The Man Behind the Angler 



truth he was afraid of what he termed my reckless 

 sailing, yet as we generally won in the end by means of 

 this alleged recklessness, he was usually pacified. 

 Once he gallantly rose above it. We were in a closely 

 contested race and I was sailing my boat in half a gale 

 without a reef. By mere good luck we had rounded 

 the outer buoy ahead and I wore her around, and 

 with great difficulty got her wing and wing. Bunsby 

 lay flat on his back, tending the sheet of the big fore 

 sail. I had the helm and the main sheet, and Paublo, 

 a negro, bailed with a bucket as the boat was a third 

 full all the time. She squared away and flew along 

 and as we passed the boats we had distanced, Bunsby 

 could not resist and raised up and waved his hat and 

 held out the end of the sheet. At that moment a big 

 sea broke astern and rolled in upon us filling the boat, 

 but, curiously enough, did not capsize her, so that 

 she stood on the surface, but almost stationary. 

 Bunsby's.face emerged from the, water, and struggling 

 to a sitting position like a half-drowned rat, he turned 

 to me and shouted, " Hold her to it, sir! hold her to 

 it. We'll beat the d fleet if we are full." We 

 slacked away the sheets and Paublo and I got over- 

 board to lighten her, while Bunsby,, not being easy on 

 the shark question, bailed her out; and even then we 

 did not come in last. It should be mentioned that 

 the buoyancy of this boat was due to a row of air^ 

 tight cans on each side, and a forward deck holding 

 a bigger can, found useful on many occasions, as when 



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