MY FIRST "TWELFTH" 113 



Company's steamer advertised in " Bradshaw" to 



sail on the 9th and reach Belfast on the Saturday 



morning. Thence I could take the mail steamer to 

 Stranraer. But 



" Of men and mice best schemes oft gang agley." 



I had reckoned without the fact that I was sailing 

 on a Friday. Our cargo not being all in we lost a 

 tide no uncommon occurrence with these coasting 

 craft. Still, the skipper assured me I should be able 

 to catch the mail train at Belfast. He reckoned, 

 however, without the weather, for no sooner were 

 we fairly in the Bristol Channel than we ran into a 

 regular gale. All night it raged, and a dirtier night 

 I have rarely seen. At last we ran into smoother 

 water in the lee of the Wicklow Hills. Before we 

 had crossed Dublin Bay, however, it was pretty 

 obvious all chance of my catching a train which left 

 Belfast in the afternoon was gone, and with it, I 

 feared, my chance of the opening day of the grouse- 

 shooting. I couldn't blame the steamer, for the gale 

 had been terrific. In fact, it was alluded to in the 

 papers as "the gale of the loth of August," and the 

 Channel Squadron, lying at Queenstown, had been 

 forced to put to sea. But I thought regretfully of 

 that lost tide. 



We had a pleasant enough run up the Irish Coast, 

 but it was midnight when we got into Belfast. I 

 slept on board the steamer, and on Sunday morning 

 I took the train to Larne. I had ascertained, if I 

 could only get across, I could get a train from Port- 



