Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1886-05-21

Il
MODERN MARINE ROMANCE.
tho Awful Experiences Of Ships Grew
in the Pacific Ooean.
San Francisco Call. z {
There was q scene Of revelry and re-
ioicing ont at 2,3O3 Polk street . few
Nights ago. The place fairly blazed
with the good cheer Of q happy family
reunited. The sailor, husband and
!ather, who had long since been given
up as lost, and dead, had returned
The scene was the home of Capt. John
Dodge, and all the merriment was
caused by the fact that tho bark
Kalakaua, John Dodge master, which
left Panama for this port on Oct. 8,
1855, and had not since been heard
rom, sailed as unconcernedly into the
Golden Gate as though nothing unus~
al had happened.
give been to sea for fifty years, and
to be candid and tell you the truth,
don't think l care about ever going
out beyond the heads again." said
Capt. Dodge, from the centre of his
family circle to an invading Call
reporter. "Why, it's just like being
planted out in Lone mountain and
walking back the next day and going
to work to pay ones own funeral ex-
penses. 1t is decidedly embarrassing.
Here, my wife, children, and friends
have been mourning for me for the
last two months, and now l turn up
ikea trump card and spoil all the fun"
and the Jolly captain chuckled good
naturally.
"How did it all happen?" inquired the
reporter"
'Well, it was this way. We started
all right from Panama on October 9.
Some old tars warned me about going
out, land said I would be sure to strike
calns; but wanted to get home, and
we started. We hadn't been out q
week before the sails tapped against
the RIGGING in a dead calm. There
wasn't enough stir in the air to put out
acandle. The ocean was as motionless
as lead. The sun beat down merci-
lessly. Was it hot? Well, I should
say so. Matches lying down on the
table in my cabin would catch fire by
themselves and burn up. Then it took
to raining. am not stretching it an
inch when say that for three months
there were not fifteen days of SUM-
shine in all. No, you are wrong.
Rain down in those parts. need not be
accompanied by wind. There was
not breath OF breeze, except for an
hour or so, occasionally, and then it
came like a puff from q heated fur
mace. We just drifted about on the
ocean like toy. lido not know how we
ever escaped. We had on board as
cargo 1922 pounds OF powder, and
it was simply a phenomenal dispen-
sation Of luck that We were not blown
up. The thunder and lightning was
simply horrifying. I have never ex-
perienced such storms, and when
streaks of forked lightning would
shoot out Of the sky and play hide
and-go-seek in our rigging the way it
used to do, can't understand why
that powder did not go off. 1 don't
know what I ever did do to deserve
this kindness.
"Did you make no Roadway at all?"
"Well, as l say, we occasionally had
2 few puffs of air, but it required lis
days for us to sight the Galapagos is
lands. They are only 700 miles from
Panama. Why, for sixty days we laid
off the Cocos islands, and day in and
day out we never lost sight of them
just drifting about within a circle OF a
dozen knots, perhaps"
"Did your provisions hold out!"
"Well, no. We began to get down to
pretty close cropping, and / determin-
ed to get to the Galapagos islands for
3 fresh supply. Luckily forus, wemet
g. whaler which had an overstock OF
tood, and we took in a good store.
The captain of the whaler warned me
about going to the Galapagos islands.
He had just come from there, and he
said he was glad to get away with his
life. The islands are owned by the
government of Ecuador, which sends
out men to gather dye moss
on them. There is nothing to
eat on the islands except
what is taken there. The class of men
who will go there are pretty rough
lot anyhow, and when they are starved
for several months they get a great
deal rougher. The whalers said that
the wild men on the islands had killed
their superintendent. seized all the
provisions on g. ship lying III their
port, and would have captured the
whaler had it not put out to sea just
in time We concluded after hearing
this tale to give the Galapagos islands
a wide berth. On February l a fresh
breeze sprang up and we made the re-
manning $500 miles in fifty days, you
gee. Our provisions had almost given
out, when we were 500 miles from this
port. | measured up and found we
only had twenty pounds of hard tack
and twenty pounds OF salt beef. ] de-
cided to divide it into ten rations for
the crew of ten next morning, but as
the day broke we sighted the brig
Selma, and she gave US a fresh store,
which lasted us. Well, that is ALL"
Judge Carter's Ways.
The Washington correspondent oil
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