208 
in the way of cheapness. The captain will 
probably be unable to understand why you 
want to go with him when there are so many 
comfortable boats running, but if you succeed 
in talking him over, you will enjoy your trip, if 
you enjoy the sturdy, unconventional side of 
things. 
In a voyage of this sort it is impossible to 
reckon accurately on the time it will take. 
With favoring breezes you can makea run in 
a day over a course that perhaps you will spend 
a week in covering onthe return. The route 
to the northward is to be preferred, ordinarily, 
to a run in a southerly direction, because the 
coast north of Cape Cod is picturesque all the 
way to the Arctic, while the coast that stretches 
southward from the same Cape is dull and flat, 
agreeable for bathing and lounging, but utterly 
wanting in scenic interest. “These small vessels 
do not stand out so far to sea in their trips as 
larger ones, and in such a run as that from 
Boston to St. John a schooner will keep so well 
in to shore that a panoramic view of the whole 
Maine coast will be afforded, and that view is a 
matchless one. 
Let it be understood that this voyage is not 
commended to women nor to delicate young 
men. Old men are too settled in their habits 
to enjoy it, and dudes are too tender to endure 
it. It is distinctly a sort of vacation that ap- 
peals to the young, strong and adventurous. 
The life will be rough, the crew may be rough, 
though good hearted, the meals will range from 
poor to awful, the smells in the cabin (which in 
most of these schooners is likewise the fore- 
castle) will not be appetizing, the motion in a 
heavy sea will be so violent that the plunging 
of an ocean grey hound will seem in compar- 
ison as a drowsy loll ina rocking chair ; but the 
voyager will return strong and tough and brown, 
and full of knowledge about sea life that he 
would not get if he crossed to Europe in the 
finest “ Liner” twice a year. 
The outfit for such a trip can be as inexpen- 
Sive as the trip itself. Simply take your oldest 
clothes. A warm overcoat is desirable, and if 
any article is bought expressly for the trip it 
might be a sou’wester, to protect the head from 
cold rains and drenching mists. The clothes 
sold to sailors at what are deservedly called 
“slop shops,” along the water front, are com- 
monly frauds. They are made of shoddy, and 
even their sou’westers leak like sieves. A 
valise will hold all that need be taken, and if 
you are foolish enough to take anything of more 
The American Angler 
value than novels, whiskey and cigars, let the 
lock on that valise be strong, for it is a griev- 
ous fact that some sailors were not brought up 
ina Sunday-school. At the same time, a few 
of those cigars, and perhaps a sly nip at that 
whiskey, will make them friends of yours from 
the start. 
It will be found desirable to take a few deli- 
cacies in the way of pickles, lemons, sardines, 
cheese, lime juice or raspberry vinegar, for the 
water on board is warm, being dipped from a 
barrel that stands in the sun all day, and the 
cuisine has commonly to do with salt pork, salt 
mackerel, potatoes, hard tack, fresh biscuit and 
alleged tea and coffe. It will be a mercy to the 
officers and crew if you will share some of 
these delicacies with them. By going aboard 
a day before sailing, spying out the state of the 
larder and having a comprehensive interview 
with the cook, a better idea will be obtained of 
what to take and what to omit, for it happens 
once in a while that a coaster goes out with a 
food supply that would really be a credit toa 
boarding house, and has a man for a cook who 
is content to kill his associates with simple in- 
digestion instead of active poison. 
Another precaution needful to a proper en- 
joyment of the voyage is a fair supply of insect 
powder. Let the bedding be shaken out and 
aired every day, for this is a matter in which 
sailors are lax, and they do not seem to mind, 
as a landsman does, the mouldly odor that per- 
vades the spaces below decks. Having thus 
assured himself that he is neither to be frozen 
or starved, the passenger can now turn his at- 
tention to enjoyment, and there is a good deal 
of it, of anew kind, especially for the jaded city 
man. The bracing sea air, the free, hearty life, 
the long sleeps, the exercise at the wheel, at the 
halliards and the capstan; the tremendous 
yarns spun by the older salts ; the sight of pass- 
ing vessels, of rocky coasts, of tumbling por- 
poise and other strange marine life; the pass- 
ing lights and shadows that make the sea as 
changeable as a piece of silk ; the trumpeting 
of the storm, the stars above the rocking masts, 
the sun rising out of the flood, the moon track- 
ing across the crisping waves, the milky phos- 
phorescence on dark nights; the clang of bells, 
tooting of whistles in a fog ; the trolling along- 
side, the spearing of dolphins, porpoises or sun- 
fishes; the warm lazy mornings, curled up 
before the break of the cabin witha pipe, or the 
greater security for privacy and quiet that is 
afforded by the cross-trees, given over to light 
