Chapter 6

by Jack London

　　Chapter VI

　　By the following morning the storm had blown itself quite out andthe Ghost was rolling slightly on a calm sea without a breath ofwind. Occasional light airs were felt, however, and Wolf Larsenpatrolled the poop constantly, his eyes ever searching the sea tothe north-eastward, from which direction the great trade-wind mustblow.

　　The men were all on deck and busy preparing their various boats forthe season's hunting. There are seven boats aboard, the captain'sdingey, and the six which the hunters will use. Three, a hunter, aboat-puller, and a boat-steerer, compose a boat's crew. On boardthe schooner the boat-pullers and steerers are the crew. Thehunters, too, are supposed to be in command of the watches,subject, always, to the orders of Wolf Larsen.

　　All this, and more, I have learned. The Ghost is considered thefastest schooner in both the San Francisco and Victoria fleets. Infact, she was once a private yacht, and was built for speed. Herlines and fittings - though I know nothing about such things -speak for themselves. Johnson was telling me about her in a shortchat I had with him during yesterday's second dog-watch. He spokeenthusiastically, with the love for a fine craft such as some menfeel for horses. He is greatly disgusted with the outlook, and Iam given to understand that Wolf Larsen bears a very unsavouryreputation among the sealing captains. It was the Ghost herselfthat lured Johnson into signing for the voyage, but he is alreadybeginning to repent.

　　As he told me, the Ghost is an eighty-ton schooner of a remarkablyfine model. Her beam, or width, is twenty-three feet, and herlength a little over ninety feet. A lead keel of fabulous butunknown weight makes her very stable, while she carries an immensespread of canvas. From the deck to the truck of the maintopmast issomething over a hundred feet, while the foremast with its topmastis eight or ten feet shorter. I am giving these details so thatthe size of this little floating world which holds twenty-two menmay be appreciated. It is a very little world, a mote, a speck,and I marvel that men should dare to venture the sea on acontrivance so small and fragile.

　　Wolf Larsen has, also, a reputation for reckless carrying on ofsail. I overheard Henderson and another of the hunters, Standish,a Californian, talking about it. Two years ago he dismasted theGhost in a gale on Bering Sea, whereupon the present masts were putin, which are stronger and heavier in every way. He is said tohave remarked, when he put them in, that he preferred turning herover to losing the sticks.

　　Every man aboard, with the exception of Johansen, who is ratherovercome by his promotion, seems to have an excuse for havingsailed on the Ghost. Half the men forward are deep-water sailors,and their excuse is that they did not know anything about her orher captain. And those who do know, whisper that the hunters,while excellent shots, were so notorious for their quarrelsome andrascally proclivities that they could not sign on any decentschooner.

　　I have made the acquaintance of another one of the crew, - Louis heis called, a rotund and jovial-faced Nova Scotia Irishman, and avery sociable fellow, prone to talk as long as he can find alistener. In the afternoon, while the cook was below asleep and Iwas peeling the everlasting potatoes, Louis dropped into the galleyfor a "yarn." His excuse for being aboard was that he was drunkwhen he signed. He assured me again and again that it was the lastthing in the world he would dream of doing in a sober moment. Itseems that he has been seal-hunting regularly each season for adozen years, and is accounted one of the two or three very bestboat-steerers in both fleets.

　　"Ah, my boy," he shook his head ominously at me, "'tis the worstschooner ye could iv selected, nor were ye drunk at the time as wasI. 'Tis sealin' is the sailor's paradise - on other ships thanthis. The mate was the first, but mark me words, there'll be moredead men before the trip is done with. Hist, now, between you an'meself and the stanchion there, this Wolf Larsen is a regulardevil, an' the Ghost'll be a hell-ship like she's always ben sincehe had hold iv her. Don't I know? Don't I know? Don't I rememberhim in Hakodate two years gone, when he had a row an' shot four ivhis men? Wasn't I a-layin' on the Emma L., not three hundred yardsaway? An' there was a man the same year he killed with a blow ivhis fist. Yes, sir, killed 'im dead-oh. His head must iv smashedlike an eggshell. An' wasn't there the Governor of Kura Island,an' the Chief iv Police, Japanese gentlemen, sir, an' didn't theycome aboard the Ghost as his guests, a-bringin' their wives along -wee an' pretty little bits of things like you see 'em painted onfans. An' as he was a-gettin' under way, didn't the fond husbandsget left astern-like in their sampan, as it might be by accident?An' wasn't it a week later that the poor little ladies was putashore on the other side of the island, with nothin' before 'em butto walk home acrost the mountains on their weeny-teeny little strawsandals which wouldn't hang together a mile? Don't I know? 'Tisthe beast he is, this Wolf Larsen - the great big beast mentionediv in Revelation; an' no good end will he ever come to. But I'vesaid nothin' to ye, mind ye. I've whispered never a word; for oldfat Louis'll live the voyage out if the last mother's son of yez goto the fishes."

　　"Wolf Larsen!" he snorted a moment later. "Listen to the word,will ye! Wolf - 'tis what he is. He's not black-hearted like somemen. 'Tis no heart he has at all. Wolf, just wolf, 'tis what heis. D'ye wonder he's well named?"

　　"But if he is so well-known for what he is," I queried, "how is itthat he can get men to ship with him?"

　　"An' how is it ye can get men to do anything on God's earth an'sea?" Louis demanded with Celtic fire. "How d'ye find me aboard if'twasn't that I was drunk as a pig when I put me name down?There's them that can't sail with better men, like the hunters, andthem that don't know, like the poor devils of wind-jammers for'ardthere. But they'll come to it, they'll come to it, an' be sorrythe day they was born. I could weep for the poor creatures, did Ibut forget poor old fat Louis and the troubles before him. But'tis not a whisper I've dropped, mind ye, not a whisper."

　　"Them hunters is the wicked boys," he broke forth again, for hesuffered from a constitutional plethora of speech. "But wait tillthey get to cutting up iv jinks and rowin' 'round. He's the boy'llfix 'em. 'Tis him that'll put the fear of God in their rottenblack hearts. Look at that hunter iv mine, Horner. 'Jock' Hornerthey call him, so quiet-like an' easy-goin', soft-spoken as a girl,till ye'd think butter wouldn't melt in the mouth iv him. Didn'the kill his boat-steerer last year? 'Twas called a sad accident,but I met the boat-puller in Yokohama an' the straight iv it wasgiven me. An' there's Smoke, the black little devil - didn't theRoosians have him for three years in the salt mines of Siberia, forpoachin' on Copper Island, which is a Roosian preserve? Shackledhe was, hand an' foot, with his mate. An' didn't they have wordsor a ruction of some kind? - for 'twas the other fellow Smoke sentup in the buckets to the top of the mine; an' a piece at a time hewent up, a leg to-day, an' to-morrow an arm, the next day the head,an' so on."

　　"But you can't mean it!" I cried out, overcome with the horror ofit.

　　"Mean what!" he demanded, quick as a flash. "'Tis nothin' I'vesaid. Deef I am, and dumb, as ye should be for the sake iv yourmother; an' never once have I opened me lips but to say fine thingsiv them an' him, God curse his soul, an' may he rot in purgatoryten thousand years, and then go down to the last an' deepest helliv all!"

　　Johnson, the man who had chafed me raw when I first came aboard,seemed the least equivocal of the men forward or aft. In fact,there was nothing equivocal about him. One was struck at once byhis straightforwardness and manliness, which, in turn, weretempered by a modesty which might be mistaken for timidity. Buttimid he was not. He seemed, rather, to have the courage of hisconvictions, the certainty of his manhood. It was this that madehim protest, at the commencement of our acquaintance, against beingcalled Yonson. And upon this, and him, Louis passed judgment andprophecy.

　　"'Tis a fine chap, that squarehead Johnson we've for'ard with us,"he said. "The best sailorman in the fo'c'sle. He's my boat-puller. But it's to trouble he'll come with Wolf Larsen, as thesparks fly upward. It's meself that knows. I can see it brewin'an' comin' up like a storm in the sky. I've talked to him like abrother, but it's little he sees in takin' in his lights or flyin'false signals. He grumbles out when things don't go to suit him,and there'll be always some tell-tale carryin' word iv it aft tothe Wolf. The Wolf is strong, and it's the way of a wolf to hatestrength, an' strength it is he'll see in Johnson - no knucklin'under, and a 'Yes, sir, thank ye kindly, sir,' for a curse or ablow. Oh, she's a-comin'! She's a-comin'! An' God knows whereI'll get another boat-puller! What does the fool up an' say, whenthe old man calls him Yonson, but 'Me name is Johnson, sir,' an'then spells it out, letter for letter. Ye should iv seen the oldman's face! I thought he'd let drive at him on the spot. Hedidn't, but he will, an' he'll break that squarehead's heart, orit's little I know iv the ways iv men on the ships iv the sea."

　　Thomas Mugridge is becoming unendurable. I am compelled to Misterhim and to Sir him with every speech. One reason for this is thatWolf Larsen seems to have taken a fancy to him. It is anunprecedented thing, I take it, for a captain to be chummy with thecook; but this is certainly what Wolf Larsen is doing. Two orthree times he put his head into the galley and chaffed Mugridgegood-naturedly, and once, this afternoon, he stood by the break ofthe poop and chatted with him for fully fifteen minutes. When itwas over, and Mugridge was back in the galley, he became greasilyradiant, and went about his work, humming coster songs in a nerve-racking and discordant falsetto.

　　"I always get along with the officers," he remarked to me in aconfidential tone. "I know the w'y, I do, to myke myself uppreci-yted. There was my last skipper - w'y I thought nothin' ofdroppin' down in the cabin for a little chat and a friendly glass.'Mugridge,' sez 'e to me, 'Mugridge,' sez 'e, 'you've missed yervokytion.' 'An' 'ow's that?' sez I. 'Yer should 'a been born agentleman, an' never 'ad to work for yer livin'.' God strike medead, 'Ump, if that ayn't wot 'e sez, an' me a-sittin' there in 'isown cabin, jolly-like an' comfortable, a-smokin' 'is cigars an'drinkin' 'is rum."

　　This chitter-chatter drove me to distraction. I never heard avoice I hated so. His oily, insinuating tones, his greasy smileand his monstrous self-conceit grated on my nerves till sometimes Iwas all in a tremble. Positively, he was the most disgusting andloathsome person I have ever met. The filth of his cooking wasindescribable; and, as he cooked everything that was eaten aboard,I was compelled to select what I ate with great circumspection,choosing from the least dirty of his concoctions.

　　My hands bothered me a great deal, unused as they were to work.The nails were discoloured and black, while the skin was alreadygrained with dirt which even a scrubbing-brush could not remove.Then blisters came, in a painful and never-ending procession, and Ihad a great burn on my forearm, acquired by losing my balance in aroll of the ship and pitching against the galley stove. Nor was myknee any better. The swelling had not gone down, and the cap wasstill up on edge. Hobbling about on it from morning till night wasnot helping it any. What I needed was rest, if it were ever to getwell.

　　Rest! I never before knew the meaning of the word. I had beenresting all my life and did not know it. But now, could I sitstill for one half-hour and do nothing, not even think, it would bethe most pleasurable thing in the world. But it is a revelation,on the other hand. I shall be able to appreciate the lives of theworking people hereafter. I did not dream that work was soterrible a thing. From half-past five in the morning till teno'clock at night I am everybody's slave, with not one moment tomyself, except such as I can steal near the end of the second dog-watch. Let me pause for a minute to look out over the seasparkling in the sun, or to gaze at a sailor going aloft to thegaff-topsails, or running out the bowsprit, and I am sure to hearthe hateful voice, "'Ere, you, 'Ump, no sodgerin'. I've got mypeepers on yer."

　　There are signs of rampant bad temper in the steerage, and thegossip is going around that Smoke and Henderson have had a fight.Henderson seems the best of the hunters, a slow-going fellow, andhard to rouse; but roused he must have been, for Smoke had abruised and discoloured eye, and looked particularly vicious whenhe came into the cabin for supper.

　　A cruel thing happened just before supper, indicative of thecallousness and brutishness of these men. There is one green handin the crew, Harrison by name, a clumsy-looking country boy,mastered, I imagine, by the spirit of adventure, and making hisfirst voyage. In the light baffling airs the schooner had beentacking about a great deal, at which times the sails pass from oneside to the other and a man is sent aloft to shift over the fore-gaff-topsail. In some way, when Harrison was aloft, the sheetjammed in the block through which it runs at the end of the gaff.As I understood it, there were two ways of getting it cleared, -first, by lowering the foresail, which was comparatively easy andwithout danger; and second, by climbing out the peak-halyards tothe end of the gaff itself, an exceedingly hazardous performance.

　　Johansen called out to Harrison to go out the halyards. It waspatent to everybody that the boy was afraid. And well he might be,eighty feet above the deck, to trust himself on those thin andjerking ropes. Had there been a steady breeze it would not havebeen so bad, but the Ghost was rolling emptily in a long sea, andwith each roll the canvas flapped and boomed and the halyardsslacked and jerked taut. They were capable of snapping a man offlike a fly from a whip-lash.

　　Harrison heard the order and understood what was demanded of him,but hesitated. It was probably the first time he had been aloft inhis life. Johansen, who had caught the contagion of Wolf Larsen'smasterfulness, burst out with a volley of abuse and curses.

　　"That'll do, Johansen," Wolf Larsen said brusquely. "I'll have youknow that I do the swearing on this ship. If I need yourassistance, I'll call you in."

　　"Yes, sir," the mate acknowledged submissively.

　　In the meantime Harrison had started out on the halyards. I waslooking up from the galley door, and I could see him trembling, asif with ague, in every limb. He proceeded very slowly andcautiously, an inch at a time. Outlined against the clear blue ofthe sky, he had the appearance of an enormous spider crawling alongthe tracery of its web.

　　It was a slight uphill climb, for the foresail peaked high; and thehalyards, running through various blocks on the gaff and mast, gavehim separate holds for hands and feet. But the trouble lay in thatthe wind was not strong enough nor steady enough to keep the sailfull. When he was half-way out, the Ghost took a long roll towindward and back again into the hollow between two seas. Harrisonceased his progress and held on tightly. Eighty feet beneath, Icould see the agonized strain of his muscles as he gripped for verylife. The sail emptied and the gaff swung amid-ships. Thehalyards slackened, and, though it all happened very quickly, Icould see them sag beneath the weight of his body. Then the gagswung to the side with an abrupt swiftness, the great sail boomedlike a cannon, and the three rows of reef-points slatted againstthe canvas like a volley of rifles. Harrison, clinging on, madethe giddy rush through the air. This rush ceased abruptly. Thehalyards became instantly taut. It was the snap of the whip. Hisclutch was broken. One hand was torn loose from its hold. Theother lingered desperately for a moment, and followed. His bodypitched out and down, but in some way he managed to save himselfwith his legs. He was hanging by them, head downward. A quickeffort brought his hands up to the halyards again; but he was along time regaining his former position, where he hung, a pitiableobject.

　　"I'll bet he has no appetite for supper," I heard Wolf Larsen'svoice, which came to me from around the corner of the galley."Stand from under, you, Johansen! Watch out! Here she comes!"

　　In truth, Harrison was very sick, as a person is sea-sick; and fora long time he clung to his precarious perch without attempting tomove. Johansen, however, continued violently to urge him on to thecompletion of his task.

　　"It is a shame," I heard Johnson growling in painfully slow andcorrect English. He was standing by the main rigging, a few feetaway from me. "The boy is willing enough. He will learn if he hasa chance. But this is - " He paused awhile, for the word "murder"was his final judgment.

　　"Hist, will ye!" Louis whispered to him, "For the love iv yourmother hold your mouth!"

　　But Johnson, looking on, still continued his grumbling.

　　"Look here," the hunter Standish spoke to Wolf Larsen, "that's myboat-puller, and I don't want to lose him."

　　"That's all right, Standish," was the reply. "He's your boat-puller when you've got him in the boat; but he's my sailor when Ihave him aboard, and I'll do what I damn well please with him."

　　"But that's no reason - " Standish began in a torrent of speech.

　　"That'll do, easy as she goes," Wolf Larsen counselled back. "I'vetold you what's what, and let it stop at that. The man's mine, andI'll make soup of him and eat it if I want to."

　　There was an angry gleam in the hunter's eye, but he turned on hisheel and entered the steerage companion-way, where he remained,looking upward. All hands were on deck now, and all eyes werealoft, where a human life was at grapples with death. Thecallousness of these men, to whom industrial organization gavecontrol of the lives of other men, was appalling. I, who had livedout of the whirl of the world, had never dreamed that its work wascarried on in such fashion. Life had always seemed a peculiarlysacred thing, but here it counted for nothing, was a cipher in thearithmetic of commerce. I must say, however, that the sailorsthemselves were sympathetic, as instance the case of Johnson; butthe masters (the hunters and the captain) were heartlesslyindifferent. Even the protest of Standish arose out of the factthat he did not wish to lose his boat-puller. Had it been someother hunter's boat-puller, he, like them, would have been no morethan amused.

　　But to return to Harrison. It took Johansen, insulting andreviling the poor wretch, fully ten minutes to get him startedagain. A little later he made the end of the gaff, where, astridethe spar itself, he had a better chance for holding on. He clearedthe sheet, and was free to return, slightly downhill now, along thehalyards to the mast. But he had lost his nerve. Unsafe as washis present position, he was loath to forsake it for the moreunsafe position on the halyards.

　　He looked along the airy path he must traverse, and then down tothe deck. His eyes were wide and staring, and he was tremblingviolently. I had never seen fear so strongly stamped upon a humanface. Johansen called vainly for him to come down. At any momenthe was liable to he snapped off the gaff, but he was helpless withfright. Wolf Larsen, walking up and down with Smoke and inconversation, took no more notice of him, though he cried sharply,once, to the man at the wheel:

　　"You're off your course, my man! Be careful, unless you're lookingfor trouble!"

　　"Ay, ay, sir," the helmsman responded, putting a couple of spokesdown.

　　He had been guilty of running the Ghost several points off hercourse in order that what little wind there was should fill theforesail and hold it steady. He had striven to help theunfortunate Harrison at the risk of incurring Wolf Larsen's anger.

　　The time went by, and the suspense, to me, was terrible. ThomasMugridge, on the other hand, considered it a laughable affair, andwas continually bobbing his head out the galley door to make jocoseremarks. How I hated him! And how my hatred for him grew andgrew, during that fearful time, to cyclopean dimensions. For thefirst time in my life I experienced the desire to murder - "sawred," as some of our picturesque writers phrase it. Life ingeneral might still be sacred, but life in the particular case ofThomas Mugridge had become very profane indeed. I was frightenedwhen I became conscious that I was seeing red, and the thoughtflashed through my mind: was I, too, becoming tainted by thebrutality of my environment? - I, who even in the most flagrantcrimes had denied the justice and righteousness of capitalpunishment?

　　Fully half-an-hour went by, and then I saw Johnson and Louis insome sort of altercation. It ended with Johnson flinging offLouis's detaining arm and starting forward. He crossed the deck,sprang into the fore rigging, and began to climb. But the quickeye of Wolf Larsen caught him.

　　"Here, you, what are you up to?" he cried.

　　Johnson's ascent was arrested. He looked his captain in the eyesand replied slowly:

　　"I am going to get that boy down."

　　"You'll get down out of that rigging, and damn lively about it!D'ye hear? Get down!"

　　Johnson hesitated, but the long years of obedience to the mastersof ships overpowered him, and he dropped sullenly to the deck andwent on forward.

　　At half after five I went below to set the cabin table, but Ihardly knew what I did, for my eyes and my brain were filled withthe vision of a man, white-faced and trembling, comically like abug, clinging to the thrashing gaff. At six o'clock, when I servedsupper, going on deck to get the food from the galley, I sawHarrison, still in the same position. The conversation at thetable was of other things. Nobody seemed interested in thewantonly imperilled life. But making an extra trip to the galley alittle later, I was gladdened by the sight of Harrison staggeringweakly from the rigging to the forecastle scuttle. He had finallysummoned the courage to descend.

　　Before closing this incident, I must give a scrap of conversation Ihad with Wolf Larsen in the cabin, while I was washing the dishes.

　　"You were looking squeamish this afternoon," he began. "What wasthe matter?"

　　I could see that he knew what had made me possibly as sick asHarrison, that he was trying to draw me, and I answered, "It wasbecause of the brutal treatment of that boy."

　　He gave a short laugh. "Like sea-sickness, I suppose. Some menare subject to it, and others are not."

　　"Not so," I objected.

　　"Just so," he went on. "The earth is as full of brutality as thesea is full of motion. And some men are made sick by the one, andsome by the other. That's the only reason."

　　"But you, who make a mock of human life, don't you place any valueupon it whatever?" I demanded.

　　"Value? What value?" He looked at me, and though his eyes weresteady and motionless, there seemed a cynical smile in them. "Whatkind of value? How do you measure it? Who values it?"

　　"I do," I made answer.

　　"Then what is it worth to you? Another man's life, I mean. Comenow, what is it worth?"

　　The value of life? How could I put a tangible value upon it?Somehow, I, who have always had expression, lacked expression whenwith Wolf Larsen. I have since determined that a part of it wasdue to the man's personality, but that the greater part was due tohis totally different outlook. Unlike other materialists I had metand with whom I had something in common to start on, I had nothingin common with him. Perhaps, also, it was the elemental simplicityof his mind that baffled me. He drove so directly to the core ofthe matter, divesting a question always of all superfluous details,and with such an air of finality, that I seemed to find myselfstruggling in deep water, with no footing under me. Value of life?How could I answer the question on the spur of the moment? Thesacredness of life I had accepted as axiomatic. That it wasintrinsically valuable was a truism I had never questioned. Butwhen he challenged the truism I was speechless.

　　"We were talking about this yesterday," he said. "I held that lifewas a ferment, a yeasty something which devoured life that it mightlive, and that living was merely successful piggishness. Why, ifthere is anything in supply and demand, life is the cheapest thingin the world. There is only so much water, so much earth, so muchair; but the life that is demanding to be born is limitless.Nature is a spendthrift. Look at the fish and their millions ofeggs. For that matter, look at you and me. In our loins are thepossibilities of millions of lives. Could we but find time andopportunity and utilize the last bit and every bit of the unbornlife that is in us, we could become the fathers of nations andpopulate continents. Life? Bah! It has no value. Of cheapthings it is the cheapest. Everywhere it goes begging. Naturespills it out with a lavish hand. Where there is room for onelife, she sows a thousand lives, and it's life eats life till thestrongest and most piggish life is left."

　　"You have read Darwin," I said. "But you read himmisunderstandingly when you conclude that the struggle forexistence sanctions your wanton destruction of life."

　　He shrugged his shoulders. "You know you only mean that inrelation to human life, for of the flesh and the fowl and the fishyou destroy as much as I or any other man. And human life is in nowise different, though you feel it is and think that you reason whyit is. Why should I be parsimonious with this life which is cheapand without value? There are more sailors than there are ships onthe sea for them, more workers than there are factories or machinesfor them. Why, you who live on the land know that you house yourpoor people in the slums of cities and loose famine and pestilenceupon them, and that there still remain more poor people, dying forwant of a crust of bread and a bit of meat (which is lifedestroyed), than you know what to do with. Have you ever seen theLondon dockers fighting like wild beasts for a chance to work?"

　　He started for the companion stairs, but turned his head for afinal word. "Do you know the only value life has is what life putsupon itself? And it is of course over-estimated since it is ofnecessity prejudiced in its own favour. Take that man I had aloft.He held on as if he were a precious thing, a treasure beyonddiamonds or rubies. To you? No. To me? Not at all. To himself?Yes. But I do not accept his estimate. He sadly overrateshimself. There is plenty more life demanding to be born. Had hefallen and dripped his brains upon the deck like honey from thecomb, there would have been no loss to the world. He was worthnothing to the world. The supply is too large. To himself onlywas he of value, and to show how fictitious even this value was,being dead he is unconscious that he has lost himself. He alonerated himself beyond diamonds and rubies. Diamonds and rubies aregone, spread out on the deck to be washed away by a bucket of sea-water, and he does not even know that the diamonds and rubies aregone. He does not lose anything, for with the loss of himself heloses the knowledge of loss. Don't you see? And what have you tosay?"

　　"That you are at least consistent," was all I could say, and I wenton washing the dishes.