: The Mutineers A Tale of Old Days at Sea and of Adventures in the Far East as Benjamin Lathrop Set It Down Some Sixty Years Ago by Hawes Charles Boardman - Sea stories

@FreeBooks

Posted in: #FreeBooks #FreeBooksIndia #FreeBooksApp #gg

Vote Up Vote Down   0 Reactions

Login to give Reaction!

I IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA

II IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP

IV IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS

V IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS

VI IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION

IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA

MY FATHER AND I CALL ON CAPTAIN WHIDDEN

My father's study, as I entered it on an April morning in 1809, to learn his decision regarding a matter that was to determine the course of all my life, was dim and spacious and far removed from the bustle and clamor of the harbor-side. It was a large room paneled with dark wood. There were books along the walls, and paintings of ships, and over the fireplace there stood a beautiful model of a Burmese junk, carved by some brown artist on the bank of the Irawadi.

My father sat by the open window and looked out into the warm sunshine, which was swiftly driving the last snow from the hollows under the shrubbery.

Already crocuses were blossoming in the grass of the year before, which was still green in patches, and the bright sun and the blue sky made the study seem to me, entering, dark and sombre. It was characteristic of my father, I thought with a flash of fancy, to sit there and look out into a warm, gay world where springtime was quickening the blood and sunshine lay warm on the flowers; he always had lived in old Salem, and as he wrote his sermons, he always had looked out through study windows on a world of commerce bright with adventure. For my own part, I was of no mind to play the spectator in so stirring a drama.

With a smile he turned at my step. "So, my son, you wish to ship before the mast," he said, in a repressed voice and manner that seemed in keeping with the dim, quiet room. "Pray what do you know of the sea?"

I thought the question idle, for all my life I had lived where I could look from my window out on the harbor.

Free books android app tbrJar TBR JAR Read Free books online gutenberg

(0)

Login to post a comment!