Sailing Alone Around The World | Page 6

whale-ship fitting farther down the harbor,
and that kept me the overtime.

CHAPTER II
Failure as a fisherman--A voyage around the world projected--From
Boston to Gloucester--Fitting out for the ocean voyage--Half of a dory
for a ship's boat--The run from Gloucester to Nova Scotia--A shaking
up in home waters--Among old friends.
I spent a season in my new craft fishing on the coast, only to find that I
had not the cunning properly to bait a hook. But at last the time arrived
to weigh anchor and get to sea in earnest. I had resolved on a voyage
around the world, and as the wind on the morning of April 24,1895,
was fair, at noon I weighed anchor, set sail, and filled away from
Boston, where the Spray had been moored snugly all winter. The
twelve-o'clock whistles were blowing just as the sloop shot ahead under
full sail. A short board was made up the harbor on the port tack, then
coming about she stood seaward, with her boom well off to port, and
swung past the ferries with lively heels. A photographer on the outer
pier at East Boston got a picture of her as she swept by, her flag at the
peak throwing its folds clear. A thrilling pulse beat high in me. My step
was light on deck in the crisp air. I felt that there could be no turning
back, and that I was engaging in an adventure the meaning of which I
thoroughly understood. I had taken little advice from any one, for I had
a right to my own opinions in matters pertaining to the sea. That the
best of sailors might do worse than even I alone was borne in upon me
not a league from Boston docks, where a great steamship, fully manned,

officered, and piloted, lay stranded and broken. This was the Venetian.
She was broken completely in two over a ledge. So in the first hour of
my lone voyage I had proof that the Spray could at least do better than
this full-handed steamship, for I was already farther on my voyage than
she. "Take warning, Spray, and have a care," I uttered aloud to my bark,
passing fairylike silently down the bay.
The wind freshened, and the Spray rounded Deer Island light at the rate
of seven knots.
Passing it, she squared away direct for Gloucester to procure there
some fishermen's stores. Waves dancing joyously across Massachusetts
Bay met her coming out of the harbor to dash them into myriads of
sparkling gems that hung about her at every surge. The day was perfect,
the sunlight clear and strong. Every particle of water thrown into the air
became a gem, and the Spray, bounding ahead, snatched necklace after
necklace from the sea, and as often threw them away. We have all seen
miniature rainbows about a ship's prow, but the Spray flung out a bow
of her own that day, such as I had never seen before. Her good angel
had embarked on the voyage; I so read it in the sea.
Bold Nahant was soon abeam, then Marblehead was put astern. Other
vessels were outward bound, but none of them passed the Spray flying
along on her course. I heard the clanking of the dismal bell on
Norman's Woe as we went by; and the reef where the schooner
Hesperus struck I passed close aboard. The "bones" of a wreck tossed
up lay bleaching on the shore abreast. The wind still freshening, I
settled the throat of the mainsail to ease the sloop's helm, for I could
hardly hold her before it with the whole mainsail set. A schooner ahead
of me lowered all sail and ran into port under bare poles, the wind
being fair. As the Spray brushed by the stranger, I saw that some of his
sails were gone, and much broken canvas hung in his rigging, from the
effects of a squall.
I made for the cove, a lovely branch of Gloucester's fine harbor, again
to look the Spray over and again to weigh the voyage, and my feelings,
and all that. The bay was feather-white as my little vessel tore in,
smothered in foam. It was my first experience of coming into port

alone, with a craft of any size, and in among shipping. Old fishermen
ran down to the wharf for which the Spray was heading, apparently
intent upon braining herself there. I hardly know how a calamity was
averted, but with my heart in my mouth, almost, I let go the wheel,
stepped quickly forward, and downed the jib. The sloop naturally
rounded in the wind, and just ranging ahead, laid her cheek against a
mooring-pile at the windward corner of the wharf, so quietly, after all,
that she would not