Dewey Lambdin - Reefs and Shoals

“Congratulations, Mister Munsell,” Lewrie said in praise.

“Well, there’s always tomorrow,” Rossyngton teased.

“Perhaps Mister Eldridge should now concentrate upon tutoring you, Mister Rossyngton,” Lewrie suggested, pulling a face. “It’s rare t’have an experienced Mid for the others to learn from, but… that’s what a congenial and co-operative Midshipmen’s mess should be, hey? Very good, Mister Eldridge.”

“Uh, thank you, sir,” Eldridge replied, a tad embarrassed to be pointed out. Lewrie gave him a reassuring nod and a smile, also taking note of Eldridge’s kit, and wondered how he was fitting in in the orlop cockpit. Eldridge normally wore slop-trousers (did he have a pair of breeches? Lewrie wondered) or a snugger pair of dark blue trousers, linen or cotton shirts, a waist-coat that had gone a light tan from age, black neck-stock, and a plain uniform coat with dull brass buttons, and the white collar patches of his rank. If he had a cocked hat, no one had seen it; his headgear day in and day out was a black felt civilian topper with a narrow brim and a tapering crown.

His fellow Mids ranged from fifteen to twenty-one years of age, whilst he was in his mid-to-late twenties when suddenly promoted into their compact little world, with all its lame jests, pranks, and general ignorance, shoulder-to-shoulder with Entwhistle, an “Honourable”, and the rest who had been reared in the comfort of the landed gentry, and the “squirearchy”, whilst Eldridge’s father was a Bristol chandler, a man in “trade”; a lot in life usually scorned by “the better sorts”.

Lewrie had been too busy with the last-minute lading, the alteration of muster lists, the sailing from Portsmouth, and then the weeks of foul and threatening weather, with not a minute to spare for thought over the matter.

Have t’get Westcott t’look into it, Lewrie told himself; That’s what First Officers’re for, ain’t it? The weather relents, start dinin’ officers and warrants in, again … with Eldridge in the rotation.

“One more thing, young sirs,” Lewrie said. “Mister Munsell, do you know the longitude and latitude of Bermuda?”

“Ehm… sixty-four degrees, fourty minutes West, sir,” Munsell piped up quickly before the others could open their mouths, “and Saint George’s Harbour is at thirty-two degrees twenty-three minutes North.”

“The highest sea-mark visible from offshore?” Lewrie posed to them. That made them share quick looks of worry, and took the wind from their sails; there were several dumb shrugs.

“The Sailing Master has the pertinent charts,” Lewrie said with a wry moue over their lack of knowledge. “I’d suggest ye all take a good, long gander at it, and familarise yourselves with the island and its waters… and all the cautions, right, Mister Caldwell?”

“Aye, sir,” Caldwell replied, back to gruffness.

And damned right, so shall I! Lewrie vowed to himself.

“The off-watch lads are dismissed,” Lewrie ordered, turning to secure his chronometer and sextant in their cases. “Carry on, Mister Spendlove.”

“Aye, sir!”

HMS Reliant ’s landfall at Bermuda was hardly an auspicious occasion. The lookouts aloft, and the watch officers, spotted a few dim lights from far offshore, in the wee hours near the end of the Middle Watch, Unfortunately, those few low-on-the-horizon lights were spread to either side of the bows. A quick peek at the chart, and a hidden gasp later, and Lewrie ordered an immediate turn-about to stand away Sou’east, into deeper water; there to stand off-and-on ’til daylight.

“What I feared,” he told Lt. Merriman and the Sailing Master, “that we’d fetch the bloody place too far North of it, and end up on the reefs and rocks. Once we can see where we’re going, we’ll come to anchor in Five Fathom Hole… assumin’ we can find it without rippin’ her bottom out.”

The previous day’s Noon Sights had placed their position close to Bermuda, close enough for Lewrie to order the t’gallants to be reefed and gasketed, the tops’1s reduced to the second reefs, and the fore and main courses shortened down to first reefs. After a light supper, a most informal one with Lt. Westcott, the Sailing Master, and a chart spread over the dining table, Lewrie had taken a three-hour nap, then had gone on deck at the beginning of the Middle Watch, at midnight, to slouch in his collapsible canvas deck chair, pace the deck, and fret for the first cry of “land ho”, hoping that their navigation was accurate enough, their course correct, so that they would fetch the islands to their Sou’east, well clear of Kitchen Shoals, Mill Breakers, Great Breaker Ledge Flat, the Nor’east Breakers, and Sea Venture Shoals, so named for the Sea Venture, which had wrecked upon them, setting the first English colonists on Bermuda… whether they wanted to be, or not. They had been bound for Virginia, but, once succoured with fresh victuals, most had stayed to make the best of a dangerous serendipity!

“I daresay we’ve been bitten by the mysterious magnetic variations hereabouts, sir,” Mr. Caldwell said with a scowl. “Bermuda’s infamous for them, sometimes up to six degrees or so, and no explaining why. They’re not seasonal, nor tied to the phases of the moon, tides, or weather.” Caldwell shrugged and gloomed in perplexity.

“Sounds spooky,” Lt. Merriman commented.

“Let’s not let the ship’s people hear any of that, hey?” Lewrie muttered to Merriman, laying a finger upon his lips for a moment. “We have enough superstitions amongst ’ em already. Carry on Mister Merriman. Now we believe we’re in deeper, safer waters, I’ll take a short ‘caulk’ in my deck chair.”

“Very good, sir, aye,” Merriman replied.

The dawn did not bring an auspicious landfall, either. As the Forenoon Watch began at 8 A.M., the winds began to freshen once more, and the inshore waters fretted and chopped in white caps and white horses, with ruffling cat’s paws over the surface. There was a heavy, scudding overcast that made the early morning shadowless and gloomy, and there was a strong smell of rain in the offing, to boot.

Oddly, though, Bermuda could not have been a more welcome sight if they had stood in in bright daylight, for, as their frigate cautiously neared St. David’s Head, the shoal waters turned lighter and clearer blue, the shores fringed in aqua green with pure white waves breaking upon almost pinkish-tan beaches, beneath the ruddy limestone headlands. And the island was so brightly green! There were trees, some fronded or spiky like palms or palmettos, flowering bushes, and open grassy spaces, perhaps lawns or croplands, and all the flora lush and verdant in an entire palette of green. Quite unlike some islands in the West Indies that could look brown and shrivelled in the sun and talced with dust, Bermuda appeared as if everything had been freshly watered and washed for their arrival.

The Sailing Master, his Mates, and the trusted senior Midshipmen busily plied their sextants to take the measurements of the known heights and prominent sea-marks, working out the distances from shore, and the known dangers of the shallows and submerged reefs noted on the charts.

“Do we stand on as we are, sir,” the Sailing Master said after a long, grim musing over the chart pinned to the traverse board, “we will enter Five Fathom Hole. There is an anchorage area just North of there, where we can find six or seven fathoms, and firm sand and rock holding ground… or so the chart promises.”

“Right there?” Lewrie asked, pointing a finger at the chart. The area that Mr. Caldwell was recommending lay close to the infamous Sea Venture Shoals… uncomfortably close, to his lights! He took a long look about to judge the wind direction, worrying that it might be foul for entering St. George’s Harbour proper. “Mister Westcott? Best bower and stern kedge, the kedge to be let go first as we crawl on. Unless a pilot takes pity on us.”