The Days of a Man 



D897 



personal interest Lieutenant William L. Maxwell 

 of the Rusb y and Lieutenant Worth G. Ross of the 

 Perry. Maxwell had been a member of the Pioneer 

 Class at Stanford, though he left to enter the Rev- 

 enue Service, afterward amalgamated with the Navy 

 during the war. Just twenty years later he helped 

 train my son Knight for his commission in the 

 naval reserve. 



A master Ross, who rose to be chief of the Revenue Service, 

 seaman possessed extraordinary skill in sleight-of-hand. One 

 day at table he explained to Captain Allen, our 

 dinner guest, how American sailors spliced ropes. 

 Taking a length, cutting it in two, and then making 

 several passes over it, he apparently displayed a 

 perfectly mended piece. Allen took the trick at 

 its face value, though evidently puzzled as to how 

 it had been done. 



Toward the middle of September, university af- 

 fairs demanding my presence, I left St. Paul on the 

 Rush somewhat in advance of the others. This 

 time the passage was smooth and with but one in- 

 cident worth recalling. As we approached Cape 

 Flattery at the mouth of the Straits of Juan de 

 Fuca, a dense fog shut down so that we could neither 

 see the headland nor hear the loud horn on Tatoosh 

 Island. When the mist lifted suddenly, the boat 

 was almost on the rocks, and the horn loudly audible. 

 Having reported this incident to the lighthouse 

 board, I was courteously informed that varying 

 layers of fog at times blanketed sound a phe- 

 nomenon by no means peculiar to Cape Flattery. 



Arrived at Seattle, I was astounded at the amount 

 and contents of the correspondence unwittingly 



C 5983 



Fog as a 



blanket to 

 sound 



