weary to care. I went forward of the bridge, and leaned over the side,
wondering where I should ever get something that I could call a ship,
and whether the old hulk would fall to pieces as she lay. The fog was
as thick as any London one, but as white as steam. While they were
tinkering at the engines below, I heard a voice in the fog about twenty
yards from the ship's side, calling out, 'Can you climb on board if
we throw you a rope?' That startled me, because I fancied we were going
to be run down the next minute by a ship engaged in rescuing a man
overboard. I shouted for the engine-room whistle; and it whistled about
five minutes, but never the sound of a ship could we hear. The ship's
boy came forward with some biscuit for me. As he put it into my hand,
I heard the voice in the fog, crying out about throwing us a rope.
This time it was the boy that yelled, 'Ship on us!' and off went the
whistle again, while the men in the engine-room--it generally took the
ship's crew to repair the _Hespa's_ engines--tumbled upon deck to
know what we were doing. I told them about the hail, and we listened
in the smother of the fog for the sound of a screw. We listened for
ten minutes, then we blew the whistle for another ten. Then the crew
began to call the ship's boy a fool, meaning that the third mate was
no better. When they were going down below, I heard the hail the third
time, so did the ship's boy. 'There you are,' I said, 'it is not twenty
yards from us.' The engineer sings out, 'I heard it too! Are you all
asleep?' Then the crew began to swear at the engineer; and what with
discussion, argument, and a little swearing,--for there is not much
discipline on board a tramp,--we raised such a row that our skipper
came aft to enquire. I, the engineer, and the ship's boy stuck to our
tale. 'Voices or no voices,' said the captain, 'you'd better patch the
old engines up, and see if you've got enough steam to whistle with.
I've a notion that we've got into rather too crowded ways.'