El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1900-07-14
a sound windpfpe this minute.


then I'd have stood by you, especially, -
he added slowly, as though from after
thought, Especially if those dogs thought
that you'd have been safer out of the way.
What he asked, with sudden frowns, as
though the subject annoyed him, what
have you been doing with yourself this
afternoon?'
s'Physicing a sick fireman principally.
The stokehold temperature was 1O5 de-
prees. and as he amused himself drinking
cold condenser water by the quart together
the somewhat natural consequence was
cramp in the stomach. They sent him up
by the ash lift, and your steward dosed
him with chlorodyne and laudanum and
tincture of rhubarb. The result WASH t
encouraging
.sOh. there's never any knowing what to
do with a sick stol1er' s inside But one of
these drugs ought to have fetched him.
perhaps one did, but the other two
didn't seem to fit his ailment."
'sWell he had them for nothing, so I
don't see what call he had to complain. I
never saw such a crew for physic. They
have drunk that big chest half dry as it
is, and if I'd let 'em they d have drunk it
three times over. What did you do to the
chap? Fill him up on the same again or
try a pillt There's ten sorts of pills in
that chest, beauties some of them. You
should have tried him on those little sill
yer coated chaps marked G. They re reg
ular twisters.'
We'll, you see he was twisted enough
already, poor devil, and if it hadn't been
for the donkeyman holding him he'd have
been overheard through the ash chute to
be rid of his misery. So, as it was, L gave
him tumbler full of raw whisky, and
that seemed gradually to unite him again
out of his knots"
The captain snorted. you're greener
than thought, Mr.. Cambel If we'd been
going on, you'd have had half the crew
sick on your hands for dose of that kind.
They're bad enough after our sour doc
tors physic, but for a tumbler of liquor
and spell of idleness old sailor would
have an ear and three toes cut off any day.
However, he added, rising stiffiy to his
feet and stretching, 1.-The chief and the
donkeyman' II see he doesn' t malinger for
long. They are none of them sweet on do
ing another mans work, that gang
Heigh hol See that line of surf We re
bringing over the lee quarter
The Tortugas?'
1.-THE Dry Tortugas There's Yankee
convict station on one of them"
Don't mention it.
Kettle grinned. We shall have made
enough westing soon, and then our course
will be pretty nearly due north, so as to
dodge the gulf stream as much possible,
and he added in lower tone, Ito get
the ship as near as may be to your chan
mel into Florida before we jettison the
crew.
We shall run into the ship tracks from
all the northern gulf ports to Europe
Il know, and we must take our chance
of not being spotted For western sea
there's a regular string of traffic trailing
down to the Dry Tortugas. There you
are for one. Look at that old wind jam
mer.'
He jerked with his thumb toward a
green painted wooden italian bark which
was squattering past less than a quar-
ter of mile away, right athwart the
last rays of the windy sunset. She was
driving merrily homeward, sending her
bows into it till the seas creamed against
her catheads and darkening her jibs with
brine up more than half their height. She
was methodically reducing sail, and
dozen many hued picturesque tatterde
malions were aloft on the foretopaallant
yard hammering the struggling canvas in
to the gaskets.
THE cowardly Dagos,'' said Kettle.
That's always their way Snug down to
topsails as soon as it gets dark, even if
there's only catspaw blowing. By
James, with a breeze like this I'd be car
rying royals on that old tub. And yet,
he went on, with his beard in the heel of
tumbling waters, and yet they say there
used to be poetry in craft of that sort,
while there was never and never will be
with a steamer L suppose the reason is
that a poet has to be man who knows
nothing whatever about what he writes
upon. L know that some chaps who string
verse nowadays have been on a steamboat
and smelled the smells of her and seen her
lines and watched the men who do the
ypt ahOnt
it, But of the old crew who wrote about
moaning harbor bars, and fair white pin
ions, and lusty wooden walls and trusty
hearts of oak, why, they knew no more
about the thing than London bobby does
of angels. And that, 1 suppose, was why
their stuff is called poetry and the lubberly
old wind TANNERS poetical. You give me
. smart steamboat, Mr.. Cambel There's
all the romance on her an old sailorman's
got any use for, and he understands It,
too, even if he can't put it down on pa
per.
II believe you're right, said Cambel
and some day "a new Dana
or a new Michael Scott will come ashore
from the upper bridge, or from an electric
lighted forecastle, or a forced draft engine
room, and show it to US plainly, whereup
on we shall swear that it for our
selves all along. But, he went on, with
a sudden frown, for the present let that
drift. You and l have enough to think of
in our own immediate present without
specializing over possible prophet which
is to arise
We have, hut so much must be
ranged by the chance of the moment that
/ don't see can do much good by talk
ing it over now. All arrangements shat
can be made ahead, l fancy we've got
fixed up already. BY the way, L suppose
you are sure that your explosion in tho
forehold won be too big. 1t would be an
aw k ward 90 for us if the old ships bottom
WAS really blown ont in sober enrneSt -