Joseph Banks. Patrick O’Brian

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СКАЧАТЬ taken yesterday till the ship got so much motion that Mr Parkinson could not set to his pencil; in the Evening wind still Fresher so much as to make the night very uncomfortable.

      30 Wind still foul, ship in violent motion, but towards Evening much more quiet: Now for the first time my Sea sickness left me, and I was sufficiently well to write.

      31 Wind Freshend again this morn; observ’d about the Ship several of the Birds calld by the seamen Mother Careys chickens, Procellaria Pelagica Linn. which were thought by them to be a sure presage of a storm, as indeed it provd, for before night it blew so hard as to bring us under our Courses,^* and make me very sea sick again.

      But this was not to last; they had almost crossed the Bay of Biscay, and early in September they passed Cape Finisterre, sailing into calm seas that among many other things provided a salp, a creature not unlike a mollusc, which “was possest of more beautiful Colouring than any thing in nature I have ever seen, hardly excepting gemms. He is of a new genus and calld of which we took another species who had no beauty to boast, but this which we called opalinum shone in the water with all the splendor and variety of colours that we observe in a real opal; he livd in the Glass of salt water in which he was put for examination several hours; darting about with great agility, and at every motion shewing an almost infinite variety of changeable colours. Towards the evening of this day a new phaenomenon appeard, the sea was almost coverd with a small species of Crabbs Cancer depurator of Linnaeus, floating upon the surface of the water, and moving themselves with tolerable agility, as if the surface of the water and not the bottom was their Proper station.”

      By this time the bark had settled down into the routine of a long voyage, the Royal Navy’s routine; for although the Endeavour might not look much like a king’s ship she was run in strict man-of-war fashion, as precise in the little bark of which Cook was the commander as ever it had been in sixty-gun line-of-battle ships in which he had been the master, the unchanging pattern of her days and nights punctuated by bells and and bosun’s pipes, her upper decks scrubbed and swabbed at dawn, her hammocks piped up at seven bells in the morning watch, hands piped to breakfast at eight bells, lower decks cleaned, and then at midday the ceremony at which all the officers and midshipmen took the sun’s altitude and the master reported noon and the latitude to the officer of the watch, whereupon the officer of the watch, stepping across the quarterdeck and taking off his hat, reported it to the captain, who would reply “Make it twelve, Mr —”, thus formally and legally beginning the nautical day. Immediately after this eight bells was struck and the hands were piped to dinner, just as they would be piped to supper in the evening and then to quarters; while a little later still hammocks would be piped down, the watch set, and the order of the night would begin. And this very long-established form of communal life was repeated indefinitely: except in times of extreme crisis its groundwork never varied: and it is this continual near-repetition, day after day, more than a thousand entries in the log as the degrees crept by, that gives a sense of the immense length of the Endeavour’s voyage – a sense that no abridged account, with its merely factual statement of weeks, months, and years, can give with anything like the same force.

      Banks and Solander lived on the periphery of this well-knit traditional community, and they might have had a sad time of it; but sailors are friendly creatures upon the whole, and although Cook was a firm disciplinarian he never made any difficulty about unimportant things: the Endeavour carried a longboat, pinnace and yawl, but Banks also had a lighterman’s skiff of his own, and he could have it hoisted out whenever the operation did not hold up the ship’s progress, and this he did with great profit during the calms that followed until 7 September, when

      The wind was now fair and we went very pleasantly on towards our destined port, tho rather too fast for any natural Enquiries, for my own part I could well dispence^* with a much slower pace, but I fancy few in the ship, Dr Solander excepted, are of the same opinion, tho I believe Every body envyed our easy contented countenances during the last Calm, which brought so much food to our pursuits.

      8 Blew fresh today, but the wind was very fair so nobody complaind, nor would they was the wind much stronger, so impatient has the Calms and foul wind made every body; by the reckoning we were off Cape St Vincent so shall soon bid adieu to Europe for some time.

      10 Since the northerly wind began to blow it has not varied a point, the Sea is now down and we go on pleasantly at the rate of about 6 Knotts; could any contrivance be found by the help of which new subjects of natural history could be taken Dr Solander and myself would be Quite happy, we are forc’d to be content; three days are now passd since any thing has been taken or indeed seen, except a stray turtle who swam by the ship about noon, but was left far behind before any instrument could possibly have been got to hand.

      On 12 September Madeira came in sight and that night the Endeavour anchored in Funchal Bay. As soon as the ship had been given pratique the next morning, Cook, with his usual kindness, sent Banks and Solander ashore; here they were received with equal kindness by the English consul, who provided them with beds, permits, guides, horses and everything necessary for a rapid and determined exploration of the island, an exploration very much helped by the presence of Dr Thomas Heberden, a resident physician, a fellow member of the Royal Society and, though this was not his main interest, something of a botanist (they named Heberdenia excelsa after him). They only had five days, and one of these was largely wasted, to their fury, by a courtesy-visit from the Governor, but even so they collected 18 fishes and 246 plants (including cryptogams), in spite of the fact that in September nearly everything but the vines had died down. Banks also had time to make some remarks about the people (exceedingly idle, exceedingly conservative), the wine (ill made, ill cultivated, and carried on men’s heads in goatskins), the friars and their admirable hospital, and the nuns (civil, but wonderfully talkative); yet although he sounds a little censorious and No-Popery, it is clear that he enjoyed himself very much indeed, as well he might, having seen the banana in great abundance, the guava, the pineapple, the cinnamon tree and the mango.

      On 18 September they sailed away, the light airs carrying them south and presently allowing them to catch “a most beautifull species of Medusa, of a colour equaling if not exceeding the finest ultramarine; it was described and call’d Medusa azurea.” Then in 30°7’N, 15°55’W they saw the Dry Salvages; and two days later they were called up very early in the morning to be shown Tenerife a great way off. “While we were engagd in looking at the hill a fish was taken which was describd and called Scomber serpens; the seamen said they had never seen such a one before except the first lieutenant, who remembered to have taken one before just about these Islands; Sr Hans Sloane in his Passage out to Jamaica also took one of these fish which he gives a picture of, Vol I, T.1.f.2.”

      Off the Canaries they picked up the north-east trade wind, and on 25 September Banks wrote in his journal:

      Wind continued to blow much as it had done so we were sure we were well in the trade; now for the first time we saw plenty of flying fish, whose beauty especialy when seen from the cabbin windows is beyond imagination, their sides shining like burnished silver; when seen from the Deck they do not appear to such advantage as their backs are then presented to the view, which are dark colourd.

      26 Went as usual and as we expect to go these next two months; flying fish are in great plenty about the ship. About one today we crossed the tropic, the night most intolerably hot, the Thermometer standing all night at 78 in the cabbin tho every window was open.

      Their expectations were justified; the trade wind bowled the Endeavour along towards Brazil at seven knots, a very fine pace for her, and although this put an end to Banks’s boating, there were often birds in the rigging and there were always, of course, the traditional sharks. The first of a long series was taken on 29 September:

      About noon a young shark was seen from the Cabbin windows following the ship, who immediately took a bait and was caught on board: he proved to be the Squalus Charcharias of СКАЧАТЬ