work all day long and for day after day. But in theend I got it finished: all my rollers properly in place, and thecradle made fast to hold it from starting before I was ready to haveit go--although of that there was not much danger, for while thesteamer had a decided pitch forward she lay on an even keel.
At first I was for sending my boat overboard the minute that I got thelast roller under her; but I had the sense, luckily, to take a reef inthis brisk intention as the thought struck me that I must have openwater to launch her in or else very likely have boat and cradletogether stuck fast in the weed. And so I set myself to clearing alittle pool into which I could launch her; and as I carried this workon I came quickly to a realizing sense of what was before me when Ishould begin to break a way through the weed for my boat's passage,and to the conviction that had I tried to make my voyage without steamto help me I never should have got through at all.
In point of fact, the weed was so thick and so firmly matted togetherthat I almost could walk on it; and when I had knocked loose a coupleof doors from their hinges and had thrown them overboard--taking two,so that I might move one ahead of the other as my cutting advanced--Ihad firm enough standing place from which I could slash away. So toughwas the mass that I was a whole day in uncovering a space less thanforty feet long by twenty broad; and when my launching-pool wasfinished it had the look of a little pond in a meadow surrounded bysolid banks.
All this showed me that even with the screw to push while I cleared away for the boat's passage I should have my hands full; but it alsoput into my head a notion that helped me a good deal in the end. Thiswas to rig on the straight stem of my boat a set of guide-barsprojecting forward in which I could work perpendicularly a cross-cutsaw, and in that way to cut a slit in the weed--which would be widenedby the boat's nose thrusting into it as the screw shoved her onward,and so would enable me to squeeze along. And as this was a matter easyof accomplishment--being only to double over a couple of iron bars sothat there would be a slit a half inch wide for the saw to travel in,and to bolt them fast to the top and bottom of the boat's stem--I didit immediately; and it worked so well when I came to try it that I wasglad enough that I had had so lucky a thought. Indeed, had I knownhow well it would turn out I should have gone a step farther andrigged my saw to run by steam power--setting up a frame in the bows tohold a wheel carrying a pin on which the saw could play and to which Icould make fast a bar from my piston-rod--and in that way saved myselffrom the longest bit of back-breaking work that ever I had to do. Butthat was a piece of foresight that came afterward, and so did meno good.
When my guide-bars were in place, and the saw made ready to slip intothem by taking off one of its handles--and I had still a spare saw tofall back upon in the event of the first one breaking--my boat wasready to go overboard into the open water, where she would lie while Iput aboard of he
r my coal and stores. But the work that was before me,as I thus came close to it, loomed up very large; and so did thedoubts which beset me as to how my voyage would end. Indeed, it was ina spirit far from exultant that at last I cut the lashings which heldthe cradle; and then with the tackle that I had ready got the heavymass started--and in a couple of minutes had my boat safely overboardand floating free, as the cradle sunk away from under her, carrieddown by its lading of iron bars.
But, whatever was to come of it, the launching of my boat started medefinitely along a fresh line of adventure, and whether I liked it ornot I had to make the best of it: and so I stated the case to mycat--who had got scared and run off into a corner while the launchingwas in progress--when he came marching up to me and seated himselfbeside me gravely, as I stood in the break in the steamer's sidelooking down at the boat that I hoped would set us free.
In the Sargasso Sea Page 35