Youth, a Narrative Read online

  Produced by Judith Boss and David Widger

  YOUTH

  A NARRATIVE

  By Joseph Conrad

  "... But the Dwarf answered: No; something human is dearer to me than the wealth of all the world." GRIMM'S TALES.

  TO MY WIFE

  YOUTH

  This could have occurred nowhere but in England, where men and seainterpenetrate, so to speak--the sea entering into the life of most men,and the men knowing something or everything about the sea, in the way ofamusement, of travel, or of bread-winning.

  We were sitting round a mahogany table that reflected the bottle, theclaret-glasses, and our faces as we leaned on our elbows. There was adirector of companies, an accountant, a lawyer, Marlow, and myself. Thedirector had been a _Conway_ boy, the accountant had served four years atsea, the lawyer--a fine crusted Tory, High Churchman, the best of oldfellows, the soul of honour--had been chief officer in the P. & O.service in the good old days when mail-boats were square-rigged at leaston two masts, and used to come down the China Sea before a fair monsoonwith stun'-sails set alow and aloft. We all began life in the merchantservice. Between the five of us there was the strong bond of the sea,and also the fellowship of the craft, which no amount of enthusiasm foryachting, cruising, and so on can give, since one is only the amusementof life and the other is life itself.

  Marlow (at least I think that is how he spelt his name) told the story,or rather the chronicle, of a voyage:

  "Yes, I have seen a little of the Eastern seas; but what I remember bestis my first voyage there. You fellows know there are those voyages thatseem ordered for the illustration of life, that might stand for a symbolof existence. You fight, work, sweat, nearly kill yourself, sometimes dokill yourself, trying to accomplish something--and you can't. Notfrom any fault of yours. You simply can do nothing, neither great norlittle--not a thing in the world--not even marry an old maid, or get awretched 600-ton cargo of coal to its port of destination.

  "It was altogether a memorable affair. It was my first voyage to theEast, and my first voyage as second mate; it was also my skipper's firstcommand. You'll admit it was time. He was sixty if a day; a little man,with a broad, not very straight back, with bowed shoulders and one legmore bandy than the other, he had that queer twisted-about appearanceyou see so often in men who work in the fields. He had a nut-crackerface--chin and nose trying to come together over a sunken mouth--and itwas framed in iron-grey fluffy hair, that looked like a chin strap ofcotton-wool sprinkled with coal-dust. And he had blue eyes in thatold face of his, which were amazingly like a boy's, with that candidexpression some quite common men preserve to the end of their days bya rare internal gift of simplicity of heart and rectitude of soul.What induced him to accept me was a wonder. I had come out of a crackAustralian clipper, where I had been third officer, and he seemed tohave a prejudice against crack clippers as aristocratic and high-toned.He said to me, 'You know, in this ship you will have to work.' I saidI had to work in every ship I had ever been in. 'Ah, but this isdifferent, and you gentlemen out of them big ships;... but there! Idare say you will do. Join to-morrow.'

  "I joined to-morrow. It was twenty-two years ago; and I was just twenty.How time passes! It was one of the happiest days of my life. Fancy!Second mate for the first time--a really responsible officer! I wouldn'thave thrown up my new billet for a fortune. The mate looked me overcarefully. He was also an old chap, but of another stamp. He had a Romannose, a snow-white, long beard, and his name was Mahon, but he insistedthat it should be pronounced Mann. He was well connected; yet there wassomething wrong with his luck, and he had never got on.

  "As to the captain, he had been for years in coasters, then in theMediterranean, and last in the West Indian trade. He had never beenround the Capes. He could just write a kind of sketchy hand, and didn'tcare for writing at all. Both were thorough good seamen of course,and between those two old chaps I felt like a small boy between twograndfathers.

  "The ship also was old. Her name was the _Judea_. Queer name, isn't it?She belonged to a man Wilmer, Wilcox--some name like that; but he hasbeen bankrupt and dead these twenty years or more, and his name don'tmatter. She had been laid up in Shadwell basin for ever so long. You mayimagine her state. She was all rust, dust, grime--soot aloft, dirt ondeck. To me it was like coming out of a palace into a ruined cottage.She was about 400 tons, had a primitive windlass, wooden latches to thedoors, not a bit of brass about her, and a big square stern. There wason it, below her name in big letters, a lot of scroll work, with thegilt off, and some sort of a coat of arms, with the motto 'Do or Die'underneath. I remember it took my fancy immensely. There was a touch ofromance in it, something that made me love the old thing--something thatappealed to my youth!

  "We left London in ballast--sand ballast--to load a cargo of coal in anorthern port for Bankok. Bankok! I thrilled. I had been six years atsea, but had only seen Melbourne and Sydney, very good places, charmingplaces in their way--but Bankok!

  "We worked out of the Thames under canvas, with a North Sea pilot onboard. His name was Jermyn, and he dodged all day long about the galleydrying his handkerchief before the stove. Apparently he never slept.He was a dismal man, with a perpetual tear sparkling at the end of hisnose, who either had been in trouble, or was in trouble, or expectedto be in trouble--couldn't be happy unless something went wrong. Hemistrusted my youth, my common-sense, and my seamanship, and made apoint of showing it in a hundred little ways. I dare say he was right.It seems to me I knew very little then, and I know not much more now;but I cherish a hate for that Jermyn to this day.

  "We were a week working up as far as Yarmouth Roads, and then we gotinto a gale--the famous October gale of twenty-two years ago. It waswind, lightning, sleet, snow, and a terrific sea. We were flying light,and you may imagine how bad it was when I tell you we had smashedbulwarks and a flooded deck. On the second night she shifted her ballastinto the lee bow, and by that time we had been blown off somewhere onthe Dogger Bank. There was nothing for it but go below with shovels andtry to right her, and there we were in that vast hold, gloomy like acavern, the tallow dips stuck and flickering on the beams, the galehowling above, the ship tossing about like mad on her side; there weall were, Jermyn, the captain, everyone, hardly able to keep our feet,engaged on that gravedigger's work, and trying to toss shovelfuls of wetsand up to windward. At every tumble of the ship you could see vaguelyin the dim light men falling down with a great flourish of shovels.One of the ship's boys (we had two), impressed by the weirdness of thescene, wept as if his heart would break. We could hear him blubberingsomewhere in the shadows.

  "On the third day the gale died out, and by-and-by a north-country tugpicked us up. We took sixteen days in all to get from London to theTyne! When we got into dock we had lost our turn for loading, and theyhauled us off to a tier where we remained for a month. Mrs. Beard (thecaptain's name was Beard) came from Colchester to see the old man. Shelived on board. The crew of runners had left, and there remained onlythe officers, one boy, and the steward, a mulatto who answered to thename of Abraham. Mrs. Beard was an old woman, with a face all wrinkledand ruddy like a winter apple, and the figure of a young girl. Shecaught sight of me once, sewing on a button, and insisted on having myshirts to repair. This was something different from the captains' wivesI had known on board crack clippers. When I brought her the shirts, shesaid: 'And the socks? They want mending, I am sure, and John's--CaptainBeard's--things are all in order now. I would be glad of something todo.' Bless the old woman! She overhauled my outfit for me, and meantimeI read for the first time _Sartor Resartus_ and Burnaby's _Ride toKhiva_. I didn't understand much of the first then; but I remember Ipreferred the soldier to the philosopher at the time; a preferencewhich life has only confirmed. One was a ma
n, and the other was eithermore--or less. However, they are both dead, and Mrs. Beard is dead, andyouth, strength, genius, thoughts, achievements, simple hearts--all dies.... No matter.

  "They loaded us at last. We shipped a crew. Eight able seamen and twoboys. We hauled off one evening to the buoys at the dock-gates, ready togo out, and with a fair prospect of beginning the voyage next day. Mrs.Beard was to start for home by a late train. When the ship was fastwe went to tea. We sat rather silent through the meal--Mahon, the oldcouple, and I. I finished first, and slipped away for a smoke, my cabinbeing in a deck-house just against the poop. It was high water, blowingfresh with a drizzle; the double dock-gates were opened, and the steamcolliers were going in and out in the darkness with their lights burningbright, a great plashing of propellers, rattling of winches, and a lotof hailing on the pier-heads. I watched the