The Cook selects a Boom. (Below is the one that was lost.)
"I'd as lieve sail in a coffin as in a bath-tub," replied the Vice, who, having commanded a blockade-runner during the late unpleasantness, had a natural fondness for tight decks and plenty of them.
"A well-covered bath-tub," remarked the Commodore, "is fully as seaworthy as a mahogany-topped coffin, and far less suggestive of canoeing on the Styx. But for a cover of some sort, I confess an affection. It keeps things dry; if a man capsizes—"
"A canoeist has no business to capsize," interrupted the Cook, who had learned canoeing on a Western river, and in a "dug out," which could only be turned over by the united efforts of at least two men, "and a canoeist has no right to have 'things' lying so loosely as to drop out."
At length the squadron set sail. The wind had freshened, and the white caps were as numerous and agitated as in a large female seminary during a night alarm of fire. The Commodore, the Vice and the Purser were all experienced sailors, so they shortened sail, but the Cook, having never handled a boat under sail before, possessed his soul of the nautical bliss that comes of ignorance. Shorten sail? He would show those fellows what a fearless sailor and a good boat could do, when the wind was disposed to aid them. The Cook experimented nervously for a few moments to learn where the sail should really be to catch the most wind, but when he learned he made full use of his knowledge, and his boat, the Cherub, seemed literally to fly. It passed the Becky Sharp, (the flagship) so rapidly that the Cook had not time to study the Commodore's face long enough to know how that official liked it; it passed the Rochefort, causing the Vice to scowl as if the unoffending Cherub were a member of the party which the whilom statesman hated; it threw for an instant the shadow of its great white mainsail on the Arethusela, darkening the blonde complexion and golden locks of the Artist-Purser.
Then the Cook began to enjoy his boat and himself. A pistol which he had in his pocket to be ready for a shot at some passing water-bird, chafed him somewhat, and he laid it in the bottom of the boat, where it would be equally handy and less troublesome. He had heard that a canoeist should always be barefooted, so he kicked off his shoes. He pitied his comrades who sat upon the hard bottoms of their boats as they sailed, while he sat upon the many folds of a large tent. All the inner lines of his beautiful canoe were before his eye, instead of being hidden by decks, as those of his companions were—if, indeed, there were any beautiful lines any where about their boats.
The Cook was happy; he fastened the sheet of his mainsail to a cleat, softly whistling, as he did so, "A Life on the Ocean Wave," neither thinking nor caring that the ocean was really several hundred miles away. He was astonished and delighted that sailing was so easy an art to acquire, but pshaw—sailors, like poets, are born, not made. Had not one of his ancestors sailed with Drake when that hero interfered with the sailing directions that had been delivered to the Spanish Armada? What might he not have achieved himself, had cruel fate not ordained that ink should be his only fluid element? Just here the Cherub made such astonishing speed that the Cook determined roughly to "time" his boat, so he estimated a mile of distance by the trees upon the shore, opened his watch and laid it in the bottom of the boat, before his eyes.
But Solomon said that pride must have a fall, and when there is any unpleasant saying of Scripture to be fulfilled, a conceited canoeist is as good as any one else that can be selected for the purpose. The squadron was approaching a point beyond which its course would be changed. The Commodore shouted "Ready about!" and the Cook's self-confidence disappeared as rapidly as if it had been the conscience of a congressman after an interview with a "subsidy" lobbyist. "Jibe!" shouted the Commodore. The Cook, almost in despair, looked astern, to see what the others did. He saw their masts straighten, their sails flap irresolutely for a moment, and then fill on the opposite side. How was it done? Accident came to the Cook's rescue: a wretched steersman at best, he had almost forgotten his helm as he looked astern, and an unintentional turn of the wrist of his steering hand turned the boat's head from the wind. Around came the new boom; the Cook had never before seen a boom come around on his own boat, and he had no idea of how close the same would come to the plane occupied by his own head. But the time occupied by an industrious boom in jibing is not sufficient for prolonged meditation, and while the Cook was wondering what to do, the boom attended faithfully to its own business. The elasticity of a green elm log is an unknown quantity; the Cook's dome of thought was equally inelastic, so the Cook soon heard a heavy thud, as when one throws a mighty stone at a well-laden chestnut tree. Then the Cook heard a splash, and he was not allowed to remain in doubt as to the object which caused it. All the terrible stories he had heard about men who had been carried down by the sails and rigging of capsizing boats came hurrying into his mind, and he swam so vigorously to escape a similar fate, that his boat had time to turn leisurely over and adjust itself to its new condition before he dared to pause in his mad career. (See [Frontispiece.])
Then the Cook swam to his boat, and resting an elbow upon her keel, gazed pensively around him. Something that seemed to be a peculiarly-shaped dark fish, a little way below the surface in front of him, proved to be the slowly sinking form of one of his shoes, going to join its mate. A black bundle, consisting of most of the Cook's personal effects wrapped in a rubber-blanket, was rescued by the Commodore just as it seemed discouraged by the difficulty it experienced in floating. The Cook's hat, one of the paddles, a covered tin pail containing butter, a worthless bit or two of board, and sundry other articles of little value, were picked up by other members of the expedition, but the indisposition of watches, pistols, and even wet tents to wander aimlessly about on the bosom of a lake is known to all students of comparative specific gravities. The Cook groped for the painter of his own boat; his other hand he rested upon the stern of the flagship, and thus the demoralized couple reached the shore. The remainder of the squadron had already disembarked, and the Purser made haste to extend the hospitalities of a private flask, but he robbed the draught of its flavor by asking, as he passed it,