The Sea-Wolf

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1904

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Chapters 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 1 Summary

The narrator Humphrey Van Weyden, 35, is aboard the Martinez outside of San Francisco Bay, having traveled from Sausalito to visit a friend. The day is extremely foggy. Humphrey stands at the bow and admires the beauty of the fog without immediately realizing the danger it poses to ships. He reflects on his recent academic work published in the Atlantic; he is a literary scholar of American literature and wrote about Edgar Allan Poe. For his next essay, “The Necessity for Freedom: A Plea for the Artist” (2), Humphrey is inspired to include a discussion about how men exist in different spheres of knowledge to the greater benefit of all.

One of the crew members comes onto the deck and joins Humphrey. He begins to explain the danger of the fog and, when distant fog horns begin to blow, “translate[s] into articulate language the speech of the horns and sirens” (3) as two ships threaten to collide. A whistle sounds, calling the Martinez to action. The crewman is angry because the other boat is proceeding through the fog recklessly, “tellin’ the rest of the world to look out for him because he’s comin’ and can’t look out for himself! [...] Common decency!” (3-4).

The oncoming ferryboat collides with the Martinez. Humphrey, the other passengers, and the crew of the Martinez scramble to secure themselves lifejackets or a seat on one of the boats as the Martinez begins to sink. Humphrey goes overboard, caught in a hysterical push of many bodies, and enters the freezing water. Though Humphrey wears a lifejacket, the cold and his inability to stay completely afloat in the waves cause him to lose consciousness.

When he awakens, Humphrey finds himself alone on the sea. He does not know how to swim. Through the fog, Humphrey spots a ship approaching and struggles to call out to them. He is spotted by someone on the boat and rescued. Humphrey falls unconscious before he is brought aboard.

Chapter 2 Summary

Humphrey regains consciousness aboard the ship of his rescuers. He is in the kitchen with Mr. Johnson, a “heavy Scandinavian type” (10), and the cook, Thomas Mugridge. Though these two men helped save him, Humphrey is cool towards them, regarding Mugridge as servile and lower class. When Mugridge gives him dry clothes, their bedraggled and mismatched appearance is mortifying for Humphrey. He learns that he has been brought aboard the Ghost, bound for Japan for seal hunting; the captain of the ship is Wolf Larsen, whom Johnson warns Humphrey against angering.

On deck, Humphrey is largely ignored by the crew: “My first thought was that a man who had come through a collision and rubbed shoulders with death merited more attention than I received” (14). Amidships lies the mate, on the brink of death from alcohol poisoning. A strong and authoritative man attempts to rouse him by dousing him with seawater. This man is revealed to be the captain, Wolf Larsen. Humphrey is struck by the captain’s physical strength and demeanor, and he is appalled at the outburst of cursing that Larsen unleashes when the mate finally dies. Humphrey muses that, amid the emotions of Larsen and the Ghost’s crew, the dead mate “was master of the situation” (17).

Chapter 3 Summary

After the mate’s death, Wolf Larsen orders for Johansen to sew the body up in spare cloth, for Mugridge to fill a bag with coal, and for the sailors to retrieve a Bible to give the dead mate a sea burial. Humphrey notes the six seal hunters aboard the ship, who have “natures that knew neither courtesy nor gentleness” (18). Wolf Larsen asks if Humphrey is a preacher, but this draws attention to Humphrey and how much he doesn’t fit in with the crew, and Humphrey becomes embarrassed and prideful.

Larsen asks Humphrey about his livelihood, to which Humphrey replies, “I am a gentleman” (20). When pushed further, Humphrey reveals that he has an income from his family. Larsen mocks him for this, claiming that Humphrey has never worked and relies on “dead men’s hands” (21). Larsen then promotes Johansen to mate, the cabin boy, George Leach, to sailor, and insists that Humphrey take the cabin boy’s place. Larsen offers Humphrey $20 a month and a portion of their profits as cabin boy. He will not help Humphrey return to San Francisco.

The cabin boy, George Leach, comes onto the deck and is questioned about his background by Larsen. When Larsen orders Leach forward to a sailor’s position, Leach protests, claiming that he signed on as a cabin boy so that he wouldn’t have to pull a hunting boat. Larsen brutally punches Leach in the stomach for his insubordination. Humphrey spots a ship approaching, and Larsen tells him it’s the Lady Mine, bound for San Francisco. Desiring to leave Larsen’s ship and proceed to his friend, Humphrey attempts to call out to the Lady Mine for passage.

Larsen calls out after Humphrey, and because of Humphrey’s inability to sound like a sailor, Larsen is able to convince the Lady Mine that Humphrey is inebriated and doesn’t truly need help. The Lady Mine proceeds without Humphrey, who is then forced “into a state of involuntary servitude to Wolf Larsen” (26).

Having found no Bible, the crew buries the dead mate unceremoniously.

Chapters 1-3 Analysis

In the opening chapters of The Sea-Wolf, Humphrey Van Weyden’s social class and gentlemanly codes are revealed through his interactions with the crews of both the Martinez and the Ghost. The tone of Humphrey’s narration in these interactions is central to understanding his societal position before the narrative began. One key example is his first exchange with the cook, Thomas Mugridge. Even though Mugridge gives Humphrey dry clothes, Humphrey describes the clothes and Mugridge’s attitude with language that is distinctly condescending. He presumes that Mugridge is trying to wring money out of him: “He was waiting for his tip [...] an hereditary servility, no doubt, was responsible” (13). Humphrey repeats this idea of hereditary servility several times in his description, indicating that his position as a gentleman creates a bias against men of Mugridge’s class and educational level.

As a self-proclaimed gentleman, Humphrey has never worked for his income nor faced the bodily hardships (malnutrition from lack of food, homelessness, etc.) that are common for the Ghost’s men. Humphrey is used to interacting with his own class, who follow a strict etiquette to make them more gentlemanly, refined, and proper. When Larsen’s mate dies and the captain devolves into a cursing rant, Humphrey is horrified by the language as it so clearly breaks his accustomed social code: “Oaths and vile language of any sort had always been repellant to me” (16).

Furthermore, Humphrey assumes a prideful, if not outright condescending, tone when describing the crew’s reaction to this onslaught of curse words. Though a gentleman is not supposed to condone profanity, Humphrey nevertheless figures himself educated enough to understand the finer nuances of Larsen’s speech: “I appreciated, as no other listener I dare say, the peculiar vividness and strength and absolute blasphemy of his metaphors” (16). Humphrey off-handedly presumes that the sailors are too stupid to understand the extent of Larsen’s speech.