“Cutler, that vessel is transmografied again,” sais I; “look at her.”
“Pooh,” said he, “that’s not the same vessel at all. The two first we saw are behind that island. That one is nothing but a coaster. You can’t take me in, Slick. You are always full of your fun, and taking a rise out of some one or another, and I shall be glad when we land, you will then have some one else to practise on.”
In a short time the schooner vanished, and its place was supplied by a remarkable white cliff, which from the extraordinary optical delusion it occasions gives its name to the noble port which is now called Ship Harbour. I have since mentioned this subject to a number of mariners, and have never yet heard of a person who was not deceived in a similar manner. As we passed through the narrows, we entered a spacious and magnificent basin, so completely land-locked that a fleet of vessels of the largest size may lay there unmoved by any wind. There is no haven in America to be compared with it.
“You are now safe,” said the pilot; “it is only twelve leagues from Halifax, and nobody would think of looking for you here. The fact is, the nearer you hide the safer you be.”
“Exactly,” sais I; “what you seek you can’t find, but when you ain’t looking for a thing, you are sure to stumble on it.”
“If you ever want to run goods, Sir,” said he, “the closer you go to the port the better. Smugglers ain’t all up to this, so they seldom approach the lion’s den, but go farther and fare worse. Now we may learn lessons from dumb animals. They know we reason on probabilities, and therefore always do what is improbable. “We think them to be fools, but they know that we are. The fox sees we always look for him about his hole, and therefore he carries on his trade as far from it, and as near the poultry yard, as possible. If a dog kills sheep, and them Newfoundlanders are most uncommon fond of mutton, I must say, he never attacks his neighbour’s flock, for he knows he would be suspected and had up for it, but sets off at night, and makes a foray like the old Scotch on the distant borders.
“He washes himself, for marks of blood is a bad sign, and returns afore day, and wags his tail, and runs round his master, and looks up into his face as innocent as you please, as much as to say, ‘Squire, here I have been watchin’ of your property all this live-long night, it’s dreadful lonely work, I do assure you, and oh, how glad I am to see the shine of your face this morning.’
“And the old boss pats his head, fairly took in, and says, ‘That’s a good dog, what a faithful honest fellow you be, you are worth your weight in gold.’
“Well, the next time he goes off on a spree in the same quarter, what does he see but a border dog strung up by the neck, who has been seized and condemned as many an innocent fellow has been before him on circumstantial evidence, and he laughs and says to himself, ‘What fools humans be, they don’t know half as much as we dogs do.’ So he thinks it would be as well to shift his ground, where folks ain’t on the watch for sheep-stealers, and he makes a dash into a flock still farther off.
“Them Newfoundlanders would puzzle the London detective police, I believe they are the most knowin’ coons in all creation, don’t you?”