Connecticut western news., 1876-08-11
PICKED UP AT SEA.

Lost in a Fog.--Picked Up by a Fisherman
 and Transferred to an Austrian Vessel---
 A Boy who Does Not Fancy Granite
 QuRrrylnG.
 The Austrian brig Enriea, which ar- rived in New York from Gloucester, England, had on board lad of sixteen, named Frederick Smith, who was taken on board out of an open boat, in which he pulled up to the vessel while she was drifting in calm about 1,5OO mil( at sea. A reporter, searching for the ves- sel, found her lying in the Atlantic
 basin, Brooklyn. Making his way on
 board he learned that the captain had | gone ashore, but that the lad he sought
 was in the forecastle below. Descend ing ladder, the reporter found himself in small and dark but tolerably clean apartment, the walls of which were lined with the sleeping berths of the crew. The little space left was crowded with chests, upon which the men were seated devouring their dinner of sea biscuit and boiled salt beef with more vigor
 than elegance. In this company was
 found the boy Smith, who proved to be
 about sixteen years old, rather small for
 his age, with fair hair and handsome and l AhOOAASOhD 1SdGu1Oos AO
 was attired in shirt and trousers, appa-
 rently made of bagging, patched and
 pieced in many places after style that
 betokened plainly that the fingers which
 had performed the work were more ac-
 customed to handling a marlingspike
 than needle. Hats and boots were evi-
 dently considered effeminAte luxuries in
 the community and were accordingly es
 chewed. On the reporter introducing
 himself, Smith, in the intervals between the bites at the "hard tack he was
 munching, told his story.
 It appears that he belongs to the vil-
 lage of Saugus, some ten miles from
 Boston, where his father, mother, two
 brothers and sister reside. His father
 is engaged in quarrying granite and the
 boy had been accustomed to help him.
 The work was very distasteful, however,
 to Fred, and when in the latter part of
 May his father bought ledge and pro-
 posed. to work it with vigor he, as he
 says, asked and obtained permission to
 go to sea. He accordingly proceeded to
 Boston and made his way to shipping
 office. There the boy signed papers en-
 gazing himself as cabin boy of the fish
 ing schooner Charles Allstrum. He was
 immediately sent to Provincetown, where
 the vessel lay, and reported to the cap
 tain. The latter, two days before sail ing, induced the lad to sign other papers, the purport of which he did not understand. To use the boys own
 words "I didn't think, but signed my own name, and when got out to sea l I found had engaged to be a fisherman , instead of @ cabin boy. We sailed from Provincetown on the last day of May, and reached the fishing banks in about l two weeks. I had to do mans work, 5 standing watch, catching and cleaning l he fish. There are two ways of fishing. F One is with single hand line, and the ] other is with trawl or line about mile l long. Each boat has two big tubs tc f hold the lines coiled up in them. It's a , there is good deal of weight on it, anc : similar line, three feet long, with { 6 is what is called gauge, or large line J. with hook on it. Each tub holds 5O( 3 hooks, making one thousand hooks o1 s each line.
 d "WeH, at four o'clock every afternoon l two of us would have to get into eacl y dory and pull out with the travis d sometimes the sea was washing clea ] over the vessel, but we had to go. Al l. the time l was out did not see two e clear days. It was so foggy that w
 could not see the length of the vessel tt and the boats only found their way bacl J. to the ship by the sound of a horn blow J. from the rigging. Several of the crey y got beyond the sound of the horn ant 3t were lost, but afterward, by good luck n found their way back. I used to traw J. while pulled the boat away from tn l, vessel until all tho line was out. Whe, 7, that was done we had to pull back to tn e ship and work around, cleaning the cod h fish, splitting it open and salting n down. Oh, it was awful work f, worked one day from five o'clock in tn IS afternoon, when we got back after sci 1t ting the travis, till three o'clock tn Id next morning. Then we had always of be up in the morning at three o'clocI le to go out and haul in the travis. Ths ,d took about four hours. Oh, that wa le worse than 'hand lining or cleaning to When the wind and tide were agains Ks me, and every hook had fish on Id struggling to get away, it almost kille D. me. Sometimes halibuts, weighing lift Id pounds, would be on the hooks, and
 used to tear my hands to pieces to pu ne in the heavy lines.'
 IS The lads hands bore testimony to u ed strict truthfulness of that part of h in story. They were as large as the hant ly of full grown, muscular farm lahore to The skin was thick as sole leathe Il, wrinkled and corrugated as the outsit he of an oyster shell, and dotted all ov h. with blisters and holes from which lars r's pieces had been torn. "One day." o1 | oon+S1o,7aI r S1o %hn o1o re fishing with small line, and rig
 boat employed in the same way. Iw fe, followed him along the best I could; b m- he pulled better than I could, and ng got out of my sight in the fog. The es was no sea running at all, so I could n Ter tell by that which way the vessel la I'll It was about half past three in the nor ve ing, just after daybreak, and pull fa- till noon trying to find the ship. I st
 nothing of it, and from that time let I
 boat drift. l was awfully hungry al
 did not know what to do.
 About four o'clock in the evening t HIS fog lifted and I saw schooner near n IS I pulled for it, but missed it in the ely which fell again. Then drifted lit '.e while till saw her again and pulled III to her. She turned out to be the E ,!H Io Wind, fishing vessel from Provin 7 llS, town. She was anchored when I S '1o her and the crew was engaged in fl: oo ing. went on board and told my ste 1n7g to Captain Bowling. He was pre- -ne hard man, too. I went to work like C ere of the crew, and did mans work .I to one morning, when we were sailing ca iIe ward I saw the brig Enrica becalm rd- ond 3riftino o1ono Q i;++1o +o +bo "+r the ward sabont two n,i1es ond ho ont oia Well, I wanted to go home, and SC