Out of the Fog | Page 9

tumbled on board, stiff with cold and with feet like stone.
They gave us brandy and took us to the warm cabin where breakfast
was being prepared and it is difficult to say which was more grateful,
the smell of food or the warmth of the fire. John was put into the
captain's bunk. It was a good exchange for he was not far from "Davy
Jones' locker." We had been on board only a few hours when the fog
rolled back again and continued for some time afterward.
The vessel was a French fishing brig from the island of St. Malo in the
English Channel. None of the crew understood English and neither of
us could speak French, but they understood the language of distress and
kindness needs no interpreter. The captain showed me a calendar and
pointed to the tenth of June, and when I pointed to the second he
evidently found it hard to believe me, but John's condition helped to
corroborate my statement. They let us eat as much as we wished, but
nature protected us, for the process of eating was so painful at first that
I felt like a sword swallower who had partaken too freely of his favorite
dish. Fortunately, also, our hosts were living the simple life. Their
menu consisted chiefly of sliced bread over which had been poured the
broth of fish cooked in water and light wine, the same fish cooked in
oil as a second course, bread and hardtack, and an occasional dish of
beans, which seemed to be regarded by them as a luxury. They had an

abundance of beer and light wine and in the morning before going to
haul their trawls, coffee was served with brandy. Cooking was done on
a brick platform, or fireplace, in the cabin, and the captain, the mate
and all hands sat around one large dish placed on the cabin floor and
each helped himself with his own spoon. A loaf of bread was passed
around, each cutting off a slice with his own sheath knife. But
notwithstanding simple food, frugal meals and primitive conditions, the
hospitality was genuine and against the background of our recent
hunger, thirst and general wretchedness, the place was heaven and our
hosts were angels in thin disguise.
In about ten days we were brought into St. Pierre, the French fishing
town on the small rocky island of Miquelon, off the Newfoundland
coast, the depot of the French fishing fleet and the only remaining
foothold for the French of the vast empire once held by them between
the North Atlantic and the Mississippi Valley. The American consul
took us in charge, sending us to a sailors' boarding house and giving
each of us a change of clothing. In another week we were sent on by
steamer to Halifax, consigned to the American consul at that port.
There John's feet proved to be in such bad condition that it was
necessary to send him to the hospital, and, as gangrene had set in, a
portion of each foot was amputated. He was "queer" for several weeks,
but, with returning physical health, gradually recovered his mental
equilibrium. After a few days in Halifax, I was sent on by steamer to
Boston, bringing the first news of either our loss or our rescue.
On reaching my home town I did not go to a boarding house; there was
plenty of room for me in the home and I was contented to stay there for
a while. The old salts received me as a long-lost brother, and while the
official notice was never handed me, I was made to feel that
somewhere in their inner consciousness I had been elected a regular
member of the Amalgamated Society of Sea Dogs, and was entitled to
an inside seat, if I could find one, about the stove of any shoemaker's
shop in the Cove. The Banks were revisited in memory, and all the old
fog experiences were brought out, amplified and elongated as far as
possible, but it was conceded that we had established a new record in
the nautical traditions of the Cove. It took several years for me to inch
my way back to physical solvency from the effects of my exposure, and
this delayed the carrying out of my plans, to which my fishing trips had

been a prelude.
The strange thing that I now have to record is that I soon forgot, or
willfully ignored, my whole experience of God, prayer and deliverance,
and became apparently more skeptical and indifferent than before. The
only way I can explain this is that I had not become a Christian, and my
dominant mental attitude reasserted itself when danger was past. I
practically never attended church. My position and influence, however,
were not