Coffee was served out to us that noon instead of lime juice, and the warmth was welcome; it helped wash down the last cooked meal that Chow was able to prepare for ten days.
Mustering on deck at eight bells, we found we were driving south under a leaden sky. Cape Horn, still dimly visible, was soon shut off, vanishing in a cloud cap over the land astern. We were sailing due south, the wind having headed us, and at four bells, the wind rapidly increasing in violence, the starboard watch turned out to help in shortening down. We at once took in the t'gans'ls, mains'l, and jib, and these were followed in quick succession by other canvas until at eight bells we had the Fuller stripped to her lower tops'ls, close reefed main upper tops'l, and storm stays'ls. The sea rose to mammoth proportions, fetching as it did from the very edge of the Antarctic ice barrier.
The canvas aloft soon became stiff with ice and all gear on the ship was coated with frozen rain, as we were swept by a succession of rain and hail storms. At nightfall we were hove to, on the starboard tack under goose winged main lower tops'l, reefed main trys'l, and storm stays'l. The oil tank forward was dripping its contents on the sea, and two oil bags were slung from the fore and main weather channels.
The storm, for the wind had now increased to fully sixty miles an hour, held steady from the west until midnight. Then it suddenly went to nor'west, and in the squalls, when the wind rose to hurricane force, the Fuller lay over on her beam ends. A vicious cross sea added its danger to the situation. All hands were then on deck, remaining aft near the mizzen rigging. The fo'c'sle, galley, and forward cabin were awash. Four men braced themselves at the spokes of the wheel, under the eye of the second mate, and relieving tackles were hooked to ease the "kick" of the tiller. Preventer braces and rolling tackles, got up earlier in the day, were hove taut to steady the heavy spars aloft. All loose gear was streaming to leeward, washing in the sea, through the open scuppers and freeing ports. A fierce boiling of white phosphorescent wave caps lit the sea as it broke over the ship, intensifying the black pandemonium overhead. The sleet-laden spume shot over the prostrate vessel in a continuous roar, drowning all attempts at shouting of orders.
It was during the wild but fascinating hours of this night that I realized the high quality of seamanship that had prepared us for an ordeal such as we were going through. The consummate skill with which the great wooden craft was being handled came home to me with a force that could not be denied. How easily a bungling lubber might have omitted some precaution, or carried sail improperly, or have done, or not done, the thousand things that would have spelled disaster!
The captain and mate stood at the lee of the mizzen mast, each with a turn of the tops'l sheets about him, and hitched over the monkey rail. The rest of us, crouching at the lee of the cabin trunk, knee deep in the water when she went over in the heavier squalls, held our places wondering what turn things would take next. Looking through one of the after cabin ports, on my way to the wheel, I saw Chow and Komoto, the cabin boy, packing a box by the light of the small lamp swinging in its gimbals. They were evidently getting ready to leave—where to—themselves and their gods alone knew.
All things have an end, and the Stygian blackness of the night gave way to gray streaks of dawn that broke upon us, revealing a scene of utmost desolation. A note of order was given to the wild confusion of the gale-wracked fabric, when Chips, his lanky figure skimming along the life line, and his sounding rod sheltered under his long oil coat, ventured to the main fife rail to sound the well. As for the crew, we were soaked with salt water and frozen to the marrow. The main lower tops'l had blown from the bolt ropes during the night; we never missed it until morning. Twenty feet of the lee bulwark—the port side—was gone, and a flapping rag of canvas at the main hatch told us that the tarpaulin was torn. Looking forward through the whistle of wind and spume that cut across the sharply tilted rigging, the scene was one of terrific strife, as though some demon ruler of the sea had massed his forces, and was making a desperate drive for the destruction of the wooden handiwork of man upon which he dared to venture over those forbidden wastes.
