4. A TRIAL TRIP 5. HOURS TO WINWARD 6. BAILING OUT 7. GAIN ON WATER 8. CONNOR'S OPINION OF THE BOAT VERSUS A LONDON FRIENDS 9. ARRIVE AT EXMITH 10. BOATMAN'S OPINION THERE 11. TAKE LOGINGS FOR A WEEK 12. EXPLORE THE EX IN BOAT 12. RETURN TO SYDMITH WEATHER OR NO IN HER 13. EARLY MORNING 14. MACAROL FISHING 15. CAUGHT IN A MACAROL BREEZE 16. SEE TOO HEAVY TO LAND AT HIGH WATER 17. A RUN FOR SHORE UNDER SALE 18. FOLMS LIFE ON THE BEACH 19. A GAL AT SYDMITH 20. BOATS A FLOWT AND MOARD ROUND A FRESHWATER PUMP 21. CONNOR'S PARLOR THAT EVENING 22. MISSES PARTINGON'S MOP AT SYDMITH 23. LONG SEATRIPS IN THE FOLM WITH WIFE AND CHILDREN 24. SOME FRIENDS REMONSTRATE ETC 25. MY WIFE CRITICIZES THE FOLM'S SPEED 26. A LAUNCH WITH THE PLUG OUT 27. THE FIRST REAL TRIAL TRIP OF THE FOLM WAS ON A CERTAIN MONDAY, ON WHICH I HAD ARRANGED A WEEK BEFORE TO SALE IN HER WITH A FRIEND FOR X-MITH. Harry Conant was to go with us, as I was a stranger to that port. Anybody can go almost anywhere by sea, provided they can pick their weather, which in this instance we were unable to do, so that our start on this particular day was not exactly a case of weather permitting, but rather one of, if possible. The evening before the weather looked unpromising with a fresh west-southwest wind, and all Conant would say, as to the next day's trip, was that with that wind an early start would be advisable, in order to make the best of what little tide we should have with us. By an early start Conant would mean 3.30 a.m., but out of deference to the domestic arrangements of my friend, the late hour of 7 a.m. was fixed upon. The sun rose among crimson streaky clouds, or as fishermen call them, the reds, that morning, and all Conant would say about the weather, or the probable time of our arrival at X-MITH, was not encouraging, though he allowed it might be done in the run of the day. My friend was not what it is called a boating man, but rather one of that game class of dry London men who thoroughly enjoy what they call a sniff of the briny. There was, as Conant said, a bit of a jump outside, but which in the present state of the tide did not run high enough inshore to make it hard to launch. And when everything was on board, including my friend and self, Conant gave the boat her last shove through the wash of a breaker until, as he said, she smelled water enough to float her, after which he stumbled in over her stern and with her head a trifle off the wind she soon gathered life under sail with a crunch crunch over the breakers seaward. The mouth of the X was ten miles dead to inward, and our pilot said the only chance of fetching it was to stand at once well offshore in order to save the last of the ebb. Professional boatbuilders rarely go to sea in their own craft, and probably don't experience unusual pleasure when they do. But as we left the shelter of the bay, and the little foam splashed her way through the rougher water outside, I confess to a feeling of wonder and pride in her strength and sea-going powers, which I have never felt since in much larger and finer sea-boats built by others. But all that sort of thing was soon checked by Conant remarking that if we meant to do anything we were bound to drive her now, and that he should advise the larger mainsail to be set, and an ore used to help her to inward. His word was of course law, and the smaller mainsail under which we started was shifted for the large one. Three bags of ballast being trimmed to inward to enable the boat to keep her lee-gunnel up under the larger sail. Conant taking my place at the tiller while I took an ore and began rowing, or rather catching a stroke when possible. The net result of which driving process, or as Conant called it, keeping her at it. Being that not a moment passed without a cloud of spray flying over us to inward, with a fair share of solid water at times over our lee-bowl, all which kept Conant busy bailing with one hand while he steered with the other. Conant seemed delighted with the boat, because, as he told my friend, you see, sir, she don't stop to look at nothing, but she goes right through everything. The London man, however, persisted in calling her a wet boat, and said he would as soon be on a duck's back, etc. We went on in this style until the high cliffs of Sidmouth were almost out of sight, the wind rather freshening all the time, but, as Conant said cheerfully, it would not do to ease her nothing, and so far as the water inside her went, he thought he rather gained on it. It was a good day for a sea-boat's trial trip, and as we went about, we met a bluff-bowed collier under reef-topsels on the other tack. Her black shining bows rising and falling in a stately way as they plunged through the sea, which ran in streams of foam from her headgear. On board the little foam it was doing rather more, and the large mainsail was lowered, and the smaller one hoisted in its place, under which she became a trifle-dryer. Conant, who in summertime despised all protection, was now as wet as a shag, and in spite of our oil-skins and sow-westers we were far from dry. We had been under way more than two hours when we again came in with the land, and found ourselves only two miles and a half to windward of our starting point. It was therefore suggested, under these circumstances, that it might be wise to hard up and run back for Sidmouth. But this step was overruled at once by Conant, who said that so much sea would by this time be running on the beach, that with a flowing tide a return to it might be risky. While if we stood to sea again for an hour we ought to fetch to windward of Otterton Head, and after that we should smoothen the water on every tack. The latter part of this prophecy was not verified, and three hours later, when we fetched a long ledge of black rocks known as Straight Point, there was a nasty untrue sea breaking over them, and upon Exmouth Bar to the westward. Two more short tacks, however, enabled us to fetch the western passage between the pole sand and the warren, where we could ease our sheets for the desired haven. And after being cramped up five hours to windward, it was pleasant to stand up again in the warm sun and wind, which nearly dried everything as we ran along under the friendly shelter of the sandbank outside us. The trial trip was over, but on reaching the landing hard at Exmouth the boatmen there looked curiously at the foam and inquired where we came from, and when told Sidmouth were half inclined to doubt our word. The oldest among them, shaking his head, pronounced her as too small, in which he was perhaps right, but there she was, and we felt that the foam might be trusted in any weather in which it would be possible to launch her from Sidmouth Beach. My wife had engaged lodgings at Exmouth for a week, with a view partly to some smooth water boating on the Ex. But distrusting the fickle ways of the open sea had wisely made the passage with her three little ones overland. It was quite two o'clock before my friend and I, two damp, unpleasant, hungry bodies, turned up at those apartments. Conant was rather fagged out, but after lunch and a hot, strong glass of rum grog assured us, as we wished him good-bye in the empty carriage on his return to Sidmouth that he felt beautiful now. It was arranged, however, before he left, that the next Monday he was to come to Exmouth and go back with me in the foam to Sidmouth. During the week we had a pleasant time exploring the tidal estuary of the Ex in her as far as Topchum. But the morning fixed very turning to Sidmouth proved, if anything, more dirty-looking than the day we left there. And after I had walked down to the shore before breakfast, and was informed by some Exmouth pilots that with that sea on the bar it would be out of the question to land at all on Sidmouth Beach, I went back to the lodgings determined to leave the foam in charge of a man where she was until the weather improved and return with my wife by carriage. The wind was strong at south-southwest with what sailors call small rain, and had been so since daylight. But we had scarcely begun breakfast before our landlady informed us that there was a man at the door who wanted to see me. And there, to my surprise, shining in a suit of oil-skin stood Harry Conant after having tramped in the rain from Sidmouth. When I expressed surprise at his coming in such weather he merely said, Well, sir, you remember you told me you wished to return today, if possible, and I continued as we came here in a strong foul wind that a fair one ought to stop us going back, adding, Still, if you prefer to go by carriage, I can take the boat home alone. Well, as to the ex-Smith pilot's idea of not being able to land at Sidmouth, Conant said, You leave that to me, sir. That kind of folk knows nothing of our sort of beach work. And so after a good breakfast Conant and I went down to the hard, and soon had the foam afloat, and ready for sea, the local boatmen, of course, watching critically our proceedings, the only one of which they approved of being a reef in our small mainsail taken in preparation for a beat to winward out of the river. This beat-out took some time, but once outside the wind was a-baffed our beam, and Conant set the large mainsail, with the smaller one boomed out, spinnaker fashion, before which we rolled along as dry as a chip, and were even able before the wind to enjoy a pipe. When, however, we arrived off Sidmouth, nearly abreast of Conant's capstone, the sea was too heavy to run for it under sail, and I had a splendid chance of seeing how a landing in a boat like the foam should be made through a sea tumbling in at high water against a steep beach. All sails in the main mass were lowered, and carefully stowed and lashed out of the way. All but one bag of shingle ballast were emptied overboard, and after the bow or cut rope had been hooked into the stem Conant took the pair of short oars or paddles, and under them backed the boat in until within a few seas of the beach, and with an eye over his shoulder kept her there for some minutes, or until three or more larger seas than ordinary had run under us and broken upon the shore. Then, with a half-dozen powerful strokes he brought her round, and pulled in so that we were carried on the shoulder of a sea, and left almost high and dry upon the beach in front of his capstone, where his son, a stout boy, and an old fisherman were waiting for us. Other help was at hand, and the foam was quickly hauled or hardened in out of the reach of the surf. It was arranged between Conant and myself that I should have the use of his capstone and wooden skids on the beach, when launching or hauling up my boat, at a small fixed rate each time they were used, and as he and his boy were often ashore about the time I was ready for a cruise this plan suited both of us. In the mackerel season, however, I was frequently on the beach before sunrise or in time to get the foam afloat before Conant put the sea. Once launched in ordinary weather I wanted no more help until the morning's fishing was over, after which there were always plenty of hands on the beach, the maxim among the fishermen, especially in rough weather, being that of mutual aid, so that the last boat ashore generally got the most help. In this way I often had three or four hours' sport with the mackerel before breakfast, landing sometimes with more fish in the bottom of the foam than a man can carry, all which, after a few taken for home use, went to swell Conant's catch. The rig of the foam was well adapted for reeling for mackerel, as it required no attention in wearing round before the wind over a school of fish. This was not the case with the larger lugged sail boats in this kind of fishing, but they nearly all carried two hands. In the season I of course had mackerel lines out sometimes during a midday cruise, but seldom met with the same sport that attended the first hours fishing after sunrise. In fact, later in the day a fresh inshore wind or what the fishermen call a mackerel breeze was best for sport. But I remember one morning when a doctor friend and I had started rather early on one of these mackerel breeze days that after a few hours' capital sport the sea had increased so rapidly by the time we intended landing the spray was flying over the seawall. There were only three other boats left out, one of which I hailed asking what he thought about a landing. He said that neither he nor his brothers in the other boats meant to try it for the next two hours or till the tide had fallen so that they could see chit rocks, when he could run in at that end of the beach, adding, and you'd best wait till we be all ashore when there'll be plenty of help there. This end of the beach was a quarter of a mile from a usual landing and Harry Conant's capstan. Both of us were a trifle more than ready for breakfast, and the wind and sea were rising fast. But there was no help for it, and we had to knock about outside till one o'clock, when, after the three fishermen had successfully landed, we made a dash for it under sail. Quite a crowd had by this time got together on the Esplanade to watch the boats come in, and I was not sorry when, after a rush on the back of a big sea, the foam ran well up the beach without shipping a bucket of water and was seized by the strong arms of five or six men who had landed before us. There is a certain amount of luck in landing through a surf under sail. But on the whole it is perhaps the safest for a non-professional, especially if alone, the boat being kept rather by the stern. And even if filled before beaching, she must be kept for an aft to the sea to the last. Besides the want of a capstan, a great objection to landing at this end of Sidmouth Beach was that in case of a sudden gale there was no retreat from it landward. The cliff meeting the beach here only a short distance above high water mark. So that after landing in dirty looking weather, boats had to be dragged along the beach parallel to the shore for some distance before they could be safely left. For the most part, however, the foam, carefully tended by Conant, led an amateurish lazy boat life among her tarry, fishy-flavored, scale-smeared consorts, basking idly for days in the sun, or when too hot, shielded from it under a well-fitted boat cover. While the long winter months were spent by her snugly housed in her native coach-house, a mile from the sea, and my wife used to say that she was where she should always keep her. Her immediate neighbors on the beach in summer, of course, Conant's two boats, the Friends and England's Rose. And I knew for certain that in case of a sudden gale with a spring tide she would be the first boat hauled up beyond the reach of the terrible sea, which once in every few years would make a clean sweep, not only of everything on the beach, but off the esplanade above it, piling up sometimes beach two feet on the road, and filling the basements of many houses facing the sea, not only with water, but solid shingle. One such night I recollect about nine p.m., hurrying off in a pair of sea-boots to see how things were going on, and found the sea pouring in sheets of foam a foot deep between every opening it could find into the town, so that it was hardly possible to wade safely across the end of one opening to the next, owing to the rush of water. I found the foam that night with half a dozen other boats moored to a fresh water pump, and when I asked a fisherman how they got so many of them there in such a short time, he said, We'd no trouble about that. After getting them on to the walk, we'd only to keep them straight, and the sea carried them into the street. The boats then lay aloft in nearly three feet of saltwater, safely moored, and rubbing noses together in this newly made port round a western town pump. Conant's cottage door looked out upon the place, and stepping inside it was strange to see him and his old father-in-law standing in two feet of water by a table with a lighted candle on it, and in the grate the remains of a fire. Everything reflected in the calm water about them, while outside the gale howled, and the sea thundered against the seawall a hundred and fifty yards off. The rest of the furniture had been carried either upstairs or to relatives' houses further inland. All but an old Dutch clock hung near the ceiling, the pendulum still swinging, and hands showing the time nine thirty, which, as the old fisherman said, must be ten minutes past high water so that he hoped they'd had the worst on it. I asked him if he had ever known a higher tide. He only pointed to a dark stain near the top of the room as the high water mark of a tide fifty years back, when we took folk out of first story windows in boats. Sidmouth did not entirely recover from one of these invasions by sea for months, and when one considers that not only every boat, but all the capstones in gear had to be hastily uprooted and removed from the beach to a place of safety in an hour or two, some idea may be formed of the work a gale of this sort gave the fishermen. The well-known story of Mrs. Parkington's ineffectual efforts to keep back the sea with her mop is founded upon a fact which occurred at Sidmouth no doubt before the building of the seawall by Rennie. But when the wind tide and sea meant business, the work of that great engineer seemed almost as useless against their combined attack as Canute's will or the old lady's mop. We have only to live long enough to arrive at years of discretion. I suppose this is my case, for I often wonder now how I ventured to undertake, and still more how I contrived to persuade my wife to trust herself and three small children with me in the foam on the long open sea voyages we used to make in her between Sidmouth and Tynmouth, dollish and babbycomb to the west, and bare and lime regis to the east. Quite alone such expeditions might be easily accomplished by any foolhardy young amateur, but handling a small open sailing boat under those squall-breeding cliffs with all you cared for on board was a nervous matter, especially when the lady in command often insisted upon sail being shortened or taken in altogether at the very moment when with a freshening land breeze the canvas carried was the sole means of keeping the boat from being blown offshore. Everything in the shape of masts, sails, and rope on board the foam was of the strongest and best, and constantly overhauled with a view to cruises made chiefly with the wind offshore, which, when at all strong, rendered any attempt to gain the land impossible under oars. Her yaw-rig was also selected for this reason, as it enabled one hand to keep the boat on her course during a squall under a mizzen and forsel without losing ground while taking in a reef or shifting a large sail for a small one. I have gone into these details to show that the actual risks incurred upon these sea-trips were not so terrible as some of our neighbors and friends at Sidmouth used to make out. Many of them, however, were retired old navalmen who had arrived at something a trifle beyond years of discretion, men who would try to undermine my wife's faith, never too strong, in me and my boat with. Look here, Mrs. Leslie, I must really come and have a look at this boat of your husbands, and see what sort of craft it is that you trust yourself with him in along the coast. Among my wife's various criticisms on the navigation of the foam, one was that upon a long trip we never appeared to get on, but seemed always stuck for hours off the same headland. This was, of course, an optical error due to being some distance offshore. Nevertheless I was never able to explain to her how, when sailing up or down a river, the foam apparently made better progress than she ever did at sea or when sailing along the coast. But somehow or other we always reached port, and the three children proved in a breeze most efficient and patient as shifting ballast. The launch of a small family boat like the foam, with wind and sea on shore, was a business requiring some care and foresight, especially with one or more lady passengers on board. The boat had to be placed ready upon three or more well-greased cross-skids or ways, and when all were on board I took my place on the middle thwart, ready to row her out until beyond the breakers before making sail. Conant would then watch for a smooth, and with the words, Are you all ready, sir? start, and follow her seaward through the wash until she was fairly afloat, after which he left us to our own devices and the tender mercy of the surf. In this way we were often able to utilize and enjoy a southerly or sea breeze, which, as Conant used to say, if it did not overblow itself and become offensive, was more steadier-like and less puffy than a smooth water offshore wind. On such days, once clear of the broken water, it was plain sailing. Accidents happened, however, in the best regulated boats, and in spite of all Conant's careful preparations, I noticed one day, after passing over the first breaker, that the cork had started from the plug-hole under the stern sheets. I had two ladies on board that day, and there was too much surf to allow a moment's time to leave my skulls or find the cork and replace it. And when one of the youngsters moved the stern sheets to look for it, the water was seen spouting up into the boat eight or nine inches high to the consternation of my lady passengers. The cork, of course, had hidden itself among the timbers aft, and I had to call for a pocket handkerchief, which, stuffed into the hole with a spare-thole pin, did duty for the cork until we had gained a good-offing clear of the broken water. Little incidents of this kind break the monotony of boating. But how that cork came to start was a mystery, because a heavy flat beachstone was always placed over it before launching. End of Chapter Four. Chapter Five of A Water Biography by Robert C. Leslie This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Chapter Five The repose of Sidmouth disturbed by a man of enterprise. He gets up a regatta, and to avoid being mixed up in it, I go to see in the foam for the day. But, after all, owing to bad weather, do get mixed with it, and sail round the course with two other boats. How Sidmouth was supplied with coals. The foam launched aboard a light collier caught in a breeze. Rowing out through a sea, a vessel drives ashore, night of royal charter gale. Some beer men land on the beach at night in heavy gale. England's rose, driven to sea with a gentleman and two ladies. Toed back by foam. I build a smaller boat as tender to foam. A year later begin to think of building a vessel large enough to leave Sidmouth in. Her dimensions, etc. Other reasons for building her instead of buying one. I begin to take long walks with a boat builder to find timber for this vessel. I buy a big tree, the felling of it, and getting it upon a saw-pit. No railway in my time came within fifteen miles of Sidmouth, and the few enterprising visitors who reached there by coach from Exeter called it dull. It was certainly not a gay place, but most of those who resided in that happy valley did so rather with a view to quiet, and among them it was rare to find anyone disposed to tamper with the grave routine of country life there. In the summer, however, of blank, there blazed out among us a brisk retired North Country shipowner who bought a little place, and after blowing off some superfluous energy upon it for a year in altering and adding to it, and driving a pair of ponies up and down the steep adjacent hills, began to attack people all round on the want of enterprise and energy in their slow southern town. Why didn't they build a pier? Or seeing how cheap and plentiful timber was, starred a ship-building yard. When did we have our last regatta? And being told we never had one, said, then it's time you did. He owned a twenty-ton yacht and was Vice Commodore of the Royal Something Yacht Club, and no doubt all the members of that club would enter their craft. And so a committee was dragged together and money to the amount of fifty pounds collected to be expended in prizes, flags, and fireworks. What are termed coast regattas are common enough, and sometimes the weather permits of the program being carried out. But Sidmouth was far from any yachting centers, while its position in West Bay made it a most undesirable rendezvous for racing craft. This, of course, the fishermen knew, and therefore expected that the money subscribed would be duly divided into a number of prizes to be rode and sailed for by them. The committee, however, thought otherwise, and after allotting thirty pounds to be sailed for by the expected yachts, and ten pounds for fireworks, etc., divided the remaining ten pounds into small prizes for local boats. When this was known on the beach, the regatta and its committee became a very unpopular subject of conversation among the fishermen. A day in September, however, was fixed, and the forthcoming Sidmouth Bragata was duly advertised in a local weekly. I had been asked to help to carry out the sailing arrangements among the fishing boats, but knowing the dissatisfaction likely to follow any attempt to do so declined, and to make sure of not being pressed into this service put to sea in the foam on the appointed day before most of the sailing committee were out of bed. And having victualed my boat for the day started with one of the fishermen's sons for a cruise seaward. As the day advanced, the wind steadily grew stronger, and by ten o'clock there was a fair amount of surf on the beach, so that some trouble was experienced in launching three of the eighteen-foot fishing boats. Two mark boats had been anchored the evening before four miles apart to the eastward and westward of the town and about two miles offshore. So far, however, no yacht of any rig was in sight, and the fishermen in the boats already afloat told me that none of the smaller ones were likely to leave the beach in the present state of the weather. About noon, however, the Vice Commodores, twenty-tonner, under a trissel and a small jib, hover in sight, followed by a smaller cutter and a very large half-decked sailing-craft, the swan of the Warren from Exmouth. The weather showed no signs of improving, and communication with the shore was fast getting more difficult, even when carried out in boats manned by three or four of the smartest fishermen. I don't know what arrangements were made at sea about a match between the yachts, but about one p.m. they started themselves somehow, the swan of the Warren leading the way round the course, followed by the little cutter and twenty-tonner. The weather had now become not only rough, but very thick with small rain, so that the yachts were not easily seen as they sailed round the course. And when the three eighteen-foot boats slipped their cables and dashed off under their forelugs and mizons for the eastern mark, they were soon out of sight in the rain and sea drift. So that, as seen now from the shore, it must have been a very dim and mysterious-looking regatta indeed. Rather to my surprise, I now saw two of the sixteen-foot boats afloat. And a boat from the shore came out to me to ask whether, in order to make up a race, I would sail round the course with these two boats, as none of the other small boats would leave the beach. These boats had each three men in them, and I agreed to go if they could find me another hand. The men were much obliged, and said that my friend Mr. G., the son of a clergyman, was on the beach, and no doubt would be glad to go. He was a first-rate hand, and after some delay joined me in the foam. The sea had gone on rising, so that as we lay ready for a start at our anchors, about a quarter of a mile from the town, it was not easy to see anything far, either shoreward or seaward. And the two boats riding just inside of mine were often almost hidden from us by the shoulder of a passing sea, while the roar of the surf among the shingle quite drowned the sound of our starting gun. I fancied I saw a puff of smoke, but could not make the men in the other boats believe it had been fired, until I pointed out to them a signal made by flag that it had. We were all soon off after that. And though, owing to her rig and smaller size, my boat had no chance against the fishermen's lug sails. We hoped by the way we went soon after starting that we might come in a good second. But the weather had become so thick that in the rain and driving spray it was impossible to see either of the mark boats. We therefore followed the boat ahead of us, knowing that he would sight the easterly mark first. And we were not far astern of him when my friend G may out an empty boat on the top of a sea only a short distance to windward of us and said, By Jove, there she is, and Ned, alluding to the leading boat, has gone on without twigging her. We then stood on just far enough to round this boat, and went about close to her, but only to find that she was one of the yacht's boats adrift, and that the real mark boat was a quarter of a mile from us and still ahead of the leading boat. This, of course, put us out of the race, even as second, for we had to tack again before rounding this first mark just a stern of the second boat. It was a long, rough four-mile sail to the western mark, and we might have claimed second prize after all, for we saw the second boat tack for shore without rounding it at all. During this cruise round we were constantly bailing, the boy with a dipper and my friend with a sea-boot. We found any amount of help ready for us on the beach that day, and by the time we landed the wind had increased to half a gale. The three yachts were almost out of sight, making the best of their way for Exmouth understorm canvas. The little North Country yachtsman was not afloat in his yacht that day, and in the local weeklies' account of the regatta it was said, after the first round the race was given up, as those on board the twenty-tonner could see no fun in knocking about pitching Bausprit in off a place like Sidmouth. Thus ended the first and last coast regatta I ever took part in. In the earlier part of the day an effort was made to start a race for gigs, and two were very pluckly manned and launched, but had to make for shore again, one of them filling outside, and her crew were taken care of by the men in one of the larger fishing boats. The cut shows how the other took the beach head first. Sidmouth was then only supplied with coal by sea, landed in large boats on the beach from Collier Briggs, anchored nearly half a mile offshore. And one of the small excitements of the place was when one of these coal briggs, after discharging her cargo, was caught by a southerly breeze either empty or before she had taken in ballast. During a stay off Sidmouth these vessels were placed in charge of one of the older beach men, who for the time was styled pilot. His local knowledge of tides and weather being considered useful while his boat in bad weather formed the most efficient link between him and the shore. Harry Conant was one of these men chosen for this service, and at times had to go off and remain on board a Collier until the weather moderated, or if sufficient ballast in the shape of undischarged coal remained in her until she was safe inside of Exmouth Bar. But when caught quite empty these vessels were sometimes left with two anchors down to take care of themselves until the gale was over. The questions, however, often arose at such times. Was the weather bad enough to take this step? Or how long would it be safe to leave the crew and pilot on board? It chanced that one morning I with many others was on the beach during a discussion of this kind. A light Collier with nearly a clean swept hold was riding rather heavily off the town. Her crew had been landed the night before leaving the captain and a Sidmouth man on board, and the question was, should a boat be launched to go off and offer them a chance of leaving the brig before the sea became too heavy? Very little time was wasted in talk before Conant and his relative Ned decided to go. It so happened that most of the handier small class of boats suited for the trip except the foam had been hauled that morning off the beach on to the Esplanade, and Ned suggested that if I would let her go she would be just the boat for the job. I confess that I felt rather flattered at this selection and said they might take her if they would take me with them. My friend Gee who was standing near also wished to go, and after some hesitation on Conant's part it was agreed that we should form two of the four hands required to pull off to the brig. I had landed in the foam several times in quite as heavy a sea but was anxious not to lose the rarer chance of launching through one, especially in the little foam. She was, as they said, one of the floatiest boats on the beach and lay handy with no fishing gear on board. There was plenty of help ready to launch her, and after she was down on the skids just in the white broad wash of the surf, my friend and I took our places at the two midship oars, Ned being the lightest of the party taking the bow oar, while Conant was to take charge of the tiller with one hand and the after oar in the other, which he used standing in the stern sheets and sheaving or shoving with it facing the boat's bow gondolier fashion. In this way he was able to see well ahead and direct us when to pull hard or easy according to the height and character of the surf. It was some minutes before he gave the word to those lending a hand at our launch of, here comes a pretty smooth mind and follow her well out, which he did himself almost waist high before jumping into her over the stern. The first rush down with the back suck or under toe of the wave as it carries the little boat forward to meet the curling crest of the next is a ticklish moment. The shallow yeasty mixture of air and water gives little grip for oars, and two or more strokes are made rather in the sand and shingle below it. This first sea must be taken at speed and a cloud of spray almost hides our bowman as the boat crushes her way through and over it, while for the next two or three seas Conant coaches us with, pull up, pull up, Mr. L, pull up hard, Mr. G, keep her going, etc. But as we get farther seaward the interval between each breaker grows longer, and when a higher wall of water than usual rises some distance ahead of us, Conant's order at times is easy a bit. We'll let that one break. Then at the next it is, pull up hard again all. This went on until we were past a wide belt of broken water which extended nearly halfway out to the brig, after which it was only steady hard work for all hands, until we were as close under the lee of the light colliers tossing stern as we dared go. The men on board threw us a line, and we rested on our oars, while Conant climbed on board the brig by it and a short rope ladder hanging a stern. What took place in that collier's little cabin I am unable to say, but it was quite half an hour before the debate was over, and Conant dropped down the line again into the foam with a letter to be posted for the captain's wife, and the news that he and the pilot had decided to bide where they was. The return trip, before wind and sea, though easier for us, required more care than the outward one. The wind veered next day to northwest, and the old brig was ballasted and sailed for the north again two days afterwards. In fact, during the twelve years I was at Sidmouth, none of these colliers were lost there, though several other vessels drove ashore at or near the place. One of these, a large timber-laden catch, came ashore the night the royal charter was lost, and was thrown up on the beach almost level with the top of the seawall, or far above ordinary high-water mark. Her owner, a Jersey shipbuilder, relaunched her with her cargo on board two months afterwards. But curiously enough, two years later, the same catch laden with oak timber drove ashore again within a mile of Sidmouth after losing all her canvas off berry-head, and was again relaunched with little or no damage. I remember also a tremendously heavy gale in which one of the beer-head luggers got caught in the broken water outside Sidmouth about midnight, and seeing the gas lights of the town ran for the beach, and without help made a safe landing upon it. It was a fearful night, and I and others were astonished next morning at finding the stranger high up on the beach, with her crew of three men on board, one of whom must have been eighty years old, quietly mending their nets and gear. But to return to my own little affairs, I may say that the foam's trip to the light collier was not the only time she took a share in useful work. For I had the honor, on one occasion, of taking four kegs of her majesty's powder from Sidmouth to the Coast Guard Station at Budley Salterton. And another day the foam was the happy instrument of, I won't say rescuing two ladies and a gentleman from a watery grave, but from the far more awkward fate of being blown alive out to sea in a small open boat, in which, after starting for a row and pulling, or rather drifting, for some time pleasantly before the wind, the gentleman, in spite of all efforts to regain the land, found himself, like Crusoe in his parogue, fast drifting seaward. I was not surprised at this, because on coming within a few yards to winward of him in the foam he was quite incapable of pulling his boat near enough for me to get hold of her. There were two elderly ladies sitting in the stern of the boat under Parasols, and their companion, who had lost his hat, was bald-headed. The boat he had hired was Connance England's Rose, and when I reached Sidmouth with her in tow he said, I was afeard after I let the gent-taker something would happen when I see how he rode away, dead to leeward. I have often thought since, that if that little party on board England's Rose had only been twenty years younger it would have been a pity to have spoiled such a good opening for a three-volume sea-story by towing their boat ashore. Though the foam was a small boat to require the attentions of a tender or dinghy, there were, during summer at Sidmouth, spells of offshore winds with smooth water, in which she could be safely left at anchor with ballast and gear on board ready for sea. I therefore now built the foam's little sister, or tender, a handy full-bodied boat eleven feet and a half long by four wide. After a short training on Sidmouth Beach as tender to the foam she began a wandering life as the boat or dinghy of the Rip Van Winkle, the keel and planking of which celebrated craft, was standing as a fine elm close to my house two years after this dinghy was built. The Rip Van Winkle was a craft of thirty-six tons old measurement, and I believe twenty decimal something register. But the tonnage of ships, like a lady's age, is not easily got at even by experts. She was certainly forty-five feet long overall by fourteen wide and drew a little over six feet of water, and was christened Rip Van Winkle, because in her we first really drifted clear of or away from a long sleepy twelve years repose in the valley of the Sid. We might perhaps have affected an escape by other means, but they did not occur to us, or we wanted the energy to use them. It is, however, even now rather a mystery to me, why or how I came to build her. My wife never cared for the sea, and my own idea is that this vessel was the result of sheer idleness. There is a was a foolish saying that time is money, which may have some truth in London or New York, but had no local truth about it for me at Sidmouth, and though I turned much time and some money into yacht when I built Rip Van Winkle, I did not find it easy to convert yacht into either again on trying to sell her some years afterwards. She took me over two years to build, being taken in, so to say, in monthly parts, as people of humble means do a big, expensively bound and illustrated Bible. Or the working man does his pig, which grows by little and littles, and comes in in a lump, after eating its last pack of barley-meal at Christmas. Of course, for ready money I might have acquired my yacht in a lump, advertising for her in the field, or the yachtsman, and have gone to cows, Southampton, or Wyvernhoe, and after some scientific prongs with a knife among her timbers, and growing through her inventory from a nearly new mainsail to a rusty frying pan, have become her owner at what the local agent says, ain't the valley of her lead, the all in gear being chucked in for nothing. But even such bargains are not always cheap, and the man whose time is really money had better turn some of it into a good yacht-builder's pockets, when, after seeing his vessel on paper and all the glory of a polished half-block model, he will, in two or three months, find himself in possession of a magnificent craft, radiant in polished teak, mahogany, and brasswork, to be manned by an extravagant skipper and crew who will rule over him and his ship from the moment she has fitted out until laid up again on the mud. Such a vessel would have cost more in a season to fit out and cruise in than the Rip Van Winkle did to build at Sidmouth, where not only was timber cheap, but the help of a good boat-builder could then be had for 18 shillings a week. When, like Crusoe or Peter the Great, you have once turned shipwright on your own account, it is curious what an interest the standing or felled timber of neighbors and friends has for you, and how you go about with a measuring tape and two-foot rule and calculate the cubic contents, etc., of their timber. Or, again, how interesting country walks become, especially in the company of your new ally, the boat-builder. There, he says, is that great elam in farmer-grips orchard-hedge, which, if it don't open full of rampant big knots, which edge elams is liable to, will cut our keel in one, and what's left of the clean tough-butt ought to make enough inch-stuff the aft-blanker-bottom. As he allows that tree-avgata over a hundred and thirty foot of solid timber in it, let alone top and lop, one will pay for a felon. The acquisition, however, of even a large tree, is surrounded with small difficulties. The tenant farmer would be glad to be rid of the toady elam what's been killing of two of his best red-streaked apple-trees for years. But it don't lay along of he, and Miss C., his landlady, can't abide to cut a stick of timber. Everything, however, comes to him who can wait. And after some months even Miss C., as a personal friend was induced to part with her big elm at blank per foot, provided she was secured against all damage it might cause in its fall to neighbor Bee's garden-hedge. Now, though a first-rate hand at his own trade, the boat-builder was wanting in the nerve and knowledge of wood-craft of a certain eminent statesman, especially when risk to other people's property was involved, and would sooner let a big tree alone than have anything to do with the risky job of felling it. The aid, therefore, of a tough, sturdy old wheel-right was called in, who minded that tree fifty-year agon, where he were a youngster, and it wasn't bigger than an overgrown hedge-stake. Even this experienced forester would, however, not touch the job until the damp early winter weather had hardened up a bit, or the road was bound firm and dry by frost. Anything is fun in the country, particularly in the short days after Christmas, when farm work is at a standstill, and the throwing of a large tree is then a local event, like a ship-launch, important enough to attract a crowd of idlers, including a flock of school-children and the village idiot. While the farmer is glad of a job for his team in moving the tree when down, either seaward or the old wheel-right's attack upon a tree in such a position was not made until, like a good general, he had taken rough bearings of everything within reach of its fall. While even a slight change in a light winter breeze indicated by the drift of blue smoke from a farmed chimney does not escape his notice. Once, however, the plan of assault is settled, he and his big apprentice, with heavy axes, soon hew a gaping wound close down to the broad-spreading base of the elm. And a rope, having been made fast high in a topmost fork, there is no scarcity of strong arms ready for a pull on it, or of advice as to the direction their efforts should take. All traffic on the road has been at a standstill for nearly half an hour before the word is given. Stand clear all, followed by, now then, all together, once more, all together now. And there is a sound of cracking in the hedge as the great tree sways for a moment, before, with a crash of huge broken limbs, the first number of our yacht lies prostrate on the frosty road, so that upon the side on which it has fallen scarcely a branch remains to be cut away. The bolt-builder is, of course, the first to observe.  But no one minds this or him now as they gather round a bright can of foaming ale, and the old wheelwright is the hero of the moment, all arguing that things have turned out better nor they expected. While even the timid bolt-builder no longer fears the fallen tree, but boldly attacks the top and lop with an axe preparatory to the removal of the huge trunk out of the Queen's Highway, after which the heavy butt-end is scientifically slung between the lofty wheels of a timber carriage and drawn by the farmer's team into a neighboring meadow. The bolt-builder remarking to me truly enough that it aren't altogether the price that makes a big tree expensive, as the money it runs into every time you touches of it. In order, therefore, to minimize this expense, a temporary saw-pit was formed by deepening a dry ditch in the meadow where the tree lay, after which the old wheelwright and his apprentice, with the help of rollers, bored windlass fashion to receive hand-spikes, soon moved this unwieldy first number of the rip fan-winkle on to the pit, ready for reduction into a keel-piece and inch-planking, which was then all left stacked to dry until the following summer. 6.  The U.S. paddle steamer Arago, Captain Lines. We land in New York, up the Hudson, a musical boat, the Calliope, break down at Tarry Town. We take to the rail, Niagara, not improve since I first saw it. Why? Down Hudson by night, dragging over the flats. We embark for Liverpool, in the Canada. Description of her. A fog. We run down the rover's bride. A steward's first idea of heist on hearing our engine stop. Why? The rover's bride forsaken and her crew taken on board our ship. A rough passage and near shave after landing passengers at Queenstown. Heavy gale in Irish Channel. Soldiers on board ship at night. Land at Liverpool and return to Sidmouth. In the meantime, with a view to increased efficiency in the personal crew of the Rip Van Winkle, a scheme of mobilization was carried out in the shape of a short preliminary cruise across the Atlantic and back. To which end, after shutting up our house at Sidmouth, and confiding the domestic cat and dog to the care of Harry Conant, my wife, three children, and self, sailed from Cow's Roads for New York on April 4th, 1860, in the United States male steamer Araggo, Captain Lines. This well-known packet was one of a line of two American-built paddle-wheelers, the Araggo and Fulton, between Avre and New York, touching at Cow's each trip. We therefore joined our ship in a tender or tug from Southampton. The weather was roughish all the way across, the Captain telling my wife that it was a regular winter passage. If so, it was not a bad one, for we made Sandy Hook in fourteen days. Captain Lines had been for many years skipper of one of the old Avre and New York sailing packets, and the Araggo was one of the most comfortable, well-appointed vessels I have ever been aboard of. She was flush decked over all, and had large, dry, well-ventilated staterooms and cabins warmed by steam, and lighted all night by mineral oil lamps. She was entirely free from any shipy smell, and the French cooking on board was excellent. Captain Lines, who was part owner, looked personally into all details on board and to the comfort of every passenger. If, sir, you have anything to complain of on board this ship, said he, don't make your complaint to any subordinate or steward, but just come straight to me. In a word he was Captain of his own ship, and all his officers and servants knew it. If ours was a rough passage, or, as the captain said, a regular winter passage, the Araggo must have been a remarkably dry boat, for from first to last she shipped no solid water, and at no time would a man right forward on her deck have had anything over him but light spray. She carried corrugated iron boats, two of which were upon the folksle just abaffed her anchors. And asking the captain whether he had ever lost either of these, he said, no, he had carried them there winter and summer for eight years, or ever since the ship had been running, and except for painting, they had never been moved. There were numbers of very pleasant American passengers on board the Araggo, and I was amused on leaving the ship to see how, in order to get through an unruly mob of Irish cab drivers gathered on the wharf, the American lady passengers led the attack. The cab men making way for them while their lords and masters followed through the opening made for them by the chivalrous cabbies. We landed on April 19th, and spent a pleasant five weeks in the states, visiting Niagara, Trenton Falls, et cetera. During these trips I was struck with the alteration in the country we passed through. Nothing left now of primeval forests or even remains of the log cabins which, when I was last there, dotted all the clearings. Our first water travel was an attempt to ascend the Hudson by steamer, ending soon after starting at Parytown, where, after the boat had stopped for some time, I was informed that she would go no farther, the crosshead of her engine having broken. This boat, the Armenian, had a powerful organ or calliope on board, operated by steam, which discourse hideous music continually until this accident, when an accumulated head of steam blew off, with a noise that quite drowned the inharmonious voice of this calliope. Our passage money was returned, and landing by a ferry boat we continued our way up the Hudson by rail. At Niagara we found, on May 1st, the front of the falls blocked by two great icebergs, formed during winter by the frozen spray. I noticed changes, not I think for the better here, in a great increase in the many vulgar tea garden-like additions in the immediate vicinity of the falls, which did much to lessen the impressiveness of the scene. It is not easy for a man in the nineteenth century to meddle with waterfalls or mountain and river scenery without spoiling some natural beauty. On our way back to New York we went down the Hudson by night in the celebrated steamer New World. It was a splendid moonlit night, and I remained on deck much of the time. Here again I found there was a chance of our river trip being cut short. I was sitting by an American fellow passenger when I remarked to him that we were not making much headway. No, sir, he replied. She is dragging over the flats. I guess we will get on faster shortly. I inquired, how long we should be getting over these shallows? Well, you see, sometimes they have to wait a while when the rivers low. How long, I asked. Well, that just depends, you know, upon when the rain happens. Sometimes they are stopped a few days. Sometimes two or three weeks. However, I guess we are going ahead again tonight. Our return to England was made from Boston in the Cunard steamer Canada. She was one of the old-fashioned wooden bluff-bowed paddleboats driven by engines powerful enough to keep her fore saloon in such a constant state of vibration that it was not easy even to write there. Both four and aft saloons were on deck, protected by bulwark six feet high. In bad weather, this upper deck was constantly washed by the sea, and in heavy gales a strong breakwater three feet high was rigged across it, forward of the paddleboxes to keep the sea out of her engine room. We had a forebirth cabin, almost in the eyes of the ship. The usual allowance of thick, cold fog was meant to the eastward of the banks, and all day large drops of condensed vapor fell on deck from the rigging like those before thunder. But beyond the rush of grey water past the ship and the beat of her paddles, there was nothing in the blank round us to indicate that we were moving. Still on we thumped through it at a steady twelve knots, the officer as he paced to and fro on the bridge, keeping what lookout he could, every five minutes pulling a small cord near the great red funnel followed by a dismal squeak, which told us below that the fog was as thick as ever. The Canada was a strong old ship, and under full speed easy to steer. An iceberg, however, has no ears for the loudest foghorn, and it is a mere game of blind hooky in case of meeting one, or of the devil taking the weakest in a collision with another ship. It is strange how soon one gets hardened to this state of things, and we began to feel as much confidence in the blind rush of the ship over the sea as in the world itself rolling through space. This was especially the case in the fore cabin, where, after dinner on the third day of the fog, we sat chatting over a few walnuts. The steam whistle had been silent for over ten minutes, and a passenger, a Yankee skipper, remarked, that he guessed the fog are clard some. When almost as he spoke there came a stampede over our heads as though the ship had been boarded by savages. The engine stopped, and looking out of the four saloon door, I saw looming high above our bow's, the gray flat form of two large topsoles. It was the sight of these, which had sent the men on the lookout, and other hands forward, rushing aft in dread of falling spars, etc. Our bow was already flying round rapidly to port when we struck a brig, and twisted her stem and bowsprit round almost at a right angle. And though our engines had stopped and reversed, we still held way enough to pass her at over five miles an hour, so that she was lost in the fog almost before the officer on deck had time to take her bearings. One of her crew, however, contrived to jump onto our bowsprit rigging and climb on board us. Luckily the blow we hit the brig forward was hard enough to spin her bow round clear of our cat head, anchor, boats, and davits. In fact no damage of any sort appeared to have been sustained by the Canada, from which a boat was at once lowered, and in charge of the first officer went away to look after the brig. The stopping of the engines and noise head, of course, brought every passenger on deck, while even the cooks and stewards peered out of their dens among the paddle boxes. One of these, a steward with a plate and napkin in his hands, rather amused me as he looked forward at the brig's sails with the remark of, oh, I thought it were heists, after which he went on polishing his plate as though there was nothing ahead of us. As he retreated again into his pantry, I said, you don't seem to care much about running into another vessel. He answered, well, not much, because you see we four foot of solid timber in our bows, and going as we does, very few vessels would hurt us. But two year back we ran stem into a heisberg, and was all knocked huff our legs by the shock, and our bowsprit and head was crumpled into matchwood, while that folksal deck there was lifted up like a leaf, and lucky for us it was fine weather, for we had to get all the bedding into her bows, and put a sail round outside before we dared go ahead, and then had to steam 800 miles back the alifax, the avenue bow put into her. As the Canada lay rolling heavily in the swell, there was plenty of time to note how her great orange-red funnel formed the only mass of color relief among the gray mystery around her, and how white and opaque the new-made steam told among the fog, as it roared in dense masses from her safety valves. For the boat was away over an hour before, just in the direction no one was looking for it, came the sound of oars, and a few minutes later the loom of the boat on top of a swell. On coming alongside the officer told our captain that, though the master and mate of the brig would stay by her, the crew refused to do so, as she was salt-laden, and her planking was started forward down to the waterline. Under these circumstances there was nothing for it but to send the carpenter in order to a survey being held before abandoning the brig. Another two hours passed rolling in the fog before the Canada's boat again returned, and with her that of the rover's bride from Cadiz with salt for St. John's Newfoundland forty days out from Gibraltar. As her ancient master and older mate and crew of four men climbed up the Canada's side, it was curious to note the small amount of their worldly goods. The skipper was carefully nursing an old mercurial weather-glass, while in the boat lay a large bundle of water-stained charts, his ship's time-keeper encompassed with something in a blue band box. The old mate came on board with a gray parrot, in a cage in one hand, and a large bundle of clothes done up in a blue cotton handkerchief in the other. For the rest the luggage mainly consisted of oil skins and dirty bundles of bedding, some stowed in hammocks, others merely corded round with rope. Altogether we were delayed four hours, and had scarcely gone ahead five minutes before the fog lifted. And there lay the old brig with main topsel aback, about a mile off, with her boat also adrift between us and her. The evening remained clear, and we did not lose sight of her for an hour. Her old master and mate looked sad and lost as they paced our deck.  They told us the seagrass was a foot long on her bottom, and that if she made over four knots she frightened them. They heard nothing of us until they heard our paddles a short time before we struck them. Had the Canada been a long modern steamer, she must have gone clear over or through this vessel, when no doubt all hands on board her would have perished. The old mate was much distressed at being carried off to Liverpool, because he was hoping to meet a son at St. John's, whom he had not seen for years, and who, as he said, at his time of life he could now never hope to meet again. According to my wife's journal, the whole of this passage was rough. But I remember no weather or incident of consequence from the time of our parting with the brig until the evening of May 27th, when, after landing most of our passengers at Queenstown, the weather got thick with a strong wind to the southward. We were all sitting at tea when a cry out on deck was followed by the engine stopping. And looking out I found nearly all the ship's company, including the engineer and some of the stokers, on deck. Some even half up the fore rigging. The cause of which excitement was not far off. For within one hundred and fifty yards of our Liebao the sea was breaking heavily over what I afterwards learnt was the conning-bag rock, on which a lighthouse was then building. I was close to the captain who had just run on deck from dinner and heard him say hastily, Dear me, I'd no idea we'd run so far. And that fore trisel on her too. Get that sail in! All sail evolutions on board the Canada were usually carried out to the tune of the Boson's whistle. But I noticed that on this occasion no use of that instrument was made. And long before the banging canvas was brailed up, our engines were going full speed astern. Owing to the wind and sea it was some moments, however, before the ship's way was checked even by them. And I had time to notice a little brig running for Waterford inside the reef, wallowing along under a forsel and close reef topsals. The old master of the rover's bride was among others in the fore rigging, frantically waving his hat and singing out, It's breakers, I tell ye, it's breakers! I have been in one or two near squeaks in boats, etc., but I confess that I never passed a more anxious thirty seconds at sea than I did on board that Cunader, until I saw that she really began to gather sternway. And I have thought since how we should have fared had she been a longer ship. As it was, she was only saved by the powerful back-action of her great paddles. We spent the night after this little shave in a gale head to sea in St. George's Channel. And when we landed at Liverpool at four p.m. next day, saw by the evening papers that some anxiety had been felt for the Canada. The gale, though short, having for a time exceeded in force that of the night on which the royal charter was lost. I made an attempt to get on deck in the height of it, about daybreak, but the sea was two feet deep outside the four saloon and was washing aft until stopped by the breakwater. Below we had a lively time, for ladies were flopping about and fainting on and off in the passage not far from our cabin. While about two in the morning a party of nine invalided soldiers, who were berthed forward on the other side of the ship, just after a heavier head-sea than usual, struck us. Rushing along their passage almost naked, yelling, She struck! She struck! Which comforting information did not, of course, tend to revive the other passengers in that part of the ship? No lights were allowed below after nine p.m., and in our cabin I was not a little surprised and pleased at the foresight of our youngest child, Katie. When I heard her say quietly from her berth, there is a piece of wax candle in my pocket, if Pa can find it. And how we found it, and stuck it alight in an empty basin, and by it were able to be of some use and comfort to one or two of the unhappy ladies who lay fainting and terrified on the floor outside our cabin. The old master of the rover's bride was a Welshman named Bowen, and before landing growled much over our shave off the salties, and how the board of trade would hear about it. He had a strange yarn also, that when the course was set, after leaving Queenstown, he sent his old mate Af to look at the compass, and when told the course said, go and look again, and that on his return the mate said, east by north, Mr. Bowen. Yes, sir, he used my name. Then, sir, I said, we shall shortly see or feel something harder than my old brig. But these little on-dee and scandals were forgotten among all classes of passengers an hour or two after landing at Liverpool, and I don't suppose the board of trade was ever troubled by Mr. Bowen. Though I noted among the shipping news many weeks afterwards that his old brig, the rover's bride, was seen and reported as a derelict, in longitude blank, latitude blank, quite a fortnight after we last saw her. On regaining our happy west country valley after this little cruise, my wife made the astounding statement that she thought she should never feel uncomfortable again, which is just how Crusoe expressed himself when, with some little difficulty, he relanded upon his island after his first attempt to circumnavigate it. But this blissful state of mind seldom stands the wear and tear of even a few months. On the beach I found things just as I had left them, and soon had the foam and her little tender in commission. Our dog and cat were quite glad to see us, though for a fortnight after we left, Buzz, the dog, according to Conant, refused almost all kinds of food, even, as Conant said, a bit of fish.