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Read Ebook: The Four-Masted Cat-Boat and Other Truthful Tales by Loomis Charles Battell Shinn Florence Scovel Illustrator
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Ebook has 434 lines and 36396 words, and 9 pages
A FEW IDIOTISMS
PAGE
AT THE LITERARY COUNTER
UNRELATED STORIES--RELATED
ESSAYS AT ESSAYS
XL. THE PROPER CARE OF FLIES 236
NOTE
I am indebted to the editors of the "Century", the "Saturday Evening Post," "Harper's Bazaar," "Puck," the "Critic," the "Criterion," and the S. S. McClure Syndicate for permission to use the articles which first met printers' ink in their columns.
C. B. L.
A FEW IDIOTISMS
THE FOUR-MASTED CAT-BOAT
AN ETCHING OF THE SEA, BY A LANDLUBBER
The sea lay low in the offing, and as far as the eye could reach, immense white-caps rode upon it as quietly as pond-lilies on the bosom of a lake.
Fleecy clouds dotted the sky, and far off toward the horizon a full-rigged four-masted cat-boat lugged and luffed in the calm evening breezes. Her sails were piped to larboard, starboard, and port; and as she rolled steadily along in the heavy wash and undertow, her companion-light, already kindled, shed a delicate ray across the bay to where the dull red disk of the sun was dipping its colors.
Her cordage lay astern, in the neat coils that seamen know so well how to make. The anchor had been weighed this half-hour, and the figures put down in the log; for Captain Bliffton was not a man to put off doing anything that lay in the day's watch.
Away to eastward, two tiny black clouds stole along as if they were diffident strangers in the sky, and were anxious to be gone. Now and again came the report of some sunset gun from the forts that lined the coast, and sea-robins flew with harsh cries athwart the sloop of fishing-boats that were beating to windward with gaffed topsails.
"Davy Jones'll have a busy day to-morrow," growled Tom Bowsline, the first boatswain's mate.
"Meaning them clouds is windy?" answered the steward, with a glance to leeward.
"The same," answered the other, shaking out a reef, and preparing to batten the tarpaulins. "What dinged fools them fellers on the sloop of fishin'-ships is! They've got their studdin'sails gaffed and the mizzentops aft of the gangway; an' if I know a marlinspike from a martingale, we're goin' to have as pretty a blow as ever came out of the south."
And, indeed, it did look to be flying in the face of Providence, for the mackerel-ships, to the last one, were tugging and straining to catch the slightest zephyr, with their yard-arms close-hauled and their poop-decks flush with the fo'c'sle.
The form of the captain of the cat-boat was now visible on the stairs leading to the upper deck. It needed but one keen glance in the direction of the black clouds--no longer strangers, but now perfectly at home and getting ugly--to determine his course. "Unship the spinnaker-boom, you dogs, and be quick about it! Luff, you idiot, luff!" The boatswain's first mate loved nothing better than to luff, and he luffed; and the good ship, true to her keel, bore away to northward, her back scuppers oozing at every joint.
"That was ez neat a bit of seamanship ez I ever see," said Tom Bowsline, taking a huge bite of oakum. "Shiver my timbers! if my rivets don't tremble with joy when I see good work."
"Douse your gab, and man the taff-rail!" yelled the captain; and Tom flew to obey him. "Light the top-lights!"
A couple of sailors to whom the trick is a mere bagatelle run nimbly out on the stern-sprit and execute his order; and none too soon, for darkness is closing in over the face of the waters, and the clouds come on apace.
A rumble of thunder, followed by a blinding flash, betokens that the squall is at hand. The captain springs adown the poop, and in a hoarse voice yells out: "Lower the maintop; loosen the shrouds; luff a little--steady! Cut the main-brace, and clear away the halyards. If we don't look alive, we'll look pretty durn dead in two shakes of a capstan-bar. All hands abaft for a glass of grog."
The wild rush of sailors' feet, the creaking of ropes, the curses of those in the rear, together with the hoarse cries of the gulls and the booming of the thunder, made up a scene that beggars description. Every trough of the sea was followed by a crest as formidable, and the salt spray had an indescribable brackish taste like bilge-water and ginger-ale.
After the crew had finished their grog they had time to look to starboard of the port watch, and there they beheld what filled them with pity. The entire sloop of mackerel-ships lay with their keels up.
"I knowed they'd catch it if they gaffed their studdin'sails," said Tom, as he shifted the quid of oakum.
The full moon rose suddenly at the exact spot where the sun had set. The thunder made off, muttering. The cat-boat, close-rigged from hand-rail to taff-rail, scudded under bare poles, with the churning motion peculiar to pinnaces, and the crew involuntarily broke into the chorus of that good old sea-song:
The wind blows fresh, and our scuppers are astern.
THE POOR WAS MAD
A FAIRY SHTORY FOR LITTLE CHILDHER
Wance upon a toime the poor was virry poor indade, an' so they wint to a rich leddy that was that rich that she had goold finger-nails, an' was that beautifil that it 'u'd mek you dopey to luke at her. An' the poor asht her would she give thim the parin's of her goold finger-nails fer to sell. An' she said she would that, an' that ivery Chuesdeh she did be afther a-parin' her nails. So of a Chuesdeh the poor kem an' they tuke the goold parin's to a jewel-ery man, an' he gev thim good money fer thim. Wasn't she the koind leddy, childher? Well, wan day she forgot to pare her nails, an' so they had nothin' to sell. An' the poor was mad, an' they wint an' kilt the leddy intoirely. An' whin she was kilt, sorra bit would the nails grow upon her, an' they saw they was silly to kill her. So they wint out to sairch fer a leddy wid silver finger-nails. An' they found her, an' she was that beautifil that her face was all the colors of the rainbow an' two more besides. An' the poor asht her would she give thim the parin's of her silver finger-nails fer to sell. An' she said that she would that, an' that ivery Chuesdeh she did be afther a-parin' her nails. So of a Chuesdeh the poor kem an' they tuke the silver parin's to the jewel-ery man, an' he gev thim pretty good money fer thim, but not nair as good as fer the goold. But he was the cute jewel-ery man, wasn't he, childher? Well, wan day she forgot to pare her nails, an' so they had nothin' to sell. An' the poor was mad, an' they wint an' kilt the leddy intoirely. An' whin she was kilt, sorra bit would the nails grow upon her, an' they saw they was silly to kill her. So they wint out to sairch for a leddy wid tin finger-nails. An' they found her, an' she was that beautifil that she would mek you ristless. An' the poor asht her would she give thim the parin's of her tin finger-nails fer to sell. An' she said she would that, an' that ivery Chuesdeh she did be afther a-parin' her nails. So of a Chuesdeh the poor kem. An' did they git the tin nails, childher? Sure, that's where y' are out. They did not, fer the leddy had lost a finger in a mowin'-machine, an' she didn't have tin finger-nails at arl, at arl--only noine.
A PECULIAR INDUSTRY
The sign in front of the dingy little office on a side-street, through which I was walking, read:
JO COSE AND JOCK EWLAH FUNSMITHS
Being of an inquisitive turn of mind, I went in. A little dried-up man, who introduced himself as Mr. Cose, greeted me cheerily. He said that Mr. Ewlah was out at lunch, but he'd be pleased to do what he could for me.
"It is you who are calling," said he, averting his eyes. Then he assumed the voice and manner of a "lecturer" in a dime museum, and rattled along as follows:
"We are in the joke business. Original and second-hand jokes bought and sold. Old jokes made over as good as new. Good old stand-bys altered to suit the times. Jokes cleaned and made ready for the press. We do not press them ourselves. Joke expanders for sale cheap. Also patent padders for stories--"
I interrupted the flow of his talk to ask him if there was much demand for the padders.
"Young man," said he, "do you keep up with current literature?"
Then he went over to a shelf on which stood a long line of bottles of the size of cod-liver-oil bottles, and taking one down, he said: "Now, here is Jokoleine, of which we are the sole agents. This will make a poor joke salable, and is in pretty general use in the city, although some editors will not buy a joke that smells of it."
I noticed a tall, black-haired, Svengalic-looking person in an inner room, and I asked Mr. Cose who he was.
"That is our hypnotizer. The most callous editors succumb to his gaze. Take him with you when you have anything to sell. We rent him at a low figure, considering how useful he is. He has had a busy season, and is tired out, but that is what we pay him for. If he were to die you'd notice a difference in many of the periodicals. The poorer the material, the better pleased he is to place it. It flatters his vanity."
I assured him that I was something of a hypnotist myself, and, thanking him for his courtesy, was about to come away, when he picked up what looked like a box of tacks and said:
"Here are points for pointless jokes. We don't have much sale for them. Most persons prefer an application of Jokoleine. A recent issue of a comic weekly had sixty jokes and but one point, showing conclusively that points are out of fashion in some editorial rooms.
"A man came in yesterday," rattled on the senior member, "and asked if we bought hand-made jokes, and before we could stop him he said that by hand-made jokes he meant jokes about servant-girls. We gave him the address of 'Punch.'"
At this point I shook hands with Mr. Cose, and as I left he was saying: "For a suitable consideration we will guarantee to call anything a joke that you may bring in, and we will place it without hypnotic aid or the use of Jokoleine. It has been done before."
And as I came away from the sound of his voice, I reflected that it had.
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