Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 7, 2025
I glanced idly at these faded bits of insignificant news, when I was electrified by seeing the following entry: #This day came to my Bro. Amos and Me, a sea-man, bringeing news of my Bro. Elijah's the capt'n's dethe, and allso mutch monie in gold, sent to us by our Bro. The sea-man is the greatest in size aver I saw. No man in towne his bed can reach so mutch as to his sholder. And comely withal#.
This was such an astounding fact to record that the writer of the old manuscript explains that 'old men that would be loath to have their credyt crackt by a tale of a stale date, report confidently that ... a sea-man was taken by the fishers. They took him up to an old disused house, and kept him there for many weeks, feeding him on raw fish, because he persistently refused the other sorts of food offered him.
But what are such incredulous persons, he continues, to make of the circumstance recorded by Albert Herport in his account of India , that a sea-man was seen in the water near the Church of Taquan, on the morning of the 29th of April 1661, and a mermaid at the same spot the same afternoon? or what do they say to the fact that in 1714, a mermaid was not only seen but captured near the island of Booro?
"It is not," said Blake, "the business of a sea-man to mind state affairs, but to hinder foreigners from fooling us." This was the principle from which he never deviated, and which he always endeavoured to inculcate in the fleet, as the surest foundation of unanimity and steadiness. "Disturb not one another with domestick disputes, but remember that we are English, and our enemies are foreigners.
Perhaps he was dropping those tears over his lost opportunities, from sheer envy of paternity and in strange jealousy of a sorrow which he could never know. Man, and even the sea-man, is a capricious animal, the creature and the victim of lost opportunities. But he made me feel ashamed of my callousness. I had no tears.
I was the only navigator on board. There was no one to check me up on the working out of my observations, nor with whom I could advise in the ticklish darkness among uncharted reefs and shoals. And I stood all watches. There was no sea-man on board whom I could trust to stand a mate's watch. I was mate as well as captain.
Nobody took any notice of him, and, with his hands in his pockets, he gazed meditatively into the water and edged along towards his own craft. His foot trembled as he placed it on the plank that formed the gangway, but, resisting the temptation to look behind, he gained the deck and walked forward. "Halloa! What do you want?" inquired a sea-man, coming out of the galley.
The words fairly whirled on the page before my astonished eyes. Where was the image of the ill-favored little old Jed, so present to my imagination? I read on breathlessly, skipping news of the hen-house and barnyard, until I came upon this, the only other reference, but quite sufficient: This day the sea-man, Samuel Harden, left us.
Joe Hawkridge and Jack Cockrell, more fit for duty than the others, put their backs into it right heartily while the sailors droned to the cadence of the pump a sentimental ditty which ran on for any number of verses and began in this wise: "As, lately I traveled toward Gravesend, I heard a fair Damosel a Sea-man commend: And as in a Tilt-boat we passed along, In praise of brave Sea-men she sung this new Song, Come Tradesman or Marchant, whoever he be, There's none but a Sea-man shall marry with me!"
This was such an astounding fact to record that the writer of the old manuscript explains that 'old men that would be loath to have their credyt crackt by a tale of a stale date, report confidently that ... a sea-man was taken by the fishers. They took him up to an old disused house, and kept him there for many weeks, feeding him on raw fish, because he persistently refused the other sorts of food offered him.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking