ON BOARD THE "JULIA A. DECKER,"
Port Hawkesbury, Gut of Canso,
July 6th. 1891.
Here the staunch Julia lies at anchor waiting for a change in the wind
and a break in the fog. To-day will be memorable in the annals of the
"Micmac" Indians, for Prof. Lee has spent his enforced leisure in
putting in anthropometric work among them, inducing braves, squaws and
papooses of both sexes to mount the trunk that served as a measuring
block and go through the ordeal of having their height, standing and
sitting, stretch of arms, various diameters of head and peculiarities
of the physiognomy taken down. While he with two assistants was thus
employed, two of our photographic corps were busily engaged in
preserving as many of their odd faces and costumes as possible, making
pictures of their picturesque camp on the side of a hill sloping
toward an arm of the Gut, with its round tent covered with birch and
fir bark, dogs and children, and stacks of logs or wood--from which
they make the strips for their chief products, baskets--cows, baggage
and all the other accompaniments of a comparatively permanent camp.
They go into the woods and make log huts for winter, but such
miserable quarters as these prove to be on closer inspection, with
stoves, dirt and chip floor, bedding and food in close proximity to
the six or eight inhabitants of each hut, suffice them during warm
weather. We found that they elect a chief, who holds the office for
life. The present incumbent lives near by St. Peter's Island, and is
about forty years old. They hold a grand festival in a few weeks
somewhere on the shore of Brasd'Or Lake, at which nearly every Indian
on the Island is expected, some two thousand in all, we are informed,
and after experiencing our good-fellowship at their camp and on board
they invited us one and all to come down, only cautioning us to bring
along a present of whiskey for the chief.
The Gut, in this part at least, is beautiful sailing ground, with
bold, wooded shores, varied by slight coves and valleys with little
hamlets at the shore and fishermen's boats lying off the beach. The
lower part we passed in a fog, so we are ignorant of its appearance as
though the Julia had not carried us within a hundred miles of it,
instead of having knowingly brought us past rock and shoal to this
quiet cove, under the red rays of the light on Hawkesbury Point, and
opposite Port Mulgrave, with which Hawkesbury is connected by a little
two-sailed, double-ended ferry-boat built on a somewhat famous model.
It seems that a boat builder of this place, who, by the way, launched
a pretty little yacht to-day, sent a fishing boat, whose model and rig
was the product of many years' experience as a fisherman, to the
London Fisheries' Exhibit of a few years past, and received first
medal from among seven thousand five hundred competitors. The Prince
of Wales was so pleased with the boat, which was exhibited under full
sail with a wax fisherman at the helm, that he purchased it and has
since used it. Later, when the United States fish commission schooner
Grampus was here with the present assistant commissioner, Capt.
Collins, in command, the plans were purchased by our government on the
condition that no copies were to be made without Mr. Embree's consent.
A little later yet, a commissioner from Holland and Sweden came over,
bought the plans and built a perfect copy of the original, the
seaworthy qualities of which has caused its type to entirely displace
the old style of small fishing boats in those countries. The boat's
abilities in heavy waters have been tested many times, and have never
failed to equal her reputation.
But, meanwhile, the Julia lies quietly at anchor, as if it were
mutely reproaching your correspondent with singing another's praises
when she has brought us safely and easily thus far, in spite of gales,
fog, and headwind, calm, and treacherous tide, and even now is eagerly
waiting for the opportunity to carry us straight and swiftly to Battle
Harbor in the straits of Belle Isle, where letters and papers from
home await us, and then up through the ice fields to Cape Chudleigh.
[The Real Start] Our real start was made from Southwest Harbor, Mt.
Desert, the Monday after leaving Rockland. Saturday night, after a
short sail in the dark and a few tacks up the Thoroughfare to North
Haven village, we anchored and rested from the confusion and worry of
getting started and trying to forget nothing that would be needed in
our two and one-half months' trip. Sunday morning was nearly spent
before things were well enough stowed to allow us to get under weigh
in safety, and then our bow was turned eastward and, as we thought,
pointed for Cape Sable. Going by the hospital on Widow's Island and
the new light on Goose Rock nearly opposite it, out into Isle au Haut
bay, we found a fresh northeaster, which warned us not to go across
the Bay of Fundy if we had no desire for an awful shaking up. In view
of all the facts, such as green men, half-stowed supplies and
threatening weather, we decided that we must not put our little vessel
through her paces that night, and chose the more ignominious, but also
more comfortable course of putting into a harbor. Consequently after
plunging through the rips off Bass Head, and cutting inside the big
bell buoy off its entrance, we ran into Southwest Harbor and came to
anchor. In the evening many of the party thought it wise to improve
the last opportunity for several months, as we then supposed, to
attend church, and to one who knew the chapel-cutting proclivities of
many of our party while at Bowdoin, it would have been amusing to see
them solemnly tramp into church, rubber boots and all. It is a fact,
however, that every member of our party, with a possible exception,
went to church in this place yesterday largely for the same reason.
Our little Julia rewarded our action of the night previous by taking
us out by Mt Desert Rock at a rattling pace Monday morning, bowing
very sharply and very often to the spindle-like tower on the rock, as
she met the Bay of Fundy chop, and at the same time administered a
very effective emetic to all but five or six of the Bowdoin boys
aboard. She is wise as well as bold and strong, and so after nightfall
waited under easy canvas for light to reveal Seal Island to our
watchful eyes. Shortly after daylight the low coast was made out, the
dangerous rocks passed, and Cape Sable well on our quarter. But there
it stayed. We made but little progress for two days, and employed the
time in laying in a supply of cod, haddock and pollock, till our bait
was exhausted. Then we shot at birds, seals and porpoises whenever
they were in sight, and from the success, apparently, at many when
they were not in sight; put the finishing touches on our stowage, and
kept three of the party constantly employed with our long
bamboo-handled dip-net, in fishing up specimens for the professor and
his assistants. As the result of this we have a large number of fish
eggs which we are watching in the process of hatching, many specimens
of crustacea and of seaweed. The photographers, in the meanwhile, got
themselves into readiness for real work by practicing incessantly upon
us.
Thursday, we made Sambro light; soon pilot boat number one hailed us
and put a man aboard, whom we neither needed nor wanted, and we were
anchored off the market steps at Halifax. The run up the harbor was
very pleasant. Bright skies, a fresh breeze off the land, and vessels
all about us made many lively marine pictures. The rather unformidable
appearing fortification, on account of which Halifax boasts herself
the most strongly fortified city of America, together with the
flag-ship Bellerophon and two other vessels of the Atlantic squadron,
the Canada and the Thrush, the latter vessel until lately having been
commanded by Prince George, gave the harbor and town a martial tone
that was heightened upon our going ashore and seeing the red coats
that throng the streets in the evening. Halifax, with its squat,
smoky, irregular streets is well known, and its numerous public
buildings, drill barracks, and well kept public gardens, all backed by
the frowning citadel, probably need no description from me. After
receiving the letters for which we came in, and sending the courteous
United States Consul General, Mr. Frye, and his vice-consul, Mr. King,
Colby '89, ashore with a series of college yells that rather startled
the sleepy old town, we laid a course down the harbor, exchanged
salutes with the steamship Caspian, and were soon ploughing along,
before a fine south-west breeze for Cape Canso.
[Ward Room of the Julia Decker] While our little vessel is driving
ahead with wind well over the quarter, groaning, as it were, at the
even greater confusion in the wardroom than when we left Rockland,
owing to the additional supplies purchased at Halifax, it may be well
to briefly describe her appearance, when fitted to carry seventeen
Bowdoin men in her hold in place of the lime and coal to which she has
been accustomed. Descending, then, the forward hatch, protected by a
plain hatch house, the visitor turns around and facing aft, looks down
the two sides of the immense centreboard box that occupies the centre
of our wardroom from floor to deck. Fastened to it are the mess
tables, nearly always lighted by some four or five great lamps, which
serve to warm as well, as the pile of stuff around and beneath the
after-hatch house cuts off most of the light that would otherwise come
down there. On the port side of the table runs the whole length of the
box; two wooden settles serve for dining chairs and leave about four
feet clear space next the "deacon's seat" that runs along in front of
the five double-tiered berths. These are canvas-bottomed, fitted with
racks, shelves, and the upper ones with slats overhead, in which to
stow our overflowing traps.
At the after end, on both sides of the wardroom, are large lockers
coming nearly to the edge of the hatch, in which most of the
provisions are stowed. At the forward end, next to the bulkhead that
separates us from the galley, are, on the port side, a completely
equipped dark room in which many excellent pictures have already been
brought to light, and on the starboard side a large rack holding our
canned goods, ketchup, lime-juice, etc. Along the bulkhead are the
fancy cracker boxes, tempting a man to take one every time he goes
below, and under the racks are our kerosene and molasses barrels.
Between the line of four double-tier berths on the starboard side and
the rack just described is a handy locker for oil clothes and heavy
overcoats. Lockers run along under the lower berths, and trunks with a
thousand other articles are stowed under the tables. A square hole cut
in the bulkhead, just over the galley head, lets heat into the
wardroom and assists the lamps in keeping us warm. As yet, in spite of
some quite cold weather, we have been perfectly comfortable.
Sometimes, however, odors come in as well as heat from the galley, and
do not prove so agreeable. If to this description, clothes of various
kinds, guns, game bags, boots, fishing tackle and books, should, by
the imagination of the reader, to be scattered about, promiscuously
hung, or laid in every conceivable nook and corner, a fair idea of our
floating house could be obtained. On deck we are nearly as badly
littered, though in more orderly fashion. Two nests of dories, a row
boat, five water tanks, a gunning float, and an exploring boat, partly
well fill the Julia's spacious decks. The other exploring boat hangs
inside the schooner's yawl at the stern. Add to these two hatch
houses, a small pile of lumber, and considerable fire wood snugly
stowed between the casks, and you have a fair idea of our anything but
clear decks. A yellow painted bust, presumably of our namesake Julia,
at the end of figure-head, peers through the fog and leads us in the
darkness; a white stripe relieves the blackness of our sides; a green
rail surmounts all; and, backed by the forms of nineteen variously
attired Bowdoin men, from professor, their tutor, alumnus, to
freshmen, complete our description.
[The Fourth of July] Meanwhile the night, clear but windless, has come
on, and we drift along the Nova Scotia coast, lying low and blue on
our northern board. The Fourth dawns rather foggy, but it soon yields
to the sun's rays and a good breeze which bowls us along toward the
Cape. An elaborate celebration of the day is planned, but only the
poem is finally rendered, due probably to increased sea which the
brisk breeze raises incapacitating several of the actors for their
assigned parts. The poem, by the late editor of '91's "BUGLE," is
worthy of preservation, but would hardly be understood unless our
whole crowd were present to indicate by their roars the good points in
it.
At night our constant follower, the fog, shuts in, and the captain
steering off the Cape, we lay by, jumping and rolling in a northeast
sea, waiting for daylight to assist us to Cape Canso Harbor and the
Little Ant. About six next morning we form one of a fleet of five or
six sail passing the striped lighthouse on Cranberry Island, and with
a rush go through the narrow passage lined with rocks and crowded with
fishermen. Out into the fog of Chedebucto Bay we soon pass and in the
fog we remain, getting but a glimpse of the shore now and then, till
we reach Port Hawkesbury.