in our
advance. "Now look here, inshore of us," added the master: "it is an
American; but I cannot make her out." "Look again: she has a new
cloth in her main-top-gallant sail." This was true enough, and by that
sign, the vessel was our late competitor, the London Packet!
As respects the Don Quixote, we had made a journey of some five
thousand miles, and not varied our distance, on arriving, a league.
There was probably some accident in this; for the Don Quixote had the
reputation of a fast ship, while the Hudson was merely a pretty fair
sailer. We had probably got the best of the winds. But a hard and close
trial of three days had shown that neither the Hudson nor the London
Packet, in their present trims, could go ahead of the other in any wind.
And yet here, after a separation of ten days, during which time our ship
had tacked and wore fifty times, had calms, foul winds and fair, and
had run fully a thousand miles, there was not a league's difference
between the two vessels!
I have related these circumstances, because I think they are connected
with causes that have a great influence on the success of American
navigation. On passing several of the British ships to-day, I observed
that their officers were below, or at least out of sight; and in one
instance, a vessel of a very fair mould, and with every appearance of a
good sailer, actually lay with some of her light sails aback, long enough
to permit us to come up with and pass her. The Hudson probably went
with this wind some fifteen or twenty miles farther than this loiterer;
while I much question if she could have gone as far, had the latter been
well attended to. The secret is to be found in the fact, that so large a
portion of American ship-masters are also ship-owners, as to have
erected a standard of activity and vigilance, below which few are
permitted to fall. These men work for themselves, and, like all their
countrymen, are looking out for something more than a mere support.
About noon we got a Cowes pilot. He brought no news, but told us the
English vessel I have just named was sixty days from Leghorn, and that
she had been once a privateer. We were just thirty from New York.
We had distant glimpses of the land all day, and several of the
passengers determined to make their way to the shore in the pilot-boat.
These Channel craft are sloops of about thirty or forty tons, and are
rather picturesque and pretty boats, more especially when under low
sail. They are usually fitted to take passengers, frequently earning more
in this way than by their pilotage. They have the long sliding bowsprit,
a short lower mast, very long cross-trees, with a taunt topmast, and,
though not so "wicked" to the eye, I think them prettier objects at sea
than our own schooners. The party from the Hudson had scarcely got
on board their new vessel when it fell calm, and the master and myself
paid them a visit. They looked like a set of smugglers waiting for the
darkness to run in. On our return we rowed round the ship. One cannot
approach a vessel at sea, in this manner, without being struck with the
boldness of the experiment which launched such massive and
complicated fabrics on the ocean. The pure water is a medium almost
as transparent as the atmosphere, and the very keel is seen, usually so
near the surface, in consequence of refraction, as to give us but a very
indifferent opinion of the security of the whole machine. I do not
remember ever looking at my own vessel, when at sea, from a boat,
without wondering at my own folly in seeking such a home.
In the afternoon the breeze sprang up again, and we soon lost sight of
our friends, who were hauling in for the still distant land. All that
afternoon and night we had a fresh and a favourable wind. The next day
I went on deck, while the people were washing the ship. It was Sunday,
and there was a flat calm. The entire scene admirably suited a day of
rest. The Channel was like a mirror, unruffled by a breath of air, and
some twenty or thirty vessels lay scattered about the view, with their
sails festooned and drooping, thrown into as many picturesque
positions by the eddying waters. Our own ship had got close in with the
land; so near, indeed, as to render a horse or a man on the shore
distinctly visible. We were on the coast of Dorsetshire. A range of low
cliffs lay directly abeam of
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