Cruise of the Dolphin | Page 5

pretended that he did not expect to behold us alive again, and tried

to throw a wet blanket over the expedition.
"Guess you'll have a squally time of it," said Charley, casting off the
painter. "I'll drop in at old Newbury's" (Newbury was the parish
undertaker) "and leave word, as I go along!"
"Bosh!" muttered Phil Adams, sticking the boathook into the
string-piece of the wharf, and sending the Dolphin half a dozen yards
toward the current.
How calm and lovely the river was! Not a ripple stirred on the glassy
surface, broken only by the sharp cutwater of our tiny craft. The sun, as
round and red as an August moon, was by this time peering above the
water-line.
The town had drifted behind us, and we were entering among the group
of islands. Sometimes we could almost touch with our boat- hook the
shelving banks on either side. As we neared the mouth of the harbor, a
little breeze now and then wrinkled the blue water, shook the spangles
from the foliage, and gently lifted the spiral mist-wreaths that still
clung alongshore. The measured dip of our oars and the drowsy
twitterings of the birds seemed to mingle with, rather than break, the
enchanted silence that reigned about us.
The scent of the new clover comes back to me now, as I recall that
delicious morning when we floated away in a fairy boat down a river
like a dream!
The sun was well up when the nose of the Dolphin nestled against the
snow-white bosom of Sandpeep Island. This island, as I have said
before, was the last of the cluster, one side of it being washed by the
sea. We landed on the river-side, the sloping sands and quiet water
affording us a good place to moor the boat.
It took us an hour or more to transport our stores to the spot selected for
the encampment. Having pitched our tent, using the five oars to support
the canvas, we got out our lines, and went down the rocks seaward to
fish. It was early for cunners, but we were lucky enough to catch as
nice a mess as ever you saw. A cod for the chowder was not so easily
secured. At last Binny Wallace hauled in a plump little fellow clustered
all over with flaky silver.
To skin the fish, build our fireplace, and cook the chowder kept us busy
the next two hours.
The fresh air and the exercise had given us the appetites of wolves, and

we were about famished by the time the savory mixture was ready for
our clam-shell saucers.
I shall not insult the rising generation on the seaboard by telling them
how delectable is a chowder compounded and eaten in this Robinson
Crusoe fashion. As for the boys who live inland, and know not of such
marine feasts, my heart is full of pity for them. What wasted lives! Not
to know the delights of a clambake, not to love chowder, to be ignorant
of lobscouse!
How happy we were, we four, sitting cross-legged in the crisp salt grass,
with the invigorating seabreeze blowing gratefully through our hair!
What a joyous thing was life, and how far off seemed death--death, that
lurks in all pleasant places, and was so near!
The banquet finished, Phil Adams drew from his pocket a handful of
sweet-fern cigars; but as none of the party could indulge without
imminent risk of becoming ill, we all, on one pretext or another,
declined, and Phil smoked by himself.
The wind had freshened by this, and we found it comfortable to put on
the jackets which had been thrown aside in the heat of the day. We
strolled along the beach and gathered large quantities of the
fairy-woven Iceland moss, which at certain seasons is washed to these
shores; then we played at ducks and drakes, and then, the sun being
sufficiently low, we went in bathing.
Before our bath was ended a slight change had come over the sky and
sea; fleecy-white clouds scudded here and there, and a muffled moan
from the breakers caught our ears from time to time. While we were
dressing, a few hurried drops of rain came lisping down, and we
adjourned to the tent to wait the passing of the squall.
"We're all right, anyhow," said Phil Adams. "It won't be much of a
blow, and we'll be as snug as a bug in a rug, here in the tent,
particularly if we have that lemonade which some of you fellows were
going to make.
By an oversight, the lemons had been left in the boat. Binny Wallace
volunteered to go for them.
"Put an extra stone on the painter, Binny," said Adams, calling after
him; "it would be awkward to