It was a case of babes in the wood or butterflies at sea. Her owner, on his maiden voyage, was all duck trousers; the captain, distinguished for the enormous yachtsman's cap he wore, was a Murrumbidgee[1] whaler before he took command of the Akbar; and the navigating officer, poor fellow, was almost as deaf as a post, and nearly as stiff and immovable as a post in the ground. These three jolly tars comprised the crew. None of them knew more about the sea or about a vessel than a newly born babe knows about another world. They were bound for New Guinea, so they said; perhaps it was as well that three tenderfeet so tender as those never reached that destination.
The owner, whom I had met before he sailed, wanted to race the poor old Spray to Thursday Island en route. I declined the challenge, naturally, on the ground of the unfairness of three young yachtsmen in a clipper against an old sailor all alone in a craft of coarse build; besides that, I would not on any account race in the Coral Sea.
"Spray ahoy!" they all hailed now. "What 's the weather goin' t' be? Is it a-goin' to blow? And don't you think we 'd better go back t' r-r-refit?"
I thought, "If ever you get back, don't refit," but I said: "Give me the end of a rope, and I 'll tow you into yon port farther along; and on your lives," I urged, "do not go back round Cape Hawk, for it 's winter to the south of it."
They purposed making for Newcastle under jury
- ↑ The Murrumbidgee is a small river winding among the mountains of Australia, and would be the last place in which to look for a whale.
