"How many of those present," inquired the young preacher, "know 'Onward Christian Soldiers'?"All were acquainted with the hymn; the pastor grasped a capstan bar and struck up the song in an agreeable tenor voice; they put their backs into the work and their hearts into the song, and the anchors of the JasperB.came out of mud to the stirring notes of "Onward Christian Soldiers, marching as to war!"While they were so engaged the breeze strengthened perceptibly.Looking towards the west, Cleggett perceived the sun sinking below the horizon.A long, blue, low-lying bank of clouds seemed to engulf it; for a moment the top of this cloud was shot through with a golden color; then a mass of quicker moving, nearer vapors from the north seemed to leap suddenly nearer still; to extend itself at a bound over almost a third of the sky; in a breath the day was gone; a storm threatened.
The rising wind made the task of getting the canvas on the poles extraordinarily difficult.Cleggett was well aware that the usual method of procedure, in the presence of a storm, is rather to take in sail than to crack on; but, always the original, he decided in this case to reverse the common custom.Ashore or at sea, he never permitted himself to be the slave of conventionalities.The Jasper B.had lain so long in one spot that it would undoubtedly take more than a capful of wind to move her.Cleggett did not know when he would get such a strong wind again, coming from the right direction, and determined to make the most of this one while he had it.Genius partly consists in the acuteness which grasps opportunities.
From the struggles of Cap'n Abernethy and the crew with the canvas, which he saw none too clearly through the increasing dusk from his post at the wheel, Cleggett judged that the wind was indeed strong enough for his purpose.Yards, sheets and sails seemed to be acting in the most singular manner.He could not remember reading of any parallel case in the treatises on navigation which he had perused.Every now and then the Cap'n or one of the crew would be jerked clean off his feet by some quickand unexpected motion of a sail and flung into the water.When this occurred the person who had been ducked crawled out on the bank of the canal again and went on board by way of the gangplank, returning stubbornly to his task.
The booms in particular were possessed of a restless and unstable spirit.They made sudden swoops, sweeps, and dashes in all directions.Sometimes as many as three of the crew of the Jasper B.would be knocked to the deck or into the water by a boom at the same time.But Cleggett noted with satisfaction that they were plucky; they stuck valiantly to the job.A doubt assailed Cleggett as to the competence of Cap'n Abernethy, but he was loyal and fought it down.
Finally Cap'n Abernethy hit upon a novel and ingenious idea.He tied stout lines to the ends of the booms.The other ends of these ropes he ran through the eyes of a couple of spare anchors.Taking the anchors ashore, he made them fast to the wooden platform which was alongside the JasperB.Then he took up the slack in the lines, pulling them taut and fastening them tightly.
Thus the booms were held fast and stiff in position, and the crew could get the canvas spread without being endangered by their strange and unaccountable actions.
This brilliant idea of anchoring the booms to the land would not have been practicable had it not been for a whimsical cessation of the wind, a lull such as incident to the coming of spring storms in these latitudes.While the wind was in abeyance the men got the sails spread.Then the Captain untied the lines, brought the spare anchors on board, knocked the gangplank loose with a few blows of his ax, and waited for the wind to resume.
