The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-08-04
WHY BOYS 90 TO SEA.
The Charm of Sailor Dress, Loose
Trousers, Flowing Necktie, Etc.
Glars Russell.

Glars Russell
was but very little lad when l first
went to ssa-ny age. 1875. Some fellows,
you know, might think 131s pretty old; but
when | look back il seems to me SO young
that | can scarcely believe | was ever so
small; and the fancy crosses me sometimes
that the MILDLY in brass buttons and gilt
bagde whose face mine still rather re-
sembles and whose lineament CLEANS out at
me from the shot-silk-plate of an old
dagueTreotype must be some queer small
boy have CHANGED to meet in a crowd, aud
who has got mixed up in my early impress
sions as though he and | were the same
person.
Why went to SEAL can hardly say l
had certainly no clear views. Maybe the
reading of story books about the ocean life
raised kind of hankerinE in me; but L
think it was the desire t shine in buttons,
to wear pair of blue cloth trousers flowing
at the feet, little Jacket with pretty brass
bound sleeves, colored shirt with a collar
lying well open at the throat ard embel-
lished with black silk handkerchief tied
in proper sailors knot, the ends twinkling
TO every breeze like the fly of a Streamer
pulling at a mast, a cap on the back Of my
head with a sparkling device above tle
peak of il representing a golden wreath
encrclng a flag beautifully coored
WIN hiuG anu SliNCt Slik. say IL was Il
yearning to walk attired in clothes of this
kind that ended in my going to ga. have
told you | had no clear views. My notions
of tne deep wero entirely romantic. |
thought of coral islands, green savannahs
forests of fruit trees, savages with bows
and arrows, great elephants with little
black men riding crosS-legged on their
heads, blue rivers winding toward the pur-
pie of distant mountains, with shining white
citiac THAR hanks tybarn tho roofs nj
the houses of the nobility were
garnished with gold and silver
and precious stones, where there were
ducks that laid emeralds and hens rubies,
and where there were the funniest monkeys
in the world to be had for the asking. |
promised one of my little sisters to bring
her box of gold-dust and the ivory tusl1
of an elephant; for another | was TO procure
a bird of paradise, two humming- birds and
a lizard that wasn't poisonous. To my
brother Tommy, who was two years
younger than myself promised a real ca
noe, and | rather think | added that if it
was to be managed | would present him
with a live savage to go fishing with him
in it.
knew geography pretty WELL though my
ideas of distant lands were little confused
when | came to think of their products; but
it seemed to me that fellow only needed to
90 10 sea TO obtain what he wanted. The
world was very big, | thought, and when a
man sailed into it he was bound to meet
with everything that was wonderful and
worth having. 1t never struck me that |
might make a voyage to a place where
there were TO elephants, no gold dust, no
canoes, no savages even, merely a civilized
black man or two, such as you may meet
any day, bland, clean and shining,
in a London street Indeed, | no
more realized the sort of country | might
first visit than | did the life | must lead in
order TO get to it. There was a great deal
of fruit mixed up in my seafaring dream;
the brass buttons and the badge stood first,
and then my vision was a plentfully
stocked as a big market with cocoanuts,
bananas, oranges, dates, custard-apples and
other tirst-class eating. | know something
about ships; l had lived half of my little
life in separate town, and could talk OF
bowsprits, quarter boats. deadeyes and jihs
without laundering; but of the hardships
of a sailors life, the food he eats, the work
he has to do, was, of course, quite ignor-
ant 1t has often amused and Interested
me since to ask roy, say of thirteen
and half, who has told his papa and man.
ma that he is determined To go to sea, what
his notions of the calling are. AS rule
find them wonderfully like what mine
were. 1t is partly an idea of getting away
from school, partly the dream of becoming
man all at once, partly fancy of pirates,
buried treasure, glttering uniforms, aud
fine curioSities to be got somehow and
brought home, the whole colored with the
light of the romance which shines very glo-
riously upon the minds of boys when they
are little, but which slowly fades as one
gets old and older, till life turns as gray
round about one as the cold November sky.