Stories of Authors, British and AmericanChubb, Edwin Watts
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Stories of Authors, British and American
Chubb, Edwin Watts
Authors, American -- Biography; Authors, English -- Biography
In crossing the bay we met with a squall that tore our rotten sails to
pieces, prevented our getting into the Kill, and drove us upon Long
Island. In our way, a drunken Dutchman, who was a passenger too, fell
overboard. When he was sinking, I reached through the water to his
shock pate, and drew him up so that we got him in again. His ducking
sobered him a little, and he went to sleep, taking first out of his
pocket a book, which he desired I would dry for him. It proved to be
my old favorite author, Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_, in Dutch,
finely printed on good paper, with copper cuts, a dress better than I
had ever seen it wear in its own language. I have since found that it
has been translated into most of the languages of Europe, and suppose
it has been more generally than any other book, except, perhaps, the
Bible. Honest John was the first that I know of who mixed narration
and dialogue; a method of writing very engaging to the reader, who in
the most interesting parts finds himself, as it were, brought into the
company and present at the discourse. Defoe in his _Crusoe_, his _Moll
Flanders_, _Religious Courtship_, _Family Instructor_, and other
pieces, has imitated it with success, and Richardson has done the same
in his _Pamela_, etc.
When we drew near the island we found it was at a place where there
could be no landing, there being a great surf on the stony beach. So
we dropped anchor, and swung round toward the shore. Some people came
down to the water edge and hallooed to us, as we did to them; but the
wind was so high and the surf so loud that we could not hear so as to
understand each other. There were canoes on the shore, and we made
signs, and hallooed that they should fetch us, but they either did not
understand us or thought it impracticable, so they went away, and
night coming on, we had no remedy but to wait till the wind should
abate. In the meantime, the boatman and I concluded to sleep if we
could, and so crowded into the scuttle with the Dutchman, who was
still wet, and the spray beating over the head of our boat leaked
through to us, so that we were almost as wet as he. In this manner we
lay all night, with very little rest; but the wind abating the next
day, we made a shift to reach Amboy before night, having been thirty
hours on the water, without victuals, or any drink but a bottle of
filthy rum, the water we sailed on being salt.
In the evening I found myself very feverish, and went in to bed; but,
having read somewhere that cold water, drunk plentifully, was good for
a fever, I followed the prescription, sweat plentifully most of the
night, my fever left me, and in the morning, crossing the ferry, I
proceeded on my journey on foot, having fifty miles to Burlington,
where I was told I should find boats that would carry me the rest of
the way to Philadelphia.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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