Cruise of the Wanderer

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22507, 15 September 1938, Page 7 (Supplement)

Cruise of the Wanderer

Part I i Although Tom was big for his 12 years, he used to feel that most of the men at the whaling station at Riverton thought of him still as a little boy. And because he felt that way he used to do all he could to prove to them that he was almost as good as a man in the work there was to do. Any odd jobs there had to be done Tom was willing to try. He liked that much better than school, because that first school in Riverton in the 1840’s was dull. What did the school teacher with his dry books know about whaling? And Tom lived for whaling. Not yet had he been out in a long-boat in that madly exciting chase after a whale. But he had watched as best he could from the cliffs such chases, and. when the whale was finally towed in he had toiled as hard as any man at the arduous jobs of cutting up the carcase.

And now he was madly excited. The reward he had hoped all his industry would bring him had been exceeded a hundred times. He was not going to join the crew of whalechasers. It was much better than that. Captain John Howell, the owner of the whaling station and the most important man in. all Southland—John felt sure in New Zealand—was going to take him with him on his next trip. It was going to be a long trip, too. A schooner had been sought to take French settlers back from Akaroa to a home under their own French flag—which Akaroa. now would never be. John had a vague idea that Akaroa was somewhere along the east coast of the South Island, but Tahiti might just as well be in another world, it looked so far away on the big globe they had in the schoolroom. Tom’s mother had been busy for days making new clothes for him—great thick clothing for the cold weather they might meet going round to Akaroa, and light, thin clothes for the heat of Tahiti. For the schoolmaster, calling on his geography, had told Tom all he could of Tahiti. '

“It's a clearing house for half the traders of the Pacific, and at the same time a paradise of beauty,” the schoolmaster had said to a boy hanging on his words. There were only a few days before the Wanderer, with Captain Howell and his crew of 16—with Tom as its least important member —would clear the Aparima bar on its way to the open sea and Akaroa, but to Tom those few days seemed like long weeks. Even the excitement of getting everything ready, and talking endlessly with the younger children about the world he was going to see, could not still his impatience. And then at last the great day arrived. All the day before the men, with Tom helping them, had been loading supplies into the Wanderer, until it seemed that there could be no more possible room to load anything. But when it was all finished Tom went home to spend his last night at Riverton for many nights—how many he could not even guess. , Tom had expected that the sun would surely shine the morning the Wanderer was to leave on its longest voyage so far,. But he was badly mistaken. He was awake well before dawn, for he could not sleep for the thought of what the day would hold for him. But when the light dawned, it was on a miserable, grey day with a heavy drizzle. It was in that drizzle that three hours after dawn the Wan-

(By L. R. Hobbs)

derer, sails quickening to the breeze, slowly left the Aparima wharf. Tom, with a heart bursting with excitement, stood as long as he could on deck waving good-bye to his mother, his father, brothers, and sisters, and friends, as they watched the Wanderer go; but long before the wharf had receded from view, a gruff call from Captain Howell, “I’ll have you know, young fellow, I’ll have no time wasted on this ship,” sent him scurrying below decks for work to do.

Tom’s duties were indefinite, but none the less arduous. In the first place he was to help the cook, and then as a matter of course he was always at the beck and call of Captain Howell and his two mates, Mr Freeman and Mr Parsons. And each of those gave him' plenty to do.

Of course, Tom knew everyone on the boat. Most of the crew were Maoris, all of whom he had known well at Riverton, and all the white men on board had been the leading figures in ‘ the little whaling camp since Tom could, remember.

For the first two days, although Tom was always ashamed about it afterwards, he did very little work, for the simple reason that the arrival of the Wanderer in the open sea coincided with the arrival of a violent attack of sea-sickness. Most of that time Tom lay in his ‘bunk in the fo’csle and groaned. Sleep was beyond him most of the time and food was unthinkable.

Not that Tom was entirely to blame for that. The rough seas and the gale that the Wanderer met as it turned to go round to Akaroa were enough to turn the stomach of a more seasoned traveller than a 12-year-old boy. Even when a white-laced. Tom made his first public appearance 48 hours later, heavy seas were still buffeting the vessel. The Wanderer, indeed, had a hard fight making its way northwards for the first sight of that Banks Peninsula, where nestled Akaroa. The second day he was about again Tom learned for himself the lesson he was never to forget all his seafaring life—that the sea as well as being the home of romance was also the home of danger and

even death to the unwary and unfortunate. (Tom did not see it happen, but he was on deck and aiding in the feverish activity that followed that first strident call of “man overboard.” When he reached the deck Captain Howell was giving orders quickly with that terrifying voice of his. At the side of an old Maori seaman he knew Tom asked what had happened. “Peter Jack’s over the side.” he was told. “He slipped in the rigging, hit the rail, and went over.” Peter Jack was a young Maori well liked by everyone. In his fall he had hit the side of the rail, Tom heard afterwards, and that seemed to have injured him, so that he could not swim. “Will they get him?” Tom asked as the hastily manned and lowered long-boat left the Wanderer. “We'll hope so, son, but it’s a heavy sea, and he’s a long way away now,” said Mr Freeman who was standing near. Tom joined the group anxiously watching from the stern for any sign of a human being*in those hillhigh waves. He could see none, and evidently after a long search the crew of the lOng-boat had no

better luck. After a fruitless cruising round the boat began to come back to the waiting Wanderer, and there was no Peter Jack in it. It was a sad and silent boat’s crew that clambered back aboard the pitching Wanderer after a fruitless search. And a chastened crew on the whole Wanderer had little to talk of for the next few days than such an unlucky beginning to a long voyage.

In the end the weather cleared and it was hard to keep from feeling happy, even in spite of the feeling of tragedy that hung over the wanderer. But when the out* post that was Akaroa in the 1840’s hove in sight, there was little time for anything but work. First of all there was the tiny wharf to reach. And then all the fuss and bustle of landing, with Captain Howell stepping ashore majestically, as befitted the owner of his ship and one of the best-known men on the whole New Zealand coast.

"Likely looking place, eh. Tom?” said the cook, Michael Hanlon, as he and Tom stepped oft together on the narrow wharf.

“It’s lovely,” said’ Tom, gazing all round him with the rapturous excitement of a 12-year-old seeing a strange place. And such a strange place it was. Even the strangely foreign looking people clustered about Captain Howell about the little wharf were talking queer words Tom could not understand. 1

“What are they saying, Mr Bunion?" he asked, shyly. “I don’t rightly know. Torn. They’re Frenchies and they talk their own lingo. Cap’n tells me they tried to start their own colony here, but the British got their flag up first. Now they want to go hack wider their own rule. Can’t say I blame them in a country, where no one but themselves understands what they say.” v “But we can’t take all this crowd to Tahiti, Mr Hanlon.” said Tom, I taking in the big number of people down to see the Wanderer arrive:

“I don’t think they’re all coming. Tom. But a lot of them are. We’ll pack’em in somewhere.” Next morning, after a sleep in a ship riding smoothly in a quiet harbour in place of the buffeting of the few nights before. Tom saw a steady stream of French people come up the Wanderer’s rickety gangway. He helped to stow their belongings in the hold and to load even more food for the trip. And then, with a little free time on his hands he hung over the rail and watched the voluble good-byes exchanged with those left behind. Most of them talked with their hands, he noticed, but for all their foreign ways they seemed a joDy crowd. He looked forward with excitement to the trip ahead, the long days to Tahiti enlivened by the new companions. One thing he longed to ask them. “These are strange people, Tom." Michael Hanlon had said. "Biey eat frogs.” Tom mentally resolved to ask at the first opportunity whether the cook had been telling the truth. There was a shy-looking, boy of about his own age among the - passengers. Pierre, his name was., and Tom intended to sound him oa the matter when the opportunity arose. (To be continued.)