The leader-enterprise. [volume] (Fitzgerald, Ga.) 1912-1915, 1915-01-01
CHAPTER XII.

a dipsy-chanty, if you please; Of
3sallormen in jerseys and tarry caps,
Oh rolling gaits, strong tobacco and 'di-
verse profanity; of cutters, and blunt
nose schooners, and tramps, canvas
and steam, some of them honest, some
OF them shady, and some of them pi-
rates OF. the first water who did not
md it necessary to hoist aloft the
Skuli and bones. The seas are dotted
With them. They remind you of the
tonce prosperous merchant, run down
at the heel, who sinks along the side
streets, ashamed to meet those he
knew in the past. You never hear
them mentioned in the maritime news,
which is the society column of the
ships; you know of their existence
only by the bleached bones of them,
-Strewn along the coast.
You who crave adventures on high
seas. you purchase ticket, steamer
chair, and couple of popular novels,
go on board to the blare of a very
1nd1Herent brass band, and believe you
are adVenturing; when, as matter of
fact, you are about to spend dull
week or fortnight on water hotel,
where the most exciting thing is the
bugle's call to meals or the discovery
OF card sharp in the smoking room.
rake real ship, go as supercargo, to
the South seas; take the side streets
OF the ocean, and learn what it can
do with NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS., blister
in ao1 Inns Nd
be adventure enough then. If you are
a weakling, either you are made
strong, or you die.
An honest ship, but run down at
the heel, rode at anchor in the sound,
a fourth-rater of the hooker breed;
that is, her principal line of business
was hauling barges up and down the
coast. When she could not pick up
enough barges to make it pay, why,
shed go gallivanting down to Cuba for
bales of tobacco or even to the Ber-
mudas for the heaven smelling onion
Today she was an onion ship; which
precIudes any idea of adventure. She
was about four thousand tons, and her
engines were sternward and not
'am1dship. She carried two masts and
:: half dozen hoist booms, and the only
visible sign of anything new on her
was her bowsprit. This was new doubt
less because she had poked her nose
TOO far into her last slip.
Hc- crew was orderly and tractable.
There were shore DRINKS, to be sure,
because they were sailors; but they
were at work. They moved about
}briskly, for they were on the point Of
sailing for the Bahamas-perhaps for
more onions. Presently the windlass
'creaked and shriiled, and the bobby
links. much in need of tar paint, red
as fish gills, clattered down into the
bow. Sometimes they painted the
chain as 1t came over; but paint was
costly, and this was done only when
the anchor threatened to stay on the
bottom. -... .,-..., .s ..............
There was sailor among this crew,
and he went by the name of Steve
" Blossom; and he was one of his kind. A
grlmy dime novel protruded rakishly
from his hip pocket, and his right
cheek was swollen as with the 10TH
ache, due, probably, to a generous
'chaw" of Seaman's Delight. He was
a real tobacco chewer, for he rarely
-Spat. He was as peaceful as a back
water bay in summer; non-argumenta-
tive and passive, he stood his watch
in fair weather and foul. ~
No one gave the anchor any more
attention after 1t came to rest. The
great city over the way was fairy-like
In its haziness and softened lines. It
was the poetry of angles, of shafts
hnd spars of stone; and Steve Bios
Fom, having moment to himself,
leaned against the rail and stared re-
Eretfully. He had been generously
trunk the night before, and it was a
pleasant recollection. Chance led his
lance to trail down the cutwater. His
Fck stretched from his collar like a
Frtle's from it's she'll
well, I'll be hornswoggled!" he
41rmured, shifting his cud from star
4ard to port.
Caught on the fuke of the anchor
us the strangest looking box he had
esr laid eyes on. There were leather
aieAeeel' bands and diamond-shaped
Hi Hy and mother of pearl, and it hung
billy on the point of the rusty fluke.
Abody would be hornswoggled to
pse such droll jest of fate. On
4 = q IKE of the old mudhook, by a
rs lou might say. In all the wild
arms he had ever read or heard
LIZ was nothing to match this.
Rasure!
TIL q Steve was destined never to be
Ctsr Re again His first impulse was
+ho n his companions; his second i'm.
- Twas to say nothing at all. and
~ VI pr an opportunity to get the box
VT bunk without being detected.
Ocllldsre! Diamonds and rubies and
.,o and old Spanish gold; all hang
The fluke of the anchor.
Gr HS We hswoggled!" in a kind Of ave-
Malaria hisper this time. An we
n TEN. a