The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1914-10-27
TAKING A CHANCE
BY ). c. PLUMMER.

We were standing. or rather, sitting
and lounging out the dogwatch on the
Nova Scotian bark Petrol. 1t was one
Of those periods which Ats into the
hard cheerless life of the seaman
like a piece Of mosaic. A period when
the faithful trade winds fill the sails
until they seem modelled out of mar
BILE and when one need not lay hand
on the braces once in a6 hours.
When Jim Bennett spat his quid
over the rail we composed ourselves
for yarn for Jim. IN his fifty years OF
life, brine-pickled and whisky soaked
life. had seen much.
Il came ashore In Charleston from
hme5uicer once" he began. "and
set about getting rid OF my money as
fast as ! could / found plenty to
help me spend It and one day / stood
In Murphy's boarding house without
enough to buy a drink and was won
dertng when that red-nosed Irish
man would kick me out on the street.
II was between cotton seasons and
there we're no square r1ggers in port,
while the coasters had their crews all
engaged for the round passage. !
couldn't get ship for love or money.
Il was standing with my hands in
my pockets and my back to the bar
for hated to see the stun going
down other peoples throats when !
hadn't the price of half glass. A
man came In from the street and I
looked at him out Of the tail Of my
eye and then stared back at the
street. He was surely neither sea-
faring man nor shipping master
and / felt little interest In anybody
else The man looked around the
room and came over to where was
standing.
Want ship, my lad7' he sRiA
Il told him did. and bloomin' bad.
too.
Well" he says, I can give you a
berth on q steam yacht. Twenty
five dollars a month. only quarter
masters work to do and going to a
warm climate
He needn't have said all that. I'd
have taken Job as cook on q mud
scow right then. 10 says I'd go.
Then he treated and. Doys. I neve.
seen man drink like that fellow in
my life. He had everybody In the
place drunk from Murphy down when
we started for the. wharves. don't
know whether walked or went In a
balloon, but when woke up the next
morning and crawied on deck with a
hornets nest buzzing in my head we
were outside of Charleston harbor and
a steaming south. The steamer was
about Eve hundred tons, sharp built
in the bows and looked good for
speed but nothing like yacht.
What sort OF q bioomin' yacht rs
this anyway says to the first man
met on the iforecRstle.
Yacht, nothing says he. s'pose
you thought you were to take care
Of some meelonare on voyage for
his health to the West Indees. Yer
on a bloody hlibuster. lad. carrying
guns to them lousy patriots that's a
f1ghtin' for liberty and free garlic in
Cuba
Well says I. kind Of rocky like,
what's the difference whether you're
carrytn' cotton to q bloody Liverpool
spinner or guns to Cuban pat11otsf
"'Just this,' says the man, coolly;
II you miss the patriot the Span
iards II twist your neck for you
However. it's all the same to a
sailor whether his neck 10 twisted by
a rope or is broken by q fall from
alott.
I'VE steamed south at . good rate
and SO far no one forward knew as
to where we intended trying for a
landing, but when we found that the
course laid would bring Ms around
Cape Maysi we knew the south coast
was our destination. We cleared the
cape all right without sighting a Span
ish vessel. and then steered south
east After day and a half good
| steaming we checked speed and be-
gan to loaf, the news coming forward
| by some leak or another that we
would land our guns at point agreed
upon between Sagua and Ga.barien.
up to this time had net felt un-
easy about getting my neck twisted
felt sure the skipperd get on the
blind side of the gunboats and land
his cargo. He looked like a man
who'd do most anything he set him
self to do, but now he began to pour
rum into his skin In way that made
| us all dubious. All that day while
we were hanging about ready to make
| a try for the land he wes drinking
Nike q fish. and by night he was drunk
all over.
TT was a dark night and no mis-,
take. The sky was covered with
clouds although there was no rain
and we had not light visible aboard
Making sharp turn we stood In for
the land. l passed the skipper as he
came from the cabin on his way to the
bridge and he smelt like a newly
tapped rum barrel When there's tick
lish work to be done with craft I'd
as lieye the skipper'd be sober, and
kinder felt my neck once or twice
as if there was rope about It. We
came steadily in, not a sound but the
pounding of the screw, and we got
squirting into the dark and seeing
nothing. Then there came out of the
blackness a fash, a boom, and the hias
OF something over the forecastIe
"a gunboat. by heavens screechet
the mate.
"Jing jing went the signals from
the bridge to the engine room and
the steamer slowed around and made
for the open sea. How that propeller
did pound and how the old tea kettle
did jump over the water.
Flash, boom, siss, another shot
skipped US amidships, but we were
soon out OF gun range. We couldn't
however, steam as we did, sink the in
fernal lights the gunboat carried
Like dog after a rabbit the blooming
steamer changed her course as we did
ours and came ptling after US.
81 believe the bloody dagoes car
smell our trail. muttered the mate
Suddenly there came mufied noise
from below and instantly we heard
the skipper shrieking down the tube
to the engine room. Speed at once
slackened and then 1t was whispered
that we had blown out a valve ano
that the engine was disabled.
The skipper gave some orders to
the mate short and sharp like pistol
shots and then the bell tangled sig
nal to the engineer. The mate swung
himself over the fiddley house ant
then rushed aft. giving some order tc
the man at theswheel. Then he suns