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The California had got under weigh at the same moment;
and we sailed down the narrow bay abreast, and were just off the mouth,
and finding ourselves gradually shooting ahead of her, were on the point
of giving her three parting cheers, when, suddenly, we found ourselves
stopped short, and the California ranging fast ahead of us. A bar stretches
across the mouth of the harbor, with water enough to float common vessels,
but, being low in the water, and having kept well to leeward, as we were
bound to the southward, we had stuck fast, while the California, being
light, had floated over.
We kept all sail on, in the hope of forcing over, but failing in this,
we hove aback, and lay waiting for the tide, which was on the flood, to
take us back into the channel. This was somewhat of a damper to us, and
the captain looked not a little mortified and vexed. “This is the same
place where the Rosa got ashore,” observed our redheaded second mate,
most mal-a-propos. A malediction on the Rosa, and him too, was all the
answer he got, and he slunk off to leeward. In a few minutes, the force
of the wind and the rising of the tide backed us into the stream, and
we were on our way to our old anchoring-place, the tide setting swiftly
up, and the ship barely manageable, in the light breeze. We came-to, in
our old berth, opposite the hide-house, whose inmates were not a little
surprised to see us return. We felt as though we were tied to California;
and some of the crew swore that they never should get clear of the bloody
coast.
R.H. Dana, Two Years Before the Mast, p. 350 |
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