In return I told her of our voyage, and her lover’s strange behaviour. How he had wanted to undertake the navigation of the yacht, and had talked of a great world of weed. How I had -believing him unhinged - refused to listen to him.
How he had taken matters into his own hands, without which she would most certainly have ended her days surrounded by the quaking weed and those great beasts of the deep waters.
She listened with an ever growing seriousness, so that I had, time and again, to assure her that I bore my old chum no ill, but rather held myself to be in the wrong. At which she shook her head, but seemed mightily relieved.
It was during Barlow’s recovery that I made the astonishing discovery that he remembered no detail of his imprisoning of me.
I am convinced now that for days and weeks he must have lived in a sort of dream in a hyper state, in which I can only imagine that he had possibly been sensitive to more subtle understandings than normal bodily and mental health allows.
One other thing there is in closing. I found that the captain and the two mates had been confined to their cabins by Barlow. The captain was suffering from a pistol-shot in the arm, due to his having attempted to resist Barlow’s assumption of authority.
When I released him he vowed vengeance. Yet Ned Barlow being my chum, I found means to slake both the captain’s and the two mates’ thirst for vengeance, and the slaking thereof is -well, another story.
John Masefield
DAVY JONES’S GIFT
'Gone to Davy Jones’ Locker' is, of course, a very familiar term among seamen to describe anyone who is drowned at sea. Davy Jones is supposed to have been a sailor originally, but for generations now he has been thought of as a sea-spirit or devil. Stories about Davy Jones are naturally many and varied, but few writers have treated the legend with greater imagination than former-seaman-turned-author John Masefield (1878-1967).
Masefield was schooled for the Merchant Navy on the training ship Conway, and then served his apprenticeship on a windjammer. There he acquired the intimate knowledge of life at sea under sail which gave such authenticity and atmosphere to his prose and poetry. When ill-health forced him to leave the sea, he turned to verse and scored an immediate hit with his first collection, Salt Water Ballads (1902). Later, he mingled fact and fantasy in outstanding collections such as A Tarpaulin Muster (1907) and A Mainsail Haul (1913).
John Masefield*s distinguished contributions to literature were honoured when he was made Poet Laureate in 1930, and then when he was awarded the O.M. in 1935. In the story which follows, 'Davy Jones's Gift' (1907) there is a little of the poetical and a lot of his feeling for the sea combined in a wholely original way.
‘Once upon a time,’ said the sailor, ‘the Devil and Davy Jones came to Cardiff, to a place called Tiger Bay. They put up at T ony Adams’s, not far from Pier Head, at the comer of Sunday Lane. And all the time they stayed there they used to be going to the rumshop, where they sat at a table, smoking their cigars, and dicing each other for different persons’ souls. Now you must know that the Devil gets landsmen, and Davy Jones gets sailor-folk; and they get tired of having always the same, so then they dice each other for some of another sort.
‘One time they were in a place in Mary Street, having some burnt brandy, and playing red and black for the people passing. And while they were looking out on the street and turning the cards, they saw all the people on the pavement breaking their necks to get into the gutter. And they saw all the shop-people running out and kowtowing, and all the carts pulling up, and all the police saluting. “Here comes a big nob,” said Davy Jones. “Yes,” said the Devil; “it’s the Bishop that’s stopping with the Mayor.” “Red or black?” said Davy Jones, picking up a card. “I don’t play for bishops,” said the Devil. “I respect the cloth,” he said. “Come on, man,” said Davy Jones. “I’d give an admiral to have a bishop. Come on, now; make your game. Red or black?” “Well, I say red,” said the Devil. “It’s the ace of clubs,” said Davy Jones; “I win; and it’s the first bishop ever I had in my life.” The Devil was mighty angry at that - at losing a bishop. “I’ll not play any more,” he said; “I’m off home. Some people gets too good cards for me. There was some queer shuffling when that pack was cut, that’s my belief.”
‘“Ah, stay and be friends, man,” said Davy Jones. “Look at what’s coming down the street. I’ll give you that for nothing.”
‘Now, coming down the street there was a reefer - one of those apprentice fellows. And he was brass-bound fit to play music. He stood about six feet, and there were bright brass buttons down his jacket, and on his collar, and on his sleeves. His cap had a big gold badge, with a house-flag in seven different colours in the middle of it, and a gold chain cable of a chinstay twisted round it. He was wearing his cap on three hairs, and he walked on both the pavements and all the road. His trousers were cut like wind-sails round the ankles. He had a fathom of red silk tie rolling out over his chest. He’d a cigarette in a twisted clay holder a foot and a half long. He was chewing tobacco over his shoulders as he walked. He’d a bottle of rum-hot in one hand, a bag of jam tarts in the other, and his pockets were full of love-letters from every port between Rio and Callao, round by the East.
“You mean to say you’ll give me that?” said the Devil. “I will,” said Davy Jones, “and a beauty he is. I never see a finer.” ‘He is, indeed, a beauty,” said the Devil. “I take back what I said about the cards. I’m sorry I spoke crusty. What’s the matter with some more burnt brandy?” “Burnt brandy be it,” said Davy Jones. So then they rang the bell, and ordered a new jug and clean glasses.
‘Now the Devil was so proud of what Davy had given him, he couldn’t keep away from him. He used to hang about the East Bute Docks, under the red-brick clock-tower, looking at the barque the young man worked aboard. Bill Harker his name was. He was in a West Coast barque, the Coronet loading fuel for Hilo. So at last, when the Coronet was sailing, the Devil shipped himself aboard her, as one of the crowd in the fo’c’sle, and away they went down the Channel. At first he was very happy, for Bill Harker was in the same watch, and the two would yarn together. And though he was wise when he shipped, Bill Harker taught him a lot. There was a lot of things Bill Harker knew about. But when they were off the River Plate, they got caught in a pampero, and it blew very hard, and a big green sea began to run. The Coronet was a wet ship, and for three days you could stand upon her poop, and look forward and see nothing but a smother of foam from the break of the poop to the jib-boom. The crew had to roost on the poop. The fo’c’sle was flooded out. So while they were like this the flying jib worked loose. “The jib will be gone in half a tick,” said the mate. “Out there, one of you, and make it fast, before it blows away.” But the boom was dipping under every minute, and the waist was four feet deep, and green water came aboard all along her length. So none of the crowd would go forward. Then Bill Harker shambled out, and away he went forward, with the green seas smashing over him, and he lay out along the jib-boom and made the sail fast, and jolly nearly drowned he was. “That’s a brave lad, that Bill Harker,” said the Devil. “Ah, come off,” said the sailors. “Them reefers, they haven’t got souls to be saved.” It was that that set the Devil thinking.