The area is associated with the notorious Bermuda Triangle. Historically, there had been the popular
notion that ships could become trapped by the extravagant growth of Sargasso
weed. Sailing ships were actually more
likely to be delayed by the relatively calm winds and ocean currents, which is
why this region was also known as the “doldrums” or “horse latitudes”. The latter name is a reference to the
unfortunate practice of throwing horses overboard to save on drinking water
when ships were delayed by the absence of wind.
The Sargasso Sea has been an ideal location for supernatural or
otherwise unfamiliar events to take place, and is the setting or inspiration
for numerous horror and science fiction tales.
In the The Mystery
of the Derelict, the four-masted sailing ship Tarawak stalls in the open
sea after drifting into an area of calm wind and weak current. The sea weed has grown especially thick here,
forming thick banks that almost look like land.
The crew discovers two ships in the neighboring water, one an ancient
derelict, and the other, a smaller, faster moving barque. The other ship appears to be in difficulty,
but the crew of the Tarawak can barely observe this due to the distance between
the ships.
There appears to be a violent struggle aboard the smaller
ship, of which the men of the Tarawak can catch only brief glimpses. Lights are moving erratically about the deck,
and there are the cracks of gunfire, which they can just barely hear when the
wind dies down. The crew assumes that
there is a mutiny on board the other ship.
In view of the horror that is later revealed, the element of distance
from which this terrible conflagration is observed makes the incident poignant
and disturbing. “There but for the grace
of God go I.” But also, “In space—or far
out at sea—no one can hear you scream.”
Hodgson describes a vast outcropping of sea weed, which almost
forms another world. In a large rowboat,
ten of the crew of the Tarawak cautiously
edge up to the two mysterious boats. One
has been abandoned for a very long time, the other more recently. The scene is reminiscent of a similar one in
the movie Alien, (1979) when a party
from the Nostromo lands on the planet
to explore another derelict, this one an alien spacecraft. Inside they find the remains of a crewmember that
died a gruesome death.
Another modern example is the arrival of the rescue party
in Event Horizon (1997). A starship of the same name is found in a
deteriorating orbit around the planet Neptune—an appropriate marine reference—and
all of its crew are dead. What happened
here?
The discovery of a derelict, whether it is a vessel that
travels the sea or outer space or even the open road, is often used to begin a
tale of horror or science fiction. In
some respects, the abandoned vehicle is a metaphor for a person, what remains
of him or her. Who was this? What happened to them?
(In Coleridge’s Rime
of the Ancient Mariner, surely the predecessor for many stories of this
kind, the old sailor who tells his story is
the derelict himself.)
The men of the Tarawak first explore the recently abandoned barque, and then the ancient rotted ship,
mindful of a storm that may soon strike.
It is eerily quiet, gloomy and spacious inside the old wreck, except for
“a low, continuous, shrill whining…” Very soon they must flee for their lives.
The Mystery of the
Derelict is one of Hodgson’s better sea stories. One can easily imagine old sailors and
shipmates sitting around a table and reminiscing about the events in this
tale. “Remember that time when we were
stalled out in the Sargasso and…” Though
the incidents as they are depicted might be the stuff of tall tales, there is
enough realism to give the story some plausibility and “bite.”
**********
HiLo Books has recently re-introduced William Hope
Hodgson’s The Night Land, originally
published in 1912. This novel, along
with The House on the Borderland, and
The Ghost Pirates, are three of his
more famous works of fiction. HiLo Books
produces “The Radium Age Science Fiction Series”, which endeavors to
re-introduce classic weird fiction from the years 1904-1933.
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