These, men would push singing a song, while
on the top of the capstan sat a man playing the fiddle, or the flute, or
some other instrument of music. You and I have seen it in pictures. Our
sons will say that they wish they had seen it in pictures. Our sons'
sons will say it is all a lie and was never in anything but the
pictures, and they will explain it by some myth or other.
Another way is to take two turns of a rope round a donkey-engine, paying
in and coiling while the engine clanks. And another way on smaller boats
is a sort of jack arrangement by which you give little jerks to a
ratchet and wheel, and at last It looses Its hold. Sometimes (in this
last way) It will not loose Its hold at all.
Then there is a way of which I proudly boast that it is the only way I
know, which is to go forward and haul at the line until It comes--or
does not come. If It does not come, you will not be so cowardly or so
mean as to miss your tide for such a trifle. You will cut the line and
tie a float on and pray Heaven that into whatever place you run, that
place will have moorings ready and free.
When a man weighs anchor in a little ship or a large one he does a jolly
thing! He cuts himself off and he starts for freedom and for the chance
of things. He pulls the jib a-weather, he leans to her slowly pulling
round, he sees the wind getting into the mainsail, and he feels that she
feels the helm.
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