Wichita eagle., 1888-08-10
CAPT. BODEN.

IN the Office of South street merchant,
with lot of letter and bill files, ETC., on
each side of it, is bound volume of The
London Mercantile Marine Magazine. A
slip Of red ribbon serves as book mark
In it. It ia not customary for merchants
to keep old magazines among their pa
pers, and friend Of tho merchant asked
him yesterday if there Was any special
reason for doing SO.
Yes" said the merchant, cit contains
a reference to my first voyage to sea. Be-
sides, like to show it to Capt. Boden
when he comes in to see me. Capt. Boden
is prosperous Long Island farmer now,
living near Northport, but twenty years
ago he was the master Of the New Haven
schooner Pandora. l was lad Of 10 then,
and made my first sea voyage in the Pan
dora. So the captain and are old friends. !"
By this time the merchant had got rid
of the dust on the outside of the maya
zine, and had opened it at tho book mark.
On one page, in black faced type, was the
heading, Rewards and Testimonials, I"
beneath which was the statement that
her British majesty and the board Of
prizes to sailor men for humanity and
bravery, as stated in the paragraphs
following. One of these paragraphs had
black pencil mark around it. 1t was as
follows:
...To Capt. Isaac Boden, of the schooner
Pandora Of New Haven, U. s., a gold
chronometer in acknowledgment of his
humanity to the master and crew of the
brig Fannie Douglas. of Nassau. N. P,
whom he rescued from their vessel on
June a."
1.-The entire crew Of the Pandora" con-
tinued the merchant, ''were Northport
citizens, neighbors and friends, you may
say, at home and at sea as well. Tho
mate, Ezekiel Norton, was the captain
brother in-law; both men owned shares in
the schooner, and both were good seamen.
The second mate, Daniel Clement, who
was about fifteen years older than either,
was acknowledged to be the best sailor
man hailing from Northport. That he was
a second mate instead of captain was
due solely to his taste for liquor.
with such q crew as this It is not sur
prising that discipline was somewhat lax.
Man O war discipline never yet got over
the rail Of coasting schooner so for as
know, but / rather think that we had
more slack rope to ours than is generally
found even In the coasting trade. In
spite of this. however. the men had a
sailor pride in the craft. and it was not
too much to say that the Pandora was
handled and cared for as well as any vessel
in tho trade
eve were on the return trip from New
Orleans for Fall River with cotton, and
had just brought Hatteras abeam when
there came piping gale out of the north
west that liked to have ended us then and
there. The wind came in squall, and
We lost the maintopnast while taking in
tho flying iib and foretopsail. Then we
hauled down the jib and lowered the fore
sail on deck in hurry, after which, find
ing the wind increasing constantly, We
close reefed the foresail and furled the
rest of tho canvas, and so lay to and let
her drift. Of course we got the wreckags
cleared away as soon rs we had snuggea
her.
"Well, the Pandora was good sea
boat, and after drifting for three days
and losing nearly 100 miles the storm
blew itself out and settled into westerly
wind that promised to make up partly for
what we had lost. We were all ANNA
ton In getting the canvas on her again to
take advantage of the breeze, the more so
as she had had a much slower passage up to
the time the storm came on than usual,
on account of light winds. As soon as we
got tho sails set Mr.. Clement and one Of
the men began blocking out new top
mast from o spruce log that we had car
ried for such an emergency. Clement was
4 good ships carpenter, and had saved the
Pandora great many dollars for minor
repairs.
While at work at this. and somewhere
about 10 O'Clock in the morning, tho man
at the wheel saw q wreck a long way Off
to Toward. It was plainly brig. for,
although both topnasts and the bowsprit
were gone, tho lower masts remained.
When the wreck was reported Capt. Boden
came on deck and took long look ct her
through the glass.
"'6he's British he said. pretty soon.
Sec anybody on herr asked MI.
Mot o soul Take . look at her
yourself
I'm mighty glad Of that said Mr..
half day of this wind il We had to run
down there
With that Mr.. Clement got rid Of .
large chew OF tobacco. and said with
emphasis:
".If We had to run down to heri Aims
ye going to run down anyhow Mr..
Clement had been twice picked off OF
floating wrecks like the one We were look
ing at, and each time it was after seeing
number Of vessels pass very close TO
windward without paying any attention
to tho wreck. He was sensitive ON the
subject, naturally. No one made any re-
ply to his question. After looking the
wreck over Mr.. Norton said:
british she is fo1 sure. The squAll
must have caught her all standing Il
bowed the canvas clean out of her. /
can't see enough tapping about her for
dishrag except that piece of the spanker
At the end Of tho gsf- There's nobody
aboard Of her, for there isn't any sor: Of
signal to be seen fore nor aft
Mr.. Clement snorted rather than said:
Give mo the glasses
'One glance was enough for him.
There's nothing like shares in tho
vessel 20 blind the eyes Of skipper he
said. Piece of the spsoker. eh? At
the and Of the gaf, ehs Can't SEQ
no signals, eh. Don't know no
difference between tarpaulins and the
end Of gaH for signals and .
piece Of . spanker. chi Don't ~snt to
see any signals, do YET Some folks arc
mean enough TO leave their own mothers
on . wreck rather than lose q capful Of
wind
The more Mr.. Clement said the more
excited he got, and from what | have re-
peated be went on 10 worse until the cap
tain got SO rolled over the tauats Of the
man that he hauled of and knocked him
down But he didn't stay down; he Was