The Mysterious Island Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Captain Grant's Children

Chapter 53 Captain Grant's Children (53)
Then, at seven o'clock in the evening on this day, the weather suddenly changed.The sky suddenly turned black, and it was overwhelming.Even the captain, Will Halle, was jolted out of his drunken world.He finally walked out of the cabin, rubbing his drunken eyes, shaking his fat red head in order to refresh himself, swallowing the air on the sea, and then looking up at the mast.At this time, the wind was blowing violently, and the wind direction changed from west to east, as if to help the "McGalli" and blow it to the coast of New Zealand as soon as possible.

Seeing this, Will Halle shouted at his sailors; and when they woke up, he urged them to lower the topsail and hoist the nightsail.John Mengel watched from the side, still secretly praising him, this person still has a lot of sailing experience.However, he still ignored the bear captain.Sir Glenarvan was also on deck, still uneasy.After two hours, the sea wind blew stronger and stronger.Will Halle hastily ordered the sailors to furl the small front sail.Because the "Meccali" has a total of two layers of sail racks, as long as the upper layer is lowered, the front sail will naturally shrink, so this work is also very convenient.

Two hours later, the waves became higher and higher, and the "McGalli" vibrated violently in the rough sea.The waves also washed up on the deck, which caused a lot of water to accumulate in the cabin.Suddenly, a big wave swept away the small side hanging on the port side.

The "McGalli" was slowly floating on the rough sea, and the seawater on board was accumulating more and more, unable to be excreted, and it seemed that it was really going to sink.John Mengel watched all this with apprehension.He was very anxious, and proposed to use a knife and an ax to break the side of the ship, so that the water could drain out, but Will Halle firmly disagreed.

At this moment, there is a bigger disaster coming to this ship, and it is impossible to prevent it.

When it was almost 11:30, John Menger, Wilson and some people standing on the deck suddenly heard a very strange sound, which was very scary.The instincts endowed by years of sailing experience at sea made the two of them immediately heightened their vigilance. Meng Geer unconsciously held Wilson's hand and said:
"This is the headwind of the sea!"

"Yes, that's right! It's indeed a headwind. This should be the sound of waves hitting the rocks!" Wilson said.

"It should be 400 meters at most!"

"Yes, not far from the coast!"

As John Mengel said, he looked overboard to observe the state of the waves, and shouted loudly:

"Wilson, sounding, quick, sounding fast!"

Wilson hastily picked up the water measuring hammer, ran all the way to the foremast plate, and dropped the plumb weight.But Will Halle, sitting in the bow, cared nothing about all this.Wilson saw that the rope fell from between his fingers and stopped at three knots.

"God! Only nine meters!" Wilson shouted.

When John Mengel heard the news, he knew that something was wrong, and immediately rushed to Will Halley, shouting:

"Captain, look, this ship is about to hit a rock."

Will Halle also witnessed all this, but he shrugged and made a helpless expression.John Mungle didn't have time to pay attention to him, but ran straight to the tiller and turned the rudder with his hand outstretched.At the same time Wilson was pulling with all his might on the foremast's jib, in order to divert the wind from the ship.

"Loosen the buckle, relax, so that you can borrow the wind!" Meng Geer shouted, while turning the tiller vigorously.They thought that through this, the "McGalley" could avoid the reef smoothly.

In about half a minute, the bow finally changed direction and successfully avoided the reef on the right.Although the wind was strong at night, Menger could still see a white wave not far from the starboard side of the ship.

At this time, Captain Will Halle, the bear, knew that something was wrong, and became anxious.But everyone only heard him yelling, but they didn't know what he was yelling, or what he wanted to do?Moreover, all the sailors under him were too drunk to wake up, so they didn't know what he wanted to express.This stupid bear didn't know that the boat was only eight nautical miles away from the coast. Maybe he thought it was at least thirty or forty nautical miles away from the coast, and it was still early!Where there are many reefs near the coast, and the moon is dark and the wind is high, the meager sailing experience of this bear captain is useless at all!
Fortunately, Captain John Mungle was in charge of it all.The experienced young captain hastily ordered and decisively let the "McGalli" avoid the dangerous shoal.It's a pity that Meng Geer couldn't figure out the situation along the coast, nor did he know where the ship was, or whether the ship had sunk into a rocky area.At this time, the westerly wind was blowing fiercely on the sea, and the ship was bumping violently up and down, and it was easy to hit the rocks.Once it happens, the consequences are really unimaginable.

Not long after, there was also the sound of headwinding waves on the starboard side of the ship.John had no choice but to turn the tiller again and adjust the sail again.It's a pity that there are too many hidden reefs, and the ship must turn around.However, in the current situation, can we make a sharp turn?Meng Geer felt helpless, so he wanted to take a risk.

Menger shouted to Wilson: "Quick! Turn the tiller to the leeward side!"

Although the boat made a sharp turn, it entered another group of reefs.I only saw the waves beating the reef high and stirring up waves in the air.This is really dangerous, life and death!Wilson and Muradi threw their whole bodies on the tiller in order to control the situation.It's a pity that the tiller has been turned to the head long ago, and it won't move no matter how much it turns.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang, and the boat really hit the rocks.The ship's shrouds snapped, and the fore-mast shook.Although the hull was not seriously damaged during the impact, it still couldn't fall over the bow.At this time, another wave rushed over, rushed the ship high, and then rushed to the top of the reef, and then stopped suddenly, which made the foremast of the ship, as well as the sail and the ropes, all fall off.The boat was hit back and forth by the waves two or three times, and the boat really couldn't move, and stopped at a [-]-degree angle.

The glass on the ship's wall was blown away by the waves, and these passengers ran out of the cabin one after another, and went to the deck together; however, the waves were fierce and repeatedly hit the deck, and it was very dangerous to stay here.John was afraid that everyone would be in danger, so he persuaded them to go back to their cabins.

"To tell the truth, John, what is the situation now?" asked Sir Glenarvan with a calm face.

"Sir, the ship is not sinking, sir," said Captain Mengel, "but there is no certainty whether the waves will wash it away."

"It's twelve o'clock in the middle of the night!"

"Sir, yes, everything can only be said at dawn, let's continue!"

"Can you sail in the sea with a small boat now?"

"Now the moon is dark and the wind is high, and the waves are so fierce, it's really impossible! Besides, it's pitch black, how can we see the direction clearly, how can we paddle towards the shore?"

"John, let's wait until dawn!"

At this time, Will Halle was running around on the deck like crazy.After panicking for a while, the sailors on the ship became more conscious, and drank the soju again.But Captain Halley jumped on the deck like a madman, crying loudly:

"This is all bad! The goods on the ship are not insured, it's over, it's over, I'm going to lose everything!"

Seeing his appearance, Meng Ge felt that there was nothing to be sorry for, and did not want to comfort him.He raised his vigilance and ordered all his friends to be armed and vigilant to prevent the bear captain and sailors from taking risks and murdering money when they had no way out.

"This bunch of bastards! If anyone dares to rush into this cabin, I will shoot him first!" The major said indifferently.

These unscrupulous sailors originally wanted to seek money and kill, but seeing that the passengers were all fully armed, they had no choice but to give up this idea and slip away wisely.John Menger's worries were finally dispelled, and he could only wait for the arrival of dawn.

At this time, the boat could not move at all.The sea breeze also stopped, and the sea gradually calmed down. It seems that the ship will not completely disintegrate for a while.John Mengel thought, as soon as the day dawned, he would go to check out the surrounding situation and observe where he could go ashore, so that he could use lifeboats to carry people to land.It's a pity that the boat is too small, and can only carry up to four people at a time; in this way, it may take three trips to go back and forth.Besides, that boat was the only one left; the waves had long since carried away the other boat which hung on the port side.

Meng Geer was lying on the canopy of the boat, listening carefully to the sound of the adverse waves, while thinking carefully about the current situation.He was trying to analyze the situation and think of some countermeasures.

The companions in the cabin were exhausted from the whole night's tossing and tossing, and they fell asleep. Glenarvan and Meng Ge also took advantage of their free time to take a nap and rest.

At four o'clock in the morning, the sun's rays appeared in the east, and the sun's rays reflected from the sea; the sea was filled with a thin morning mist, and the waves were slightly surging.

Meng Geer took the lead on the deck, and slowly watched the sky brighten up, and a red cloud appeared in the eastern sky.The vast light also dissipated the morning fog, and the black reef also revealed its majestic appearance.The white foam and spray hit between the rocks, and the water was dripping, so that people on the deck saw the rocks as a black line.In a little distance, a lighthouse was shining red in the distance; it seemed that the land was eight or nine nautical miles away from the ship!

"Ah! Haha! Look, there is land!" John Mengel shouted excitedly.

At this time, Jazz and his party woke up, and they all ran to the deck, silently looking at the land in the distance.Whether the people on the land are good or evil, these travelers think, there is a place to live there.

"By the way, where is the captain?" Sir Glenarvan suddenly thought of this question.

"Sir, I didn't see it, I don't know it," said Menger.

"By the way, what about those sailors?"

"Oh! I didn't see it, I don't know..."

"Could they all be drunk to death?" the major continued.

"Let's look for them!" said Sir Glenarvan. "Humanism cannot ignore them!"

Then, Muradi and Wilson searched everywhere, but after searching for the ship many times, they still didn't find any figure.

"Ah! No one on board?" asked Sir Glenarvan in surprise.

"Perhaps jumped into the sea to escape!" Paganel said angrily.

"It's absolutely possible!" Meng Geer was full of suspicion, and walked towards the stern, saying as he walked, "Let's go find the boat!"

Both Wilson and Muradi were going to help lower the boat into the sea; so they followed Munger, and walked together towards the stern; but when they got there they found that the boat was long gone.

Take on important responsibilities
It turned out that Captain Halley the Bear and his sailors escaped to land in a small boat in the dark all night when Sir Glenarvan and his party were asleep.Normally, the captain was the last to leave the ship, but now he was the first to escape.

"Those bastards have escaped!" said John Mungle to Sir Glenarvan. "Sir, it seems to be doing well, and it will save you a lot of trouble!"

"John, I think so too," said Sir Glenarvan. "A ship must have a captain! Now, you take on this important task! Our skills are not good enough, and we can only be your temporary sailors." !"

After hearing this, everyone applauded together to show their agreement; then they ran to the deck and stood in line, as if they were waiting for the captain's instructions.

"John, give your orders now!" Sir Glenarvan said to the new captain.

Meng Geer first looked at the sea, then at the broken mast, thought for a while and said:
"There are only two ways to successfully get out of danger. The first way is to remove the boat from this reef and sail out to sea; the second way is to row to the shore on a raft."

"In comparison, I think the first way is better if it's feasible!" Sir Glenarvan said.

"That's right. If we don't have a means of transportation, it would be very dangerous to forcibly park on land!" Meng Ge added.

"Yes, you know, this is New Zealand! It's very scary to go ashore in the middle of nowhere!"

"Especially where our ship is, it's gone too far, it's already passed Oakland! It's all done by that bastard drunkard! At noon, we'll take another careful measurement, and it's likely that we'll have to go further. Drive back!"

"Now that the ship is broken down like this, is it really true to continue sailing?" Mrs. Helen asked anxiously.

"Ma'am, there is no obstacle!" Menger reassured, "In fact, we only need to install a temporary mast on the bow as the foremast; even if we walk very slowly, we can still reach Oakland. If it really doesn't work, That can only go to the coast, from land to Auckland."

"Let's check the extent of the ship's damage first!" Major McNabbs suggested.

Glenarvan, Menger, and Muradi hastily lifted the large hatch and entered the cargo hold below.I saw that the cargo hold was full of cooked leather, piled up indiscriminately, and it was estimated to be two hundred tons.In order to reduce the weight of the ship, Meng Geer ordered a part of the leather to be tied up and thrown into the sea.

Everyone worked like this for three hours, and finally cleaned up the bottom of the boat, so that we can observe the condition of the bottom of the boat.As you can see, on the left side of the bottom of the boat, two seams are split.Fortunately, the boat was tilted to the right, so the cracked left side was raised out of the water, and the sea water could not enter the cabin.Wilson hurriedly used some hemp thread, stuffed it into the cracked seam, and then nailed a piece of copper, thus repairing the bottom of the boat.

You can see that the seawater accumulated in the bilge is not even two feet deep; if the water is pumped again, the weight of the ship will be reduced even more.

Check the hull of the boat again, there are no major obstacles yet.

Finally, Wilson dived into the water himself, and finally found out the situation of that part of the ship stuck in the reef.The bow of the boat had touched the mud-sand, and the surrounding of the beach was very steep; the lower part of the beak and about two-thirds of the keel had sunk into the middle of the mud-sand.Most of the hull was above the surface, however; the depth of the water here was about five metres.The rudder is not fully embedded and can be freely steered.Therefore, the "McGalley" is able to operate.

Meng Geer's original plan was to drive the boat away from the reef beach when the tide was high.Now, however, the tide was low, and the boat was heeling to the right, and there was no need to continue to support it.Therefore, Menger planned to use the sail frame on the ship and other wood to form a temporary foremast.But this work will take a day, and it can only be done before noon tomorrow.

"Brothers, let's do it!" Meng Geer did things simply and did what he said.

As soon as the companions who served as sailors temporarily heard it, they started to work.Some were busy furling the sails, others climbed to the topsail, and others lowered the mainsail and topsail.Little Robert was also busy, jumping up and down like a little monkey; his proficiency was definitely not lower than that of any cadet sailor.

Everyone thought that in order to make the bow of the boat tilt up when the tide was high, two anchors should be dropped at the stern.If the boat was here, it would not be a very difficult thing to drop anchor.But now something must be done.

"How shall we do without boats?" asked Sir Glenarvan.

"You can make a raft out of broken masts and wine barrels. I have observed that the anchor of this ship is not very big, so it is not very difficult to throw it. As long as the anchor can be strong, I have a solution!" Captain Mengel said confidently.

"John, do it now! Don't waste your precious time!"

Afterwards, all companions went on deck.Everyone worked together, broke off the mast stump, took off the mast plate, tied up empty wine barrels, and loaded the oars.

When the raft was half finished, the sun was already in the western sky.

John was busy taking bearings so that the raft could be lowered at low tide, and Sir was in charge of directing the work of building the raft.Fortunately, Menger found a Greenwich Observatory almanac in Will Halle's cabin, and a dirty sextant; he took measurements with these instruments.

Menger took bearing measurements on deck.Unfortunately, the line of sight of the sextant telescope was blocked by rocks to the north; Menger thought of using a flat plate filled with mercury to make measurements, but where could one get mercury?Meng Geer suddenly had a flash of inspiration and used tar instead of mercury.Because he knew that, besides mercury, tar could also reflect sunlight.

Menger knew that now everyone knows that they are in New Zealand, so the longitude is known, and there is no need to measure it; what needs to be done is to determine the latitude.

Menger first used a sextant to measure the distance between the sun on the meridian and the ground: 68 minutes and 30 seconds; from here, it can be inferred that the distance between the sun and the center of heaven is: 21 minutes and 30 seconds; Up, no more, no less, exactly 90°.This day is February 2rd. According to the Greenwich Almanac, the sundial should be 3 minutes and 16 seconds. Add this number to the distance from the center of the sky, and the number is 30°, that is, the latitude is 38°.
It can be seen that the current position of the "McGalley" is 171°13' east longitude and 38° south latitude, and the error will not be too much.

Paganel handed over the map he had bought in Eden City. Meng Geer looked at it and found that it was already the mouth of Austria Bay, north of Kahuajiao, that is, the seaside of Auckland Province, New Zealand.The city of Auckland is located at 37° south latitude, but the "McGalley" has now deviated one latitude south, so it must travel one latitude north to reach Auckland.

"It's just another 25 nautical miles, it's nothing!" said Sir Glenarvan.

"It's nothing to walk 25 nautical miles on the sea! But if you walk on land for such a long time, it will be very strenuous!" Paganel said.

"So, the current task now is to sail the 'McGalli' in the sea as soon as possible!" Meng Ge concluded.

(End of this chapter)