The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1896-09-05
A TERRIBLE COMBAT.
What the Tam O'Shanter's Crew
Recently Saw at Sea.
King of Sea Serpents, With Eyes Like
Rubics and shieldIise Scales.

American sailing ship Tam O'Shanter, sit
ting In the comfortable cabin Of his vessel
as she swung at anchor off Robbins reef In
New York bay.
A quartet of other ships and half dozen
barlss from foreign ports brought tales of
storms and trouble at sea, but they pale
into insigni 1canCe when compared with
the experience Of the Tam O'Shanter's
Skipper.
Sharks OF prodieious size, alliRators and
sea serpcnts figured In this story, and Of
the last named, one Of monstrous proper
tions, led all the other snakes which
swarmed about tiio ship.
The sna.es which "crept through the
Shiny sen, rs related by tho Ancient Mar
iner, would not have stood ghost of a
chance with tho vast school OF serpents
seen from the Tam O'Shnnter's deck.
The combats fought In ocean depths by
giants Of the occan as related and sworn
To by Jack Tars the world over would de
serve no place beside the history OF the
mighty conflicts witnessed by Captain
Peabody and his crew on the voyage from
Hongkong.
Mrs. Peabody accompanied her husband
on this trip. as did also their pretty, blue
eyed, golden haired little daughter, Claire
Lenore Frances Peabody, IS she told visit.
ors graycly, who las spent three of her six
years on board her fathers ship. Mother
and daughter both saw the snalSes-the
"nasty beasts" Claire called them--and
they vouched for the accuracy of the skip
pers story.
Captain Peabody is handsome man OF
possibly 45, with curling brown heard and
mustachc slightly streaEed with gray.
He is we'll educated. 1t required some per-
suasion to induce him to spin the yarn Of
the voyage, hut he finally began:
"Clark Resell" said the captain, "de-
clares an old sailor once told him that If
he were to write onc-quarter of all he'd
seen, heard and gene through the reader
would throw away the book and call him
evil names 'afore' he'd read half what was
writ.
Now, mt the risk of being doubted and
called evil names, ! am going To try TO
describe little Incident that happened
during our late pasSg'-s In this ship from
HonCkong 10 New York, and, l may add,
only ono of many remarkable incidents, ,
hear the landsmen Gull them, that have
happened during my 81 years Of sea life.
However, without fear or favor, / shall
now proceed 20 give the account rs entered
at the time OF tho occurrence In my private
logbook
Ion May 2s, 1895, at daylight, the low
land of Bornco was in sight of the ship,
exactly on the equator. 1 noticed the wa
ter on the port sido of the ship looked very
muddy, while that on the starboard or of
shore side was quito blue. on pulling up
a bucket of water from either side of the
ship we found the blue water was, as we
expected, quite salt, while the muddy wa
ter OH the port side was rs nearly fresh as
water could be under such conditions"
Nasty, muddy ,vattr, and you couldn't
drink it," intercepted Claire. but it
didn't have snlt In i5. and tasted It, Ughp
"This fresh water" continued the skip
per, had without doubt been driven So
far offshorc by one of the many estuaries
of the Pontinials river, tho tides of which
are very strong, especially on the ebb,
when tho frcsh water forces its way for
fully lvg Miios oTsboro and for somo rea
son unknown 70 me refuses to amalgamate
with the salt water
Large uGml.ors of sharks all sorts of
other fish ard s-al,cs were seen on the blue
water side. Some of tho snakes were of
immorse sire, while the smallest, which
came cl0sc u the ship, were not less than
feet long They were of many colors,
somccf tho lorGonos being prcttily striped
ard othors spotted.
ION the port or fresh water side a num-
bor OF clligst1rs ard huge catfish, such as
wc catch iU rlo southern rivers were TO he
seen sv'imlnlng close tn the dividing line
of fresh ard C3lt victor. Every once IN
awhile ono couhl be seen making dash
1t n del hin CT bonita"
"Thcy ri.od tic fish right in pieces"
wns Cliire'a comment at this point.
But the ALI ,ators were not always so
fast ie thc,r excursions" pursued the cap
tain, "for wo saw one which had TO pay
dearly for is' tcmcrlty In trying TO seize u
beautiful dolphin that. was at tho moment
being hotly purFed by gn inmensc shark.
AnigetcrHnd shark bGtN seized the dolphin
at the G.llne moment, and In AN instant we
bchcld "a terrific conflict Tho shark man.
agctl 20 scizc the a!ligator's right hind leg
in its mouth, Gpd, keeping itself well under
water, 10 cyoil the irigAtfGl lushings of
tho Clt9r's tail, it stored the unfortunate
aurinn oEt Ito to blCo cr sals water.
Iii, ppcqrcl 90 DO moro t'iHn the alligator
could stand. ior We sGw that he rapidly
grew weaker TIC shark appeared 10 real
ize that hc Ind his antagonist out of his
clomcnt, Tor Lc suddenly let 60 his hold
on tho To-, oId, makinga terrific dash at
the ratar'a stpraach, literally tore out its
entrdils
"1'he blood from the combatants attract
cd every ono ot ITO sslt and fresh water
deniacns IN t-c vicinity 20 the scene Of the
combat, ard the utmost confusion ap-
pcsrcd 70 prevail, but as the same time wo
could sco from our Gcck that the lnrgcr
and mere powerful Of hcflshcs had formed
pools or synlicGtos, ard rs result tho
small fls,ios on both sides disappeared In
short order We zoe the same thing on the
Stick Exchange once In awhile.
However, much as we bad been sur
priscd, II was ordered that we were To- be
more s..rrrisrd get for, just as we thought
the turmoil In tho water was growing less,
our attention was called 20 the other side
Of the ship. and we there saw sight such
Us VIC had never seen before and mover be-
licvcd any man had Cocn.
MOI even Marco Polo or Baron Nun
chauscn. In their Widest flights Of imag.
!nation, ever attempted describing such
monster ns we say dancing with easy un.