Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1885-02-11
AROUND THE HORN.
Doubling the Cape In a Twenty-Five Ton
Schooner Many Years Ago.
TFropo he BOSTON GIoIle

My schooner, the Mary and Emma,
was the smallest craft that ever rounded
Cape Horn" said Capt. D. Ct. Patterson.
: She was just twenty-five tons by the
new measurement. I left Nantucket,
December 6, 1848, bound for San Fran
cisco. The Foccio, Capt. J. Miller
Cranston, eighteen tons, left there about
the same time, bound for the same port,
but she went through the Straits of
Magellan, and saved, by so doing, about
1000 miles,"
why didn't you go through the
Straits ?"
"I'll tell you. Just before left Nan
tucket, news reached there of the loss of
two New London schooners, in the
Straits, and when I went to get nv
policy OF insurance I found on the
margin of it: This company objects
to the schooners passing through the
Straits of Magellan; and 80 I informed
them l would take that policy and
put the little schooner around Cape
Horn"
"How long were you in getting to the
cape2"
"We were sixty days getting to a
point off Cape Horn. remember the
sixtieth day out we hove to in distress
ing gale of wind, and the cook came to
me and said, Captain, can't give you
no duff to-day'-you know what duff is,
plum duff. I said, why not?' He
says, I've been overlooking the log
book, an find I've given you duff fifty
nine times since we left port Then,
why not to-day?' I says. He says, Be
cause she rolls it out of the boiler as
fast as I puts it in A pooty good
reason"
"Were you near the shore in round
ing the cape?"
"Oh, yes; I harbored there three
days in the Bay of Good Success, where
we wooded and watered, and put the
little schooner in perfect order for
doubling Cape Horn. We were then
just thirty miles this side of it. Tt was
a bleak, desolate, mountainous place, on
the Strait of Lamar, one of the Terra
del Fuego Islands. The wood we
wooded with there burnt readily when
we cut it green. It looked more like
our maple and birch than anything
else, very close grained. We didn't see
any natives but found one wigwam,
made of brush, seaweed and mud.
There was lot of clam shells lying
round it that looked as if they had been
recently thrown there. We filed our
barrels from nice fresh-water stream,
ice-cold, coming from the mountains.
The mountains were not very high, per-
haps 1000 or 5000 feet. It's cold there
all the year round, you know"
How was the weather after leaving
the Bay of Good Success?"
ut was terrible. For twenty days
we did not make degree of longitude,
which is but about twenty miles in that
latitude. The vessel was hove to I'M
der shortened sail oil OF tWo-thirds of
that time. There we're seven of US all
told. My brother was first mate, but he
was not a navigator, and / placed a
good deal of confdencein Uncle Rube,'
al old whaling captain that I'd shipped
as assistant navigator. He'd rounded
Cape Horn several times before, and ad-
vised me to keep off to the south and
give the cape wide birth. After we'd
been hove to the better part of twenty
days, as I told you, and got wide off
from the Cape, got little mad and
said that was going to tack ship in
shore, and wouldn't tack back again
without rounding the cape or going in
among the islands. The wind favored
Us very little, and the schooner went
Oy the cape and was not tackled again
for two weeks, when we were 1000 miles
north of the cape in the Pacific. The
e. III
i'll we arrived in Talcuhana, where we
wooded and watered again, and stayed
Jour days. There were ten or a dozen
vessels there bound for San Francisco
md several that had come from there |
bound back again. We had consul |
5ation at the hoUel, and it was agreed |
among them all to steer from Talcu- |
hama northwest, cross line in ITO, west |
longitude, and from there go hard full |
through the northeast trades, which |
would take us into 80 north and 40 |
vest longitude, there take the wind from
he northwest, go into San Francisco
Dc the port tack. It was a fine day
when we left Talcuhana-just what
We wanted, fair wind-and
gave orders to keep the vessel nor
vest. Uncle Rube looked into the
compass and says to the steersman:
Did the captain give you orders to steer
lor'west?' He says, Yes, he's going to
ross the line in 10 west, an that
course IL take us there He says, 7
lever crossed in less than 1876; an if
le undertakes to cross in ITO we'll eat
IL up, an drink all up, an starve,
n choke, an die He kep' that agoin'
IL the time. When we reached the
inc we was becalmed for two or three
lays, an he said, Il told you so;' an
lever used the sextant for two or three
lays. He thought we were goners, an
:ep' his old story going continually.
We wasn't lying still as he thought we
vas; we was making twenty miles day
nth the current. At the end of the
bird day our light sails was shivering
nth the air; at the end of the fourth
ey they had to come in on account of
he strong breeze; and at the end of
be fifth day we were fairly into the