construction of that complex creature called a human being: Nothing sustains me more. There lies, however, another meaning in the same condition: the riddle which is not a riddle, the but seeming contradiction. By that nature also am I filled with my deepest foreboding; in the sense that, my best hope, it constitutes them as well able adversary—and a possibly dangerous one. Accustomed in the sea way to being ruled by captains with near sachemlike powers, they are paradoxically men of the most independent of minds. It is not by chance that man’s noblest deeds have occurred on the seas of the planet, far from any land, on the ships that course the great oceans; or that on these same ships, and for the identical reason, that of isolation beyond the reach of other forces, have been committed acts among man’s most profoundly evil. These antipodal directions for men to take seeming more potential in matters soon to be upon us.
* * *
First light was casting its glow, rose shading into carmine, over the island and across sky and waters, the annunciation of a tranquil day. I had sent upward of forty men chosen and indoctrinated by Gunner’s Mate Delaney ashore first. Now I stood at the top of the accommodation ladder with the deck watch and Delaney stood at the bottom as the sailors, each with infinite solicitude carrying a tray of seedlings in cut-down five-inch casings, filed by me and started gingerly down the ladder into the first of the boats, Coxswain Rachel Meyer standing amidships at the wheel. On the glassy water the boat bobbed hardly at all.
“Steady as you go,” I kept saying as the men passed by me. “Take an even strain.”
As the sailor reached the platform on the ladder’s bottom, Delaney received the tray from him, held it until the man had seated himself securely in the boat, then gave it carefully back. “Hold it with both hands, mate,” I heard him say in his Ozark twang. “Straight up. In your lap.”
Not until the entire boarding procedure had been completed but for one man did the gunner’s mate yell up to me. “Captain, we’re ready for another.”
Thus the first boat filled with men, each with a tray of seedlings. “Stand off, Coxswain,” I called down.
Meyer swung away smartly and the next boat came alongside. We filled three boats, including the farming gear—the grappling irons, the entrenching-tools, the lines—and then the flotilla got underway for the island lying half a league off.
Ever since we first raised the island that morning now less than a week back, both sea and lagoon had preserved an unruffled stillness. I was particularly glad that, carrying our fragile and priceless cargo, the same shiny patina of waters bore us this day. As we moved in, the quiescence of sea and island seemed to envelop us in a solitude in which even a voice was a jarring thing, the reigning peacefulness appearing to silence the men, leaving them with their thoughts; they sat very straight, exceptionally solemn, each grasping the tray in his lap with both hands. Delaney had put the fear of God in them about those seedlings. Our flotilla came on line abreast, so as not to have them troubled even by a boat’s wake, and at one-quarter speed. Beyond the bow I could see the advance party standing on the beach, watching us approach, behind them the island’s prideful green rising. Together, as if choreographed, the boats slid up gently out of the green-on-azure lagoon and onto the fine pinkish sand and Delaney hopped out, the first one. Again under the gunner’s mate’s nursing ministrations, the men first handed the seedlings out to the beach party, then each debarked himself and took back the tray that was his charge and responsibility. It was a wonder, the somber, tender ritual in which these sea-fashioned men moved, as if knowing all too well the preciousness of their lading. Then we off-loaded the farming gear.
The beach party picked up the gear and our company of sailors started
* * *
First light was casting its glow, rose shading into carmine, over the island and across sky and waters, the annunciation of a tranquil day. I had sent upward of forty men chosen and indoctrinated by Gunner’s Mate Delaney ashore first. Now I stood at the top of the accommodation ladder with the deck watch and Delaney stood at the bottom as the sailors, each with infinite solicitude carrying a tray of seedlings in cut-down five-inch casings, filed by me and started gingerly down the ladder into the first of the boats, Coxswain Rachel Meyer standing amidships at the wheel. On the glassy water the boat bobbed hardly at all.
“Steady as you go,” I kept saying as the men passed by me. “Take an even strain.”
As the sailor reached the platform on the ladder’s bottom, Delaney received the tray from him, held it until the man had seated himself securely in the boat, then gave it carefully back. “Hold it with both hands, mate,” I heard him say in his Ozark twang. “Straight up. In your lap.”
Not until the entire boarding procedure had been completed but for one man did the gunner’s mate yell up to me. “Captain, we’re ready for another.”
Thus the first boat filled with men, each with a tray of seedlings. “Stand off, Coxswain,” I called down.
Meyer swung away smartly and the next boat came alongside. We filled three boats, including the farming gear—the grappling irons, the entrenching-tools, the lines—and then the flotilla got underway for the island lying half a league off.
Ever since we first raised the island that morning now less than a week back, both sea and lagoon had preserved an unruffled stillness. I was particularly glad that, carrying our fragile and priceless cargo, the same shiny patina of waters bore us this day. As we moved in, the quiescence of sea and island seemed to envelop us in a solitude in which even a voice was a jarring thing, the reigning peacefulness appearing to silence the men, leaving them with their thoughts; they sat very straight, exceptionally solemn, each grasping the tray in his lap with both hands. Delaney had put the fear of God in them about those seedlings. Our flotilla came on line abreast, so as not to have them troubled even by a boat’s wake, and at one-quarter speed. Beyond the bow I could see the advance party standing on the beach, watching us approach, behind them the island’s prideful green rising. Together, as if choreographed, the boats slid up gently out of the green-on-azure lagoon and onto the fine pinkish sand and Delaney hopped out, the first one. Again under the gunner’s mate’s nursing ministrations, the men first handed the seedlings out to the beach party, then each debarked himself and took back the tray that was his charge and responsibility. It was a wonder, the somber, tender ritual in which these sea-fashioned men moved, as if knowing all too well the preciousness of their lading. Then we off-loaded the farming gear.
The beach party picked up the gear and our company of sailors started
Similar Books
