We had intended to sail on this day, but the glass had been falling and it was blowing hard from the southeast, so that it seemed advisable to wait for some improvement in the weather. The next day, January 10, the glass began to rise and the sky looked less threatening, the scud no longer rushing across the heavens at a wild pace; so we got underway after breakfast, and once more set sail for the desert island.
For a vessel sailing from Trinidad to Bahia the wind is always fair, being from northeast to southeast; but for one sailing the reverse way the wind is, as often as not, right ahead. This bad luck we now experienced. Trinidad lay to the southeast of us, and southeast was also the direction of the wind. When we were outside the bay we put the vessel on the port tack and at five in the evening we were off the Moro San Paulo lighthouse. Then we went about and steered away from the land.
This was, I think, our most disagreeable voyage. It blew hard all the time, and there were violent squalls of wind and rain that frequently compelled us to scandalise our mainsail and lower the foresail. The sea ran high, and was very confused, so that, sailing full and by, the yacht made little progress, labouring a good deal, and constantly driving her bowsprit into the short, steep waves. On the third day out we took two reefs down in the mainsail and two in the foresail. The wind was constantly shifting between east and south, so that we often went about so as to sail on the tack which enabled the vessel to point nearest to her destination.
When we had been six days out we were only halfway to Trinidad, having accomplished the distance of 350 miles from Bahia.
On this day I had some trouble with Arthur. He had, I think, brought a bottle of rum on board surreptitiously at Bahia, or, possibly, he had helped himself from the barrel, which was always kept, for security, in my cabin. As I used to sleep on deck during Pollock’s watch, he could then find his opportunity, as no one was below to catch him. At midnight, when I relieved the other watch, he refused to obey an order. He had done this on two previous occasions, also when under the influence of smuggled spirits, and had quickly been brought to his senses and to his work by having his head punched. It was his wont to become repentant and make amends for his bad conduct by extra good behaviour; and I must allow that he did his work willingly enough, as a rule, but drink converted him into a foolish sea-lawyer.
The offence was flagrant on this occasion, and as a head-punching only resulted in making him sulky, I determined to discharge him. Seeing that months might elapse before we left Trinidad for the West Indies, and not wishing to have him on my hands all that time, I made up my mind to run back to Bahia with him at once; so the mainsheet was promptly slacked off, and we bore away, to the young man’s great surprise. I would not let him go below, in case he should get at the rum again; so ordered him to stay on the deck forward. Before the end of my watch he disobeyed this order and sneaked below in the dark. When I discovered this I went down and ordered him to come on deck at once. He obeyed, promptly this time, as he was, no doubt, reaching the sober and repentant stage; but I would not trust him, and tied him up by his foot to the bulwarks forward, and kept him a prisoner until we came into port.
He was the only paid hand we had who was subject to these fits of insubordination. The doctor and myself never had any difficulties with the others; they did their work cheerfully.
Now that we were running before the wind and sea we made good progress, and we sighted the Moro San Paulo light at 2 a.m. on Sunday, January 19. The distance, therefore, that we had made after six days of tacking was now accomplished before the wind in 50 hours.
We were becalmed off the entrance of the bay for several hours. It was an excessively hot day, and the morning breeze did not spring up till later than usual, so that we did not let go our anchor under Fort la Mar until midday. And now, lo! the flags of the State of Bahia no longer decorated the city and forts, but a flag something like the old Brazilian flag, but yet not the same, floated everywhere. Had there, then, been yet another revolution while we were away, and was some new form of government—communistical or oligarchical or whatnot—being experimented upon? We learnt, on landing, that this was the National flag of the Brazilian Republic, but only a tentative one, which was being flown so that the citizens could see how it looked. I believe several other patterns were tried, and thus exhibited in the cities for public approval, before one was definitely selected.
The harbour doctor came off to us, was amused at our story, and again gave us pratique. Wilson had, of course, been much puzzled at the reappearance of the Alerte, and was anxious to hear what had happened.
I took Arthur before the Consul on Monday morning, and formally discharged him.
New brooms sweep clean, they say, and the new Republican Municipality had decided to clean dirty Bahia as economically as possible, and had hit upon the following ingenious plan. The police were instructed to consider anyone, whatever his rank, who was found walking in the streets after bedtime, as a dangerous conspirator, and to promptly arrest
