sneering about the commander, and saying he did not believe Columbus knew
where he was going to or had ever been there before. The memorable cry
of “Land ho!” thrilled every heart in the ship but his. He gazed a while
through a piece of smoked glass at the penciled line lying on the distant
water, and then said: “Land be hanged,–it’s a raft!”
When this questionable passenger came on board the ship, he brought
nothing with him but an old newspaper containing a handkerchief marked
“B. G.,” one cotton sock marked “L. W. C.” one woollen one marked “D. F.”
and a night-shirt marked “O. M. R.” And yet during the voyage he worried
more about his “trunk,” and gave himself ,more airs about it, than all
the rest of the passengers put together.
If the ship was “down by the head,” and would got steer, he would go and
move his “trunk” farther aft, and then watch the effect. If the
ship was “by the stern,” he would suggest to Columbus to detail some men
to “shift that baggage.” In storms he had to be gagged, because his
wailings about his “trunk” made it impossible for the men to hear the
orders. The man does not appear to have been openly charged with any
gravely unbecoming thing, but it is noted in the ship’s log as a “curious
circumstance” that albeit he brought his baggage on board the ship in a
newspaper, he took it ashore in four trunks, a queensware crate, and a
couple of champagne baskets. But when he came back insinuating in an
insolent, swaggering way, that some of his things were missing, and was
going to search the other passengers’ baggage, it was too much, and they
threw him overboard. They watched long and wonderingly for him to come
up, but not even a bubble rose on the quietly ebbing tide. But while
every one was most absorbed in gazing over the side, and the interest was
momentarily increasing, it was observed with consternation that the
vessel was adrift and the anchor cable hanging limp from the bow. Then
in the ship’s dimmed and ancient log we find this quaint note:
“In time it was discouvered yt ye troblesome passenger hadde
gonne downe and got ye anchor, and toke ye same and solde it to
ye dam sauvages from ye interior, saying yt he hadde founde it,
ye sonne of a ghun!”
Yet this ancestor had good and noble instincts, and it is with pride that
we call to mind the fact that he was the first white person who ever
interested himself in the work of elevating and civilizing our Indians.
He built a commodious jail and put up a gallows, and to his dying day he
claimed with satisfaction that he had had a more restraining and
elevating influence on the Indians than any other reformer that ever,
labored among them. At this point the chronicle becomes less frank and
chatty, and closes abruptly by saying that the old voyager went to see
his gallows perform on the first white man ever hanged in America, and
while there received injuries which terminated in his death.
The great grandson of the “Reformer” flourished in sixteen hundred and
something, and was known in our annals as, “the old Admiral,” though in
history he had other titles. He was long in command of fleets of swift
vessels, well armed and, manned, and did great service in hurrying up
merchantmen. Vessels which he followed and kept his eagle eye on, always
made good fair time across the ocean. But if a ship still loitered in
spite of all he could do, his indignation would grow till he could
contain himself no longer–and then he would take that ship home where he
lived and, keep it there carefully, expecting the owners to come for it,
but they never did. And he would try to get the idleness and sloth out
of the sailors of that ship by compelling, them to take invigorating
exercise and a bath. He called it “walking a plank.” All the pupils
liked it. At any rate, they never found any fault with it after trying