There She Blows! Or, The Log of the ArethusaMacy, William Hussey
General
There She Blows! Or, The Log of the Arethusa
Macy, William Hussey
Sea stories; Whaling -- Fiction
"Yes, I made a running cruise of it, and didn't anchor till I made my
last port in Sydney; so I've brought my own report from there."
We ran into Holmes' Hole and anchored at nine o'clock among a large
fleet of coasting vessels, who had made a harbor for the night like
ourselves. Before daylight in the morning we were heaving up again,
and, with a fair wind, we ran down for Nantucket Bar with all our
bunting flying. Down goes our anchor again in the old berth which we
left three years ago, the sails are rolled up to the yards in a hurry,
and a boat is lowered to pull the captain ashore. The owner is seen
with his horse and the inevitable green box on wheels, waiting on the
cliff shore to receive him, and take him to the arms of his family. The
boat pulls square in, and lands him on the north beach, and returns to
the ship, for an immense black Noah's-ark-looking craft is already seen
moving out of the docks in the harbor, which the pilot tells us is "the
camels." Several boats soon arrive, with friends and relatives of the
Nantucket men. Here is our worthy mate's son in one of them, a stout,
well-grown lad and evidently a "chip of the old block;" and here in
another boat is an embryo "Cape Horner," a young brother of Obed B.,
who is already shipped, and is to sail in a fortnight.
"Ah, Obed;" he says, as he hops in over the rail, with hands
outstretched, and his nut-brown, young face lighted up with pleasure
and excitement, "I'm going in the Ranger; and if you hadn't got home
just as you did, you wouldn't have seen me for I don't know how many
years. Yes, the folks are all well at home, and the camels will have
you into the wharf before night. The steamer will be along soon. We've
got a new steamboat, too, since you went away. Say, Obed, I got the
dollar from Captain Upton's wife this morning. I was the first boy
that knew it was the Arethusa. One of the men came down out of the old
south tower, and told me what signal the ship had set, and I put for
the captain's house. I got the dollar, and then I dug for another, for
I knew where the mate's wife lived, too; but some other boys had found
it out by that time, and I had a tight race for it with Jack Manter,
but I was tired then, I had run so far, and Manter got ahead of me, and
sung out first, as he rushed into the front entry, but I tumbled right
in after him. Mrs. Grafton was scared half to death at first, till she
understood what the matter was, and then she laughed and cried both
at once, and handed out a dollar, and said we might divide it, if we
liked, but it belonged to Jack, for he was a little ahead of me, and
I didn't care much, for I'd got one. Some mates' wives don't give but
half a dollar," said he, pausing to get breath.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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