Jethou; or, Crusoe Life in the Channel IslesSuffling, Ernest R. (Ernest Richard)
General
Jethou; or, Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles
Suffling, Ernest R. (Ernest Richard)
Channel Islands; Jethou
When we had finished the boat we were rather at a loss to know how to
find accommodation for her when we did not actually require to use her.
In fine weather she could lie moored just off the house, and to enable
us always to keep her afloat, we rigged up an out-haul, so that standing
on the shore we could haul the boat out or in to its moorings whenever
we chose. This was all very well in fine weather, but when a fresh
south-west wind was blowing, and a heavy sea on, she would pitch and
roll to such an extent that we were afraid she would break loose and
drift away. We had therefore to cast about for some safer place for her,
and with this in view inspected the whole island round. When we came to
Lobster Bay, at the north-east corner, we agreed that that was the most
sheltered position we could find, and most suitable in every way for a
haven.
Quite at the angle of the island a promontory runs straight out to the
eastward for a distance of about forty yards, thus forming a shelter
from the rush of the rising tide through the Perchee Channel, while the
island of Herm kept the wind from the north-east in check.
"Now," said Alec, "if we could build a little stone breakwater from the
end of Cape Homard (Cape Lobster, as Alec called the point, because we
kept the lobster and crab pots there), we could make as safe a little
harbour as one could wish for."
This proposition seemed all very well, but the quantity of stone I knew
it would take rather staggered me, and I was a long time before I could
be brought to give my consent to help in the matter. But when Alec had
laid out his plans to me, I found them so consistent that I readily
agreed to help in the work.
Without wearying the reader by describing in too great detail the
building of our breakwater, I will just give an outline of how it was
built, and another great success achieved, although to ensure that
success we had to work like a couple of galley slaves. Still, with all
our hard work, we were as happy as a couple of schoolboys. We toiled,
sang, and ate with such appetites as only those who are used to hard
work in the sea air can know.
Our plan was to work on Monday; enjoy fishing, etc., on Tuesday; work on
Wednesday at the breakwater, at the garden on Thursday; on Friday at the
breakwater again; and on Saturday till noon also, after which we devoted
the rest of the day to baking, clothes washing and mending, and other
domestic duties. How my mother and 'Cilla would have laughed to see me
at the wash-tub, or hanging out the linen to dry on the furze bushes; or
to have seen Alec using a flat iron which, with great labour, we had
forged, and which was of a peculiar construction, but still very
efficacious in its work. Men are notoriously awkward in their manner of
wringing and other laundry work, and I expect we were no exception to
the general rule. We made our clothes _clean_, and that was all we
required.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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