CHAPTER XIII.

A MUTINY IN THE FIRE-ROOM.

As no one could see the Ville d’Angers and the two schooners in the dense fog that settled down upon them after the crew of the steamer had been re-organized, it would be difficult to determine precisely in what manner they were separated. Capt. O’Hara did not start the screw of the steamer until he had stationed his ship’s company in accordance with his instructions given by the senior vice-principal. If there was any fault anywhere, it was in the instructions.

Observations had been taken on board of all the vessels at noon, and the course for the Madeira Islands was ascertained to be south-west, half-west; and the two schooners went off in this direction, with the wind from the southward, but veering to the west. O’Hara used up about two hours in stationing his crew, arranging the quarters of the officers and seamen, and in giving his instructions. By this time the Tritonia and the Josephine were a dozen miles on their way, and they looked like white specks on the ocean to the naked eye. The young captain believed that the Ville d’Angers, from what she had done, would sail twelve knots an hour; and at this rate he could overhaul the rest of the fleet in a couple of hours. But the Ville d’Angers was hardly under way before the fog settled down upon her, and shut out the schooners from view.

The heavy whistle of the steamer could be heard for a long distance; but the bell and fog-horn of the other vessels could not be distinguished by the lookout of the Ville d’Angers. Then the wind hauled to the westward, heading off the sailing-vessels. O’Hara was watching the weather and the vessels very closely all the time; and, though the direction of the wind did not greatly affect the steamer, he saw that the Josephine and Tritonia could no longer lay their course.

He continued the steamer on the course given out for two hours, without seeing or hearing any thing of his consorts. The captain began to be a little worried; for he would as soon have thought of drowning himself as of disobeying the orders of the senior vice-principal, and going off on an independent cruise. It was evident enough to him, that the schooners had tacked, or had been crowded off their course by the changing wind; he could not tell whether they had gone to the westward or southward. He wished Mr. Fluxion had told him what he should do under such circumstances as the present, which might have been easily foreseen.

“Upon my sowl, I am afraid we shall part company with the rest of the fleet,” said the captain to Tom Speers, who was on the deck.

“It seems to me we have done it already,” replied the second officer.

“That’s a fact! Now the wind has changed, and it bothers me to know whether the schooners have tacked and stood to the southward, or kept as close to the wind as they could, and gone off to the westward.”

“It isn’t possible to tell what they have done.”

“That’s true for you!” added the captain, musing. “Now let us think it over seriously. We ought to have overhauled the Josephine and Tritonia just where we are at this moment,” and he glanced at the clock that hung in the pilot-house. “But there is no sight nor sound of them here.--Blow the whistle, Mr. Raymond, if you please.”

“We have whistled every five minutes since the fog settled down upon us,” replied the fourth officer, as he sounded it again.

It was time to heave the log, and the officer of the quarter-watch left the pilot-house to attend to this duty. In a few moments he reported the steamer as going only eight knots an hour. O’Hara was vexed at this low rate of speed; for he was persuaded that the steamer was good for at least twelve knots. He went to the engine-room to inquire into the matter. Richards was in charge of the engine; and he was seated on his cushioned bench, reading a novel.

“What the blazes are you doing in here?” shouted the captain, abating no little of his natural politeness. “Sure, the steamer is making only eight knots an hour by the last log; and the schooners will bate us out at this rate.”

“We are making but thirty-eight revolutions a minute; and eight miles is all that can be expected,” replied the assistant engineer.

“Well, what’s the matter with her?” demanded O’Hara, not a little excited.

“I can’t get steam enough to do any better,” replied Richards rather doggedly, for he did not like the manner in which the captain had spoken to him.

“Can’t you get all the steam you want?” asked O’Hara, in a more moderate tone; for he began to see that his manner was a little too arbitrary.

“I have called down into the fire-room twenty times for more steam, and I have been down myself; but I don’t seem to make myself understood,” replied Richards in a more affable tone, corresponding to that of the captain.

“Those blackguards of firemen are not doing their duty!” exclaimed O’Hara, rushing down to the fire-room, believing the difficulty was altogether in the matter of language.

He spoke to the Italian in his own language; and the fellow shrugged his shoulders, and looked insolent, though he said nothing to which exception could be taken.

“Fill up your furnaces!” shouted the captain, repeating the words in French for the benefit of the ones who did not understand Italian. “We are making but eight knots an hour; and we shall lose the rest of the fleet at this rate!”

The men heaved in a few shovels of coal; and O’Hara, believing he had said and done all that was necessary, left the fire-room. He went upon the poop-deck, where he found Tom Speers; and both of them gazed out into the dense fog, and listened for any sounds that might indicate the situation of the rest of the fleet.

“Do you make out any thing, Speers, darlint?” asked the captain.

“Nothing at all,” replied Tom. “In my opinion we have seen the last we shall of the schooners till we get to Funchal.”

“Don’t say that, Tom: I would rather lose my command than part company with the rest of the fleet.”

“I don’t see why you need mourn about the matter. We know where we are bound, and we can get there without any help from the schooners,” added Tom.

“If we lose them they will say we did it on purpose.”

“They can’t say that; for our log will show just how it happened, after we compare it with those of the other vessels.”

The young captain was very impatient; and, after waiting half an hour, he ordered the officer of the watch to heave the log again. It was done, and the report was only seven knots.

“Faix, it seemed to me she was going at a snail’s pace,” said O’Hara, now thoroughly roused by the tardy movement of the vessel.

“I don’t understand it,” added Tom.

At this moment one of the crew who had been detailed to act as an oiler, because he had a taste for working on machinery, came upon the upper deck.

“Mr. Richards directs me to report to the captain that the engine is making but thirty revolutions a minute, and that the firemen won’t do any better,” said the oiler.

“That’s what the matter! Bad luck to those same blackguards of firemen! We should have done better with some of the fellows in the fire-room!” exclaimed O’Hara, as he hastened down to the main deck.

He had hardly reached the foot of the ladder before Mr. Frisbone hailed him, coming out of the cabin.

“What’s the trouble, Capt. O’Hara?” shouted the Prince, in his usual loud tone, though the captain was not six feet from him. “I’ve been taking a nap; and, when I waked up, I thought the steamer had stopped; but I found she was moving a little. Is any thing out of kilter?”

“We are making but six knots an hour, sir; and the rascals of firemen won’t work,” replied O’Hara.

“Won’t work? What’s got into them?”

“I don’t know, sir: I am going down into the fire-room to see what the trouble is.”

“All right: that’s the way to do business; and I’ll go down with you,” added the Prince.

They stopped in the engine-room to hear what the engineer had to say about it. Richards had been down, and had called in French a dozen times for more steam; but the firemen would not do any better. He had found the furnace-doors open; and he concluded that the Italians and Frenchmen had concluded to strike for higher wages, though they had received their own price for their services.

“We will soon see about that!” exclaimed O’Hara, as he began to descend the iron steps into the fire-room.

“I guess we can straighten them out,” added the Prince, as he followed the captain.

They found the firemen--not only the watch on duty, but all of them--seated in the airiest part of the room, smoking their pipes and cigars as coolly as though every thing was going well on board. The doors of the furnaces were fastened wide open, and the steam was rapidly diminishing in pressure.

“What are you about?” demanded O’Hara, very indignant at the state of things he found in the fire-room.

Mr. Frisbone went to the furnaces at the same time, for it was of no avail for him to say any thing to these men who did not understand his language. He closed the doors of the furnaces, which were tolerably well supplied with coal, and opened the draughts. As he did so, one of the Frenchmen came up to him, followed by two more.

“_Non! Non!_” shouted one of them, as he closed the draught, and threw open the doors again.

He proceeded to make a rather violent speech in his own language, which was not understood by the Prince. But the latter could understand the man’s actions if not his words; and they meant rebellion as plainly as though it had been formally declared in the English tongue. He was not a man to be set aside by anybody; and he pushed the Frenchman away, and opened the doors and draughts again. He had scarcely completed the task before one of the men struck him a violent blow on the head, which felled him to the floor. But he was not badly hurt, and leaped to his feet on the instant. In the twinkling of an eye he had knocked over two of his assailants; and the third was on the point of hitting him on the back of the head with an iron bar, when O’Hara, seeing his danger, rushed upon the Frenchman, and, seizing the man by the neck, jammed his knees into the small of his back so as to throw him over backwards.

Richards stood in the engine-room at the head of the steps, watching the progress of events. When the Frenchman knocked the Prince over, the engineer called Shakings and Rimmer, both of whom tumbled down the steps in season to defend the captain from a violent assault on the part of the Italians, who were disposed to make common cause with their fellow-laborers. Raymond, hearing the noise in the fire-room, hastened below, followed by Tom Speers. These ample re-enforcements caused the firemen to fall back, and place themselves on the defensive.

“I am ready to fight if need be, though I am a man of peace,” said the Prince, puffing with his exertions. “But I should like to know what I am fighting for. What’s the matter? What has caused this row?”

“The men won’t work,” replied O’Hara.

“What’s the reason they won’t work?” demanded Mr. Frisbone, who was sufficiently familiar with labor difficulties to be competent to meet any emergency of this kind. “Aren’t they satisfied with their wages?”

“They want a portion of wine served out to each man while they are at work,” replied O’Hara, to whom Alfonzo had explained the desire of the men, and the reason why they had stopped work.

“Wine!” exclaimed the Prince, in utter disgust.

Mr. Frisbone, as shown in a preceding volume of this series, was a very fierce temperance man, and did not believe that intoxicating drinks of any kind, not even wine and beer of the mildest type, were proper for use under any circumstances. He did not tolerate the drinking customs of any nation he visited. He never tasted the cup in any form himself, never gave it to his neighbor, or permitted it to be given to him if he had the power to prevent it.

“Alfonzo says they asked for wine on board of the Josephine, and were told there was none on board. He did not believe a statement so absurd as this one seemed to him; and he and his associates considered the reply as a refusal to grant their reasonable request. He thought it was no use to ask for wine again; and they have struck for it as the only way they are likely to get it,” explained the captain.

“Struck for wine, have they?” demanded the Prince, gazing with contempt at the firemen. “But, while we are settling this question, the fires are going out; and soon we shall have no steam at all.”

The Prince closed one of the furnace-doors, and Shakings another. All the draughts were adjusted so that the fires began to roar.

Alfonzo spoke a few sharp words to his companions; and they began to arm themselves with such weapons as were at hand,--pokers, shovels, hammers, iron bars. Shakings wanted the party to “clean them out” without any delay. While things were in this attitude, the cook and one of the stewards came down into the fire-room, and intimated that they were ready to do duty as the occasion might require.

“No clubs,” added Shakings, when he saw the steward pick up a coal-breaker. “We don’t want any weapons. We can bring them to their senses quicker without breaking any of their bones; and we want to use them, not kill them.”

The Prince liked this argument, and warmly seconded it. The boatswain of the Josephine was the self-constituted leader of the party, possibly because there was more fight in him than in any other. He made a spring at Alfonzo, who was armed with a hammer used in breaking coal. He clinched with the fellow, to whom the weapon in his hand was rather an incumbrance than otherwise. As he raised it to strike his assailant, Shakings seized him by the arm. A sharp struggle ensued; but the stalwart tar was too much for his opponent, and in a moment he had thrown him to the floor, and put his foot upon him.

The Prince pitched into the Frenchman who had struck him before. He wrenched a shovel out of his hands, and then threw him down. Observing how the boatswain handled his man, he followed his example, holding the rascal down with his foot, while he menaced him with the shovel if he attempted to use his hands. Rimmer was slower and clumsier than the boatswain, but he succeeded in taking down one of the smallest of the Italians. Raymond did not scruple to tackle another; and so quick were his movements, that his man was down almost as soon as the leader of the firemen. All the others went for the remaining two of the foreigners; and they were soon _hors de combat_. The prestige seemed to be with the Americans from the beginning.

It was a very striking spectacle, even after all the hitting had been done, to see six men held down on the floor. Tom Speers had fought like a tiger with a Frenchman he had tackled alone in the beginning of the affray; and, though O’Hara came to his aid, it was not till he had nearly overcome his foe.

“What shall we do with them?” asked the Prince, as soon as he could obtain breath enough to speak.

“Who hasn’t his hands full?” demanded the boatswain.

“I haven’t,” replied the captain.

“Then have rope enough sent down to tie these fellows hand and foot, if you please, captain,” added Shakings.

But all the watch except the quartermaster and the seaman at the wheel had heard the noise of the conflict, and had secured positions where they could see what was going on in the hold. As soon as they heard the call of Shakings, they gathered up all the spare line they could find about the deck and in the lockers, and threw it down into the fire-room. O’Hara passed them to the victors in the conflict, and each secured his own man. The battle was ended, and the victory won.

“Do you want wine now, you villains?” said the Prince when the conquest was completed.

“But we are pretty much out of firemen,” added the captain, as he looked at the mutineers, made fast to the stanchions and other parts of the vessel.

“I am willing to take my turn at the shovels,” replied the Prince.

By this time the fires in the furnaces were burning in the most satisfactory manner; and the Prince declared that the steamer was increasing her speed. The captain directed that several of the students who had done duty in the fire-room before the foreigners came on board should be detailed to serve again. Four of them appeared in answer to the summons; and, as the novelty of the occupation had not worn off, they were glad to be employed in this capacity again. All hands except the firemen, the boatswain, and the carpenter, left the fire-room.

The Italians and Frenchmen were fully convinced that they had made a mistake in refusing to work: they began to talk among themselves; and some of the amateurs understood enough of what was said by the actual firemen, to comprehend that they were ready to resume their work. But the students said nothing about what they had heard. In the course of an hour the foreigners were tired of their confined position, and begged to be released from durance, promising to do their duty faithfully.

When the captain came down to see them a little later, they plead with him; and he consulted with Mr. Frisbone and the boatswain.

“Let ’em loose, and set ’em to work; but don’t give ’em any wine, or liquor of any sort,” said the Prince.

“I don’t know whether there is any wine on board,” replied O’Hara. “If there were I wouldn’t give it to those fellows after they have behaved so badly. But I don’t think they will give us any more trouble after the pounding they have had.”

Shakings was directed to release the firemen; and, when he did so, he blustered and handled them so roughly, that they seemed to be inspired with a wholesome terror of his fists. He cuffed and kicked them more liberally than Capt. O’Hara thought was necessary; and the latter suggested the propriety of treating a fallen and submissive foe with a little more magnanimity.

“Bless your heart, captain, it isn’t of any use to treat such fellows gently. They aren’t used to it. If you treat them well they will turn upon you, and bite,” replied Shakings, as he released the last man; but, in deference to the captain, he failed to kick him as he had the rest of them.

The three who were on watch sprang to the shovels, and were disposed to waste the coal in their zeal to do their duty. The Italians, who were off duty, went to their quarters under the forecastle. O’Hara did not like the way they behaved, and he directed Shakings to keep a close watch over them.

“Have you heard any thing of the rest of the fleet, Speers?” asked the captain, as he joined the second officer on the poop-deck.

“I have not; and the fog is thicker than ever,” replied Speers. “Have you looked at the barometer lately? It feels like bad weather to me. The sea seems to have an ugly look, what we can see of it.”

“I looked at it just as I came up; and it indicates a little more wind than we have been having the last twelve hours; but I don’t think it is any thing very bad that’s coming.”

“What was that?” said Tom Speers, suddenly looking to the northward.

“Well, what was it? I didn’t hear any thing,” replied O’Hara, gazing in the direction indicated.

“I don’t know what it was; but it sounded like a gun, or the stroke of a bell,” added Speers.

“Gun on the starboard quarter, the lookout forward reports,” said Raymond, hailing the captain from the main deck.

“All right: we heard it here,” replied O’Hara. “Is it a gun, or a bell? Report if you hear it again, Mr. Raymond.”

“If it was a bell, it may be the other vessels of the fleet. If it was a gun, it was not fired by the Josephine or the Tritonia, for the reason that neither of them has a gun to fire.”

“I hear it again; and I am sure it is a bell,” exclaimed Tom Speers.

“Whisht! Wait till you hear another; for the two schooners are together, and when one rings the other will, you may be sure,” added the captain, not a little excited.

But no other stroke of a bell was heard for a little time.

“I know the sound of the Tritonia’s bell; and it isn’t she,” said O’Hara. “It is a much heavier bell we hear.”

All hands listened again.