The boys cast anchor within the shelter of Buffalo’s breakwater October 10, 1899, and looked over the strange, green waters of Lake Erie. They immediately went to work, stepped the masts and set up the rigging for the last stage of their long journey. A thousand miles of lakes stretched between them and old St. Joseph, yet the young voyagers felt that they were almost home. They forgot for a time that the great inland seas were sure to be swept by gales that would increase in force and frequency as the season advanced, until the freezing blast closed up navigation altogether, and the waters, now tracked in all directions by vessels of every description, would be deserted—left to the howling winds, the grinding cakes of ice, and the screaming gulls.
It was a serious situation that stared them in the face, did they but realize it. The sharp gales on the lakes were to be dreaded even more than the tempest on the ocean, for land, never very far off, surrounded on every hand, and a lee shore was an imminent peril.
A mere zephyr toyed with the flag at the “Gazelle’s” masthead as she lay at anchor—too soft to waft the yacht a mile an hour—so it was not strange that Kenneth and his crew forgot for a time that the lake, now so calmly sleeping, would soon rise in its anger and lash itself into white foam.
The lack of wind gave the crew an opportunity to visit Niagara Falls, and they took time to drink in a full measure of this most magnificent of Nature’s wonders, a sight that they will remember all their days—the crowning spectacle of their trip.
After a three days’ stay at Buffalo, the breeze sprang up, the boys raised the anchor, and the “Gazelle,” her sails spread to the freshening wind, sped out of harbor and away on the last lap of her race round the Eastern half of the United States.
“Hurrah!” the boys shouted, and, clasping hands, congratulated each other.
The “Gazelle” acted as if she felt that her native waters bore her once more, and skimmed along as lightly as the gulls that circled in the clear, cool air. Straight across the lake she flew, sped by an ever-increasing wind, until the point off the Welland Canal, on the Canadian side, was reached. With a snap characteristic of her, she came about and started off on another tack, then stopped suddenly with a jar that knocked the boys to their knees. Hard on the rocks! There was not a minute to spare if the good yacht was to be saved. With a spring, Kenneth let go the mainsail halliards, and the slatting sail came down on the run, while Arthur lowered the jib. It was quick work, but these young men had had the training that made them decide rapidly and act effectively.
The sails down, the yacht rested more easily, but still she pounded, the waves dashing her heavily on the cruel ledges.
SWAYING ON THE HALLIARDS.
“THE SAILS WERE HOISTED.”