Perth Amboy evening news., 1903-12-03
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The Lightship of -
6 Frying-P Pan Sl1oal O.
G:


THE day was bright, and a light haze
| blurred the Carolina coast line.
The long summer now drawing to a
close, had been s%ingularly free from
squalls and transforms, and as q con-
sequence the water on and around Fry
ing-Pan shoal, that long line Of sunk
en- rocks jutting out into the channel
a perpetual to all sea-Soing
craft, had been unusually peaceful and
somnolent, ana the lightship Dora
had mostly rocked like a cradle in
gentle oscillations, for the motion OF
u lightship never ceases.
A solitary figure, hat of a man
athletic and powerful, stood leaning
against the wheel, looking musinSly
out at the broken line of distant shore,
more sharply defined where the sun
light fell on a wooded cliff, which swept
down to the edge of the sea.
Except for the veil of mist along
the oceans edge, the atmosphere was
~singularly clear, and the Dora seemed
closer to land than usual and the
monotony of her incessant roll back
and forth should have been soothing
to the man on board.
Judging by his face, however, there
WIS a pent-up storm within him not
at all in accord with the placidity and
beauty Of the late September day and
the tranquil waters of the Atlantic as
they puzzled and rippled in seeming in
nocenca over Frying-Pan reef.
When McNair had applied for the
position of keeper of the lightship sta
toned off hat dangerous coast his age
was considered an objection; not that
he was too old, but too young.
That he had been a good seaman,
had spent the last few years in cast
ern waters, had served Uucle Sam with
courage and fidelity out in the Philip
pines, as a still troublesome wound
in the shoulder testified, seemed sufll-
cient reasons for his appointment to
the prison life of the lightship near
Cape Hatteras, OF the most danger
GUS on the Atlantic coast.
A word in his favor from some Il
in congress who held the car of the
navy department decided the matter,
and McNair was put in charge OF the
| Ilghtship Dora, vacated unwillingly by
| his predecessor, and only because he
| had been crushed to death on the
Jagged rock points, when the Dora.
dragging her anchor during a winter
gale, had been swept over on the reef.
There were two men aboard beside
the master, and the regulations of the
| department allowed them 10 come
ashore alternately every six months
! for a short reprieve from the monotony
of their life amid ocean, aloof from all
contact with mankind, and the conten-
| tons and turmoil of life ashore.
They were both grizzle-haired sail
! ors, fishermen who had a thorough
acquaintance with the shoals and cur
| rents, the harbors and places of ref
uge, along the coast'from Hatteras to
! tho gulf.
MeNair pretended TO no such knowl-
edge.
"A good 'un, McNair. But he never
t1duuitu HlllllS bul Il yb5ll' Ctli
tell that" old Anderson remarked to
! Bill Peters, his companion, as they sat
busy with their lines for deep-sea
| fishing and watched McNair's gloomy
abstraction and the heavy frOwn on
his clean-sbaven lace.
Sailor? Before the mast? Not
much! Tom Anderson knows a thing
or two, and a swell when he sees one.
McNair's a tiptop fellow. Has grit;
and he'll stand by a mate. If it warn't
for him-that last tine ashore, when
l broke Sullivan's head. and good for
him, too-it's not on the deck of the
Dora I'd be sitting this day"
"McNair's all right. Smart chap,
too"
But queer. Seems to me he's got
something in his mind. Maybe muir
der. But It's his lookout, and he's fair
and square, and the kind of fellow
you wan in q tight place, when there's
danger around. Ever noticed how
queer and soft-like he looks when it
blows and how he kinder smiles when
the Frying-Pan gets nasty, and it looks
bad for the Dora? Can't be nothing
but murder, and a lot of fellows ought
to be shot if they got their deserts.
Guess McNair vas right when he put
| q hold in him Ness he came on the