1、1The Open Boatby Stephen Crane(1871-1900)Chapter 1NONE of them knew the color of the sky. Their eyes glanced level, and were fastened upon the waves that swept toward them. These waves were of the hue of slate, save for the tops, which were of foaming white, and all of the men knew the colors of the
2、 sea. The horizon narrowed and widened, and dipped and rose, and at all times its edge was jagged with waves that seemed thrust up in points like rocks.Many a man ought to have a bath-tub larger than the boat which here rode upon the sea. These waves were most wrongfully and barbarously abrupt and t
3、all, and each froth-top was a problem in small boat navigation.The cook squatted in the bottom and looked with both eyes at the six inches of gunwale which separated him from the ocean. His sleeves were rolled over his fat forearms, and the two flaps of his unbuttoned vest dangled as he bent to bail
4、 out the boat. Often he said: “Gawd! That was a narrow clip.“ As he remarked it he invariably gazed eastward over the broken sea.The oiler, steering with one of the two oars in the boat, sometimes raised himself suddenly to keep clear of water that swirled in over the stern. It was a thin little oar
5、 and it seemed often ready to snap.The correspondent, pulling at the other oar, watched the waves and wondered why he was there.The injured captain, lying in the bow, was at this time buried in that profound 2dejection and indifference which comes, temporarily at least, to even the bravest and most
6、enduring when, willy nilly, the firm fails, the army loses, the ship goes down. The mind of the master of a vessel is rooted deep in the timbers of her, though he command for a day or a decade, and this captain had on him the stern impression of a scene in the grays of dawn of seven turned faces, an
7、d later a stump of a top-mast with a white ball on it that slashed to and fro at the waves, went low and lower, and down. Thereafter there was something strange in his voice. Although steady, it was deep with mourning, and of a quality beyond oration or tears.“Keeper a little more south, Billie,“ sa
8、id he.“A little more south, sir,“ said the oiler in the stern.A seat in this boat was not unlike a seat upon a bucking broncho, and, by the same token, a broncho is not much smaller. The craft pranced and reared, and plunged like an animal. As each wave came, and she rose for it, she seemed like a h
9、orse making at a fence outrageously high. The manner of her scramble over these walls of water is a mystic thing, and, moreover, at the top of them were ordinarily these problems in white water, the foam racing down from the summit of each wave, requiring a new leap, and a leap from the air. Then, a
10、fter scornfully bumping a crest, she would slide, and race, and splash down a long incline and arrive bobbing and nodding in front of the next menace.A singular disadvantage of the sea lies in the fact that after successfully surmounting one wave you discover that there is another behind it just as
11、important and just as nervously anxious to do something effective in the way of swamping boats. In a ten-foot dingey one can get an idea of the resources of the sea in the line of waves that is not probable to the average experience, which is never at sea in a dingey. As each slaty wall of water app
12、roached, it shut all else from the view of the men in the boat, and it was not difficult to imagine that this particular wave was the final outburst 3of the ocean, the last effort of the grim water. There was a terrible grace in the move of the waves, and they came in silence, save for the snarling
13、of the crests.In the wan light, the faces of the men must have been gray. Their eyes must have glinted in strange ways as they gazed steadily astern. Viewed from a balcony, the whole thing would doubtlessly have been weirdly picturesque. But the men in the boat had no time to see it, and if they had
14、 had leisure there were other things to occupy their minds. The sun swung steadily up the sky, and they knew it was broad day because the color of the sea changed from slate to emerald-green, streaked with amber lights, and the foam was like tumbling snow. The process of the breaking day was unknown
15、 to them. They were aware only of this effect upon the color of the waves that rolled toward them.In disjointed sentences the cook and the correspondent argued as to the difference between a life-saving station and a house of refuge. The cook had said: “Theres a house of refuge just north of the Mos
16、quito Inlet Light, and as soon as they see us, theyll come off in their boat and pick us up.“As soon as who see us?“ said the correspondent.“The crew,“ said the cook.“Houses of refuge dont have crews,“ said the correspondent. “As I understand them, they are only places where clothes and grub are sto
17、red for the benefit of shipwrecked people. They dont carry crews.“Oh, yes, they do,“ said the cook.“No, they dont,“ said the correspondent.4“Well, were not there yet, anyhow,“ said the oiler, in the stern.“Well,“ said the cook, “perhaps its not a house of refuge that Im thinking of as being near Mos
18、quito Inlet Light. Perhaps its a life-saving station.“Were not there yet,“ said the oiler, in the stern.Chapter 2As the boat bounced from the top of each wave, the wind tore through the hair of the hatless men, and as the craft plopped her stern down again the spray slashed past them. The crest of e
19、ach of these waves was a hill, from the top of which the men surveyed, for a moment, a broad tumultuous expanse; shining and wind-riven. It was probably splendid. It was probably glorious, this play of the free sea, wild with lights of emerald and white and amber.“Bully good thing its an on-shore wi
20、nd,“ said the cook. “If not, where would we be? Wouldnt have a show.“Thats right,“ said the correspondent.The busy oiler nodded his assent.Then the captain, in the bow, chuckled in a way that expressed humor, contempt, tragedy, all in one. “Do you think weve got much of a show, now, boys?“ said he.W
21、hereupon the three were silent, save for a trifle of hemming and hawing. To express any particular optimism at this time they felt to be childish and stupid, but they all doubtless possessed this sense of the situation in their mind. A young man 5thinks doggedly at such times. On the other hand, the
22、 ethics of their condition was decidedly against any open suggestion of hopelessness. So they were silent.“Oh, well,“ said the captain, soothing his children, “well get ashore all right.“But there was that in his tone which made them think, so the oiler quoth: “Yes! If this wind holds!“The cook was
23、bailing: “Yes! If we dont catch hell in the surf.“Canton flannel gulls flew near and far. Sometimes they sat down on the sea, near patches of brown sea-weed that rolled over the waves with a movement like carpets on line in a gale. The birds sat comfortably in groups, and they were envied by some in
24、 the dingey, for the wrath of the sea was no more to them than it was to a covey of prairie chickens a thousand miles inland. Often they came very close and stared at the men with black bead-like eyes. At these times they were uncanny and sinister in their unblinking scrutiny, and the men hooted ang
25、rily at them, telling them to be gone. One came, and evidently decided to alight on the top of the captains head. The bird flew parallel to the boat and did not circle, but made short sidelong jumps in the air in chicken-fashion. His black eyes were wistfully fixed upon the captains head. “Ugly brut
26、e,“ said the oiler to the bird. “You look as if you were made with a jack-knife.“ The cook and the correspondent swore darkly at the creature. The captain naturally wished to knock it away with the end of the heavy painter, but he did not dare do it, because anything resembling an emphatic gesture w
27、ould have capsized this freighted boat, and so with his open hand, the captain gently and carefully waved the gull away. After it had been discouraged from the pursuit the captain breathed easier on account of his hair, and others breathed easier because the bird struck their minds at this time as b
28、eing somehow grewsome and ominous.In the meantime the oiler and the correspondent rowed. And also they rowed.6They sat together in the same seat, and each rowed an oar. Then the oiler took both oars; then the correspondent took both oars; then the oiler; then the correspondent. They rowed and they r
29、owed. The very ticklish part of the business was when the time came for the reclining one in the stern to take his turn at the oars. By the very last star of truth, it is easier to steal eggs from under a hen than it was to change seats in the dingey. First the man in the stern slid his hand along t
30、he thwart and moved with care, as if he were of Sevres. Then the man in the rowing seat slid his hand along the other thwart. It was all done with the most extraordinary care. As the two sidled past each other, the whole party kept watchful eyes on the coming wave, and the captain cried: “Look out n
31、ow! Steady there!“The brown mats of sea-weed that appeared from time to time were like islands, bits of earth. They were travelling, apparently, neither one way nor the other. They were, to all intents stationary. They informed the men in the boat that it was making progress slowly toward the land.T
32、he captain, rearing cautiously in the bow, after the dingey soared on a great swell, said that he had seen the lighthouse at Mosquito Inlet. Presently the cook remarked that he had seen it. The correspondent was at the oars, then, and for some reason he too wished to look at the lighthouse, but his
33、back was toward the far shore and the waves were important, and for some time he could not seize an opportunity to turn his head. But at last there came a wave more gentle than the others, and when at the crest of it he swiftly scoured the western horizon.“See it?“ said the captain.“No,“ said the co
34、rrespondent, slowly, “I didnt see anything.“Look again,“ said the captain. He pointed. “Its exactly in that direction.“7At the top of another wave, the correspondent did as he was bid, and this time his eyes chanced on a small still thing on the edge of the swaying horizon. It was precisely like the
35、 point of a pin. It took an anxious eye to find a lighthouse so tiny.“Think well make it, captain?“If this wind holds and the boat dont swamp, we cant do much else,“ said the captain.The little boat, lifted by each towering sea, and splashed viciously by the crests, made progress that in the absence
36、 of sea-weed was not apparent to those in her. She seemed just a wee thing wallowing, miraculously, top-up, at the mercy of five oceans. Occasionally, a great spread of water, like white flames, swarmed into her.“Bail her, cook,“ said the captain, serenely.“All right, captain,“ said the cheerful coo
37、k.Chapter 3IT would be difficult to describe the subtle brotherhood of men that was here established on the seas. No one said that it was so. No one mentioned it. But it dwelt in the boat, and each man felt it warm him. They were a captain, an oiler, a cook, and a correspondent, and they were friend
38、s, friends in a more curiously iron-bound degree than may be common. The hurt captain, lying against the water-jar in the bow, spoke always in a low voice and calmly, but he could never command a more ready and swiftly obedient crew than the motley three of the dingey. It was more than a mere recogn
39、ition of what was best for the common safety. There was surely in it a quality that was personal and heartfelt. And after this devotion to the commander of the boat 8there was this comradeship that the correspondent, for instance, who had been taught to be cynical of men, knew even at the time was t
40、he best experience of his life. But no one said that it was so. No one mentioned it.“I wish we had a sail,“ remarked the captain. “We might try my overcoat on the end of an oar and give you two boys a chance to rest.“ So the cook and the correspondent held the mast and spread wide the overcoat. The
41、oiler steered, and the little boat made good way with her new rig. Sometimes the oiler had to scull sharply to keep a sea from breaking into the boat, but otherwise sailing was a success.Meanwhile the light-house had been growing slowly larger. It had now almost assumed color, and appeared like a li
42、ttle gray shadow on the sky. The man at the oars could not be prevented from turning his head rather often to try for a glimpse of this little gray shadow.At last, from the top of each wave the men in the tossing boat could see land. Even as the light-house was an upright shadow on the sky, this lan
43、d seemed but a long black shadow on the sea. It certainly was thinner than paper. “We must be about opposite New Smyrna,“ said the cook, who had coasted this shore often in schooners. “Captain, by the way, I believe they abandoned that life-saving station there about a year ago.“Did they?“ said the
44、captain.The wind slowly died away. The cook and the correspondent were not now obliged to slave in order to hold high the oar. But the waves continued their old impetuous swooping at the dingey, and the little craft, no longer under way, struggled woundily over them. The oiler or the correspondent t
45、ook the oars again.Shipwrecks are apropos of nothing. If men could only train for them and have 9them occur when the men had reached pink condition, there would be less drowning at sea. Of the four in the dingey none had slept any time worth mentioning for two days and two nights previous to embarki
46、ng in the dingey, and in the excitement of clambering about the deck of a foundering ship they had also forgotten to eat heartily.For these reasons, and for others, neither the oiler nor the correspondent was fond of rowing at this time. The correspondent wondered ingenuously how in the name of all
47、that was sane could there be people who thought it amusing to row a boat. It was not an amusement; it was a diabolical punishment, and even a genius of mental aberrations could never conclude that it was anything but a horror to the muscles and a crime against the back. He mentioned to the boat in g
48、eneral how the amusement of rowing struck him, and the weary-faced oiler smiled in full sympathy. Previously to the foundering, by the way, the oiler had worked double-watch in the engine-room of the ship.“Take her easy, now, boys,“ said the captain. “Dont spend yourselves. If we have to run a surf
49、youll need all your strength, because well sure have to swim for it. Take your time.“Slowly the land arose from the sea. From a black line it became a line of black and a line of white, trees, and sand. Finally, the captain said that he could make out a house on the shore. “Thats the house of refuge, sure,“ said the cook. “Theyll see us before long, and come out after us.“The distant light-house reared high. “The keeper ought to be able to make us out now, if hes looking through a glass,“ said the captain. “Hell notify the life-saving people.“None of th
