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Dan and I both made sure it was a strike. But, no! He came up far astern, and then went down for good. The sea got rough. The wind was chilling to the bone. Sheerwater ducks were everywhere, in flocks and singly. Saw one yellow patch of small bait fish about an inch long. This patch was forty yards across. No fish appeared to be working on it. Dan sighted a big swordfish. We made for him.
The long, heaving swells, the windy lanes, the flight of the sheerwater and the uplifted flukes of the whale, the white wall of tuna on the horizon, the leap of the dolphin, the sweet, soft scent that breathes from off the sea, the beauty and mystery and color and movement of the deep these are Lone Angler's alone, and he is as rich as if he had found the sands of the Pacific to be pearls, the waters nectar, and the rocks pure gold.
In less than a week our men were drafted into different men-of-war on the station. I was appointed a warrant officer in the 'Sheerwater, forty-four guns; and as the admiral opened the despatch, the only words he spoke puzzled me for many a day after. "'You have accomplished your orders too well, said he; 'that privateer is but a poor compensation for the whole French navy."
We did not get started out on the water until eight o'clock. The east wind had whipped up a little chop that promised bad. But the wind gradually died down and the day became hot. Great thunderheads rose over the mainland, proclaiming heat on the desert. We saw scattered sheerwater ducks and a school of porpoises; also a number of splashes that I was sure were made by swordfish.
The fifth day we ran off the west side with several other boats, and roamed the sea in search of fins. No anchovies on the surface, no sheerwater ducks, no sharks, nothing to indicate tuna. About one o'clock Captain Dan sheered southwest and we ran sixteen miles toward Clemente Island. It was a perfect day, warm, hazy, with light fog, smooth, heaving, opalescent sea. There was no wind.
I followed her, and ran in, and anchored in Sheerwater Bay; my pilot being of no sort of assistance to me, he seeming to have a very imperfect knowledge of the locality. Soon after anchoring, a boat came out of the lagoon to us, and we recognised some of our prize-crew of the Sea Bride in her. In effect the Tuscaloosa and the prize had both been three days in the harbour of Angra Pequena.
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