The Sailor, the Plums, and the Ghost: An Odd Night at Sea

The remarkable Nova Scotian-born seaman Joshua Slocum has a permanent place in maritime history as the first person to single-handedly sail around the world (1895-1898.)  On November 14, 1909, he set out on his boat, the “Spray,” from Vineyard Haven, Massachusetts, for the West Indies.  He was never seen again.  His exact fate is still considered a classic mystery of the sea.

Slocum’s book about his round-the-world voyage, “Sailing Around the World,” is a must-read for anyone interested in tales of the sea or travel literature in general.  However, for the purposes of this blog, I will settle for quoting the passage describing how one night, the sailor’s solo expedition went all Strange Company on him.  The occurrence took place in late July 1895, when Slocum was between the Azores and Gibraltar.

Since reaching the islands, I had lived most luxuriously on fresh bread, butter, vegetables, and fruits of all kinds. Plums seemed the most plentiful on the Spray, and these I ate without stint. I had also a Pico white cheese that General Manning, the American consul general, had given me, which I supposed was to be eaten, and of this I partook with the plums. 

Alas! by night-time I was doubled up with cramps. The wind, which was already a smart breeze, was increasing somewhat, with a heavy sky to the sou’-west. Reefs had been turned out, and I must turn them in again somehow. Between cramps I got the main-sail down, hauled out the earrings as best I could, and tied away point by point, in the double reef. 

There being sea-room, I should, in strict prudence, have made all snug and gone down at once to my cabin. I am a careful man at sea, but this night, in the coming storm, I swayed up my sails, which, reefed though they were, were still too much in such heavy weather; and I saw to it that the sheets were securely belayed. In a word, I should have laid to, but did not. I gave her the double-reefed mainsail and whole jib instead, and set her on her course. Then I went below, and threw myself upon the cabin floor in great pain. 

How long I lay there I could not tell, for I became delirious. When I came to, as I thought, from my swoon, I realized that the sloop was plunging into a heavy sea, and looking out of the companionway, to my amazement I saw a tall man at the helm. His rigid hand, grasping the spokes of the wheel, held them as in a vise. One may imagine my astonishment. His rig was that of a foreign sailor, and the large red cap he wore was cockbilled over his left ear, and all was set off with shaggy black whiskers. He would have been taken for a pirate in any part of the world. While I gazed upon his threatening aspect I forgot the storm, and wondered if he had come to cut my throat. This he seemed to divine. 

“Señor,” said he, doffing his cap, “I have come to do you no harm.” And a smile, the faintest in the world, but still a smile, played on his face, which seemed not unkind when he spoke. 

"I have come to do you no harm. I have sailed free,” he said, “but was never worse than a contrabandista. I am one of Columbus’s crew,” he continued. “I am the pilot of the Pinta come to aid you. Lie quiet, señor captain,” he added, “and I will guide your ship tonight. you have a calentura, but you will be all right tomorrow.” 

I thought what a very devil he was to carry sail. Again, as if he read my mind, he exclaimed: “Yonder is the Pinta ahead; we must overtake her. Give her sail; give her sail! Vale, vale, muy vale!” Biting off a large quid of black twist, he said: “You did wrong, captain, to mix cheese with plums. White cheese is never safe unless you know whence it comes. Quien sabe, it may have been from leche de Capra and becoming capricious — ”

“Avast, there!” I cried. “I have no mind for moralizing.” 

I made shift to spread a mattress and lie on that instead of the hard floor, my eyes all the while fastened on my strange guest, who, remarking again that I would have “only pains and calentura,” chuckled as he chanted a wild song: 

High are the waves, fierce, gleaming, 

High is the tempest roar! 

High is the sea-bird screaming! 

High the Azore! 

I suppose I was now on the mend, for I was peevish, and complained: “I detest your jingle. Your Azore should be a roost, and would have been were it a respectable bird!” I begged he would tie a rope-yarn on the rest of the song, if there was any more of it. 

I was still in agony. Great seas were boarding the Spray, but in my fevered brain I thought they were boats falling on deck, that careless draymen were throwing from wagons on the pier to which I imagined the Spray was now moored, and without fenders to breast her off. 

“You’ll smash your boats!” I called out again and again, as the seas crashed on the cabin over my head. “You’ll smash your boats, but you can’t hurt the Spray. She is strong!” I cried. 

I found, when my pains and calentura had gone, that the deck, now as white as a shark’s tooth from seas washing over it, had been swept of everything movable. To my astonishment, I saw now at broad day that the Spray was still heading as I had left her, and was going like a race-horse. Columbus himself could not have held her more exactly on her course. The sloop had made ninety miles in the night through a rough sea. I felt grateful to the old pilot, but I marvelled some that he had not taken in the jib. 

The gale was moderating, and by noon the sun was shining. A meridian altitude and the distance on the patent log, which I always kept towing, told me that she had made a true course throughout the twenty-four hours. 

I was getting much better now, but was very weak, and did not turn out reefs that day or the night following, although the wind fell light; but I just put my wet clothes out in the sun when it was shining, and lying down there myself, fell asleep. 

Then who should visit me again but my old friend of the night before, this time, of course, in a dream. 

“You did well last night to take my advice,” said he, “and if you would, I should like to be with you often on the voyage, for the love of adventure alone.” 

Finishing what he had to say, he again doffed his cap and disappeared as mysteriously as he came, returning, I suppose, to the phantom Pinta. 

I awoke much refreshed, and with the feeling that I had been in the presence of a friend and a seaman of vast experience. I gathered up my clothes, which by this time were dry, then, by inspiration, I threw overboard all the plums in the vessel.

Yes, the story does read like food poisoning-induced delirium.  However, there is that matter about the “Spray” staying on course through a gale…

[Note: If you’d like to read more about Slocum’s adventurous life, Stan Grayson’s “A Man For All Oceans” is a terrific biography.]