The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1899-09-07
The Ishmaelite.
How Fishing-Schooner Got Bad Reputa-
lions and Kept It.

How a Fishing-schooner Got a Bad Reputa-
tions and Kept It.
The heroine of Morgan Robertson,s
story, Salvage" in the September Cen
fury, is the Yankee fishing schooner Rose
bud. She was about as piratical look
ing craft as one could we'll meet with in
Western waters. Before telling of the
browning adventure of her career. Mr..
K obertson explains how she earned the
sobriquet Of Ishmaelite.
She had a large crew, abnormally large
hawse- pipes, and a bad reputation-the
last attribute born of the first. Register
ed as the Rosebud, this innocent name
was painted on her stern and on her six
teen dories; but she was known among
the fishing fleets as the Ishmaelite.
and the name fitted her. Secretive and
unfrlendly, she tished alone, avoiding
company, answered few halls, and, sell
dom filling her hold, disposed of her
catch as her needs required, in out of the
way ports, often as far south as Charles
ton. And she usually left behind her
| such bitter memories of her visit as p)ac-
ed the last port at the bottom of her list of
markets.
No ship chandler or provision dealer
ever showed her recipted bills, and not
few OF them openly averred that certain
burglares of their goods had plausible
connection with her presence in port. Be
this as 1t may, the fact stood that farmers
on the coast who saw her high bow and
unmlstakable hawse- pipes when she ran
| in for bait, invariably double locked their
| barns and chicken coops, and turned
loose all tied dogs when night descend
ed, often to find dogs and chickens gone
in the morning
Once, too, three small schooners had
come home with empty holds, and COM
planned of the appearance, while anchor
ed in the fog, of a fiotilla of dories man
ned by masked men, who overpowered
and locked all hands il the cabin or fore
| castle, and then remoye d the cargoes of
fish to their own craft, hidden in the fog.
Shortly after this the lshmaelte disposed
OF a large catch in Baltimore, and the
piracy was believed of her, but never
| proved.
Her luck at finding things was remark
able. Drifting dories, spars, oars, and
trawl-tubs sought her unsavory company
as though impelled by the inanimate per
versity which had sent them drifting. They
were sold in port, or returnd to their own
her career she had towed whistling buoy
| into Boston, and claimed salvage Of the
| government, showing her log book to
prove that she had picked it up far at sea-
| The salvage was paid but as her reputa-
| ton sp, cad, there We're those who de
clared that she had sent it adrift herself
AS poets and sailors believe that ships
/ have souls, it may be that she gloried in
| her shame, like other fallen creatures for
her large, slanting, oval hawSe- pipes and
| boot-top stripe gave fine Oriental sheer
to her face-like bow, and there was slur
| and insult to respectable craft in the lazy
! dignity with which she would swash
| through the fleet on the port tack, com
| polling vessels on the starboard tack to
| give up their right of way or be rammed :;
| for she was large craft, and there was
menace in her solid bowsprit- boom, as
| thick as an ordinary mainmast An out
ward bound coasting- schooner, resenting
| this lawlessness on one occasion, attempt
ed to assert her rights, and being on the
lawful starboard tack, bore steadily down
on the Ishmaelite who budged not a
! quarter point, and losing heart at the last
moment, luffed up all shaking in just the
position to allow the ring of her port
anchor to catch on the bill of the
! Ishmaehte's starboard anchor. As her
ring stopper and shank painter were
weak, the patent windlass unlocked and
| the end of the cable not secured in the
chain blocker, the Ishmaelite walked calm
ly away with the anchor and a hundred
fathoms of chain, which, at the next port,
she sold as legitimate spoils of the sea.