“M-o-o-o-o-o-o-m! come that sound again, and it seemed ter be jest ther same place as it was before.
“‘Confound them, are they tagging us?’ shouts Captain Wellfleet.
“‘Looks like it, sir,’ says I, swinging her over and going off on the other tack. But no sooner was we headed the other way than I’m blessed if that same old horn didn’t start up again.
“M-o-o-o-o-m!
“‘It’s the Flying Dutchman!’ declares the skipper, who was one of the old-school, hard-shell sailormen, and believed in Adamaster and all them things. By that time, although I didn’t take much stock in such yarns as that, I began to think there was something out of the ordinary in the wind. Well, sir, for half an hour or more we swung to and fro, and always we’d have that same old ‘M-o-o-o-o-o-m!’ dead ahead of us.
“And so it kept up till it came time to change watches. The fog was just as thick as ever, and we didn’t see my relief coming from for’ard till he reached the waist. By this time the skipper was jumping about from one foot to the other, pretty nearly daffy. And still, every now and then, we’d hear that ‘M-o-o-o-o-m!’ right off our bow. It was fairly uncanny, I’m telling you, the way it chased us.
“‘Send the cook aft, and tell him to make me a cup of tea,’ roars the skipper, as my relief comes up. ‘My nerves is knocked plum galley-west.’
“‘Sorry, sir,’ says the man; ‘the cook is doctoring the cow.’
“‘Doctoring the cow?’ bellows the skipper.