Many of the
neighborhood homes in which I visited as a boy had souvenirs of the
ocean displayed on the mantelpiece or on the everlasting solitude of the
parlor table. There were great conch shells that a boy could put to his
ear and hear the surf roaring on the beaches from which they had been
taken; articles made of sandalwood; curiously wrought things under
glass; miniature pagodas; silk scarfs; bow-legged idols; and a wonderful
model of the good ship Dolphin, or of some other equally staunch craft,
in which the breadwinner, father or son, had sailed on some eventful
voyage. These had all been "brought from over sea," I was told, and this
gave me the impression that "over sea" must be a very rich and
interesting place.
But the souvenirs of the sea were not as interesting to me as its
survivors. We had in our town, and especially in our end of it, which
was called "the Cove," a choice assortment of old sea dogs who had
sailed every sea, in every clime--had seen the world, in fact, and were
not averse, under the stimulus of good listeners, to telling all they
knew about it and sometimes a little more.
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