The creature which had so powerfully affected2 the feelings of the Irishman was dead; but dead and harmless though it was, it drew forth3 from his comrades a shout of intense surprise when they saw it, for it was no less than a cuttlefish4 of proportions so gigantic that they felt themselves in the presence of one of those terrible monsters of the deep, about which fabulous5 tales have been told, and exaggerated descriptions given since the beginning of historical time.
“Av he’s not the say-sarpint himself, boys,” panted Squill, as he pointed6 to him with looks of unmitigated admiration7, “sure he must be his first cousin.”
And Squill was not far wrong, for it was found that the monstrous8 fish measured fifty-two feet between the extremities9 of its outspread arms. Its body was about eight feet long and four feet broad. Its great arms, of which it had ten radiating from its body, varied10 in length and thickness—the longest being about twenty-four feet, and the shortest about eight. The under sides of these arms were supplied with innumerable suckers, while from the body there projected a horny beak11, like the beak of a parrot.
“It’s wishin’, I am, that I might see wan12 o’ yer family alive,” said Squill, as he turned over the dead arms; “but I’d rather not be embraced by ye. Och! what a hug ye could give—an’ as to howldin’ on—a thousand limpets would be nothin’ to ye.”
“I don’t expect ever to see one alive,” said Little Stubbs, “an’ yet there must surely be more where that came from.”
The very next day Squill had his wish gratified, and Stubbs his unbelief rebuked14, for, while they were out in the boat rowing towards one of the fishing-banks with several of their comrades, they discovered a living giant-cuttlefish.
“What’s that, boys?” cried the Irishman, pointing to the object which was floating in the water not far ahead of them.
Blazer always growled. His voice was naturally low and harsh—so was his spirit. Sometimes a grunt17 supplanted18 the growl15, suggesting that he was porcine in nature—as not a few men are.
But it was not seaweed. The thing showed signs of life as the boat drew near.
“Starboard! starboard hard!” shouted Little Stubbs, starting up.
But the warning came too late. Next moment the boat ran with a thud into a monster cuttlefish. Grummidge seized a boat-hook, shouted, “Stern all!” and hit the creature with all his might, while Stubbs made a wild grasp at a hatchet20 which lay under one of the thwarts21.
Instantly the horny parrot-like beak, the size of a man’s fist, reared itself from among the folds of the body and struck the boat a violent blow, while a pair of saucer-like eyes, fully1 four inches in diameter, opened and glared ferociously22. This was terrifying enough, but when, a moment later, two tremendous arms shot out from the body near the eyes, flung themselves around the boat and held on tight, a yell of fear escaped from several of the men, and with good reason, for if the innumerable suckers on those slimy arms once fairly attached themselves to the boat there seemed to be no chance of escape from the deadly embrace. In that moment of danger Little Stubbs proved himself equal to the occasion. With the hatchet he deftly23 severed24 the two limbs as they lay over the gunwale of the boat, and the monster, without cry or sign of pain, fell back into the sea, and moved off, ejecting such a quantity of inky fluid as it went that the water was darkened for two or three hundred yards around.
“Well done, Little Stubbs!” cried Grummidge, as he watched the creature disappearing. “You’ve often worried our lives in time past, but this time you’ve saved ’em. Coil away the limbs, boys. We’ll measure ’em and enter ’em in the log when we go ashore25.”
It may interest the reader to know that the measurements were as follows:—
The longer and thinner arm was nineteen feet in length; about three and a half inches in circumference26; of a pale pinkish colour, and exceedingly strong and tough. As all the men agreed that more than ten feet of the arm were left attached to the monster’s body, the total length must have been little short of thirty feet. Towards the extremity27 it broadened out like an oar19, and then tapered28 to a fine tongue-like point. This part was covered with about two hundred suckers, having horny-toothed edges, the largest of the suckers being more than an inch in diameter, the smallest about the size of a pea. The short arm was eleven feet long, and ten inches in circumference. It was covered on the under side throughout its entire length with a double row of suckers. Grummidge, who was prone30 to observe closely, counted them that night with minute care, and came to the conclusion that the creature must have possessed31 about eleven hundred suckers altogether. There was also a tail to the fish—which Squill called a “divil-fish”—shaped like a fin29. It was two feet in width.
Lest any reader should imagine that we are romancing here, we turn aside to refer him to a volume entitled Newfoundland, the oldest British Colony, written by Joseph Hatton and the Reverend M. Harvey, in which (pages 238 to 242) he will find an account of a giant-cuttlefish, devil-fish, or squid, very similar to that which we have now described, and in which it is also stated that Mr Harvey, in 1873, obtained possession of one cuttlefish arm nineteen feet long, which he measured and photographed, and described in various newspapers and periodicals, and, finally, sent to the Geological Museum in St. John’s, where it now lies. The same gentleman afterwards obtained an uninjured specimen32 of the fish, and it is well known that complete specimens33, as well as fragments, of the giant cephalopod now exist in several other museums.
Can any one wonder that marvellous tales of the sea were told that night round the fires at supper-time? that Little Stubbs became eloquently34 fabulous, and that Squill, drawing on his imagination, described with graphic35 power a monster before whose bristling36 horrors the great sea-serpent himself would hide his diminished head, and went into particulars so minute and complex that his comrades set him down as “one o’ the biggest liars37” that ever lived, until he explained that the monster in question had only appeared to him “wance in wan of his owld grandmother’s dreams!”
In fishing, and hunting with bows and arrows made by themselves, as well as with ingenious traps and weirs38 and snares39 of their own invention, the crew spent their time pleasantly, and the summer passed rapidly away. During this period the rude tents of spars and sailcloth were supplanted by ruder huts of round logs, caulked40 with hay and plastered with mud. Holes in the walls thereof did service as windows during the day, and bits of old sails or bundles of hay stuffed into them formed shutters41 at night. Sheds were also put up to guard provisions and stores from the weather, and stages were erected42 on which to dry the cod-fish after being split and cleaned; so that our shipwrecked crew, in their new home, which they named Wagtail Bay, had thus unwittingly begun that great industry for which Newfoundland has since become celebrated43 all the world over.
It is not to be supposed that among such men in such circumstances everything went harmoniously44. At first, indeed, what with having plenty to do in fishing, hunting, building, splitting and drying fish, etcetera, all day, and being pretty well tired out at nights, the peace was kept pretty easily; all the more that Big Swinton had been quelled45 and apparently46 quite subdued47. But as the stores became full of food and the days shortened, while the nights proportionately lengthened48, time began to hang heavy on their hands, and gradually the camp became resolved into the two classes which are to be found everywhere—the energetically industrious49 and the lazily idle. Perhaps we should say that those two extreme phases of human nature began to show themselves, for between them there existed all shades and degrees, so that it was difficult to tell, in some cases, to which class the men belonged.
The proverbial mischief50, of course, was soon found, for the latter class to do, and Grummidge began to discover that the ruling of his subjects, which sat lightly enough on his shoulders during the summer, became a matter of some trouble and anxiety in autumn. He also found, somewhat to his surprise, that legislation was by no means the easy—we might say free-and-easy—business which he had supposed it to be. In short, the camp presented the interesting spectacle of a human society undergoing the process of mushroom growth from a condition of chaotic51 irresponsibility to that of civilised order.
The chaotic condition had been growing worse and worse for some time before Grummidge was forced to take action, for Grummidge was a man of long-suffering patience. One night, however, he lost all patience, and, like most patient people when forced out of their natural groove52, he exploded with surprising violence and vigour53.
It happened thus:—
The crew had built for themselves a hut of specially54 large dimensions, in which they nightly assembled all together round the fires, of which there were two—one at either end. Some of the men told stories, some sang songs, others played at draughts55 of amateur construction, and a good many played the easy but essential part of audience.
The noise, of course, was tremendous, but they were used to that, and minded it not. When, however, two of the men began to quarrel over their game, with so much anger as to interrupt all the others, and draw general attention to themselves, the thing became unbearable56, and when one called the other “a liar,” and the other shouted with an oath, “You’re another,” the matter reached a climax57.
“Come, come, Dick Swan and Bob Crow,” cried Grummidge, in a stern voice; “you stop that. Two liars are too much in this here ship. One is one too many. If you can’t keep civil tongues in your heads, we’ll pitch you overboard.”
“You mind your own business,” gruffly replied Dick Swan, who was an irascible man and the aggressor.
“That’s just what I’ll do,” returned Grummidge, striding up to Swan, seizing him by the collar, and hurling58 him to the other end of the room, where he lay still, under the impression, apparently, that he had had enough. “My business,” said Grummidge, “is to keep order, and I mean to attend to it. Isn’t that so, boys?”
“No—yes—no,” replied several voices.
“Who said ‘No’?” demanded Grummidge.
Every one expected to see Big Swinton step forward, but he did not. His revenge was not to be gratified by mere59 insubordination. The man who did at last step forward was an insignificant60 fellow, who had been nicknamed Spitfire, and whose chief characteristics were self-will and ill-nature. He did not lack courage, however, for he boldly faced the angry ruler and defied him. Every one expected to see Spitfire follow Dick Swan, and in similar fashion, but they were mistaken. They did not yet understand Grummidge.
“Well, Spitfire, what’s your objection to my keeping order?” he said, in a voice so gentle that the other took heart.
“My objection,” he said, “is that when you was appinted capting there was no vote taken. You was stuck up by your own friends, an’ that ain’t fair, an’ I, for one, refuse to knuckle61 under to ’ee. You may knock me down if you like, for I ain’t your match by a long way, but you’ll not prove wrong to be right by doin’ that.”
“Well spoken, Master Spitfire!” exclaimed a voice from the midst of the crowd that encircled the speakers.
“Well spoken, indeed,” echoed Grummidge, “and I thank you, Master Spitfire, for bringin’ this here matter to a head. Now, lads,” he added, turning to the crowd, “you have bin62 wrong an’ informal, so to speak, in your proceedin’s when you appinted me governor o’ this here colony. There’s a right and a wrong in everything, an’ I do believe, from the bottom of my soul, that it’s—that it’s—that—well, I ain’t much of a dab63 at preaching as you know, but what I would say is this—it’s right to do right, an’ it ain’t right for to do wrong, so we’ll krect this little mistake at once, for I have no wish to rule, bless you! Now then, all what’s in favour o’ my bein’ gov’nor, walk to the end o’ the room on my right hand, an’ all who wants somebody else to be—Spitfire, for instance—walk over to where Dick Swan is a-sittin’ enjo’in’ of hisself.”
Immediately three-fourths of the crew stepped with alacrity64 to the right. The remainder went rather slowly to the left. “The Grummidges has won!” cried Squill, amid hearty65 laughter.
The ruler himself made no remark whatever, but, seating himself in a corner of the hut, resumed the game which had been interrupted, quite assured that the game of insubordination was finally finished.
The day following that on which the reign66 of King Grummidge was established, a new member of considerable interest was added to the colony. Blaze, Stubbs, and Squill chanced to be out that day along the shore. Squill, being in a meditative67 mood, had fallen behind his comrades. They had travelled further than usual, when the attention of the two in front was attracted by what seemed to them the melancholy68 howling of a wolf. Getting their bows ready, they advanced with caution, and soon came upon a sad sight—the dead body of a native, beside which crouched69 a large black dog. At first they thought the dog had killed the man, and were about to shoot it, when Stubbs exclaimed, “Hold on! don’t you see he must have tumbled over the cliff?”
A brief examination satisfied them that the Indian, in passing along the top of the cliffs, had fallen over, and that the accident must have been recent, for the body was still fresh. The dog, which appeared to be starving, showed all its formidable teeth when they attempted to go near its dead master. Presently Squill came up.
“Ah, boys,” he said, “ye don’t onderstand the natur’ o’ the baste—see here.”
Taking a piece of dried fish from his pocket, he went boldly forward and presented it. The dog snapped it greedily and gulped70 it down. Squill gave him another and another piece; as the fourth offering was presented he patted the animal quietly on its head. The victory was gained. The dog suffered them to bury its master, but for four days it refused to leave his grave. During that time Squill fed it regularly. Then he coaxed71 it to follow him, and at last it became, under the name of Blackboy, a general favourite, and a loving member of the community.
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1
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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cuttlefish
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| n.乌贼，墨鱼 | |
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fabulous
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| adj.极好的；极为巨大的；寓言中的，传说中的 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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extremities
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| n.端点( extremity的名词复数 )；尽头；手和足；极窘迫的境地 | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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beak
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| n.鸟嘴，茶壶嘴，钩形鼻 | |
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wan
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| (wide area network)广域网 | |
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miser
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| n.守财奴，吝啬鬼 (adj.miserly) | |
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rebuked
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| 责难或指责( rebuke的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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growl
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| v.（狗等）嗥叫，（炮等）轰鸣；n.嗥叫，轰鸣 | |
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growled
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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grunt
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| v.嘟哝；作呼噜声；n.呼噜声，嘟哝 | |
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supplanted
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| 把…排挤掉，取代( supplant的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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oar
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| n.桨，橹，划手；v.划行 | |
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hatchet
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| n.短柄小斧；v.扼杀 | |
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thwarts
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| 阻挠( thwart的第三人称单数 )； 使受挫折； 挫败； 横过 | |
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ferociously
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| 野蛮地，残忍地 | |
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deftly
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| adv.灵巧地，熟练地，敏捷地 | |
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severed
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| v.切断，断绝( sever的过去式和过去分词 )；断，裂 | |
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ashore
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| adv.在(向)岸上，上岸 | |
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circumference
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| n.圆周，周长，圆周线 | |
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extremity
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| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
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28
tapered
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| adj. 锥形的，尖削的，楔形的，渐缩的，斜的 动词taper的过去式和过去分词 | |
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fin
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| n.鳍；(飞机的)安定翼 | |
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prone
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| adj.(to)易于…的，很可能…的；俯卧的 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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specimens
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| n.样品( specimen的名词复数 )；范例；（化验的）抽样；某种类型的人 | |
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eloquently
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| adv. 雄辩地(有口才地, 富于表情地) | |
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graphic
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| adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的 | |
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bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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liars
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| 说谎者( liar的名词复数 ) | |
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weirs
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| n.堰，鱼梁（指拦截游鱼的枝条篱）( weir的名词复数 ) | |
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snares
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| n.陷阱( snare的名词复数 )；圈套；诱人遭受失败（丢脸、损失等）的东西；诱惑物v.用罗网捕捉，诱陷，陷害( snare的第三人称单数 ) | |
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caulked
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| v.堵（船的）缝( caulk的过去式和过去分词 )；泥…的缝；填塞；使不漏水 | |
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shutters
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| 百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 )； （照相机的）快门 | |
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ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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harmoniously
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| 和谐地，调和地 | |
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quelled
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| v.（用武力）制止，结束，镇压( quell的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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subdued
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| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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lengthened
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| （时间或空间）延长，伸长( lengthen的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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chaotic
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| adj.混沌的，一片混乱的，一团糟的 | |
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groove
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| n.沟，槽；凹线，（刻出的）线条，习惯 | |
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vigour
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| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
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54
specially
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| adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地 | |
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55
draughts
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| n. <英>国际跳棋 | |
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56
unbearable
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| adj.不能容忍的；忍受不住的 | |
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57
climax
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| n.顶点；高潮；v.(使)达到顶点 | |
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58
hurling
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| n.爱尔兰式曲棍球v.猛投，用力掷( hurl的现在分词 )；大声叫骂 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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insignificant
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| adj.无关紧要的，可忽略的，无意义的 | |
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knuckle
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| n.指节；vi.开始努力工作；屈服，认输 | |
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bin
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| n.箱柜；vt.放入箱内；[计算机] DOS文件名:二进制目标文件 | |
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dab
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| v.轻触，轻拍，轻涂；n.(颜料等的)轻涂 | |
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alacrity
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| n.敏捷，轻快，乐意 | |
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65
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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reign
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| n.统治时期，统治，支配，盛行；v.占优势 | |
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meditative
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| adj.沉思的，冥想的 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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crouched
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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70
gulped
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| v.狼吞虎咽地吃，吞咽( gulp的过去式和过去分词 )；大口地吸（气）；哽住 | |
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71
coaxed
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| v.哄，用好话劝说( coax的过去式和过去分词 )；巧言骗取；哄劝，劝诱 | |
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