“Twenty-five degrees, twenty minutes West,” Mr. Caldwell summed up with un-accustomed glee, “which places us about… here. Five hundred miles Sou’west of Cape Saint Vincent, and only a few minutes North of the thirty-third latitude,” he said, making a tentative X upon the chart.
“Do we stand on this course a few days more, we could fetch the Madeiras,” Lt. Westcott pointed out. “Anyone thirsty for some wine?”
“Or, we stand on West-Sou’west a bit longer ’til we strike the thirty-second latitude, then follow it the lubberly way, right across the Atlantic to Bermuda,” Lewrie countered. “Perhaps thirty-two degrees twenty minutes, just in case.”
He and the Sailing Master had pored over another chart of Bermudan waters for hours, the night before, and both of them had gloomed in unison to note how quickly the Atlantic’s abyssal depths shallowed and shoaled, the nearer one got to shore. Even more fearful were the many and great expanses of rocks, shoals, flats, and banks indicated all round the North, Northwest, and West of the chain of islets that made up the wee archipelago… and the ovals that marked the wrecks of ships that had gone down on those myriad underwater perils. It was not a place to approach unwarily; Bermuda’s old name among sailormen was “The Isle of the Devils”!
“Now your results, young gentlemen,” the Sailing Master asked of the Midshipmen. Some showed blase calm, one or two even beamed in confidence, whilst the two youngest, Munsell and Rossyngton, displayed more trepidation.
“Uhm-hmm, very good, Mister Eldridge,” Mr. Caldwell droned on as he studied each slate or sheet of foolscap. “A few minutes out, Mister Warburton, but close. Uhm-hmm, Mister Entwhistle, Mister Grainger. Well, well, Mister Rossyngton, despite the First Lieutenant’s jape, we are not as close to the Madeiras as you make us. Now then, Mister Munsell,” Caldwell said, expecting the worst, as usual, with a grave phyz on, and a demanding hand out for the lad’s slate. “Well, my word. My word, indeed!” the Sailing Master marvelled, glancing quickly from Munsell to his slate and back again, so “all-aback” that he looked as if he would inspect the backside of the slate, or turn it upside down.
“Mister Eldridge has been tutoring us, sir,” Munsell said with joy. “Me in particular, really,” the lad confessed.
“Not half a degree out, either in longitude or latitude!” Mr. Caldwell exclaimed, holding Munsell’s slate for all to see, to prove it. Even Lewrie, who had struggled for ages with the formula, and admittedly still not a dab-hand navigator, could see that Munsell had worked it properly, with very few side-scribbles, and had not cribbed it from the others. He was all but gape-jawed in amazement, too; Midshipman Munsell could usually place them on the far side of the ocean from where they really were, or somewhere in the jungles of the Amazon when in West Indies waters!
“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!”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
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!