CHAPTER XV.

Bensersiel

[For this chapter see Map B.]

The decisive incidents of our cruise were now fast approaching. Looking

back on the steps that led to them, and anxious that the reader should

be wholly with us in our point of view, I think I cannot do better than

give extracts from my diary of the next three days:

“_Oct._ 16 (up at 6.30, yacht high and dry). Of the three galliots out

at anchor in the channel yesterday, only one is left.... I took my turn

with the breakers this morning and walked to Wangeroog, whose village I

found half lost in sand drifts, which are planted with tufts of

marram-grass in mathematical rows, to give stability and prevent a

catastrophe like that at Pompeii. A friendly grocer told me all there

is to know, which is little. The islands are what we thought

them—barren for the most part, with a small fishing population, and a

scanty accession of summer visitors for bathing. The season is over

now, and business slack for him. There is still, however, a little

trade with the mainland in galliots and lighters, a few of which come

from the ‘siels’ on the mainland. ‘Had these harbours?’ I asked.

‘Mud-holes!’ he replied, with a contemptuous laugh. (He is a settler in

these wilds, not a native.) Said he had heard of schemes for improving

them, so as to develop the islands as health-resorts, but thought it

was only a wild speculation.

“A heavy tramp back to the yacht, nearly crushed by impedimenta. While

Davies made yet another trip, I stalked some birds with a gun, and

obtained what resembled a specimen of the smallest variety of

jack-snipe, and small at that; but I made a great noise, which I hope

persuaded somebody of the purity of our motives.

“We weighed anchor at one o’clock, and in passing the anchored galliot

took a good look at her. _Kormoran_ was on her stern; otherwise she was

just like a hundred others. Nobody was on deck.

“We spent the whole afternoon till dark exploring the Harle, or gap

between Wangeroog and Spiekeroog; the sea breaking heavily on the banks

outside.... Fine as the day was, the scene from the offing was desolate

to the last degree. The naked spots of the two islands are hideous in

their sterility: melancholy bits of wreck-wood their only relief, save

for one or two grotesque beacons, and, most _bizarre_ of all, a great

church-tower, standing actually _in_ the water, on the north side of

Wangeroog, a striking witness to the encroachment of the sea. On the

mainland, which was barely visible, there was one very prominent

landmark, a spire, which from the chart we took to be that of _Esens,_

a town four miles inland.

“The days are growing short. Sunset is soon after five, and an hour

later it is too dark to see booms and buoys distinctly. The tides also

are awkward just now.[1] High-water at morning and evening is between

five and six—just at twilight. For the night, we groped with the lead

into the Muschel Balge, the tributary channel which laps round the

inside of Spiekeroog, and lay in two fathoms, clear of the outer swell,

but rolling a little when the ebb set in strong against the wind.

[1] I exclude all the technicalities that I can, but the reader should

take note that the tide-table is very important henceforward.

“A galliot passed us, going west, just as we were stowing sails; too

dark to see her name. Later, we saw her anchor-light higher up our

channel.

“The great event of the day has been the sighting of a small German

gunboat, steaming slowly west along the coast. That was about half-past

four, when we were sounding along the Harle.

“Davies identified her at once as the _Blitz_, Commander von Brüning’s

gunboat. We wondered if he recognised the _Dulcibella_, but, anyway,

she seemed to take no notice of us and steamed slowly on. We quite

expected to fall in with her when we came to the islands, but the

actual sight of her has excited us a good deal. She is an ugly, cranky

little vessel, painted grey, with one funnel. Davis is contemptuous

about her low freeboard forward; says he would rather go to sea in the

_Dulce_. He has her dimensions and armament (learnt from Brassey) at

his fingers’ ends: one hundred and forty feet by twenty-five, one 4.9

gun, one 3.4, and four maxims—an old type. Just going to bed; a

bitterly cold night.

“_Oct._ 17.—Glass falling heavily this morning, to our great disgust.

Wind back in the SW and much warmer. Starting at 5.30 we tacked on the

tide over the ‘watershed’ behind Spiekeroog. So did the galliot we had

seen last night, but we again missed identifying her, as she weighed

anchor before we came up to her berth. Davies, however, swore she was

the _Kormoran_. We lost sight of her altogether for the greater part of

the day, which we spent in exploring the Otzumer Ee (the gap between

Langeoog and Spiekeroog), now and then firing some perfunctory shots at

seals and sea-birds . . . (nautical details omitted). . . . In the

evening we were hurrying back to an inside anchorage, when we made a

bad mistake; did, in fact, what we had never done before, ran aground

on the very top of high water, and are now sitting hard and fast on the

edge of the Rute Flat, south of the east spit of Langeoog. The light

was bad, and a misplaced boom tricked us; kedging-off failed, and at 8

p.m. we were left on a perfect Ararat of sand, and only a yard or two

from that accursed boom, which is perched on the very summit, as a lure

to the unwary. It is going to blow hard too, though that is no great

matter, as we are sheltered by banks on the sou’-west and nor’-west

sides, the likely quarters. We hope to float at 6.15 to-morrow morning,

but to make sure of being able to get her off, we have been

transferring some ballast to the dinghy, by way of lightening the

yacht—a horrid business handling the pigs of lead, heavy, greasy, and

black. The saloon is an inferno, the deck like a collier’s, and

ourselves like sweeps.

“The anchors are laid out, and there is nothing more to be done.

“_Oct._ 18—Half a gale from the sou’-west when we turned out, but it

helped us to float off safely at six. The dinghy was very nearly

swamped with the weight of lead in it, and getting the ballast back

into the yacht was the toughest job of all. We got the dinghy

alongside, and Davies jumped in (nearly sinking it for good), balanced

himself, fended off, and, whenever he got a chance, attached the pigs

one by one on to a bight of rope, secured to the peak halyards, on

which I hoisted from the deck. It was touch and go for a few minutes,

and then easier.

“It was nine before we had finished replacing the pigs in the hold, a

filthy but delicate operation, as they fit like a puzzle, and if one is

out of place the floor-boards won’t shut down. Coming on deck after it,

we saw to our surprise the _Blitz_, lying at anchor in the Schill

Balje, inside Spiekeroog, about a mile and a half off. She must have

entered the Otzumer Ee at high-water for shelter from the gale; a neat

bit of work for a vessel of her size, as Davies says she draws

nine-foot-ten, and there can’t be more than twelve on the bar at

high-water neaps. Several smacks had run in too, and there were two

galliots farther up our channel, but we couldn’t make out if the

_Kormoran_ was one.

“When the banks uncovered we lay more quietly, so landed and took a

long, tempestuous walk over the Rute, with compass and notebooks.

Returning at two, we found the glass tumbling down almost visibly.

“I suggested running for Bensersiel, one of the mainland villages

south-west of us, on the evening flood, as it seemed just the right

opportunity, if we were to visit one of those ‘siels’ at all. Davies

was very lukewarm, but events overcame him. At 3.30 a black, ragged

cloud, appearing to trail into the very sea, brought up a terrific

squall. This passed, and there was a deathly pause of ten minutes while

the whole sky eddied as with smoke-wreaths. Then an icy puff struck us

from the north-west, rapidly veering till it reached north-east; there

it settled and grew harder every moment.

“‘Sou’-west to north-east—only the worst sort do that,’ said Davies.

“The shift to the east changed the whole situation (as shifts often

have before), making the Rute Flats a lee shore, while to windward lay

the deep lagoons of the Otzumer Ee, bounded indeed by Spiekeroog, but

still offering a big drift for wind and sea. We had to clear out sharp,

to set the mizzen. It was out of the question to beat to windward, for

it was blowing a hurricane in a few minutes. We must go to leeward, and

Davies was for running farther in well behind the Jans sand, and not

risking Bensersiel. A blunder of mine, when I went to the winch to get

up anchor, settled the question. Thirty out of our forty fathoms of

chain were out. Confused by the motion and a blinding sleet-shower that

had come on, and forgetting the tremendous strain on the cable, I cast

the slack off the bitts and left it loose. There was then only one turn

of the chain round the drum, enough in ordinary weather to prevent it

running out. But now my first heave on the winch-lever started it

slipping, and in an instant it was whizzing out of the hawse-pipe and

overboard. I tried to stop it with my foot, stumbled at a heavy plunge

of the yacht, heard something snap below, and saw the last of it

disappear. The yacht fell off the wind, and drifted astern. I shouted,

and had the sense to hoist the reefed foresail at once. Davies had her

in hand in no time, and was steering south-west. Going aft I found him

cool and characteristic.

“‘Doesn’t matter,’ he said; ‘anchor’s buoyed. (Ever since leaving the

Elbe we had had a buoy-line on our anchor against the emergency of

having to slip our cable and run. For the same reason the end of the

chain was not made permanently fast below.) We’ll come back to-morrow

and get it. Can’t now. Should have had to slip it anyhow; wind and sea

too strong. We’ll try for Bensersiel. Can’t trust to a warp and kedge

out here.’

“An exciting run it was, across country, so to speak, over an unboomed

watershed; but we had bearings from our morning’s walk. Shoal water all

the way and a hollow sea breaking everywhere. We soon made out the

Bensersiel booms, but even under mizzen and foresail only we travelled

too fast, and had to heave to outside them, for the channel looked too

shallow still. We lowered half the centreboard and kept her just

holding her own to windward, through a most trying period. In the end

had to run for it sooner than we meant, as we were sagging to leeward

in spite of all, and the light was failing. Bore up at 5.15, and raced

up the channel with the booms on our left scarcely visible in the surf

and rising water. Davies stood forward, signalling—port, starboard, or

steady—with his arms, while I wrestled with the helm, flung from side

to side and flogged by wave-tops. Suddenly found a sort of dyke on our

right just covering with sea. The shore appeared through scud, and men

on a quay shouting. Davies brandished his left arm furiously; I ported

hard, and we were in smoother water. A few seconds more and we were

whizzing through a slit between two wood jetties. Inside a small square

harbour showed, but there was no room to round up properly and no time

to lower sails. Davies just threw the kedge over, and it just got a

grip in time to check our momentum and save our bowsprit from the

quayside. A man threw us a rope and we brought up alongside, rather

bewildered.

“Not more so than the natives, who seemed to think we had dropped from

the sky. They were very friendly, with an undercurrent of

disappointment, having expected salvage work outside, I think. All

showed embarrassing helpfulness in stowing sails, etc. We were rescued

by a fussy person in uniform and spectacles, who swept them aside and

announced himself as the Custom-house officer (fancy such a thing in

this absurd mud-hole!), marched down into the cabin, which was in a

fearful mess and wringing wet, and producing ink, pen, and a huge

printed form, wanted to know our cargo, our crew, our last port, our

destination, our food, stores, and everything. No cargo (pleasure);

captain, Davies; crew, me; last port, Brunsbüttel; destination,

England. What spirits had we? Whisky, produced. What salt? Tin of

Cerebos, produced, and a damp deposit in a saucer. What coffee? etc.

Lockers searched, guns fingered, bunks rifled. Meanwhile the German

charts and the log, the damning clues to our purpose, were in full

evidence, crying for notice which they did not get. (We had forgotten

our precautions in the hurry of our start from the Rute.) When the huge

form was as full as he could make it, he suddenly became human,

talkative, and thirsty; and, when we treated him, patronising. It

seemed to dawn on him that, under our rough clothes and crust of brine

and grime, we were two mad and wealthy aristocrats, worthy _protégés_

of a high official. He insisted on our bringing our cushions to dry at

his house, and to get rid of him we consented, for we were wet, hungry,

and longing to change and wash. He talked himself away at last, and we

hid the log and charts; but he returned, in the postmaster’s uniform

this time before we had finished supper, and haled us and our cushions

up through dark and mud to his cottage near the quay. To reach it we

crossed a small bridge spanning what seemed to be a small river with

sluice-gates, just as we had thought.

“He showed his prizes to his wife, who was quite flustered by the

distinguished strangers, and received the cushions with awe; and next

we were carried off to the Gasthaus and exhibited to the village

circle, where we talked ducks and weather. (Nobody takes us seriously;

I never felt less like a conspirator.) Our friend, who is a

feather-headed chatterbox, is enormously important about his ridiculous

little port, whose principal customer seems to be the Langeoog

post-boat, a galliot running to and fro according to tide. A few

lighters also come down the stream with bricks and produce from the

interior, and are towed to the islands. The harbour has from five to

seven feet in it for two hours out of twelve! Herr Schenkel talked us

back to the yacht, which we found resting on the mud—and here we are.

Davies pretends there are harbour smells, and says he won’t be able to

sleep; is already worrying about how to get away from here. Ashore,

they were saying that it’s impossible, under sail, in strong north-east

winds, the channel being too narrow to tack in. For my part I find it a

huge relief to be in any sort of harbour after a fortnight in the open.

There are no tides or anchors to think about, and no bumping or

rolling. Fresh milk to-morrow!”