Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1901-10-12
HIS NAME FORGOTTEN.

HIS NAME FORGOTTEN.
The cottage stood on a high cliff over
looking the harbor, and toward the west,
far beyond two or three groups of small,
rocky islands-barren save for n few
scrub oaks and vagrant pines-could be
seen the fine arc of the horizon circling
through 40 or 80 degrees. The sun
had set half an hour before, and had left
the eastern sky all pallid from its pass
ing. The sea was silent and shining,
and faint glow of silver at a certain
point showed where the moon was about
to rise. A ripping murmur came up
from the foot of the cliff.
They were talking of the ocean. A
man who crossed over to Europe every
summer told of his experience during a
great storm, when he had seen one of the
enormous Atlantic liners dashed about
like a toy ship in the eddy of a brook;
how the passengers had been ordered be-
low into the sitting saloons, and that
next morning, when fair weather had
come and they were allowed to go on
deck; how they had seen part of the
great bridge shattered and torn, and We're
told that three men had been washed
overheard during the night.
lady who was of the company said
that the bravest men We're to be found
among sailors, and she related the story
of certain British blueiacket who had
jumped overheard in midocean to rescue
little girl who had fallen over the rail-
moralist shifted the air disdainfully
and remarked III an eX-cathedra sort of
way that sailors were bad lot; that on
shore they were always drunk, and at
sea only the severest discipline could con-
troll them; they were creatures, not men,
with the instincts of the brute rather
than the intelligence of the human be.
A. I'm IN
bearded gentleman who sat fondling a
spyglass, with his chair tilted back
against the wall, "the captain here, who
has had sailors under him, and who
knows them well, will agree with me, I'm
sure"
mo. not entirely" was the quiet re-
Spouse. No one spoke Immediately, and
the captain turned his glass over in his
hands, stroked it tenderly, while his eyes
were fastened upon that point in the
horizon where the disk of the moon was
SLOWLY appearing-squeezed up from be-
low, as it We're, between the sky and
! the Sea-then he said:
Our friend here is too general in his
| condemnation of poor Jack AS a class
| he is, I'm afraid, little better than a
brute; but he is made so through force
! of circumstances. The dangers that he
continually encounters, and for a mere
plttance, are great His nervous force
is nigh strung and kept at an unnatural
| pltch while at sea, and on his return to
| shore is II to be wondered at that he
should seek indulgence in RIGHTEOUSNESS
and intemperance-when he finds him
self on land with his pockets full of
money, beSet by those who would graft
| ~ his passions? But the sailors life il
not what 1t used to be, and although
with the gradual substitution of steam
FOR sail as motive power has disap-
peared much of the romance and mic
nf q MOI Natr's
on the whole, his moral condition has
been bettered, so that little by little his
position Is becoming that of a skilled
aborer, with nearly the same privileges
and the same possibilities as his brothers
on land enjoy. He may never rise Ia
the captains berth of a great steamer,
but with attention to duty he can be-
| come fit subject for respect and pro-
hclent within the limitation of his craft.
ears ago the merchant marine pre-
| Sented great possibilities to the temper
ate, ambitious youth who entered the
service with the hope of some day be-
coming the master of a ship. He picked
up foreign tongue or two, read contem-
porary history, wrote in his log every
day, studied navigation, and. above all
remembered what he saw and read. The
| captain OF clipper ship who himself
mad once been common sailor was as
line specimen of manhood as Won
| would see anywhere. But such typeS
| We're to be found only in the merchant
| marine or packet service, rarely in the
| navy. The merchant captain was The
| supreme head, the father of the family
that gathered day by day around his
! board. Hardened by service he was
ever courteous 20 ladies. and he regard
ed Vlrtuous women as little lower than
the angels. He was frank and omen
| with his old comrades Of the service: his
character was easy TO read; he was
fnthfnl IN small as well rs great things
| and no man ever had truer friend.
The dream of nearly all these can
tainS was of the day of retirement
when, in some Anticipated seaport they
| should at last find rest ana peace among
| their own. and in their summer even
| ingS sit in their little porticos-as | sit
! here-Smoke their pipes. and-and-and
tell their grandchildren the story Of
the sea"
The captain paused and looked thought.
! fully across the space Of water over
which the light of the moon was grad
| ually spreading itself, making his face
| beam and lending n sparkle TO the tears
! that stood in his eyes. He was think
! ing perhaps Of those brave men dead and
! gone whose bodies lie far under the sea
| on beds of rock and tangled weed. with
| calm. cold faces gliStening like agate
! He, too perhaps, had had his ambition.
! The day of retirement had come and
passed. The quiet seaport, the cottage,
aud the little garden were here and in
the evening he smoked his pipe and told
tales of the ocean; but it was 10
strangers that he spoke
Somebody, the moralist I think, babe
us regard the beauty of the night His
words seemed to arouse the CAPTAIN.
Three years after the war" he began
Il was. executive officer on board the old
Wabash, stationed for the time at
harleStOwn. One day orders came from