The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-08-21
started in to smooth them away"
"WelI?" said the captain of the ca

49,
started in to smooth them away"
"Well?" said the captain of the cat
tie boat.
"Oh, with me- said Kettle, truculent-
ly, they Strengthened out so soon as
ever 1 began to hit. If your mates
knew their business they'd soon have
that crew in hand again.
Il don't allow my mates to knock the
men about. To give them their due they
wanted to; they were brought up in a
school which would probably suit you,
captain, all three of them; but l dom [
permit that sort of thing. 1 am a Chris
tan man and l will not order my fell
low men to be struck. If the fellows
refuse their duty, it lies between them
and their consciences.'
LAS if an old'sailor had a conscience"
murmured Kettle to himself. We'll,
captain. I'm no small piece of a Chris
tan myself, but 1 was taught that
whatever my hand findeth to do, to do
it with all my might, and 1 guess bash
ing a lazy crew comes under that
head" i-G
Il don't want either your advice or
your theology"
IF I wasn't a passenger here" said
Kettle. I'D like to tell you what 1
thought of your seamanship, and your
notion of making a masters ticket re-
spected. But TIL hold my tongue on
that. AS it is I think 1 ought just to
say 1 don't consider this ships safe,
run the way she. is
The captain of the cattle boat flushed
darl1ly. He jerked his head towards the
ladder. Get down off this bridge" he
said.
What"
You hear me. Get down off my
bridge. If you've learnt anything about
your profession you must know this is
private up here, and no place for
blooming passengers"
Kettle glared and hesitated. He was
not used to, receiving orders of this de-
scription, and the innovation did not
please him. But for once in his life he
submitted. Miss Carnegie was sitting.
under the lee of the deckhouse aft,
watching him, and somehow or other he
did not choose to have scene before
her. 1t was all part of this strange new
feeling which had come over him.
He gripped his other impulses tight,
and went and sat beside her. She well
coined him cordially She made no Sc
cret of her pleasure at his presence.
But her talk just now Jared upon him.
Like other people who see the ocean
and its traffic merely from the anna
tours view, she was able to detect ro-
nance beneath her present discomforts,
and she was pouring into his ear her
scheme for making it the foundation of
her most ambitious poem.
In Kettles mind, to build an epic on
such a groundwork, was nothing short
of proclamation. He viewed the sea, sea-
men and sea duties with an intimate
eye; to him they were common and un-
clean to the furtherest degree; no trick
of language could elevate their mean
nesses. He pointed out how she would
prostitute her talent by laying hold of
such an unsavory subject, and eXtolled
the beauty of his own ideal. Tackle a
cornfield. miss he would say again
and again, with lis butter yellow color,
and its bobs of red peoples, and the
green hedges all round You write po-
etry such as 1 know you can about a
and farmers and farm build
ings with matched roofs, and you'll
wake one of these mornings (like all
poets hope to do some day. and find
famous. And because why,
you want to know? Well, miss, it's be-
cause cornfields and the country, and
all that, are what people want to hear
about, and dream they've got handy to
their own back doorstep. They're so
peaceful, so restful. You take it from
me, no one would even want to read
four words about this beastly cruel sea
and the brltes of men who make their
living by driving ships across it. No,
by ia, no, miss, you take it from a
man who knows, they'd just despise
it." And so they argued endlessly at
the point, each keeping an unchanged |
opinion.
Perhaps of all the human freight
that the cattle boat carried, Mr.. Nc
Todd was the only one person entirely |
n o N no rob. tn M
work to do; the messroom was warm, |
stuffy and entirely to his taste; liquor |
was plenty and the official engineers
Of the ship were Scotch and argumen- |
-atlve. He never came on deck for a |
Whit of fresh air, never knew a mo-
nents tedium; he lived in a. pleasant |
of broad dialect, strong
tobacco and toasting oil, and thor
lughly enjoyed himself; though when |
he moment of trial came, and his |
hews and energies were wanted for
he saving of human life. he quickly |
showed that this Capua had in no way |
;apped his efficiency.
The steamer had, as has been said
carried foul weather with her all the
way across the Atlantic from the river
Platte, as though it were a curse in
licted for the cruelty of her stevedores.
rhe crew forgot what it was like to
wear dry clothes; the after guard lived
n state of bone-weariness. A harder
captain would have still contrived to
teep them up to the mark; but the man
Who wasin supreme command was fee
lie and undecided, and there is no
ioubt that vigilance was dangerously
lackened.
A fog, too, which came down to cover
he sea, stopped out all view of the
un, and compelled them for three days
o depend on dead reckoning; and (af-
er the EVENT. it was said afstrong cur
ent set the steamer unduly to the
Westward ~ '-t
Anyway. he the cause what it may.