August, 1918 
7 
COLLECTING from OUT OF the PAST 
Over the Relics of the Old Whaling Days Still to Be Seen in a Little Seaport City of New England 
Broods the Glamour of the Sea and the Glory of Brave Deeds 
GRACE NORTON ROSE 
Drawings by Jack Manley Rose 
T HE little steamer from our island to the 
mainland squirmed up to her dock and 
we came down the gangplank with all the 
haste of the first passengers ashore. Baggage 
laden, we crossed the tracks and made our short 
way up the cobbled streets to Arthur Tabor’s 
Old Curiosity Shop. 
Arthur Tabor set his broom against a bot¬ 
tomless chair that, with a weather-beaten spin¬ 
ning wheel, Hanked the old time entrance, and 
came forward to meet us wholeheartedly. We 
paused at the small-paned show windows to 
glance over the treasures there displayed, and 
hesitated on the bright threshold to appraise 
the shadowy interior where he was stowing 
away our hand bags. It al¬ 
ways looked as it always had, 
but we viewed it all wnh die 
same delight that our first 
glimpse of it gave us. Cum¬ 
bersome wardrobes, chests of 
drawers, unwieldy davenports, 
and horsehair rockers blocked 
off all light and nearly all 
moving space; and strange 
dusty piles of odds and ends 
that the past century had used 
banked every conceivable cor¬ 
ner. Overhead hung quaint 
wall-papered band boxes that 
once held the blandishing bon¬ 
nets of charming maids, parts 
of spinning gear, firearms and 
fire irons, and straight-backed 
chairs in orderly rows that 
filled me with a strange desire 
to sit upon them suspended as 
they were. 
We threaded our way in, 
while Mr. Tabor went off to 
find a certain copper kettle that 
he had tucked away against our 
coming. We pulled from dusty 
corners all sorts of odd bits 
with histories we were sure he 
could tell us. As we came peer¬ 
ing towards the light that 
lay in brilliant dusty squares 
across the uneven floor and 
passed the table of old books 
with a customary comprehen¬ 
sive glance for familiar titles, 
Mr. Tabor stood there behind the shabby show¬ 
case turning an old copper kettle affectionately 
in his hands to our admiring gaze. Here we 
loitered to hear about the kettle—and claim it 
as our own, even as the Illustrator pounced 
upon a little mounted cannon, tucked away 
under a table, and hauled it out into the light. 
My wandering eye had caught it long since 
and I had steadily disregarded it with the al¬ 
most hopeless prayer that the Illustrator’s 
acquisitive eye might chance to overlook it. I 
had visions of that small unwieldy mass of iron 
and wood haunting our future. 
Warned by our host’s presaging look, and 
wise from old experiences. I glanced about for 
a handy chair, and the Illustrator leaned agains' 
a nearby table with a rare delight painted upon 
his face, and as for Arthur Tabor, the boyish 
exhuberance there was a balm to jaded senses. 
I give the story for what it is worth, and make 
no claims for its truth in the main nor its ac¬ 
curacy of detail. Under the spell of our en¬ 
tertainer’s beaming blue eye and drawling New 
England voice, we swallow with avidity all that 
he has to tell us; and, if in the winter months 
of long separation from the witchery of The 
Old Curiosity Shop, we come to question a tale 
or stumble across in some forgotten volume its 
replica, we only marvel at the memory and the 
dramatic spirit of the man. 
Y ES, sir, that cannon—I 
jest knew you’d find that 
out. Why that’s been here for 
most six weeks now and not a 
soul so much as looked at it” 
(ah, the subtle flattery!), “I 
said to myself when you came 
in you’d be tickled to death to 
hear the story that goes with it. 
She came off the Catalpa, 
whaler—sailed from here un¬ 
der Captain Anthony. Oh, 
’long about—well what’s the 
odds about the exact date? 
There’s not an Irishman 
around here but what loves the 
captain, and many a dinner has 
been given in his honor by 
Irish societies all over the 
country.” 
He stooped to the little shab¬ 
by, snub-nosed thing, and 
patted its side lovingly, “She’s 
seen exciting times, she has! 
Little gun carried up for’ard, 
she was, and Captain Anthony 
had her all loaded ready for 
trouble in case they called his 
bluff; but England wasn’t 
looking for any kind of a mix- 
up with us then and the game 
went through. 
“You know the time of the 
Fenian troubles, I can’t exactly 
tell you the facts of the case 
but, anyway, the Catalpa had 
Arthur Tabor’s Old Curiosity Shop, where those 
who search find many a treasure of the past 
