Dana, Richard Henry, 1815-1882; Sailors; Seafaring life; Voyages and travels
Sunday, September 11th. Lat. 30° 04' N., lon. 63° 23' W.; the
Bermudas bearing north-northwest, distant one hundred and fifty
miles. The next morning about ten o'clock, ``Sail ho!'' was cried
on deck; and all hands turned up to see the stranger. As
she drew nearer, she proved to be an ordinary-looking
hermaphrodite brig, standing south-southeast, and probably bound
out from the Northern States to the West Indies, and was just the
thing we wished to see. She hove-to for us, seeing that we wished
to speak her, and we ran down to her, boom-ended our
studding-sails, backed our main topsail, and hailed her: ``Brig
ahoy!'' ``Hallo!'' ``Where are you from, pray?'' ``From New York,
bound to Curaçoa.'' ``Have you any fresh provisions to spare?''
``Aye, aye! plenty of them!'' We lowered away the quarter-boat
instantly, and the captain and four hands sprang in, and were soon
dancing over the water and alongside the brig. In about half an
hour they returned with half a boat-load of potatoes and onions,
and each vessel filled away and kept on her course. She proved to
be the brig Solon, of Plymouth, from the Connecticut River, and
last from New York, bound to the Spanish Main, with a cargo of
fresh provisions, mules, tin bake-pans, and other notions. The
onions were fresh; and the mate of the brig told the men in the
boat, as he passed the bunches over the side, that the girls had
strung them on purpose for us the day he sailed. We had made the
mistake, on board, of supposing that a new President had been
chosen the last winter, and, as we filled away, the captain hailed
and asked who was President of the United States. They answered,
Andrew Jackson; but, thinking that the old General could not have
been elected for a third time, we hailed again, and they answered,
Jack Downing, and left us to correct the mistake at our leisure.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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