Stories of Comedy | Page 6

your betthers.
What do you know iv navigation? Maybe you think it's as aisy for to
sail on a voyage as to go start a fishin'." And Barny turned on his heel
and left the shore.
The next day passed without the hooker sailing, and Barny gave a most
sufficient reason for the delay, by declaring that he had a warnin' givin
him in a dhrame (Glory be to God), and that it was given to him to
understand (under Heaven) that it wouldn't be lucky that day.
Well, the next day was Friday, and Barny, of course, would not sail any

more than any other sailor who could help it on this unpropitious day.
On Saturday, however, he came, running in a great hurry down to the
shore, and, jumping aboard, he gave orders to make all sail, and taking
the helm of the hooker, he turned her head to the sea, and soon the boat
was cleaving the blue waters with a velocity seldom witnessed in so
small a craft, and scarcely conceivable to those who have not seen the
speed of a Kinsale hooker.
"Why, thin, you tuk the notion mighty suddint, Barny," said the
fisherman next in authority to O'Reirdon, as soon as the bustle of
getting the boat under way had subsided.
"Well, I hope it's plazin' to you at last," said Barny, "troth one ud think
you were never at say before, you wor in such a hurry to be off; as
new-fangled a'most as the child with a play toy."
"Well," said the other of Barny's companions, for there were but two
with him in the boat, "I was thinkin' myself, as well as Jemmy, that we
lost two fine days for nothin', and we'd be there a'most, maybe, now, if
we sail'd three days agon."
"Don't b'lieve it," said Barny, emphatically. "Now, don't you know
yourself that there is some days that the fish won't come near the lines
at all, and that we might as well be castin' our nets on the dhry land as
in the say, for all we'll catch if we start on an unlooky day; and sure, I
towld you I was waitin' only till I had it given to me to undherstan' that
it was looky to sail, and I go bail we'll be there sooner than if we started
three days agon, for if you don't start with good look before you, faix
maybe it's never at all to the end o' your trip you'll come."
"Well, there's no use in talkin' aboot it now, anyhow; but when do you
expec' to be there?"
"Why, you see we must wait antil I can tell how the wind is like to
hould on, before I can make up my mind to that."
"But you're sure now, Barny, that you're up to the coorse you have to
run?"

"See now, lave me alone and don't be cross crass-questionin'
me--tare-an-ouns, do you think me sich a bladdherang as for to go to
shuperinscribe a thing I wasn't aiquil to?"
"No; I was only goin' to ax you what coorse you wor goin' to steer?"
"You'll find out soon enough when we get there--and so I bid you agin
lay me alone,--just keep your toe in your pump. Shure I'm here at the
helm, and a weight on my mind, and it's fitther for you, Jim, to mind
your own business and lay me to mind mine; away wid you there and
be handy, haul taut that foresheet there, we must run close on the wind;
be handy, boys; make everything dhraw."
These orders were obeyed, and the hooker soon passed to windward of
a ship that left the harbor before her, but could not hold on a wind with
the same tenacity as the hooker, whose qualities in this particular
render it peculiarly suitable for the purposes to which it is applied,
namely, pilot and fishing boats.
We have said a ship left the harbor before the hooker had set sail; and it
is now fitting to inform the reader that Barny had contrived, in the
course of his last meeting with the "long sailor," to ascertain that this
ship, then lying in the harbor, was going to the very place Barny
wanted to reach. Barny's plan of action was decided upon in a moment;
he had now nothing to do but to watch the sailing of the ship and
follow in her course. Here was, at once, a new mode of navigation
discovered.
The stars, twinkling in mysterious brightness through the silent gloom
of night, were the first encouraging, because visible, guides to the
adventurous mariners of antiquity. Since then, the sailor, encouraged by
a bolder science, relies on the unseen agency of nature, depending on
the fidelity of