"Your true sea-dog, who runs in and out of inlets, is a man for marvels!"
coolly observed the stranger. 'They know the color of the sea at night,
and are for ever steering in the wind's eye in search of adventures. I
wonder, more of them are not kept at making almanacs! There was a mistake,
concerning a thunder-storm, in the last I bought, and all for the want of
proper science. And pray, friend, who is this 'Skimmer of the Seas,' that
is said to be running after his needle, like a tailor who has found a hole
in his neighbor's coat?"
"The witches may tell! I only know that such a rover there is, and that he
is here to-day, and there to-morrow. Some say, it is only a craft of mist,
that skims the top of the seas, like a sailing water-fowl, and others
think it is the sprite of a vessel that was rifled and burnt by Kidd, in
the Indian Ocean, looking for its gold and the killed. I saw him once,
myself, but the distance was so great, and his manoeuvres so unnatural,
that I could hardly give a good account of his hull, or rig."
"This is matter that don't get into the log every watch! Whereaway, or in
what seas, didst meet the thing?"
"'Twas off the Branch. We were fishing in thick weather, and when the mist
lifted, a little, there was a craft seen standing in-shore, running like a
race-horse; but while we got our anchor, she had made a league of offing,
on the other tack!"
"A certain proof of either her, or your, activity! But what might have
been the form and shape of your fly-away?"
"Nothing determined.
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