Next in
attractiveness, after seafaring, came ship-building. I longed to be
master in both professions, and in a small way, in time, I
accomplished my desire. From the decks of stout ships in the worst
gales I had made calculations as to the size and sort of ship safest
for all weather and all seas. Thus the voyage which I am now to
narrate was a natural outcome not only of my love of adventure, but of
my lifelong experience.
One midwinter day of 1892, in Boston, where I had been cast up from
old ocean, so to speak, a year or two before, I was cogitating whether
I should apply for a command, and again eat my bread and butter on the
sea, or go to work at the shipyard, when I met an old acquaintance, a
whaling-captain, who said: "Come to Fairhaven and I'll give you a
ship. But," he added, "she wants some repairs." The captain's terms,
when fully explained, were more than satisfactory to me. They included
all the assistance I would require to fit the craft for sea. I was
only too glad to accept, for I had already found that I could not
obtain work in the shipyard without first paying fifty dollars to a
society, and as for a ship to command--there were not enough ships to
go round. Nearly all our tall vessels had been cut down for
coal-barges, and were being ignominiously towed by the nose from port
to port, while many worthy captains addressed themselves to Sailors'
Snug Harbor.
The next day I landed at Fairhaven, opposite New Bedford, and found
that my friend had something of a joke on me.
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