XIX. THE YANKEE AMONGST THE MERMAIDS. A YARN, BY A CAPE CODDER.

Do I b’leve in the sea-sarpint? You might as well ax me if I b’leved in the compass, or thought the log could lie. I’ve never seed the critter myself, cos I haint cruised in them waters as he locates himself in, not since I started on my first voyage in the ‘Confidence’ whaler, Captain Coffing; but I recking I’ve got a brother as hails from Nahant, that sees him handsome every year, and knows the latitude and longitude of the beast, just as well as I knows the length o’ the futtock shrouds o’ the foretops.

Did you ever see a marmaid? Waell, then, I reckon you’d best shut up, cos I have, and many on ’em; and marmen too, and marmisses and marmasters, of all sizes, from babbies not bigger nor mackrels to regular six-feeters, with starns like a full-grow’d porpus. I’ve been at a marmaid’s tea-party, and after larnin’ the poor ignorant scaly critters how to splice the main-brace, I left the hull bilin’ on ’em blazin’ drunk.

You see, when our craft was cruisin’ up the Arches, we cast anchor one mornin’ in pretty deep water, just abrest of a small green island as wasn’t down in the chart, and hadn’t got no name, nyther. But our capting know’d what he was arter, abeout as right as ninepence, cos a small skewner came alongside pretty sune, freighted with brandy and wine for the officers, what they’d ordered for their own private stores. Waell, the slings was run up to the end o’ the main-yard, and the waisters were busy hoistin’ up the barrils, when a cask o’ brandy slipped from the slings as it was being canted round, and dropped right splash into the sea, sinkin’ right away. Upon ’zaminationing the manifest, it proved to be the best cask o’ brandy in the skewner, imported from Boardo direct for the capting himself.

“You etarnal lazy suckers,” said he; “look here! take all the boats’ anchors, lash ’em together in tews so as to form grapnels o’ four pints each, and drag all about here for that ar’ brandy—and mind you find it, or I’ll put every mother’s son of you on short allowance o’ rye for the next month.”

Waell, the boats was ordered out, and a gropin’ we went. I was placed in the jolly, with Sy Davis and Pete Slinks, and a middy to direct. The middy was a pretty considerable smart fellow, and jest as we was puttin’ off, he nodded up to the chaplin as was leanin’ over the side, and says:

“What say you to an hour’s float upon this here glassy sea?”

The parson was down by the man ropes in a minnit, and off we sot a fishin’ for the brandy tub.

The current run pretty slick by the side o’ the little island, and the second luff, who was in the cutter, ordered us to go a-head and watch along the shore jest to see if the tub warn’t rolled up there by the tide. We pretended to look right hard for the tub, till we made the lee o’ the island, and then if we didn’t resolve to take it easy and run the noose o’ the jolly into the yaller sand o’ the shore, there ain’t no snakes. I held on in the starn by the grapnel, and the parson pulled out of his pocket a good-sized sample bottle o’ the new stuff as he’d jest bought, and wanted the middy to taste—and arter passin’ their ideas on the licker, the chaplin gave us men a pretty stiff horn a piece, now I tell you—and first-rate it was, I swow. It iled the parson’s tongue like all out-doors—it took him to talk—all abeout the old original anteek names o’ the islands that laid in spots all about thar’—classic ground, as he called it, and a pretty yarn he did spin tew.

Then the middy, who’d been keepin’ dark and layin’ low all this time, show’d his broughtens-up, and let fly a hull broadside at the parson about them ar’ syringes and other fabblus wimming.

Waell, you see, all this here talk made us dry as thunder; so the chaplin said he guessed the sun was over the fore-yard, and baled us out another horn o’ licker all round. Then he took a “spell ho!” at the jawin’ tackle, and allowed there was a river in Jarminy, where all our Dutch imegrants hails from, and that a naked gall used to locate herself in a whirlpool, and come up on moonshiney nights and sing a hull bookful o’ songs, as turned the heads o’ all the young fellers in them parts. Waell, reports ruz up as she’d a hull cargo o’ gold stowed away at the bottom o’ the whirlpool, and many a wild young Jarman, seduced by the gall’s singin’ and hopes o’ gold, lept into the river, and warn’t heerd on never arter. These matters hurt the young gall’s kariter, and the old folks, who’d always allowed that she was a kind of goddess, began to think that she warn’t the clear grit, and the young fellers said her singin’ was no great shakes, and that her beauty warn’t the thing it was cracked up to be.

There was a famous general, who wasn’t raised in that section o’ the country, but had swapped a castle on a mountain in Spain for one o’ them ar’ water lots near the whirlpool; he began to find himself rayther short o’ cash to buy his groceries, and concluding that he couldn’t dew without a leetle whiskey to keep off the aguy, resolved to pay the whirlpool gall a visit, and jest see if he couldn’t soft soap the young critter out of a leetle rhino. Next full moon, he tortles to the bluff what hung over the bilin’ and foamin’ river, and jest at eight bells, up ruz the gall, stark naked, a sittin’ on the white froth o’ the whirlin’ water, and singin’, “Won’t you come to my bower what I’ve shaded for you?”

“Waell,” says the gineral, not a bit daunted—says he, “look here, my gall: I mean to eat a lobster salad with you to-night, if you promise to behave like a lady, and won’t cut up no shines.”

Waell, the gall give her word o’ honour, and the gineral dove into the whirlpool, and down they went right slick.

Next mornin’, the gineral was found to hum with a sighter old gold pieces, bigger round than the top of a backer-box, and a hull pot full o’ the tallest kind o’ jewels; you see, the sojer had carried a small flask of Monongahely in his pocket, and the river gall couldn’t git over the old rye—tew glasses opened her heart, I guess, and she let the gineral slip his cable in the mornin’ with just abeout as much gold as he could stow away.

Some o’ his friends kalkilated as he’d better drop his anchor thar’ agin—and there was some talk in the settlement of formin’ a jynt-stock company for the purpose o’ gettin’ up all the gold—but the gineral tell’d ’em he guessed he’d got enough for him, and he seed quite enough down thar’ not to want to go no more; and refusin’ to say what he had seen, or tell ’em how they was to go to work, it kinder stopped the jynt-stock company.

The river gall she fell quite in love with the gineral right up to the hub, and sot on the bilin’ water night arter night, singin’, “Meet me by moonlight alone;” but the gineral said he’d see her drowned first afore he trust her agin—for, says he, “No woman was never deceived twyst,” which riled the river gall like mad, and in revenge she sot the whirlpool a bilin’ like all creation, as if resolved to keep the neighbourhood in hot water. From the sarcumstance of the gineral’s gettin’ so much gold out o’ the river, the Jarmins called it the Rhino, and its been known by somethin’ like that name ever since.

When the chaplain had expended his yarn, he sarved out another allowance o’ licker. I recking that he was the raal grit for a parson—always doin’ as he’d be done by, and practisin’ a darned sight more than he preached. “ ’Taint Christian-like,” says he, “to drink by one’s self, and a raal tar never objects to share his grog with a shipmate.” Them’s gin-a-wine Bunker Hill sentiments, and kinder touch the bottom of a sailor’s heart!

The middy then uncoiled another length o’ cable abeout the fabbelus wimming o’ the sea, and said it were a tarnation pretty idea, that them angels from hevving as ruled the airth should keep watch over the treasures o’ the water. Then he telled a yarn consarnin’ the capting of a marchantman as was trading in the South Seas, layin’ at anchor, becalmed, one Sunday mornin’ abeout five bells, when a strange hail was heard from under the bows o’ the craft, and the hands on deck as answered the hail seed somebody in the water with jest his head and arms stickin’ out, and holdin’ on to the dolphing striker. Waell, I guess they pretty soon throw’d him a rope and hauled him aboard, and then they seed he was a regular built marman, one half kinder nigger, and tother half kinder fish, but altogether more kinder fish than kinder nigger. So, as I was tellin’ you, they got him aboard, and he made an enquerry arter the capting, who come out o’ his cabing, and the marman made him a first-rate dancin’-skeul bow, and says in ginnewine English:

“Capting, I sorter recking it ain’t entered into your kalkilation as this here is Sabber-day, for you’ve dropped your tarnal big anchor right in front o’ our meetin’-house door, and our folks can’t go to prayers.”

Waell, the capting was rayther taken aback, and the calm, you see, overlayin’ him in that thar’ hot latitude, had sot his back up above a bit; and besides that, he felt considerable streeked at bein’ roused out o’ his mornin’s nap for nothin’; so, altogether he felt sorter wolfish, and lookin’ at the strannger darned savagerous, says:

“Who in creation are you?”

This here speech put the marman’s dander up, for he says right sassy:

“I guess I’m appinted deacon over all the marmans and marmaids in these here parts, and I’ll jest trouble you to treat me with the respect due tew a strannger and a gentleman.”

Waell, I recking the capting’s ebenezer was roused, for he seized hold of a harpoon that was layin’ on the fowksell, and hollered to the marman:

“You fishy vaggybund, make tracks out o’ my ship, you sammony-tailed son of a sea-cook, or I’ll drive the grains slick through your scaly carkiss, I will.”

Waell, the critter seein’ as the capting meant dannger, made but one flop with his tail, and skeeted over the side o’ the ship into the water. The capting did not weigh anchor, nor nothin’, only during the night the cable was cut by the marmen, and the ship drifted on tew a korril reef, and rubbed a tarnal big hole in her plankin’.

“That’s a good yarn,” said the parson, “and I b’leve it’s true as gospel. Nothin’s impossible in natur, and the hull o’ these strange fixins as we hear tell on, is nothin’ more than links in the almighty great chain cable of universal natur’. Bats is the link o’ betweenity as connects the naturs o’ fowls o’ the air and the beasts o’ the field. Seals and alligators links the naturs o’ beasts and fishes. Babboons and apes links beasts with humans; and why should not marmaids be the links between humans and the fishes o’ the sea? But there’s the signal for the boat’s return; here’s jest a little horn a piece in the bottle—let’s licker one more round, and then absquattle.”

We pulled quietly back to the ship. The barrel of brandy had not been found, and I wish I may be sniggered if the capting did not fly into the biggest kind o’ quarter-deck passion I ever did see. He stormed great guns and fired hull broadsides at the boat’s crews, swearin’ that they should keep on dredgin’ till the tub was found, if it was the day arter eternity. So, you see, the hands was piped to dinner, but I was ordered tew keep in the boats and take care they didn’t stave each other.

Waell, I laid down in the capting’s gig, and what with the parson’s licker, and the talk abeout marmaids, and syringes, and water-galls, and one thing and t’other, a very pretty muss began mixin’ in my brain pan. So, as I was layin’ comfortably moored in the starn-sheets, with my head a leetle over the boats’ quarter, I thought it highly unwrong that the brandy tub hadn’t been fotched up, and that the men usin’ the grapnels must have shirked as we did, cos, if they’d sarched as they oughter, they must have seed the barrel, for the water was so petickler clear that you could dissarn the crabs crawlin’ over the korril rocks at the bottom o’ twenty fathom.

Waell, while I was lookin’ into the ocean to see if I could light upon the barrel, a leetle o’ the largest fish I ever did see come and swum right close to the bottom of the sea, jest under the boats. Then it kept risin’ and risin’, till I seed its long fins were shaped like men’s arms; and when it come near the sarfis, it turned on its back, and then I seed a human face! I know’d at once that it was a marmaid, or a marman, or one o’ them amfibberus critters called fabbelus syringes, as the chaplain had been spinnin’ his yarns abeout. So, the critter popt its head up jest above the water, which was smooth as glass, and a little smoother tew by a darned sight, and jest as clear and jest as shiny, and says he to me:

“Look here, strannger, you and your shipmates ain’t doin’ the genteel thing to me no how you can fix it, for they’re playing old hub with my garding grounds and oyster beds by scratchin’ and rakin’ ’em all over with them ar’ darned anchors and grapnel fixins, in a manner that’s harrowin’ to my feelins. If the capting wants his thundernation licker tub, let him just send eeny decent Christian down with me, and I’ll gin it him.”

Waell, I’m not goin’ to say that I didn’t feel kinder skeered, but the chaplain’s yarns had rubbed the rough edge off, and the notion o’ findin’ the capting’s cask pleased me mightily, cos I knowed it would tickle the old man like all creation, and sartingly get me three or four liberty days for shore goin’ when we returned to Port Mahon. So, as I hadn’t on nothin’ petikler as would spile, only a blue cotting shirt and sail-cloth pantys, and the weather bein’ most uncommon warm, I jest told the marman I was ready, and tortled quietly over the boat’s side into the blue transparent sea.

The marman grappled me by the fist, and we soon touched bottom, now I tell ye. I found as I could walk easy enough, only the water swayed me abeout jest as if I war a leetle tight, but I didn’t seem to suffer nothin’ from want o’ breath, nyther.

We soon reached whar’ the brandy-cask was lyin’ right under the ship’s keel, which accounts for its not bein’ seen nor nothin’ by the boats’ crews. I felt so everlastingly comical abeout findin’ the tub, that I told the half-bred dolphing fellow that pinted it out, that if I knowed how to tap it, I wish I might die if I wouldn’t give him a gallon o’ the stuff as a salvage fee.

“What’s in it?” says the marman.

“Why, licker,” says I.

“Waell,” says the marman, “so I heerd them scrapin’ fellers in the boats say; but I guess I’ve licker enough to last my time, tho’ I recking your licker is something stronger than salt water, seein’ that its hooped up in that almighty way.”

“Why, you lubber,” says I, “it’s brandy—the raal ginnewine coneyhack.”

“And what’s that?” says the marman.

“Why, dew tell—want to know?” says I; “have you lived to your time o’ life without tastin’ spirretus licker? Waell, I swow, you oughter be the commodore of all them cold water clubs, and perpetual president of all temp’rance teetotallers. Go ahead, matey; pilot the way to your shanty, and I’ll roll the barrel arter you. I’ll sune give you a drink o’ licker that will jest take the shirt-tail off eeny thing you ever did taste, now I tell you.”

Waell, the critter flopped ahead, for you see its the natur’ o’ the marmen, seein’ as they’ve no legs, only a fish’s tail what’s bent under them, jest like the lower part o’ the letter J, to make way by floppin’ their starns up and down, and paddlin’ with their hands—somethin’ between a swim and a swagger—but the way they get through the water is a caution. I rolled the tub along over the smooth white shiny sand, and the crabs and lobsters skeeted off right and left sides out o’ my way regular skeered, and big fishes of all shapes and makes, with bristlin’ fins, swum close alongside me, and looked at me quite awful with their small gooseberry eyes, as much as to say, “What the nation are you at?”

Bymeby, the marman brought up in front of rayther a largeish cave or grotto of rock and shell work, kivered with korril and sea-weed. So, you see, the tub was put right on eend in one corner; I made an enquerry o’ the marman if he had a gimblet, and he said he b’leved there was such a thing in the hold or cellar; he’d found a carpenter’s tool-chest in a wreck a few miles to the easterd, and he fotched away six or seving of the leetle fixins, thinkin’ they might be useful to hum—so, he opened the back door and hailed a young marman to bring him the gimblet.

Seein’ as there was no benches nor nothin’ to sit down on, which marmen and marmaids don’t desire, cos they’ve no sittin’ parts to their bodies, which is all fish from their waistbands, I jest sot on the top o’ the brandy tub, and took an observation of the critter before me. His face was reglar human, only it looked rayther tawney and flabby like a biled nigger, with fishy eyes, and a mouth like a huge tom cod. His hair hung stret down his shoulders, and was coarse and thick, like untwisted rattlin’; his hands were somethin’ like a goose’s paw, only the fingers were longer and thicker; and his body was not exactly like an Injin’s nor a nigger’s, nor a white man’s—nor was it yaller, nor blue, nor green—but a sorter altogether kinder mixed up colour, lookin’ as if it were warranted to stand the weather. Jest abeout midships, his body was tucked into a fish’s belly, with huge green scales right down to the tail.

Whilst I was surveyin’ the marman fore and aft, the back door opened, and a she critter flopped in, with a young marman at the breast. The leetle sucker was not bigger than a pickerel, with a tail of a delicate sammon colour, and a head and body jest like one o’ them small tan monkeys, with a face as large as a dollar. The marman introduced the she critter as his wife, and we soon got into a coil of talk right slick, all abeout the weather, and the keare and trouble o’ a young family—and I wished I may be swamped if the marmaid warn’t a dreadful nice critter to chatter. Like all wimming folk, she was plaguey kewrous as to whar’ I was raised and rigged—and when I said I guess I hailed from Cape Cod, and all along shore thar’, she looked at the marman, and said to me:

“Waell, I never—Cape Cod! why, strannger, I guess there must be some finnity in our breeds.”

Waell, you see, I grew rayther kewrous tew, and wanted to log the petiklers o’ the nateral history o’ the race o’ marmen—so I made a few enquerries respectin’ their ways o’ life.

“I guess,” says I, “you’ve a tarnal good fish market in these here parts, and keep your table well supplied with hallibut and sea-bass, and black-fish, eh?”

“Why, strannger,” says the marman, rayther wrathy, “seein’ its you I won’t be offended, or, by hevving, if that speech ain’t enough to make a marman feel scaly, why then it ain’t no matter. We claim to be half fish in our natur’, and I reckon you don’t kalkilate we gobbles our relations? there’s sea varmint enough in all conscience, sitch as oysters, and clams, and quahogs, and muscles, and crabs, and lobsters. We go the hull shoat with them; and then we cultivates kail and other sea truck in our gardings, and sometimes we swims under the wild fowl as they’re floatin’, and jerks down a fine duck or a gull, or gathers their eggs off the rocks, or the barnacles off drift wood.”

Jest then, the marman’s eldest son-fish fotched in the gimblet, and brought up the marman’s jawin’ tacks with a round turn. The young un was about the size of an Injin boy jest afore he runs alone—half papoose, half porpus. He got a leetle skeered when he clapt eyes on me, but I gave him a stale quid o’ backer to amuse himself, and the sugar plum made the marmaster roll his eyes above a bit, now I tell you.

Waell, I bored a hole in the brandy tub, and pickin’ up an empty clam-shell, handed a drink to the lady, and told her to tote it down. She swaller’d it pretty slick, and the way she gulped afterwards, and stared, and twisted her fishy mouth, was a sin to Davy Crockett. The marman looked rayther wolfy at me, as if I’d gin her pison; so I drawed a shell-fall and swallered it myself. This kinder cooled him down, and when the marmaid got her tongue tackle in runnin’ order agin, she said she guessed the licker was the juice of hevving, and she’d be darned if she wouldn’t have another drink right off the reel.

Seein’ this, the marman swallered his dose, and no sooner got it down than he squealed right out, and clapped his webby hands together, and wagged his tail like all creation. He swore it was elegant stuff, and he felt it tickle powerful from the top of his head to the eend of his starn-fin. Arter takin’ two or three horns together, the sonny cried for a drink, and I gin him one that sent him wrigglin’ on the sand like an eel in an uneasiness. So, the marman said as the licker was raal first-rate, and first-rater than that tew, he guessed he’d ask in his next door neighbour and his lady, jest to taste the godsend. Waell, in a minnit, in comes a huge marman of the most almighty size, looking jest like Black Hawk when he was bilious; he fotched up his lady with him, and his eldest son, a scraggy hobbadehoy marman, and his darters, two young marmaids or marmisses, jest goin’ out o’ their teens, who flapped their yaller-skinned paws over their punking-coloured chops, pretendin’ to be almighty skeered at comin’ afore a strannge man in a state o’ natur’—but they forgot all abeout that thar’ when the licker was handed to them.

Arter takin’ a few smallers, the fresh marman said he guessed the clam-shell was altogether tew leetle to get a proper amount of licker whereby a feller could judge correctly of the raal taste o’ the stuff—so he went to his berth in the next cave, and fotched a large blue and silver shell that held abeout a pint.

The news o’ the brandy-tub spred pretty slick, for in half an hour, I’d the hull grist o’ the marmen belongin’ to that settlement cooped up in the cavern. Sitch a noisy swillin’ set o’ wet souls I never did see; the drunk com’ on em almighty strong, for they kept me sarvin’ out the licker jest as quick as it would run. I thought if the capting could have seen me astridin’ his brandy-cask, in an underground grocery at the bottom o’ the sea, surrounded by sich a skeul of odd fish, how many dozen at the gangway would he have ordered the bosen’s mate to have sarved me out?

The way the drunk affected the different critters was right kewrous, now I tell you. One great scaly feller stiffened his tail all up, and stood poppindickler erect on the peaked pints of the eend fin, like a jury-mast, and jawed away raal dignified at all the rest, wantin’ them to appoint him a sort o’ admiral over the hull crew. Another yeller feller, with a green tail, was so dreadful blue, that he doubled himself into a figgery 5, and sung scraps and bits o’ all sorts o’ sea songs, till he got tew drunk to speak at all. Some o’ the marmen wanted to kiss all the marmaids, and tew o’ the ladies begun scratchin’ and fightin’ like two pusseys, cos one trod on t’other’s tail. Some went floppin’ and dancin’ on the sand like mad, raisin’ sitch a dust that I could not see to draw the licker—but the party round the tub soon druv’ them to the right abeout, as interferin’ with the interest o’ the settlement. Every minnit some fresh marman dropped on the ground with the biggest kind of load on; I never seed a set o’ critters so almighty tight, yellin’, swearin’, huggin’, and fightin’, till they growed so darned savagerous that I kinder feared for my own safety amongst them drunken moffradite sea aborgoines. So, you see, I up and told them that I’d clapt my veto on the licker, and that they should not have any more.

Waell, if ever you did hear a most etarnal row, or see a hull raft o’ drunken fellers cut didoes, then was the time. It was voted that I were a public enemy, and every half-drunken marman suddenly become very ’fishus to have me lynched, and it were settled at last that I were to be rode on a rail, and then tarred and feathered. But, while some o’ the varmint went arter the rail and the tar, the rest o’ the critters begun quarrelin’ who was to sarve out the licker; and as each marman, drunk or sober, wanted to have the keare o’ the precious stuff, they soon raised a pretty muss, and kept on tearin’ at each other like a pack o’ wolves. Seein’ this, I jest kinder sneaked quietly away from the cave grocery till I com’ in sight o’ the ship, when I struck upperd for the sarfis, and swum for dear life. I soon seed that the boats’ crew were musterin’ for another bout o’ draggin’ for the brandy-cask; so, fearin’ least the capting should miss me, I jest laid hold o’ the edge o’ the gig, and crawled in pretty quickly, and laid myself down in the starn-sheets, as if I’d never been out o’ the boat.

I hadn’t laid thar’ half a second, when I heerd a noise jest for all the world as if somebody was squeezin’ a small thundercloud right over my head. I ruz up, and thar’ were the capting and the hull crew lookin’ over the ship’s side at me—the officers in a tarnal rage, and the men grinnin’ like so many hyenas.

“Rouse up, you long-sided lazy swab, and bring the boats in from the boom. Are you goin’ to sleep all day?”

“Ay, ay, Sir,” said I, jumpin’ up in the boat, when all the water run off me like forty thousand mill-streams—I’d been so outrageous soaked while down with the marmen. I felt kinder skeered lest the capting should see it, but when I stood up he laughed right out, and so did the hull crew tew.

“Why, he’s not awake yet,” said the capting. “Bosen, give him another bucket.”

You see they wanted to persuade me that I’d fell asleep in the gig, as fast as a meetin’-house, and slept thar’ the hull while the crew were at dinner, and that no shoutin’ nor nothin’ couldn’t wake me up—so, the bosen run along the boom and jest give me a couple o’ buckets o’ sea-water right over me. When I told ’em my yarn abeout the marman poppin’ up his head, and invitin’ me down, and all abeout findin’ the brandy-tub and the rest, they swore that I’d got drunk on the parson’s licker, and dreamt it all in the boat. But I guess I know what I did see, jest abeout as slick as anybody; and the chaplain b’lieved the hull story; and said that as I’d learnt the marmen the valley o’ licker, they’d get huntin’ up all the tubs and barrels out of the different wrecks in all the various seas; and that intemperance would spile the race, and thin ’em off till they became one o’ the things that was—jest like the Injins what’s wastin’ away by the power o’ rum and whiskey given ’em by the white men.

I recking the parson warn’t far out in his kalkilashing. The love o’ licker has had its effect upon the marmen and the marmaids; they must have thinned off surprisin’ly, for I ain’t seed none since, nor I don’t know nobody that has nyther.