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Old Gold; or, The Cruise of the "Jason" Brig, a novel by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 9. The Mighty River |
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_ CHAPTER NINE. THE MIGHTY RIVER Before morning the "Jason" was pitching and tossing in a heavy sea which had risen very suddenly, and for the next week, whenever the brothers cared to face the rain, wind, and spray, they found Captain Banes on deck looking very grim and anxious and evidently in no humour for entering into conversation. The officers and crew too looked worn and harassed with hard work and the buffeting they had received; but it was evident that they took it all as a matter of course, and were perfectly confident about the ability of the brig to weather a far worse storm. It was quite bad enough, and prolonged till the pitching of the vessel became very wearisome; but there was one thing which always met the eyes of the brothers when they went on deck, and that was the figure of Briscoe tucked up in the best shelter he could find, beneath bulwark or behind deckhouse, clad in glistening black waterproof; and smoking a big cigar. He always saw the brothers as soon as they appeared on deck, and if they nodded to him he was quick to respond, but he never forced his company upon them; and it was so too in the cabin, for he was quiet and unobtrusive, speaking readily when spoken to, but only to subside at once when the conversation flagged. "What has become of his inquisitive organ, Brace?" "That's what I was thinking: he seems quite a different man." The storm was over at last, and one morning, as the brig was running due west under a full press of sail, it suddenly struck Brace that the water over the side was not so clear as it had been an hour before when he was leaning over the bulwark gazing down into the crystalline depths, trying to make out fish, and wondering how it was that, though there must be millions upon millions in the ocean through which they were sailing, he could not see one. "We must be getting into water that has been churned up by the storm," thought Brace; but just then the second mate came up and he referred to him. "Water not so clear?" he said. "No wonder; we're right off the mouths of the Amazon now." "So far south?" "Yes, and running right in. Before long the water, instead of being like this--a bit thick--will be quite muddy, and this time to-morrow we shall be bidding good-bye to the sea, I suppose, for some time to come." Lynton's words were quite right, for the next day, after a most satisfactory run, Brace stood gazing over the bows of the brig at the thick muddy water that was churned up, and finding it hard to believe that he was sailing up the mouth of a river; for, look which way he would, nothing was to be seen but water, while when he tried his glass it was with no better success. But at last the land was to be made out on the starboard bow, or rather what was said to be land, a long, low, hazy something on the distant horizon. A couple of days later there was land plain enough on both sides of the brig, and they commenced a long, dismal progress up stream, of a monotonous kind that was wearisome in the extreme. As time went on, though, there was a change, and that was followed by plenty of variety in the shape of huge trees, with all their branches and leaves tolerably fresh, floating seaward, just as they had fallen from the bank after the mighty stream had undermined them. In one case there were land birds flitting about the few boughs that appeared above the water, but generally they were gulls snatching at the small fish attracted by the floating object. Once there was a great matted-together patch of earth fully thirty yards long and half as wide, a veritable island with bushes still in their places, floating steadily seaward, and helping to explain the muddiness of the water and the shallowness of the ocean far out and to right and left of where the great river debouched. Several consultations took place between the captain and Sir Humphrey as to the course to be taken, and the latter politely asked Briscoe to join in the discussion and give his opinion. "No," he said; "I shan't say anything. I've only one idea about it, and that is to sail up one of the big rivers that run out of this, one that has not been explored before, so as to get amongst what's new." "Well, that's what we want, isn't it, Free?" said Brace. "Exactly." "Then I needn't interfere in any way, gentlemen," said Briscoe. "I only say choose your river, and let's get to work: only pick one that has banks to it where we can land and do something." "Then you don't want us to go as far as we can up one of the explored rivers?" said the captain, smiling. "Certainly not," cried Brace. "I understand, gentlemen. Give me time, and I'll take you to just the place you want. I know the river, but I never heard its name. It runs, as far as I could make out, due nor'-west: that is, as far as I went up. After that it went no one knows where." "That's the place," cried Brace. "Is it very big?" "Tidy, squire," said the captain. "It's very deep, and there's plenty of room for the brig; and, what's better, the current's sluggish, so that we can make our way." "What about the forest? Is it far back from the waterside?" "Hangs over it, so that one can send a boat ashore every night with a cable to make fast to one of the great trees, and save letting down and getting up the anchor." "But about the river itself: can you take the brig up far--no rocks, shoals, or waterfalls?" "Nothing of the kind, sir," said the captain. "It's all deep, muddy, sluggish water running through a great forest, and I should say it carries off the drainage of hundreds of miles of country. It must come from the mountains right away yonder, and sometimes there must be tremendous rains to flood the stream, for I remember seeing marks of sand and weeds and dry slime thirty or forty feet up some of the trunks, and I should say that at times the whole country's flooded and we shall have to look out to keep from grounding right away from the river's course." "You will take care of that," said Sir Humphrey, smiling. "I shall try, sir," said the captain grimly, "for I don't think you'd like to wake up some morning and find the brig in the middle of a forest, waiting till the next flood-time came." A week later, after being baffled again and again by adverse winds, Brace and his brother stood upon the deck of the brig one evening just as the wind dropped, as if simultaneously with the descent of the sun like a huge globe of orange fire behind a bank of trees a hundred yards to their left. The river, smooth and glassy, glowed in reflection from the ruddy sky, the sails flapped, and, no longer answering to her helm, the vessel was beginning slowly to yield to the sluggish current, when there was a rattling sound as the chain cable ran through the hawse-hole, and directly after the anchor took hold in the muddy bottom, the way on the brig was checked, and she swung in mid-stream with her bowsprit pointing out the direction of her future course--a long open waterway between two rapidly-darkening banks of trees whose boughs drooped over and dipped their muddied tips in the stream. "Will this do, squire?" said the captain. "Gloriously," said Brace; "but I thought you meant to make fast every night to one of the trees." "By-and-by, my lad, by-and-by, when there's a handy tree. This would be bad landing for a boat--all one tangle of jungle, and hard to get through. You wanted to get where it was wild: hear that?" "Yes," said Brace excitedly, as he heard a long-drawn cry from out of the forest, one which was answered from a distance, while the last cry was replied to faintly from still farther away. "What's that--a jaguar?" "Monkey," said the captain drily, "and that grunting just beginning and rising into a regular boom isn't made by the pumas, for I don't think there'd be any in these great forest-lands." "What then?" said Brace, in a low voice, as if awe-stricken by the peculiar sounds. "Frogs, my lad, frogs." _Quaaak_! A peculiarly loud and strident hollow echoing cry, which was startling in its suddenness and resembled nothing so much as a badly-blown note upon a giant trombone. "What's that?" "That?" said the captain, thrusting his hat on one side so as to leave ample room for scratching one ear. "That? Oh, that's a noise I only remember hearing once before, and nobody could ever tell me what it was. There's a lot of queer noises to be heard in the forest of a night, and it always struck me that there are all kinds of wild beasts there such as have never been heard of before and never seen." "I dessay," said a voice behind them which made them both start round and stare at the speaker, who had been leaning over the bulwark unobserved. "What's that?" said the captain sharply. "I said I dessay," replied Briscoe; "but that thing isn't one of them." "What is it then?" said the captain shortly. "One of those great long-legged crane things that begin work about this time, fishing in the swamps for frogs." "You think the noise was made by a crane?" "Sure of it, mister," was the reply. "I've sat up before now at the edge of a swamp to shoot them for specimens, and there's several kinds of that sort of bird make a row like that." "Humph!" ejaculated the captain gruffly. "You seem to know. Perhaps, then, you'll tell us what made that noise?" He held up his hand, and all listened to a peculiar whirring sound which began at a distance, came closer and closer till it seemed to pass from under the trees, swing round the ship, and slowly die away again. "Ah, that!" said Briscoe quietly. "Sounds like someone letting off a firework with a bang at the end gone damp. No, I don't know what that is. Yes, I do," he added hastily. "That's a big bird too." "Crane?" said the captain, with an incredulous snort. "No, sir," said the American: "different thing altogether. It's a night bird that flies round catching beetles and moths--bird something like our 'Whip-poor-Wills' or 'Chuck-Will's-widows.'" "Bah!" said the captain. "Yes, that's right," cried Brace: "a bird something like our English night-hawk that sits in the dark parts of the woods and makes a whirring sound; only it isn't half so loud as this." "Well," said the captain grudgingly, "perhaps you're right. I'm not good at birds. I know a gull or a goose or turkey or chicken. I give in." The strange whirring sound as of machinery came and went again; but the maker was invisible, and attention was taken from it directly by a loud splash just astern. "Fish!" cried Brace. "Yes, that's fish," said the captain. "No mistake about that, and you may as well get your tackle to work, squire, for these rivers swarm with 'em, and some of them are good eating. Bit of fish would be a pleasant change if you can supply the cook." "But it's too dark for fishing," said Brace. "Better chance of catching something," said the captain. "But that isn't fish; that's something fishing." There was no need for the captain to draw attention to the fact, for those near him were straining their eyes towards the shore, from which a strange beating and splashing sound arose, but apparently from beyond the black bank of trees formed by the edge of the forest. "There must be a lake on the other side of the bank," said Brace eagerly. "No," replied the captain; "only one of the creeks that run inland among the trees. Come, do you know what that is?" "It sounds like an alligator splashing about in shallow water," replied Brace. "You've hit it first time, squire. It's a big one lashing about with its tail to stun the fish so that they float up ready for his meal. That's right, isn't it, Mr Briscoe?" "Quite," said the American. "I've seen them doing it in the Mississippi swamps; but they were only small ones, five or six feet long. This one sounds as if it were a thumper." "Yes," said Sir Humphrey, "I suppose there are monsters in these waters. Ah!" he continued, as the splashing grew louder; "that sounds like a warning to us not to think of bathing while we are up the river." "Bathing!" cried the captain. "I should think not. You can't do it here, sir, for, besides alligators and different kinds of pike, these waters swarm with small fish that are always savagely hungry. The big ones are plentiful enough, but the little ones go in shoals and are as ready to attack as the others, and they have teeth like lancets, so take care." The splashing ceased, and this seemed to be the signal for fresh sounds to arise both up and down the river and from the forest depths on either bank, till the night seemed to be alive with a strange chorus, which, as Brace and his companions listened, culminated in a tremendous crash, followed by a dead silence. "Whatever is that?" whispered Brace. "Big tree tumbled," said Briscoe carelessly. "But there is no wind--there was no lightning." "No," said the American, "but it had to tumble some time. You often hear that in the woods: they go on growing and growing for hundreds of years, and then they stop from old age and overgrowth, and begin to rot and rot, till all at once, night or day, the top's too heavy for the bottom, and down they come. We'll go and have a look at that one in the morning." _ |
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