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They've got the idea they're h'isting the mains'l, but it ain't nothing but the spanker. If I was going to stay aboard I'd give 'em a few lessons the next few days that they'd not forget all the rest of their lives." "You're certainly mixing your figures in great shape this morning," commented the minister good-naturedly.
"That wheel, there, is lashed over; they've paid out the mains'l enough to starboard, and set the jib properly to port. That's why the fores'l isn't up!" "What of it?" "Why, sir, she'll sail that way all day in a wind like this, and nobody have to touch her! They knew we'd be popping at their helmsman, and they fixed it so we carn't! Now it's our turn to start something!"
He'd have given a year's earnings, I knew, to have people point him out on the street and say, "There's Sam Hollis there's the boy to carry sail nobody ever made him take his mains'l in," the same as they used to say of a half dozen or so that really would carry sail that would drive a vessel under before they would be the first to reef.
If I could make quids o' them there sentiments, I'd set up a factory an' send a inexhaustible supply to the big-wigs in parlymint for perpetooal mastication. There now, don't stare, but go for'ard, an' see, two of you take in another reef o' the mains'l. If the glass speaks true, we'll be under my namesake barepoles before long; look alive, boys!"
In the midst of all this Code Schofield struggled aft and began hauling forth the mains'l that at the first edge of the Bank had been relegated in favor of the triangular riding sail. Pete Ellinwood saw him, and in a great voice bawled down the hatchway to the fo'c's'le. "Salt's wet, boys; the skipper's haulin' out the mains'l!"
Take in the studding-sl's and stow the flying jib. It was time; the squall was on us, and the vessel began to heel. 'Ah, said the captain, 'we have still too much canvas set; all hands lower the mains'l! Five minutes after, it was down; and we sailed under mizzen-tops'ls and to'gall'nt sails.
The "Petrel" came on drew nearer was not a hundred feet away from the schooner's stern. A strong swimmer, such as Wilbur, could cover the distance in a few strides. Two minutes ago Wilbur might have "Set your mains'l," came the bellow of Captain Kitchell. "Clap on to your throat and peak halyards." The Chinamen hurried aft. Wilbur followed.
Every man comes in here to-day under four lowers, no more, and some under reefed mains'l, or trys'l, but four whole lowers ain't enough for this gentleman not for Wesley. He must carry that gaff-tops'l if he pulls the planks out of her. He always brings her home, but if some of the underwriters'd see him out here they'd soon blacklist him till he mended his ways.
A string of men on the rigging from the shear poles clear up to the mast-head yes, and a man astraddle the main gaff once or twice, passing buckets of water to wet down the mains'l." "Yes, and barrels of water out toward the end of the main-boom keep the sail stretched. Man, but those were the days we paid attention to racing." "Those were the days," asserted the skipper.
There she was, my lovely Aurora, to anchor in the stream, and there was me on the end of the dock looking at her, and that's all I could do look at her. She was lying to two anchors and with her mains'l standing.
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