morning promised to be lighter than we had found the weather for several days, and we even experienced some benefit from the moon. The wind, too, began to back round to the eastward again, as we approached the dawn; and we got the three top-sails, close-reefed, the fore-course, and a new fore-top-mast stay-sail, on the ship. At length day appeared, and the sun was actually seen struggling among dark masses of wild-looking, driving clouds. For the first time since we entered those narrow waters, we now got a good look around us. The land could be seen in all directions.
The passage in which we found the Crisis, at sunrise on the morning of the second of these adventurous days, was of several leagues in width; and bounded, especially on the north, by high, precipitous mountains, many of which were covered with snow. The channel was unobstructed; and not an island, islet, or rock, was visible. No impediment to our proceeding offered, and we were still more encouraged to push on. The course we were steering was about south-south-west, and the captain predicted we should come out into the ocean to the westward of the Straits of Le Maire, and somewhere near the Cape itself. We should unquestionably make a great discovery! The wind continued to back round, and soon got to be abaft the beam. We now shook our reefs out, one after another, and we had whole topsails on the vessel by nine o’clock. This was carrying hard, it must be owned; but the skipper was determined to make hay while the sun shone. There were a few hours, when I think the ship went fifteen knots by the land, being so much favoured by the current. Little did we know the difficulties towards which we were rushing!
Quite early in the day, land appeared ahead, and Marble began to predict that our rope was nearly run out. We were coming to the bottom of a deep bay. Captain Williams thought differently; and when he discovered a narrow passage between two promontories, he triumphantly predicted our near approach to the Cape. He had seen some such shape to the mountains inland, in doubling the Horn, and the hill-tops looked like old acquaintances. Unfortunately we could not see the sun at meridian, and got no observation. For several hours we ran south-westerly, in a passage of no great width, when we came to a sudden bend in our course, which led us away to the north-west. Here we still had the tide with us, and we then all felt certain that we had reached a point where the ebb must flow in a direction contrary to that in which we had found it, in the other parts of the passage. It followed, that we were now halfway through to the ocean, though the course we were steering predicted a sinuous channel. We were certainly not going now towards Cape Horn.
Notwithstanding the difficulties and doubts which beset us, Captain Williams packed on the ship, determined to get ahead as fast as he could, while there was light. It no longer blew a gale, and the wind was hauling more to the southward again. It soon got to be right aft, and before sunset it had a little westing in it. Fortunately, it moderated, and we set our main-sail and top-gallant-sails. We had carried a lower and top-mast studding-sails nearly all day. The worst feature in our situation, now, was the vast number of islands, or islets, we met. The shore on each side was mountainous and rude, and deep indentations were constantly tempting us to turn aside. But, rightly judging that the set of the tide was a lair index to the true course, the captain stood on.
The night that followed was one of the most anxious I ever passed. We were tempted to anchor a dozen times, in some of the different bays, of which we passed twenty; but could not make up our minds to risk another cable. We met the flood a little after sunset, and got rid of it before morning. But the wind kept hauling, and at last it brought us fairly on a taut bow-line; under top-gallant-sails, however. We had come too far to recede, or now would have been the time to turn round, and retrace our steps. But we hoped every moment to reach some inclination south, again, that would carry us into the open sea. We ran a vast many chances of shipwreck, passing frightfully near several reefs; but the same good Providence which had so far protected us, carried us clear. Never was I so rejoiced as when I saw day returning.
We had the young ebb, and a scant wind, when the sun rose next day. It was a brilliant morning, however, and everybody predicted an observation at noon. The channel was full of islands, still, and other dangers were not wanting; but, as we could see our way, we got through them all safely. At length our course became embarrassed, so many large islands, with passages between them, offering on different sides. One headland, however, lay before us; and, the ship promising to weather it, we held on our way. It was just ten o’clock as we approached this cape, and we found a passage westward that actually led into the ocean! All hands gave three cheers as we became certain of this fact, the ship tacking as soon as far enough ahead, and setting seaward famously with the tide.
Captain Williams now told us to get our quadrants, for the heavens were cloudless, and we should have a horizon in time for the sun. He was anxious to get the latitude of our discovery. Sure enough, it so fell out, and we prepared to observe; some predicting one parallel, some another. As for the skipper himself, he said he thought we were still to the eastward of the Cape; but he felt confident that we had come out to the westward of Le Maire. Marble was silent; but he had observed, and made his calculations, before either of the others had commenced the last. I saw him scratch his head, and go to the chart which lay on the companionway. Then I heard him shout—
“In the Pacific, by St. Kennebunk!”—he always swore by this pious individual when excited—“We have come through the Straits of Magellan without knowing it!”
Chapter XII
“Sound trumpets, ho!—weigh anchor—loosen sail—
The seaward-flying banners chide delay;
As if’t were heaven that breathes this kindly gale,
Our life-like bark beneath it speeds away.—”
—Pinkney
The stout ship Crisis had, like certain persons, done a good thing purely by chance, Had her exploit happened in the year 1519, instead of that of 1800, the renowned passage we had just escaped from would have been called the Crisis Straits, a better name than the mongrel appellation it now bears; which is neither English, nor Portuguese. The ship had been lost, like a man in the woods, and came out nearer home, than those in her could have at all expected. The “bloody currents” had been at the bottom of the mistake, though this time they did good, instead of harm. Any one who has been thoroughly lost on a heath, or in a forest, or, even in a town, can comprehend how the head gets turned on such occasions, and will understand the manner in which we had mystified ourselves.
I shall remember the feelings of delight with which I looked around me, as the ship passed out into the open ocean, to my dying day. There lay the vast Pacific, its long, regular waves rolling in towards the coast, in mountain-like ridges, it is true, but under a radiant sun, and in a bright atmosphere. Everybody was cheered by the view, and never did orders sound more pleasant in my ears, than when the captain called out, in a cheerful voice, “to man the weather braces.” This command was given the instant it was prudent; and the ship went foaming past the last cape with the speed of a courser. Studding-sails were then set, and, when the sun was dipping, we had a good offing, were driving to the northward under everything we could carry, and had a fair prospect of an excellent run from the neighbourhood of Terra del Fuego, and its stormy seas.
It is not my intention to dwell on our passage along the western coast of South America. A voyage to the Pacific was a very different thing in the year 1800, however, from what it is to-day. The power of Spain was then completely in the ascendant, intercourse with any nation but the mother country, being strictly prohibited. It is true, a species of commerce, that was called the “forced trade on the Spanish Main” existed under that code of elastic morals, which adapts the maxim of “your purse or your life” to modern diplomacy, as well as to the habits of the highwayman. According to divers masters in the art of ethics now flourishing among ourselves, more especially in the atmosphere of the journals of the commercial communities, the people that “can trade and won’t trade, must be made to trade.” At the commencement of the century, your mercantile moralists were far less manly in the avowal of their sentiments, though their practices were in no degree wanting in the spirit of our more modern theories. Ships were