The Republican journal., 1882-07-13
The Story of the Alcazar.
Bl MARY HAlLECk Fl

B1 MAKN HAll.f-Ck EoOl.
1t was told 10y Captain John to boy
from the main land. who WAS spending
the summer on the Island, as they sat to-
gether. one August evening, at sunset,
on a broken bowsprit which had once
been Il part of the AlcaZar
1t was dead low water at Southwest
Ilarbor a land locked inlet which nearly
cut the Island in two, and was the gate
way through which the fishing craft from
the village at the harbor head found their
way out into the great PenobScot Bay.
There were many days during the stern
winter and bleak spring months when the
gate was blocked with ice. or Neled in
fog. but nature relented Il little toward
the Island folk in the fall ana sent them
sunny days for their late. scant harvest
ing, and steady winds for the macktrcl-
| fishing, to give them little hope before
the winter set in, sharp, with the cQun-
octial. Now, at low tide, the bright gate
way shone wide open, as if to let out the
waters which rise and fall ten feet in the
inlet You could look out far beyond the
lighthouse on Grecnlaw's Neck, and the
islands that thrOng the mouth Of the
/ harbor, to the red spot of flame the
sunset had kindled below the rack of
smoke grey clouds. The color burned
III a dull gleam upon the water broken
by the dark shapes Of shadoWy islands
the sail-boats at anchor in the muddy,
gistening flats leaned over disconsOlate-
ly on their sides, in despair of ever
again feeling tho thrill Of the returning
waters beneath their keels; and the
gray, weather beaten houses, crowded
together on the brink Of the cliff above
the beach, looked like group of hooded
| old women watching for belated sail, as
II they bad caught the expression of their
! inmates lives At high tide the hulk of
the Alcazar had been full Of water, which
was now pouring out through a hole in
the planking OF her side i'll IA continuous
murmurOus stream, like the voice Of
| persistent tdlker in silent company.
The old ship looked much too big for her
narrow grave, at the foot of the green
| cliff in which her anchor was deeply sunk
and half overgroWn with thistles her
! blunt bow and the ragged stump of the
figure head rose, dark and high, above
the wet beach where Captain John sat,
with his absorbed listener, on the bow
spirit. There were riffs about her rail
| where the red sunset looked through.
| Her naked sides, that for years had been
molstencd only by the perennial rains and
SHOWS, showed rough and scaly like the
| armor OF some tabled sea monster She
was tcthered to the cliff by her rusty an
| ch0r chain which swung across the space
| between, serving as a clothes line for the
dragged drift weed left by the receding
tide to dry.
"She was a big ship for these parts, -
| Captain John was saying. There want
one like her ever come into these waters
/ before. Lord Folks come down from
| the Neck, and from Green's Landin
and Nor'east llarbor, and don't know
| but they come from the mainland, to see
| her when She was fust towed in And
such work as they made OF her name
Some called it one way and some another
It's kind of Il Cuban name. they say.
expect there aint anybody round here
that can call it right. However twas,
old Capn Green took and pried it off her
starboard quarter, and somebody got hold
OF it and nailed it up over the blacksmith
shop door, and there you see it now. The
old Capn named her the Stranger when
he had her rettted. Maybe YOU could
make out the tail of an $ on her stern if
| you could get around there. That names
been gone these forty year Seems if she
never owned to it, and it didn't stick to
her. She was never called anything but
the AlcaZar long as ever knew her, and
expect know full's much about her as
anybody round here. Twas a-settn'
here, on this very beach, at low water,
lust's we be now, the old man told me
lust how he picked her up. 1t took a
wonderful holt on him; there's no doubt
about that. He told it to me more'n once
before the time come when he was to put
the llnlsh on to it but, in a gen'ral way,
the Capn want much of a talker, and he
was shy OF this partic'lar business, for rea-
SONS that expect nobody knows much
about. But man most always likes to
talk to somebody, no matter how close
monthed he may be. Twas Just about
this time o year, fall of '27-the year
ParsOn FlavorS was ordained Cap'n
Green had gone a mack'rel tishin' with
his two boys off Isle au Haut, and they
dld think O crusn' out into Frenchman' s
Bay, II the weather hel' steady. They was
havin fair luck, hangin round the island,
OIL and on, for matter of week. when
IL thlckened up Il little and set IN fOggy,
and for two days they didn't see the
shore. The second evenin' the wind
freshened from the southland and east
ard, and drove the fog in shore bit.
and the sun, just before he set, looked
like big yellow ball through the fog,
and made a sickly kind of glimmer
over the water They was a-lyin' at an
chor, and all Of a sudden, right to the
wind'ard Of 'em, this old ship loomed up,
drittin' in with the wind and flood tide
They couldn't make her out, and | guess
for Il minute, the old Cap'n didn't know
but it was the FLYNN Dutchman but she
hadn't a rag O sail on her, and, as she
got nearer, they could see there Want a
man on board. The Cap'n didn't like the
looks of her, but he knew she WANT no
phantom, and he and one of his boys
down with the punt and went alongside.
| "Twa'n't more'n a quarter of mile to