Mountain View Union High School - Blue and Gray Yearbook (Mountain View, CA)

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Eiivraiurr A Svnuth S7221 Epianhe BY JACK G. NORTH, JR., '16 lfffffx '. W-X ft J i ' f vi!-E-9994? 4 W -- www eb E- A ' fj 'X' jill ., , . ffn f' N gfgiflilgfz about the ori in of su erstition reminds me o' the Iufygyl WW . . g Vp . 552. time .l. cruised on the Dark Seaf' muttered old Bill Rus- sell, as he sat cross-legged, smoking a pipe among half QQ lf 'a dozen old salts, who were busy spinning yarns in the 4Sailors' Retreatf :fy UNine-tenths of all seamen are superstitious, he began. 'tl was the other tenth, but fshiver me timbers' Qi., if I am not one of the nine now. Yes, and all because 'I shipped on the 'Dark Sea., 'Alt was in the early part of nineteen hundred and thirteen, Feb- ruary thirteen, to be exact. l was tadrift on the beachf broke. USO giving my mains 'l Qtrousersj a hoist and taking a reef up in her, 1 picked up my sea bag from the sawdust covered floor of Maloney's Saloon, and hoisted anchor, beating the wharves of San Francisco for a job. Finally, after a long fcruise' I landed a job on the barkentine KDark Sea', bound for the Sandwich Islands with a cargo of beef. Don't the natives over there kill their own meat U? What should they Want with beef?'l interrupted a dapper Kdropper in'. With the trace of a grin, Bill answered: NVell, I suppose they fig- ured on spreading it between their islands. I was stowed away in her fo'cls'l with the rest o' the crew and awaited the bosun's pipe for all hands on deck. We sailed at three i11 the afternoon, Friday, the thirteenth, but mind you l had never given credit to superstition. Evidently the cap- tain was ignorant of the date of sailing, tho' a practical impossibility, or if he knew, he kept his calendared secret exceedingly close or nearly every last seaman would have refused to sail. Three days of mild sailing, and the fourth-that was a 'whop- per.' A forty-mile gale hit us. The watch below was piped on deck, everything was shortened and then we close hauled on the starboard i.

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MARIE G-ARLIEP1' THOS. KLECKNER E RIARGARET VVRIGHT w 4 4 1

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16 BLUE AND GRAY tack. The old man and the mate alone remained on deck, the rest of us went below. The 'Dark Sea' was a strong craft, you understand, but twelve days of heavy seas, sprung her timbers so that when on the thirteenth day, tossing rudderless, she struck a reef and broke in two amidships. Bllieve me, I've never seen a norlwester last that long. Twelve of the crew and the first mate saved themselves, me included. We all piled into the life boat like sardines and pulled for the island that this reef luckily enclosed. For thirteen hours we fought those waves while covering the two miles from reef to island. On landing we at once set to work building a camp close to the water's edge, in case a stray ship passed that way. Suddenly we were terrified to see three of our mates who had wondered off to explore the island, come bounding over the rocks, pursued-yes, pursued by a score of man eatin', ferocious lookin' cannibals! We let out a blood- curdling, piratical yell, and the cannibals stopped. Their amazement soon passed and they continued their pursuit. Then arming ourselves with clubs, rocks, or anything handy, we advanced to defend our on- coming comrades. The man-eaters were armed with long, pointed wooden poles with a sort of American Indian tomahawk attached to the end. Zip, bang, zip, crash, thud, and the battle was on. At last we were overpowered and taken to their camp to be used for 'white man a-la-bake-em', or something else mighty savory. 'tOur conquerors marched us before the 'high-mucky-muck' of the tribe and after jabbering for half an hour, the 'big bug' motioned us away. We were now led up to a huge fire, forced to lie down and then bound hand and foot. Immensc stones were laid over the fire to heat--we were to give our black friends a light repast of :baked man'. HThe large stones on which we were to trest in peace' were soon hot-sizzling when spat upon-and we prepared to feed our cannibal- istic hosts. 'We were then hauled to our feet and the bonds removed. I withdrew my handkerchief to wipe away some gathering-sweat, when suddenly the whole crew of cannibals let out a ghastly moan and fell on their stomachs around me. As soon as I could gather my scat- tered wits, to comprehend that it was my pink and green 'bugle cloth,' the one daughter Emma gave me for Christmas, that had this effect on them, I yelled to my equally surprised shipmates excitedly, 'Dash me scuppers, boys. our hash isn't cooked yet.' Calling all my ingenuity to hand, I hoisted the green and pink emblem of idolatry on the roof of a nearby cannibal's thatch home. I stood before my salaming, charmed cannibals like Napoleon viewing the fight at, at a-a-well, when he stood on some mound or other. My shipmates looked on with awe and puzzled eyes at my sud- denly acquired monarchial throne. A few moments later I bade my 'servants' arise. At the raising of my hand one fellow came toward me. He lifted his arm and mo- tioned to a 'house' which was the one adorned by my colored handker- chief. He then pointed to a group of black ugly women who sat at the base of the 'housel Pointing to himself and then to me, he con- cluded by salaming. 'lrVell, what if it is your housefl' I said. This I remarked in English, but immediately remembered that our hosts were