Adventure and adventurers > Hudson Bay, or, Everyday life in the wilds of North America

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ASCENDING TO THE TRUCK.
mast. The tops were gained easily, and we even made
two or three steps up the top-mast shrouds with affected
indifference; but, alas! our courage was failing—at
least mine was—very fast. However, we gained the
cross-trees pretty well, and then sat down for a little to
recover breath. The top-gallant-mast still reared its
taper form high above me, and the worst was yet to
come. The top-gallant shrouds had no rattlins on them,
so I was obliged to shin up; and, as I worked myself
up the two small ropes, the tenacity with which I
grasped them was fearful. At last I reached the top,
and with my feet on the small collar that fastens the
ropes to the mast, and my arms circling the mast itself
—for nothing but a bare pole, crossed by the royal-yard,
now rose above me—I glanced upwards. After taking
a long breath, and screwing up my courage, I slowly
shinned up the slender pole, and, standing on the royal-
yard, laid my hand upon the truck. After a time I
became accustomed to it, and thought nothing of taking
an airing on the royal-yard after breakfast.
About the 5th or 6th of August, the captain said we
must be near the land. The deep-sea lead was rigged,
and a sharp look-out kept, but no land appeared. At
last, one fine day, while at the mast-head, I saw some¬
thing like land on the horizon, and told them so on
deck. They saw it too, but gave me no answer. Soon
a hurried order to “Dowse top-gallant-sails and reef
top-sails ” made me slide down rather hastily from my
elevated position. I had scarcely gained the deck,
when a squall, the severest we had yet encountered,
struck the ship, laying her almost on her beam-ends;