boat was detained one day on the banks of the canal. On the fourth day the Mayeta ended her services by arriving at Albany, where, after a journey of four hundred miles, experience had taught me that I could travel more quickly in a lighter boat, and more conveniently and economically without a companion. It was now about the first week in August, and the delay which would attend the building of a new boat especially adapted for the journey of two thousand miles yet to be travelled would not be lost, as by waiting a few weeks, time would be given for the malaria on the rivers of New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland, and even farther south, to be eradicated by the fall frosts. David returned to his New Jersey home a happy man, invested with the importance which attaches itself to a great traveller. I had unfortunately contributed to Mr. Bodfish’s thirst for the marvellous by reading to him at night, in our lonely camp, Jules Verne’s imaginative “Journey to the Centre of the Earth.” David was in ecstasies over this wonderful contribution to fiction. He preferred fiction to truth at any time. Once, while reading to him a chapter of the above work, his credulity was so challenged that he became excited, and broke forth with, “Say, boss, how do these big book-men larn to lie so well? does it come nat’ral to them, or is it got by edication?” I have since heard that when Mr. Bodfish arrived in the pine-wood regions of New Jersey he related to his friends his adventures “in furrin parts,” as he styled the Dominion of Canada, and so interlaced the facts of the cruise of the Mayeta with the fancies of the “Journey to the Centre of the Earth,” that to his neighbors the region of the St. Lawrence has become a country of awful and mysterious associations, while the more knowing members of the community which David honors with his presence are firmly convinced that there never existed such a boat as the Mayeta save in the wild imagination of David Bodfish.
Mr. Bodfish’s fictitious adventures, as related by him, covered many thousand miles of canoe voyaging. He had penetrated the region of ice beyond Labrador, and had viewed with
complacency the north pole, which he found to be a pitch-pine spar that had been erected by the Coast Survey “to measure pints from.” He roundly censured the crews of whale-ships which had mutilated this noble government work by splitting much of it into kindling-wood. Fortunately about two-thirds of Mr. Bodfish’s audience had no very clear conceptions of the character of the north pole, some of them having ignored its very existence. So they accepted this portion of his narrative, while they rejected the most reasonable part of his story.
The Mayeta was sent to Lake George, and afterwards became a permanent resident. Two years later her successor, the Paper Canoe, one of the most happy efforts of the Messrs. Waters, of Troy, was quietly moored beside her; and soon after there was added to the little fleet a cedar duck-boat, which had carried me on a second voyage to the great southern sea. Here, anchored safely under the high cliffs, rocked gently by the loving waters of Lake George, rest these faithful friends. They carried me over five thousand miles, through peaceful rivers and surging seas. They have shared my dangers; they now share my peace.
CHAPTER V. THE AMERICAN PAPER BOAT AND ENGLISH CANOES.
THE PECULIAR CHARACTER OF THE PAPER BOAT. — THE HISTORY OF THE ADOPTION OF PAPER FOR BOATS. — A BOY’S INGENUITY. — THE PROCESS OF BUILDING PAPER BOATS DESCRIBED. — COLLEGE CLUBS ADOPTING THEAM. — THE GREAT VICTORIES WON BY PAPER OVER WOODEN SHELLS IN 1876.
Inquiries regarding the history and
durability of paper boats occasionally reach me through the medium of the post-office. After all the uses to which paper has been put during the last twenty years, the public is yet hardly convinced that the flimsy material, paper, can successfully take the place of wood in the construction of light pleasure-boats, canoes, and racing shells. Yet the idea has become an accomplished fact. The success of the victorious paper shells of the Cornell College navy, which were enlisted in the struggles of two seasons at Saratoga, against no mean antagonists, — the college crews of the United States, — surely proves that in strength, stiffness, speed, and fineness of model, the paper boat is without a rival.
When used in its own peculiar sphere, the improved paper boat will be found to possess the following merits: less weight, greater strength, stiffness, durability, and speed than a wooden boat of the same size and model; and the moulded paper shell will retain the delicate lines so essential to speed, while the brittle wooden shell yields more or less to the warping influences of sun and moisture. A comparison of the strength of wood and paper for boats has been made by a writer in the Cornell Times, a journal published by the students of that celebrated New York college:
“Let us take a piece of wood and a piece of paper of the same thickness, and experiment with, use, and abuse them both to the same extent. Let the wood be of one-eighth of an inch in thickness — the usual thickness of shell-boats, and the paper heavy pasteboard, both one foot square. Holding them up by one side, strike them with a hammer, and observe the result. The wood will be cracked, to say the least; the pasteboard, whirled out of your hand, will only be dented, at most. Take hold and bend them: the wood bends to a certain degree, and then splits; the pasteboard, bent to the same degree, is not affected in the least. Take a knife and strike them: the wood is again split, the pasteboard only pierced. Place them on the water: the wood floats for an indefinite time; the pasteboard, after a time, soaks, and finally sinks, as was to be expected. But suppose we soak the pasteboard in marine glue before the experiment, then we find the pasteboard equally as
impervious to the water as wood, and as buoyant, if of the same weight; but, to be of the same weight, it must be thinner than the wood, yet even then it stands the before-mentioned tests as well as when thicker; and it will be found to stand all tests much better than wood, even when it weighs considerably less.
“Now, enlarging our pieces, and moulding them into boats of the same weight, we find the following differences: Wood, being stiff and liable to split, can only be moulded into comparative form. Paper, since it can be rendered perfectly pliable, can be pressed into any shape desirable; hence, any wished-for fineness of lines can be given to the model, and the paper will assume the identical shape, after which it can be water-proofed, hardened, and polished. Paper neither swells, nor shrinks, nor cracks, hence it does not leak, is always ready for use, always serviceable. As to cost, there is very little difference between the two; the cost being within twenty-five dollars, more or less, the same for both. Those who use paper boats think them very near perfection; and surely those who have the most to do with boats ought to know, prejudice aside, which is the best.”
An injury to a paper boat is easily repaired by a patch of strong paper and a coating of shellac put on with a hot iron. As the paper boat is a novelty with many people, a sketch of its early history may prove interesting to the reader. Mr. George A. Waters, the son of the senior member of the firm of E. Waters & Sons, of Troy, New York, was invited some years since to a masquerade party. The boy repaired to a toy shop to purchase a counterfeit face; but, thinking the price (eight dollars) was more than he could afford for a single evening’s sport, he borrowed the mask for a model, from which he produced a duplicate as perfect as was the original. While engaged upon his novel work, an idea impressed itself upon his ingenious brain. “Cannot,” he queried, “a paper shell be made upon the wooden model of a boat? And will not a shell thus produced, after being treated to a coat of varnish, float as well, and be lighter than a wooden boat?”
This was in March, 1867, while the youth was engaged in the manufacture of paper boxes. Having repaired a wooden shell-boat by
covering the cracks with sheets of stout paper cemented to the wood, the result satisfied him; and he immediately applied his attention to the further development of his bright idea. Assisted by his father, Mr. Elisha Waters, the enterprise was commenced “by taking a wooden shell, thirteen inches wide and thirty feet long, as a mould, and covering the entire surface of its bottom and sides with small sheets of strong Manila paper, glued together, and superposed on each other, so that the joints of one layer were covered by the middle of the sheet immediately above, until a sheet of paper had been formed one-sixteenth of an inch in thickness. The fabric thus
constructed, after being carefully dried, was removed from the mould and fitted up with a suitable frame, consisting of a lower keelson, two inwales, the bulkhead; in short, all the usual parts of the frame of a wooden shell, except the timbers, or ribs, of which none were used — the extreme stiffness of the skin rendering them unnecessary. Its surface was then carefully waterproofed with suitable varnishes, and the work was completed. Trials proved that, rude as was this first attempt compared with the elegant craft now turned out from paper, it had marked merits, among which were, its remarkable stiffness, the symmetry of the hull with respect to its long axis, and the smoothness of the water-surface.”
A gentleman, who possesses excellent judgment and long experience in all that relates to paper boats, furnishes me with the following valuable information, which I feel sure will interest the reader.
“The process of building the paper shell-boat is as follows: The dimensions of the boat having been determined upon, the first step is to construct a wooden model, or form, an exact facsimile of the desired boat, on which to mould the paper skin. For this purpose the lines of the boat are carefully drawn out of the full size, and from the drawings thus made the model is prepared. It is built of layers of well-seasoned pine, securely fastened together to form one solid mass; which, after having been laid up of the general outline required, is carefully worked off, until its surface, which is made perfectly smooth, exactly conforms to the selected lines, and its beam, depth, and length are those of the given boat. During the process of its construction, suitable rabbets are cut to receive the lower keelson, the two inwales, and the bow and stern deadwoods, which, being put in position, are worked off so that their surfaces are flush with that of the model, and forming, as it were, an integral part of it. It being important that these parts should, in the completed boat, be firmly attached to the skin, their surface is, at this part of the process, covered with a suitable adhesive preparation.
“The model is now ready to be covered with paper. Two kinds are used: that made from the best Manila, and that prepared from pure unbleached linen stock; the sheets being the full length of the model, no matter what that may be. If Manila paper is used, the first sheet is dampened, laid smoothly on the model, and securely fastened in place by tacking it to certain rough strips attached to its upper face. Other sheets are now superposed on this and on each other, and suitably cemented together; the number depending upon the size of the boat and the stiffness required. If linen paper is used, but one sheet is employed, of such weight and dimensions that, when dry, it will give just the thickness of skin necessary. Should the surface of the model be concave in parts, as in the run of boats with square sterns for instance, the paper is made to conform to these surfaces by suitable convex moulds, which also hold the paper in place until, by drying, it has taken and will retain the desired form. The model, with its enveloping coat of paper, is now removed to the dry-room. As the paper skin dries, all wrinkles disappear, and it gradually assumes the desired shape. Finally, when all moisture has been evaporated, it is taken from the mould an exact fac-simile of the model desired, exceedingly stiff, perfectly symmetrical, and seamless.
“The paper is now subjected to the water-proof process, and the skin, with its keelson, inwales, and dead-woods attached, is then placed in the carpenter’s hands, where the frame is completed in the usual manner, as described for wooden boats. The paper decks being put on, it is then ready for the brass, iron, and varnish work. As the skins of these boats (racing-shells) vary from one-sixteenth of an inch in the singles, to one-twelfth of an inch in the six-oared outriggers, the wooden frame becomes necessary to support and keep them in shape. In applying this invention to gigs, dingys, canoes, and skiffs, a somewhat different method is adopted. Since these boats are subjected to much hard service, and must be so constructed as to permit the occupant to move about in them as is usual in such craft, a light and strong frame of wood is prepared, composed of a suitable number of pairs of ribs, with stem and stern pieces cut from the natural crooks of hackmatack roots. These are firmly framed to two gunwales and a keelson, extending the length of the boat; the whole forming the skeleton shape of the desired model. The forms for these boats having been prepared, as already described for the racing-shells, and the frame being let into this form, so that the outer surface of the ribs, stem and stern pieces will conform with its outer surface, the paper skin is next laid upon it. The skin, manufactured from new, unbleached linen stock, is carefully stretched in place, and when perfectly dry is from one-tenth to three-sixteenths of an inch thick. Removed from the model, it is water-proofed, the frame and fittings completed, and the boat varnished. In short, in this class of boats, the shape, style, and finish are precisely that of wooden ones, of corresponding dimensions and class, except that for the usual wooden sheathing is substituted the paper skin as described.
“The advantages possessed by these boats over those of wood are:
“By the use of this material for the skins of racing-shells, where experience has demonstrated the smooth bottom to be the best, under-water lines of any degree of fineness can be developed, which cannot successfully be produced in those of wood, even where the streaks are so reduced in thickness that strength, stiffness, and durability are either wholly sacrificed or greatly impaired. In the finer varieties of ‘dug-outs’ equally fine lines can be obtained; but so delicate are such boats, if the sides are reduced to three-sixteenths of an inch or less in thickness, that it is found practically impossible to preserve their original forms for any length of time. Hence, so far as this point is concerned, it only remains for the builder to select those models which science, guided by experience, points out as the best.
The paper skin, after being water-proofed, is finished with hard varnishes, and then presents a solid, perfectly smooth, and horny surface to the action of the water, unbroken by joint, lap, or seam. This surface admits of being polished as smooth as a coach-panel or a mirror. Unlike wood, it has no grain to be cracked or split, it never shrinks, and, paper being one of the best of non-conductors, no ordinary degree of heat or cold affects its shape or hardness, and hence these boats are admirably adapted for use in all climates. As the skin absorbs no moisture, these boats gain no weight by use, and, having no moisture to give off when out of the water, they do not, like wooden boats, show the effect of exposure to the air by leaking. They are, therefore, in this respect always prepared for service.
The strength and stiffness of the paper shells are most remarkable. To demonstrate it, a single shell of twelve inch beam and twenty-eight feet long, fitted complete with its outriggers, the hull weighing twenty-two pounds, was placed on two trestles eight feet apart, in such a manner that the trestles were each the same distance from the centre of the cockpit, which was thus entirely unsupported. A man
weighing one hundred and forty pounds then seated himself in it, and remained in this position three minutes. The deflection caused by this strain, being accurately measured, was found to be one-sixteenth of an inch at a point midway between the supports. If this load, applied under such abnormal conditions, produced so little effect, we can safely assume that, when thus loaded and resting on the water, supported throughout her whole length, and the load far more equally distributed over the whole frame, there would be no deflection whatever.
“Lightness, when combined with a proper, stiffness and strength, being a very desirable quality, it is here that the paper boats far excel their wooden rivals. If two shells are selected, the one of wood and the other with a paper skin and deck, as has been described, of the same dimensions and equally stiff, careful experiment proves that the wooden one will be thirty per cent. the heaviest. If those of the same dimensions and equal weight are compared, the paper one will be found to exceed the wooden one in stiffness and in capacity to resist torsional strains in the same proportion. Frequent boasts are made that wooden shells can be and are built much lighter than paper ones; and if the quality of lightness alone is considered, this is true; yet when the practical test of use is applied, such extremely light wooden boats have always proved, and will continue to prove, failures, as here this quality is only one of a number which combine to make the boat serviceable. A wooden shell whose hull weighs twenty-two pounds, honest weight, is a very fragile, short-lived affair. A paper shell of the same dimensions, and of the same weight, will last as long, and do as much work, as a wooden one whose hull turns the beam at thirty pounds.
“An instance of their remarkable strength is shown in the following case. In the summer of 1870, a single shell, while being rowed at full speed, with the current, on one of our
principal rivers, was run into to the stone abutment of a bridge. The bow struck squarely on to
obstacle, and such was the momentum of the mass that the oarsman was thrown directly through the flaring bow of the cockpit into the river. Witnesses of the accident who were familiar with wooden shells declared that the boat was ruined; but, after a careful examination, only the bow-tip was found to be twisted in a spiral form, and the washboard broken at the point by the oarsman as he passed between the sides. Two dollars covered the cost of repair. Had it been a wooden shell the shock would have crushed its stem and splintered the skin from the bow to the waist.”
Old and cautious seamen tried to dissuade me from contracting with the Messrs. Waters for the building of a stout paper canoe for my journey. Harvard College had not adopted this “
newfangled notion” at that time, and Cornell had only begun to think of attempting to out-row other colleges at Saratoga by using paper boats. The Centennial year of the independence of the United States, 1876, settled all doubts as to the value of the result of the years of toil of the inventors of the paper boat. During the same year the incendiary completed his revengeful work by burning the paper-boat manufactory at Troy. The loss was a heavy one; but a few weeks later these unflinching men were able to record the following victories achieved that single season by their boats.
The races won by the paper boats were:
The Intercollegiate Championship: Freshmen and University.
The International Championship at Saratoga: Singles, Doubles, and Fours.
The National Championship, N. A. of A. 0.: Singles, Doubles, and Fours.
The World’s Championship at Centennial Exhibition: Singles, Doubles, and Fours.
The Professional Championship of the United States.
And every other important race of the season, besides receiving the highest honors at the Centennial Exhibition. The right to make boats of paper in Canada and in the United States is exclusively held by the Messrs. Waters, and they are the only manufacturers of paper boats in the world.
It is not many years since Mr. McGregor, of London, built the little Rob Roy canoe, and in it made the tour of interesting European waters. His example was followed by an army of tourists, and it is now a common thing to meet canoe voyagers in miniature flotillas upon the watercourses of our own and foreign lands. Rev. Baden Powell, also an Englishman, perfected the model of the Nautilus type of canoe, which possesses a great deal of sheer with fullness of bow, and is therefore a better boat for rough water than the Rob Roy. The New York Canoe Club have adopted the Nautilus for their model. We still need a distinctive American type for our waters, more like the best Indian canoe than the European models here presented. These
modern yacht-like canoes are really improved kyaks, and in their construction we are much indebted to the experience of the inhabitants of the Arctic Circle. Very few of the so-called Rob Roy canoes, built in the United States, resemble the original perfected boat of Mr. McGregor — the father of modern canoe travelling. The
illustrations given of English canoes are from imported models, and are perfect of their type.
CHAPTER VI. TROY TO PHILADELPHIA.
PAPER CANOE MARIA THERESA. — THE START. — THE DESCENT OF THE HUDSON RIVER. — CROSSING THE UPPER BAY OF NEW YORK. — PASSAGE OF THE KILLS. — RARITAN RIVER — THE CANAL ROUTE FROM NEW BRUNSWICK TO THE DELAWARE RIVER. — FROM BORDENTOWN TO PHILADELPHIA.
My canoe of the English “Nautilus” type was completed by the middle of October;
and on the cold, drizzly morning of the 21st of the same month I embarked in my little
fifty-eight pound craft from the landing of the paper-boat manufactory on the river Hudson, two miles above Troy. Mr. George A. Waters put his own canoe into the water, and proposed to escort me a few miles down the river. If I had any misgivings as to the stability of my paper canoe upon entering her for the first time, they were quickly dispelled as I passed the stately Club-house of the Laureates, which contained nearly forty shells, all of paper. The dimensions of the Maria Theresa were: length, fourteen feet; beam, twenty-eight inches; depth, amidships, nine inches; height of bow from horizontal line, twenty-three inches; height of stern, twenty inches. The canoe was
one-eighth of an inch in thickness, and weighed fifty-eight pounds. She was fitted with a pair of steel outriggers, which could be easily unshipped and stowed away. The oars were of spruce, seven feet eight inches long, and weighed three pounds and a quarter each. The double paddle, which was seven feet six inches in length, weighed two pounds and a half. The mast
and sail — which are of no service on such a miniature vessel, and were soon
discarded — weighed six pounds. When I took on board at Philadelphia the canvas deck-cover and the rubber strap which secured it in position, and the outfit, — the cushion, sponge, provision-basket, and a fifteen-pound case of charts, — I found that, with my own weight included (one hundred and thirty pounds), the boat and her cargo, all told, provisioned for a long cruise, fell considerably short of the weight of three Saratoga trunks containing a very modest wardrobe for a lady’s four weeks’ visit at a fashionable watering-place.
The rain ceased, the mists ascended, and the sunlight broke upon us as we swiftly descended upon the current of the Hudson to Albany. The city was reached in an hour and a half. Mr. Waters, pointing his canoe northward, wished me bon voyage, and returned to the scene of the triumphs of his patient labors, while I settled down to a steady row southward. At Albany, the capital of the state, which is said to be one hundred and fifty miles distant from New York city, there is a tidal rise and fall of one foot. A feeling of buoyancy and independence came over me as I glided on the current of this noble stream, with the consciousness that I now possessed the right boat for my enterprise. It had been a dream of my youth to become acquainted with the charms of this most romantic river of the American continent. Its sources are in the clouds of the Adirondacks, among the cold peaks of the northern wilderness; its ending may be said to be in the briny waters of the Atlantic, for its channel-way has been sounded outside of the sandy beaches of New York harbor in the bosom of the restless ocean. The highest types of civilized life are nurtured upon its banks. Noble edifices, which contain and preserve the works of genius and of mechanical art, rear their proud roofs from among these hills on the lofty sites of the picturesque Hudson. The wealth of the great city at its mouth, the metropolis of the young nation, has been lavished upon the soil of the river’s borders to make it even more beautiful and more fruitful. What river in America, along the same length of coast-lines as from Troy to New York (one hundred and fifty-six miles), can rival in natural beauty and artificial applications of wealth the lovely Hudson? “The Hudson River,” says its genial historian, Mr. Lossing, “from its birth among the mountains to its marriage with the ocean, measures a distance of full three hundred miles.”
Captain John Smith’s friend, the Englishman Henry Hudson, while in the employ of the Dutch East India Company, in his vessel of ninety tons, the Half-Moon, being in search of a northwest passage south of Virginia, cast anchor outside of Sandy Hook, September 3, 1609, and on the 11th passed up through the Narrows into the present bay of New York. Under the firm conviction that he was on his way to the long-sought Cathay, a day later he entered the Hudson River, where now stands the proud metropolis of America. As the Half-Moon ascended the river the water lost its
saltness, and by the time they were anchored where the city of Albany now stands all hopes of Cathay faded from the heart of the mariner. Englishmen called this river in honor of its discoverer, but the Dutch gave it the name of North River,
the Delaware had been discovered and named South River. Thus, while in 1609 Samuel
Champlain was exploring the lake which bears his name, Hudson was ascending his river upon the southern water-shed. The historian tells us that these bold explorers penetrated the wilderness, one from the north and the other from the south, to within one hundred miles of each other.
The same historian (Dr. Lossing) says: “The most remote source of the extreme western branch of our noble river is Hendricks Spring, so named in honor of Hendricks Hudson. We found Hendricks Spring in the edge of a swamp, cold, shallow, about five feet in diameter, shaded by trees, shrubbery, and vines, and fringed with the delicate brake and fern. Its waters, rising within half a mile of Long Lake, and upon the same summit-level, flow southward to the Atlantic more than three hundred miles; while those of the latter flow to the St. Lawrence, and reach the same Atlantic a thousand miles away to the far northeast.”
Since Dr. Lossing visited the western head of the Hudson River, the true and highest source of the stream has probably been settled by a gentleman possessing scientific acquirements and inflexible purpose. On the plateau south of Mount Marcy, State-Surveyor Colvin found the little Lake Tear-of-the-Clouds to be the loftiest sheet of water in the state, — four thousand three hundred and twenty-six feet above the sea, — and proved it to be the lake-head of the great river Hudson. A second little pond in a marsh on a high plateau, at the foot of Mount Redfield, was also discovered, — “margined and embanked with luxuriant and deep sphagnous moss,” — which was named by the party Moss Lake. It was found to flow into the Hudson. A beautiful little bivalve shell, three-sixteenths of an inch in diameter, of an undescribed species, was found in the pellucid water, and thus a new shell was handed over to conchology, and a new river source to geography, in the same hour. This pool is four thousand three hundred and twelve feet above tide-water, and only a few feet lower than its sister, Tear-of-the-Clouds — the highest source of the Hudson.
Should the state of New York adopt Mr. Colvin’s suggestion, to reserve six hundred square miles of the Adirondack region for a public park, the pool Tear-of-the-Clouds will be within the reservation. The waters of these baby
fountains are swollen by contributions from the streams, ponds, and lakes of the Adirondack wilderness, until along the banks of Fishing Brook, a tributary of the Hudson, the water is utilized at the first saw-mill. A few miles lower down the forests are vexed by the axe of the lumbermen, and logs are floated down the river one hundred miles to Glens Falls, where the State Dam and Great Boom are located. Half a million logs have been gathered there in a single spring.
It was upon the Hudson that the first successful steamboat, built by Robert Fulton, made its voyage to Albany, the engine having been built by Watt & Bolton, in England.
From Mr. Lossing we obtain the following.
“The Clermont was one hundred feet long, twelve feet wide, and seven feet deep. The following advertisement appeared in the Albany Gazette on the 1st of September, 1807:
“The North River steamboat will leave Paulus Hook (Jersey City) on Friday, the 4th of September, at 9 in the morning, and arrive at Albany on Saturday at 9 in the afternoon. Provisions, good berths, and accommodations are provided. The charge to each passenger is as follows:
To Newburgh, . . . . 3 Dollars. . . Time, 14 hours. ” Poughkeepsie, . . 4 ” . . . . ” 17 ” ” Esopus, . . . . 5 ” . . . . ” 20 ” ” Hudson, . . . . 5-1/2″ . . . . ” 30 ” ” Albany, . . . . 7 ” . . . . ” 36 ” .”
The trip, which was made against a strong head wind, was entirely successful. The large steamers can now make the trip from New York to Albany in about ten hours.
As I pulled easily along the banks of the river, my eyes feasted upon the gorgeous coloring of the autumnal foliage, which formed a scene of beauty never to be forgotten. The rapid absorption of oxygen by the leaves in the fall months produces, in northern America, these vivid tints which give to the country the appearance of a land covered with a varied and brilliant garment, “a coat of many colors.” A soft hazy light pervaded the atmosphere, while at the same time the October air was gently exhilarating to the nervous system. At six o’clock P. M. the canoe arrived at Hudson City, which is on the east bank of the river, and I completed a row of thirty-eight statute miles, according to local authority; but in reality forty-nine miles by the correct charts of the United States Coast Survey. After storing the Maria Theresa in a shed, I repaired to a dismal hotel for the night.
At seven o’clock the next morning the river was mantled in a dense fog, but I pushed off and guided myself by the sounds of the running trains on the Hudson River Railroad. This corporation does such an immense amount of freighting that, if their freight trains were connected, a continuous line of eighty miles would be constructed, of which sixteen miles are always in transit day and night. Steamboats and tugs with canal-boats in tow were groping about the river in the misty darkness, blowing whistles every few minutes to let people know that the pilot was not sleeping at the wheel. There was a grand clearing up at noon; and as the sun broke through the mist, the beautiful shores came into view like a vivid flame of scarlet, yellow, brown, and green. It was the death-song of summer, and her dying notes the tinted leaves, each one giving to the wind a sad strain as it softly dropped to the earth, or was quickly hurled into space.
A few miles south of Hudson City, on the west bank, the Catskill stream enters the river. From this point the traveller may penetrate the picturesque country of the Appalachian range, where its wild elevations were called Onti Ora, or “mountains of the sky,” by the aborigines.
Roundout, on the right bank of the Hudson, is the terminus of the Delaware and Hudson Canal, which connects it with Port Jervis on the Delaware, a distance of fifty-four miles. This town, the outlet of the coal regions, I passed after meridian. As I left Hudson on the first of the flood-tide, I had to combat it for several hours; but I easily reached Hyde Park Landing (which is on the left bank of the stream and, by local authority, thirty-five miles from Hudson City) at five o’clock P. M. The wharf-house sheltered the canoe, and a hotel in the village, half a mile distant on the high plains, its owner. I was upon the river by seven o’clock the next morning. The day was varied by strong gusts of wind succeeded by calms. Six miles south of Hyde Park is the beautiful city of
Poughkeepsie with its eighteen thousand inhabitants, and the celebrated Vassar Female College. Eight miles down the river, and on the same side, is a small village called New Hamburg. The rocky promontory at the foot of which the town is built is covered with the finest arbor vitae forest probably in existence. Six miles below, on west bank, is the important city of Newburg, one of the termini of the New York and Erie Railroad. Four miles below, the river narrows and presents a grand view of the north entrance of the Highlands, with the Storm King Mountain rising fully one thousand five hundred feet above the tide. The early Dutch navigators gave to this peak the name of Boter-burg (Butter-Hill), but it was rechristened Storm King by the author N. P. Willis, whose late residence, Idlewild, commands a fine view of Newburg Bay.
When past the Storm King, the Crow-Nest and the almost perpendicular front of Kidd’s Plug Cliff tower aloft, and mark the spot where Kidd (as usual) was supposed to have buried a portion of that immense sum of money with which popular belief invests hundreds of localities along the watercourses of the continent. Now the Narrows above West Point were entered and the current against a head-wind made the passage unusually exciting. The paper canoe danced over the boiling expanse of water, and neared the west shore about a mile above the United States Military Academy, when a shell, from a gun on the grounds of that institution burst in the water within a few feet of the boat. I now observed a target set upon a little flat at the foot of a gravelly hill close to the beach. As a second, and finally a third shell exploded near me, I rowed into the rough water, much disgusted with cadet-practice and military etiquette. After dark the canoe was landed on the deck of a schooner which was discharging slag or cinder at Fort Montgomery Landing. I scrambled up the hill to the only shelter that could be found, a small country store owned by a Captain Conk who kept entertainment for the traveller. Rough fellows and old crones came in to talk about the spooks that had been seen in the neighboring hills. It was veritable “Sleepy Hollow” talk. The physician of the place, they said, had been “skert clean off a bridge the other night.”
Embarking the following morning from this weird and hilly country, that prominent natural feature, Anthony’s Nose, which was located on the opposite shore, strongly appealed to my imagination and somewhat excited my mirth. One needs a powerful imagination, I thought, to live in these regions where the native element, the hill-folk, dwell so fondly and earnestly upon the ghostly and mysterious. Three miles down the river, Dunderberg, “the thundering mountain,” on the west bank, with the town of Peekskill on the opposite shore, was passed, and I entered Haverstraw Bay, the widest part of the river. “Here,” says the historian, “the fresh and salt water usually contend, most equally, for the mastery; and here the porpoise is often seen in large numbers sporting in the summer sun. Here in the spring vast numbers of shad are caught while on their way to spawning-beds in
freshwater coves.” Haverstraw Bay was crossed, and Tarrytown passed, when I came to the
picturesque little cottage of a great man now gone from among us. Many pleasant memories of his tales rose in my mind as I looked upon Sunnyside, the home of Washington Irving, nestled in the grove of living green, its white stuccoed walls glistening in the bright sunlight, and its background of grand villas looming up on every side. At Irvington Landing, a little further down the river, I went ashore to pass Sunday with friends; and on the Monday following, in a dense fog, proceeded on my route to New York.
Below Irvington the far-famed “Palisades,” bold-faced precipices of trap-rock, offer their grandest appearance on the west side of the Hudson. These singular bluffs, near Hoboken, present a perpendicular front of three hundred or four hundred feet in height. Piles of broken rock rest against their base: the contribution of the cliffs above from the effects of frost and sun.
While approaching the great city of New York, strong squalls of wind, blowing against the ebb-tide, sent swashy waves into my open canoe, the sides of which, amidships, were only five or six inches above water; but the great buoyancy of the light craft and its very smooth exterior created but little friction in the water and made her very seaworthy, when carefully watched and handled, even without a deck of canvas or wood. While the canoe forged ahead through the troubled waters, and the breezes loaded with the saltness of the sea now near at hand struck my back, I confess that a longing to reach Philadelphia, where I could complete my outfit and increase the safety of my little craft, gave renewed vigor to my stroke as I exchanged the quiet atmosphere of the country for the smoke and noise of the city. Every instinct was now challenged, and every muscle brought into action, as I dodged tug-boats, steamers, yachts, and vessels, while running the thoroughfare along the crowded wharves between New York on one side and Jersey City on the other. I found the slips between the piers most excellent ports of refuge at times, when the ferry-boats, following each other in quick succession, made the river with its angry tide boil like a vortex. The task soon ended, and I left the Hudson at Castle Garden and entered the upper bay of New York harbor. As it was dark, I would gladly have gone ashore for the night, but a great city offers no inducement for a canoeist to land as a stranger at its wharves.
A much more pleasant reception awaited me down on Staten Island, a gentleman having notified me by mail that he would welcome the canoe and its owner. The ebb had ceased, and the incoming tide was being already felt close in shore; so with tide and wind against me, and the darkness of night settling down gloomily upon the wide bay, I pulled a strong oar for five miles to the entrance of Kill Van Kull Strait, which separates Staten Island from New Jersey and connects the upper bay with Raritan Bay.
The bright beams from the light-house on Robbin’s Reef, which is one mile and a quarter off the entrance of the strait, guided me on my course. The head-sea, in little, splashy waves, began to fill my canoe. The water soon reached the foot-rest; but there was no time to stop to bale out the boat, for a friendly current was near, and if once reached, my little craft would enter smoother waters. The flood which poured into the mouth of Kill Van Kull soon caught my boat, and the head-tide was changed to a favorable current which carried me in its strong arms far into the salt-water strait, and I reached West New Brighton, along the high banks of which I found my haven of rest. Against the sky I traced the outlines of my land-mark, three poplars, standing sentinel-like before the house of the gentleman who had so kindly offered me his hospitality. The canoe was emptied of its shifting liquid ballast and carefully sponged dry. My host and his son carried it into the main hall of the mansion and placed it upon the floor, where the entire household gathered, an admiring group. Proud, indeed, might my dainty craft have been of the appreciation of so lovely a company. her master fully appreciated the generous board of his kind host, and in present comfort soon forgot past trials and his wet pull across the upper bay of New York harbor.
My work for the next day, October 27th, was the navigation of the interesting strait of the old Dutch settlers and the Raritan River, of New Jersey, as far as New Brunswick. The average width of Kill Van Kull is three-eighths of a mile. From its entrance, at Constable’s Point, to the mouth of Newark Bay, which enters it on the Jersey side, it is three miles, and nearly two miles across the bay to Elizabethport. Bergen Point is on the east and Elizabethport on the west entrance of the bay, while on Staten Island, New Brighton, Factoryville, and North Shore, furnish homes for many New York business men.
At Elizabethport the strait narrows to one eighth of a mile, and as the mouth of the Rahway is approached it widens. It now runs through marshes for most of the way, a distance of twelve miles to Raritan Bay, which is an arm of the lower bay of New York harbor. The strait, from Elizabethport to its mouth, is called Arthur Kill; the whole distance through the Kills, from Constable’s Point to Raritan Bay, is about seventeen statute miles. At the mouth of Arthur Kill the Raritan River opens to the bay, and the city of Perth Amboy rests on the point of high land between the river and the strait.
Roseville and Tottenville are on the Staten Island shores of Arthur Kill, the former six miles, the latter ten miles from Elizabethport. The tide runs swiftly through the Kills. Leaving Mr. Campbell’s residence at nine A. M., with a tide in my favor as far as Newark Bay, I soon had the tide against me from the other Kill until I passed the Rahway River, when it commenced to ebb towards Raritan Bay. The marshy shores of the Kills were submerged in places by the high tide, but their monotony was relieved by the farms upon the hills back of the flats.
At one o’clock my canoe rounded the heights upon which Perth Amboy is perched, with its snug cottages, the homes of many oystermen whose fleet of boats was anchored in front of the town. Curious yard-like pens constructed of poles rose out of the water, in which boats could find shelter from the rough sea.
The entrance to the Raritan River is wide, and above its mouth it is crossed by a long railroad bridge. The pull up the crooked river (sixteen miles) against a strong ebb-tide, through extensive reedy marshes, was uninteresting. I came upon the entrance of the canal which connects the rivers Raritan and Delaware after six o’clock P. M., which at this season of the year was after dark. Hiding the canoe in a secure place I went to visit an old friend, Professor George Cook, of the New Jersey State Geological Survey, who resides at New Brunswick. In the morning the professor kindly assisted me, and we climbed the high bank of the canal with the canoe upon our shoulders, putting it into the water below the first two locks. I now
commenced an unexciting row of forty-two miles to Bordentown, on the Delaware, where this artificial watercourse ends.
This canal is much travelled by steam tugs towing schooners of two hundred tons, and by barges and canal-boats of all sizes drawing not above seven feet and a half of water. The boats are drawn through the locks by stationary steam-engines, the use of which is discontinued when the business becomes slack; then the boatmen use their mules for the same purpose. To tow an average-sized canal-boat, loaded, requires four mules, while an empty one is easily drawn by two. It proved most expeditious as well as convenient not to trouble the lock-master to open the gates, but to secure his assistance in carrying the canoe along the tow-path to the end of the lock, which service occupied less than five minutes. In this way the canoe was carried around seven locks the first day, and when dusk approached she was sheltered beside a paper shell in the boat-house of Princeton College Club, which is located on the banks of the canal about one mile and a half from the city of Princeton.
In this narrow watercourse these
indefatigable collegians, under great disadvantages, drill their crews for the annual intercollegiate struggle for championship. One Noah Reed provided entertainment for man and beast at his country inn half a mile from the boat-house, and thither I repaired for the night.
This day’s row of twenty-six miles and a half had been through a hilly country,
abounding in rich farm lands which were well cultivated. The next morning an officer of the Princeton Bank awaited my coming on the banks of the sluggish canal. He had taken an early walk from the town to see the canoe. At Baker’s Basin the bridge-tender, a one-legged man, pressed me to tarry till he could summon the Methodist minister, who had charged him to notify him of the approach of a paper canoe.
Through all my boat journeys I have remarked that professional men take more interest in canoe journeys than professional oarsmen; and nearly all the canoeists of my acquaintance are ministers of the gospel. It is an innocent way of obtaining relaxation; and opportunities thus offered the weary clergyman of studying nature in her ever-changing but always restful moods, must indeed be grateful after being for months in daily contact with the world, the flesh, and the devil. The tendency of the present age to liberal ideas permits clergymen in large towns and cities to drive fast horses, and spend an hour of each day at a harmless game of billiards, without giving rise to remarks from his own congregation, but let the overworked rector of a country village seek in his friendly canoe that relief which nature offers to the tired brain, let him go into the wilderness and live close to his Creator by studying his works, and a whole community vex him on his return with “the appearance of the thing.” These self-constituted critics, who are generally ignorant of the laws which God has made to secure health and give contentment to his creatures, would poison the sick man’s body with drugs and nostrums when he might have the delightful and generally successful services of Dr. Camp Cure without the after dose of a bill. These hardworked and miserably paid country clergymen, who are rarely, nowadays, treated as the head of the congregation or the shepherd of the flock they are supposed to lead, but rather as victims of the whims of influential members of the church, tell me that to own a canoe is indeed a cross, and that if they spend a vacation in the grand old forests of the Adirondacks, the brethren are sorely exercised over the time wasted in such unusual and unministerial conduct.
Everywhere along the route the peculiar character of the paper canoe attracted many remarks from the bystanders. The first impression given was that I had engaged in this rowing enterprise under the stimulus of a bet; and when the curious were informed that it was a voyage of study, the next question was “How much are you going to make out of it?” Upon learning that there was neither a bet nor money in it, a shade of disappointment and incredulity rested upon the features of the bystanders, and the canoeist was often rated as a “blockhead” for risking his life without being paid for it.
At Trenton the canal passes through the city and here it was necessary to carry the boat around two locks. At noon the canoe ended her voyage of forty-two miles by reaching the last lock, on the Delaware River, at Bordentown, New Jersey, where friendly arms received the Maria Theresa and placed her on the trestles which had supported her sister craft, the Mayeta, in the shop of the builder, Mr. J. S. Lamson, situated under the high cliffs along the crests of which an ex-king of Spain, in times gone by, was wont to walk and sadly ponder on his exile from la belle France.
The Rev. John H. Barkeley, proprietor as well as principal of the Bordentown Female
Seminary, took me to his ancient mansion, where Thomas Paine, of old Revolutionary war times, had lodged. Not the least attraction in the home of my friend was the group of fifty young ladies, who were kind enough to gather upon a high bluff when I left the town, and wave graceful farewell to the paper canoe as she entered the tidal current of the river Delaware en route for the Quaker city.
During my short stay in Bordentown Mr. Isaac Gabel kindly acted as my guide and we explored the Bonaparte Park, which is on the outskirts of the town. The grounds are
beautifully laid out. Some of the old houses of the ex-king’s friends and attendants still remain in a fair state of preservation. The elegant residence of Joseph Bonaparte, or the Count de
Surveilliers, which was always open to American visitors of all classes, was torn down by Mr. Hairy Beckon, an Englishman in the diplomatic service of the British government, who purchased this property some years after the Count returned to Europe, and erected a more elaborate mansion near the old site. The old citizens of Bordentown hold in grateful remembrance the favors showered upon them by Joseph Bonaparte and his family, who seem to have lived a democratic life in the grand old park. The Count returned to France in 1838, and never visited the United States again. New Jersey had welcomed the exiled monarch, and had given him certain legal privileges in property rights which New York had refused him; so he settled upon the lovely shores of the fair Delaware, and lavished his wealth upon the people of the state that had so kindly received him. The citizens of neighboring states becoming somewhat jealous of the good luck that had befallen New Jersey in her capture of the Spanish king, applied to the state the cognomen of “New Spain,” and called the inhabitants thereof “Spaniards.”
The Delaware River, the Makeriskitton of the savage, upon whose noble waters my paper canoe was now to carry me southward, has its sources in the western declivity of the Catskill Mountains, in the state of New York. It is fed by two tributary streams, the Oquago (or Coquago) and the Popacton, which unite their waters at the boundary line of Pennsylvania, at the northeast end of the state, from which it flows southward seventy miles, separating the Empire and Keystone states. When near Port Jervis, which town is connected with Rondout on the Hudson River, by the Hudson and
Delaware Canal, the Delaware turns sharply to the southwest, and becomes the boundary line between the states of New Jersey and
Pennsylvania. Below Easton the river again takes a Southeasterly course, and flowing past Trenton, Bristol, Bordentown, Burlington, Philadelphia, Camden, Newcastle, and Delaware City, empties its waters into Delaware Bay about forty miles below Philadelphia.
This river has about the same length as the Hudson — three hundred miles. The tide
reaches one hundred and thirty-two miles from the sea at Cape May and Cape Henlopen.
Philadelphia is the head of navigation for vessels of the heaviest tonnage; Trenton for light-draught steamboats. At Bordentown the river is less than half a mile wide; at Philadelphia it is three-fourths of a mile in width; while at Delaware City it widens to two miles and a half. Delaware Bay is twenty-six miles across in the widest part, which is some miles within the entrance of the Capes.
October 31st was cool and gusty. The river route to Philadelphia is twenty-nine statute miles. The passage was made against a strong head-wind, with swashy waves, which made me again regret that I did not have my canoe-decking made at Troy, instead of at Philadelphia. The
highly cultivated farms and beautiful country-seats along both the Pennsylvania and New Jersey sides of the river spoke highly of the rich character of the soil and the thrift of the inhabitants. These river counties of two states may be called a land of plenty, blessed with bountiful harvests.
Quaker industry and wise economy in
managing the agricultural affairs of this section in the early epochs of our country’s settlement have borne good fruit. All praise to the memory of William Penn of Pennsylvania and his worthy descendants. The old towns of
Bristol on the right, and Burlington on the left bank, embowered in vernal shades, have a most comfortable and home-like appearance.
At five o’clock P. M. I arrived at the city pier opposite the warehouse of Messrs. C. P. Knight & Brother, No. 114 South Delaware Avenue, where, after a struggle with wind and wave for eight hours, the canoe was landed and deposited with the above firm, the gentlemen of which kindly offered to care for it while I tarried in the “City of Brotherly Love.”
Among the many interesting spots hallowed by memories of the past in which Philadelphia abounds, and which are rarely sought out by visitors, two especially claim the attention of the naturalist. One is the old home of
William Bartram, on the banks of the Schuylkill at Grey’s Ferry; the other, the grave of Alexander Wilson, friends and co-laborers in nature’s extended field; — the first a botanist, the second the father of American ornithology.
William Bartram, son of the John Bartram who was the founder of the Botanic Garden on the west bank of the Schuylkill, was born at that interesting spot in 1739. All botanists are familiar with the results of his patient labors and his pioneer travels in those early days, through the wilderness of what now constitutes the southeastern states. One who visited him at his home says: “Arrived at the botanist’s garden, we approached an old man who, with a rake in his hand, was breaking the clods of earth in a tulip-bed. His hat was old, and flapped over his Etee; his coarse shirt was seen near his neck, as he wore no cravat nor kerchief; his waistcoat and breeches were both of leather, and his shoes were tied with leather strings. We approached and accosted him. He ceased his work, and entered into conversation with the ease and politeness of nature’s nobleman. His
countenance was expressive of benignity and happiness. This was the botanist, traveller and philosopher we had come to see.”
William Bartram gave important assistance and encouragement to the friendless Scotch pedagogue, Alexander Wilson, while the latter was preparing his American Ornithology for the press. This industrious and peaceable botanist died within the walls of his dearly-loved home a few minutes after he had penned a description of a plant. He died in 1823, in the eighty-fifth year of his age. The old house of John and William Bartram remains nearly the same as when the last Bartram died, but the grounds have been occupied and improved by the present proprietor, whose fine mansion is near the old residence of the two botanists.
Without ample funds to enable him to carry out his bold design, Alexander Wilson labored and suffered in body and mind for several years, until his patient and persistent efforts achieved the success they so richly merited. All but the last volume of his American Ornithology were completed when the overworked naturalist died.
The old Swedes’ Church is the most ancient religious edifice in Philadelphia, and is located near the wharves in the vicinity of Christian and Swanson streets, in the old district of Southwark. The Swedes had settlements on the Delaware before Penn visited America. They built a wooden edifice for worship in 1677, on the spot where the brick “Swedes’ Church” now stands, and which was erected in 1700.
Threading narrow streets, with the stenographic reporter of the courts, Mr. R. A. West, for my guide, we came into a quiet locality where the ancient landmark reared its steeple, like the finger of faith pointing heavenward. Few indeed must be the fashionable Christians who worship under its unpretentious roof, but there is an air of antiquity surrounding it which interests every visitor who enters its venerable doorway.
The church-yard is very contracted in area yet there is room for trees to grow within its sacred precincts, and birds sometimes rest there while pursuing their flight from the Schuylkill to the Delaware. Among the crowded graves is a square brick structure, covered with an horizontal slab of white marble, upon which I read:
“THIS MONUMENT COVER5 THE REMAINS OF
ALEXANDER WILSON,
AUTHOR OF THE AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY.
HE WAS BORN IN RENFREWSHIRE, SCOTLAND, ON THE 6 JULY, 1766;
EMIGRATED TO THE UNITED STATES IN THE YEAR 1794;
AND DIED IN PHILADELPHIA, OF THE DYSENTERY,
ON THE 23 AUGUST, 1813, AGED 47.
Ingenio stat sine morte decus.”
Philadelphia has been called the, “city of homes,” and well does she merit that
comfortably sounding title, for it is not a misnomer. Unlike some other large American cities, the artisan and laborer can here own a home by becoming a member of a building association and paying the moderate periodical dues. Miles upon miles of these cosy little houses, of five or six rooms each, may be found, the inmates of which are a good and useful class of citizens, adding strength to the city’s discipline and government.
The grand park of three thousand acres, one of, if not the largest in the world, is near at hand, where the poor as well as the rich can resort at pleasure. I took leave of the beautiful and well laid-out city with a pang of regret not usual with canoeists, who find it best for their comfort and peace of mind to keep with their dainty crafts away from the heterogeneous and not over-civil population which gathers along the water-fronts of a port.
CHAPTER VII. PHILADELPHIA TO CAPE HENLOPEN.
DESCENT OF DELAWARE RIVER. — MY FIRST CAMP. — BOMBAY HOOK. — MURDERKILL CREEK. — A STORM IN DELAWARE BAY. — CAPSIZING OF THE CANOE. — A SWIM FOR LIFE. — THE PERSIMMON GROVE. — WILLOW GROVE INN. — THE LIGHTS OF CAPES MAY AND HENLOPEN.
Monday, November 9, was a cold, wet
day. Mr. Knight and the old,
enthusiastic gunsmith-naturalist of the city, Mr. John Krider, assisted me to embark in my now
decked, provisioned, and loaded canoe. The stock of condensed food would easily last me a month, while the blankets and other parts of the outfit were good for the hard usage of four or five months. My friends shouted adieu as the little craft shot out from the pier and rapidly descended the river with the strong ebb-tide which for two hours was in her favor. The anchorage of the iron Monitor fleet at League Island was soon passed, and the great city sank into the gloom of its smoke and the clouds of rainy mist which enveloped it.
This pull was an exceedingly dreary one. The storms of winter were at hand, and even along the watercourses between Philadelphia and Norfolk, Virginia, thin ice would soon be forming in the shallow coves and creeks. It would be necessary to exert all my energies to get south of Hatteras, which is located on the North Carolina coast in a region of storms and local disturbances. The canoe, though heavily laden, behaved well. I now enjoyed the advantages resulting from the possession of the new canvas deck-cover, which, being fastened by buttons along each gunwale of the canoe, securely covered the boat, so that the occasional swash sent aboard by wicked tug-boats and large schooners did not annoy me or wet my precious cargo.
By two o’clock P. M. the rain and wind caused me to seek shelter at Mr. J. C. Beach’s cottage, at Markus Hook, some twenty miles below
Philadelphia, and on the same side of the river. While Mr. Beach was varnishing the little craft, crowds of people came to feel of the canoe, giving it the usual punching with their finger-nails, “to see if it were truly paper.” A young Methodist minister with his pretty wife came also to satisfy their curiosity on the paper question, but the dominie offered me not a word of
encouragement in my undertaking. He shook his head and whispered to his wife: “A wild, wild enterprise indeed.” Markus Hook derived its name from Markee, an Indian chief, who sold it to the civilized white man for four barrels of whiskey.
The next morning, in a dense fog, I followed the shores of the river, crossing the Pennsylvania and Delaware boundary line half a mile below the “Hook;” and entered Delaware, the little state of three counties. Thirty-five miles below, the water becomes salt. Reaching New Castle, which contained half its present number of inhabitants before Philadelphia was founded, I pulled across to the New Jersey side of the river and skirted the marshy shore past the little Pea Patch Island, upon which rises in sullen dreariness Fort Delaware. West of the Island is Delaware City, where the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, fourteen miles in length, has one of its termini, the other being on a river which empties into Chesapeake Bay. Philadelphia and Baltimore steamboat lines utilize this canal in the passage of their boats from one city to the other.
After crossing Salem Cove, and passing its southern point, Elsinborough, five miles and a half below Fort Delaware, the inhospitable marshes became wide and desolate, warning me to secure a timely shelter for the night. Nearly two miles below Point Elsinborough the high reeds were divided by a little creek, into which I ran my canoe, for upon the muddy bank could be seen a deserted, doorless fish-cabin, into which I moved my blankets and provisions, after cutting with my pocket-knife an ample supply of dry reeds for a bed. Drift-wood, which a friendly tide had deposited around the shanty, furnished the material for my fire, which lighted up the dismal hovel most cheerfully. And thus I kept house in a comfortable manner till morning, being well satisfied with the progress I had made that day in traversing the shores of three states. The booming of the guns of wild-fowl shooters out upon the water roused me before dawn, and I had ample time before the sun arose to prepare breakfast from the remnant of canned ox-tail soup left over from last night’s supper.
I was now in Delaware Bay, which was assuming noble proportions. From my camp I crossed to the west shore below Reedy Island, and, filling my water-bottles at a farm-house, kept upon that shore all day. The wind arose, stirring up a rough sea as I approached Bombay Hook, where the bay is eight miles wide. I tried to land upon the salt marshes, over the edges of which the long, low seas were breaking, but failed in several attempts. At last roller after roller, following in quick succession, carried the little craft on their crests to the land, and packed her in a thicket of high reeds.
I quickly disembarked, believing it useless to attempt to go further that day. About an eighth of a mile from the water, rising out of the salt grass and reeds, was a little mound, covered by trees and bushes, into which I conveyed my cargo by the back-load, and then easily drew the light canoe over the level marsh to the camp. A bed of reeds was soon cut, into which the canoe was settled to prevent her from being strained by the occupant at night, for I was determined to test the strength of the boat as sleeping-quarters. Canoes built for one person are generally too light for such occupancy when out of water. The tall fringe of reeds which encircled the boat formed an excellent substitute for chamber walls, giving me all the starry blue heavens for a ceiling, and most effectually screening me from the strong wind which was blowing. As it was early when the boat was driven ashore I had time to wander down to the brook, which was a mile distant, and replenish my scanty stock of water.
With the canvas deck-cover and rubber blanket to keep off the heavy dews, the first night passed in such contracted lodgings was endurable, if not wholly convenient and agreeable. The river mists were not dispelled the next day until nine o’clock, when I quitted my warm nest in the reeds and rowed down the bay, which seemed to grow broader as I advanced. The bay was still bordered by extensive marshes, with here and there the habitation of man located upon some slight elevation of the surface. Having rowed twenty-six miles, and being off the mouth of Murderkill Creek, a squall struck the canoe and forced it on to an oyster reef, upon the sharp shells of which she was rocked for several minutes by the shallow breakers. Fearing that the paper shell was badly cut, though it was still early in the afternoon, I ascended the creek of ominous name and associations to the landing of an inn kept by Jacob Lavey, where I expected to overhaul my injured craft. To my surprise and great relief of mind there were found only a few superficial scratches upon the horn-like shellacked surface of the paper shell. To apply shellac with a heated iron to the wounds made by the oyster-shells was the work of a few minutes, and my craft was as sound as ever. The gunner’s resort, “Bower’s Beach Hotel,” furnished an excellent supper of oyster fritters, panfish, and fried pork-scrapple. Mine host, before a blazing wood fire, told me of the origin of the name of Murderkill Creek.
“In the early settlement of the country,” began the innkeeper, “the white settlers did all they could to civilize the Indians, but the cussed savages wouldn’t take to it kindly, but worried the life out of the new-comers. At last a great landed proprietor, who held a big grant of land in these parts, thought he’d settle the troubles. So he planted a brass cannon near the creek, and invited all the Indians of the neighborhood to come and hear the white man’s Great Spirit talk. The crafty man got the savages before the mouth of the cannon, and said, ‘Now look into the hole there, for it is the mouth of the white man’s Great Spirit, which will soon speak in tones of thunder.’ The fellow then touched off the gun, and knocked half the devils into splinters. The others were so skeerd at the big voice they had heard that they were afraid to move, and were soon all killed by one charge after another from the cannon: so the creek has been called Murderkill ever since.”
I afterwards discovered that there were other places on the coast which had the same legend as the one told me by the innkeeper. Holders of small farms lived in the vicinity of this tavern, but the post-office was at Frederica, five miles inland. Embarking the next day, I felt sure of ending my cruise on Delaware Bay before night, as the quiet morning exhibited no signs of rising winds. The little pilot town of Lewes, near Cape Delaware, and behind the Breakwater, is a port of refuge for storm-bound vessels. From this village I expected to make a portage of six miles to Love Creek, a tributary of Rehoboth Sound. The frosty nights were now exerting a sanitary influence over the malarial districts which I had entered, and the unacclimated canoeist of northern birth could safely pursue his journey, and sleep at night in the swamps along the fresh-water streams if protected from the dews by a rubber or canvas covering. My hopes of reaching the open sea that night were to be drowned, and in cold water too; for that day, which opened so calmly and with such smiling promises, was destined to prove a season of trial, and before its evening shadows closed around me, to witness a severe struggle for life in the cold waters of Delaware Bay.
An hour after leaving Murderkill Creek the wind came from the north in strong squalls. My little boat taking the blasts on her quarter, kept herself free of the swashy seas hour after hour. I kept as close to the sandy beach of the great marshes as possible, so as to be near the land in case an accident should happen. Mispillion Creek and a light-house on the north of its mouth were passed, when the wind and seas struck my boat on the port beam, and continually crowded her ashore. The water breaking on the hard, sandy beach of the marshy coast made it too much of a risk to attempt a landing, as the canoe would be smothered in the swashy seas if her head way was checked for a moment.
Amidships the canoe was only a few inches out of water, but her great sheer, full bow, and smoothness of hull, with watchful management, kept her from swamping. I had struggled along for fourteen miles since morning, and was fatigued by the strain consequent upon the continued manoeuvring of my boat through the rough waves. I reached a point on Slaughter Beach, where the bay has a width of nearly nineteen miles, when the tempest rose to such a pitch that the great raging seas threatened every moment to wash over my canoe, and to force me by their violence close into the beach. To my alarm, as the boat rose and fell upon the waves, the heads of sharp-pointed stakes appeared and disappeared in the broken waters. They were the stakes of
fishermen to which they attach their nets in the season of trout-fishing. The danger of being impaled on one of these forced me off shore again.
There was no undertow; the seas being driven over shoals were irregular and broken. At last my sea came. It rolled up without a crest, square and formidable. I could not calculate where it would break, but I pulled for life away from it towards the beach upon which the sea was breaking with deafening sound. It was only for a moment that I beheld the great brown wave, which bore with it the mud of the shoal, bearing down upon me; for the next, it broke astern, sweeping completely over the canoe from stern to stem, filling it through the opening of the canvas round my body. Then for a while the watery area was almost smooth, so completely had the great wave levelled it. The canoe being water-logged, settled below the surface, the high points of the ends occasionally emerging from the water. Other heavy seas followed the first, one of which striking me as high as my head and shoulders, turned both the canoe and canoeist upside-down.
A Capsize in Delaware Bay (100K)
Kicking myself free of the canvas deck, I struck out from under the shell, and quickly rose to the surface. It was then that the words of an author of a European Canoe Manual came to my mind: “When you capsize, first right the canoe and get astride it over one end, keeping your legs in the water; when you have crawled to the well or cockpit, bale out the boat with your hat.” Comforting as these instructions from an experienced canoe traveller seemed when reading them in my hermitage ashore, the present application of them (so important a principle in Captain Jack Bunsby’s log of life) was in this emergency an impossibility; for my hat had disappeared with the seat-cushion and one iron outrigger, while the oars were floating to leeward with the canoe.
The boat having turned keel up, her great sheer would have righted her had it not been for the cargo, which settled itself on the canvas deck-cloth, and ballasted the craft in that position. So smooth were her polished sides that it was impossible to hold on to her, for she rolled about like a slippery porpoise in a tideway. having tested and proved futile the kind suggestions of writers on marine disasters, and feeling very stiff in the icy water, I struck out in an almost exhausted condition for the shore. Now a new experience taught me an interesting lesson. The seas rolled over my head and shoulders in such rapid succession, that I found I could not get my head above water to breathe, while the sharp sand kept in suspension by the agitated water scratched my face, and filled my eyes, nostrils, and ears. While I felt this pressing down and burying tendency of the seas, as they broke upon my head and shoulders, I understood the reason why so many good
swimmers are drowned in attempting to reach the shore from a wreck on a shoal, when the wind, though blowing heavily, is in the victim’s favor. The land was not over an eighth of a mile away, and from it came the sullen roar of the breakers, pounding their heavy weight upon the sandy shingle. As its booming thunders or its angry, swashing sound increased, I knew I was rapidly nearing it, but, blinded by the boiling waters, I could see nothing.
At such a moment do not stop to make vows as to how you will treat your neighbor in future if once safely landed, but strike out, fight as you never fought before, swallowing as little water as possible, and never relaxing an energy or yielding a hope. The water shoaled; my feet felt the bottom, and I stood up, but a roller laid me flat on my face. Up again and down again, swimming and crawling, I emerged from the sea, bearing, I fear, a closer resemblance to Jonah
(being at last pitched on shore) than to Cabnel’s Venus, who was borne gracefully upon the rosy crests of the sky-reflecting waves to the soft bed of sparkling foam awaiting her.
Wearily dragging myself up the hard shingle, I stood and contemplated the little streams of water pouring from my woollen clothes. A new danger awaited me as the cold wind whistled down the barren beach and across the desolate marshes. I danced about to keep warm, and for a moment thought that my canoe voyage had come to an unfortunate termination. Then a buoyant feeling succeeded the moment’s
depression, and I felt that this was only the first of many trials which were necessary to prepare me for the successful completion of my
undertaking. But where was the canoe, with its provisions that were to sustain me, and the charts which were to point out my way through the labyrinth of waters she was yet to traverse? She had drifted near the shore, but would not land. There was no time to consider the propriety of again entering the water. The struggle was a short though severe one, and I dragged my boat ashore.
Everything was wet excepting what was most needed, — a flannel suit, carefully rolled in a water-proof cloth. I knew that I must change my wet clothes for dry ones, or perish. This was no easy task to perform, with hands benumbed and limbs paralyzed with the cold. O shade of Benjamin Franklin, did not one of thy kinsmen, in his wide experience as a traveller, foresee this very disaster, and did he not, when I left the “City of Brotherly Love,” force upon me an antidote, a sort of spiritual fire, which my New England temperance principles made me refuse to accept? “It is old, very old,” he whispered, as he slipped the flask into my coat- pocket, “and it may save your life. Don’t be foolish. I have kept it well bottled. It is a pure article, and cost sixteen dollars per gallon. I use it only for medicine.” I found the flask; the water had not injured it. A small quantity was taken, when a most favorable change came over my entire system, mental as well as physical, and I was able to throw off one suit and put on another in the icy wind, that might, without the stimulant, have ended my voyage of life.
I had doctored myself homoeopathically under the old practice. Filled with feelings of gratitude to the Great Giver of good, I reflected, as I carried my wet cargo into the marsh, upon the wonderful effects of my friend’s medicine when taken only as medicine. Standing upon the cold beach and gazing into the sea, now lashed by the wild frenzy of the wind, I determined never again to do so mean a thing as to say a
word against good brandy.
Having relieved my conscience by this just resolve, I transported the whole of my wet but still precious cargo to a persimmon grove, on a spot of firm land that rose out of the marsh, where I made a convenient wind-break by
stretching rubber blankets between trees. On this knoll I built a fire, obtaining the matches to kindle it from a water-proof safe presented to me by Mr. Epes Sargent, of Boston, some years before, when I was ascending the St. Johns River, Florida.
Before dusk, all things not spoiled by the water were dried and secreted in the tall sedge of the marshes. The elevation which had given me friendly shelter is known as “Hog Island.” The few persimmon-trees that grew upon it furnished an ample lunch, for the frosts had mellowed the plum-like fruit, making it sweet and edible. The persimmon (Diospyrus
Virginiana) is a small tree usually found in the middle and southern states. Coons and other animals feast upon its fruit. The deepening gloom warned me to seek comfortable quarters for the night.
Two miles up the strand was an old gunners’ inn, to which I bent my steps along Slaughter Beach, praying that one more day’s effort would take me out of this bleak region of ominous names. A pleasant old gentleman, Mr. Charles Todd, kept the tavern, known as Willow Grove Hotel, more for amusement than for profit. I said nothing to him about the peculiar manner in which I had landed on Slaughter Beach; but to his inquiry as to where my boat was, and what kind of a boat it was to live in such a blow, I replied that I found it too wet and cold on the bay to remain there, and too rough to proceed to Cape Henlopen, and there being no alternative, I was obliged to land much against my inclination, and in doing so was drenched to the skin, but had managed to get dry before a fire in the marshes. So the kind old man piled small logs in the great kitchen fireplace, and told me tale upon tale of his life as a schoolmaster out west; of the death of his wife there, and of his desire to return, after long years of absence, to his native Delaware, where he could be comfortable, and have all the clams, oysters, fish, and bay truck generally that a man could wish for.
“Now,” he added, “I shall spend my last days here in peace.” He furnished an excellent supper of weak-fish or sea trout (Otolithus regalio), fried oysters, sweet potatoes, &c.
This locality offers a place of retirement for men of small means and limited ambition. The broad bay is a good sailing and fishing ground, while the great marshes are the resort of many birds. The light, warm soil responds generously to little cultivation. After a day of hunting and fishing, the new-comer can smoke his pipe in peace, to the music of crackling flames in the wide old fireplace. Here he may be
comfortable, and spend his last days quietly vegetating, with no criticisms on his deterioration, knowing that he is running to seed no faster than his neighbors.
The wind had gone to rest with the sun, and the sharp frost that followed left its congealed breath upon the shallow pools of water nearly half an inch in thickness by morning. From my bed I could see through the window the bright flashes from Cape May and Cape
Henlopen lights. Had not misfortune beset me, a four-hours’ pull would have landed me at Lewes. There was much to be thankful for, however. Through a merciful Providence it was my privilege to enjoy a soft bed at the Willow Grove Inn, and not a cold one on the sands of Slaughter Beach. So ended my last day on Delaware Bay.
CHAPTER VIII. FROM CAPE HENLOPEN TO NORFOLK, VIRGINIA
THE PORTAGE TO LOVE CREEK. — THE DELAWARE WHIPPINGPOST. — REHOBOTH AND INDIAN RIVER BAYS. — A PORTAGE TO LITTLE ASSAWAMAN BAY. — ISLE OF WIGHT BAY. — WINCHESTER PLANTATION. — CHINCOTEAGUE. — WATCHAPREAGUE INLET. — COBB’S ISLAND. — CHERRYSTONE. — ARRIVAL AT NORFOLK. — THE “LANDMARK’S” ENTERPRISE.
My first thought the next morning was of the lost outrigger, and how I should replace it. My host soon solved the problem for me. I was to drive to the scene of the late disaster in his light, covered wagon, load it with the canoe and cargo, and take the shortest route to Love Creek, six miles from Lewes, stopping on the way at a blacksmith’s for a new outrigger. We drove over sandy roads, through forests of pine and oak, to the village of Milton, where a curious crowd gathered round us and facetiously asked if we had “brought the canoe all the way from Troy in that ‘ere wagon.” The village smith, without removing the paper boat from her snug quarters, made a fair outrigger in an hour’s time, when we continued our monotonous ride through the dreary woods to a clearing upon the banks of a cedar swamp, where in a cottage lived Mr. George Webb, to whom Bob Hazzle, my driver, presented me. Having now reached Love Creek, I deposited my canoe with Mr. Webb, and started off for Lewes to view the town and the ocean.
Across the entrance of Delaware Bay, from Cape Henlopen Light to Cape May Light on the southern end of New Jersey, is a distance of twelve statute miles. Saturday night and Sunday were passed in Lewes, which is situated inside of Cape Henlopen, and behind the celebrated stone breakwater which was constructed by the government. This port of refuge is much frequented by coasters, as many as two or three hundred sails collecting here during a severe gale. The government is building a
remarkable pier of solid iron spiles, three abreast, which, when completed, will run out seventeen
hundred feet into the bay, and reach a depth of twenty-three feet of water. Captain Brown, of the Engineers, was in charge of the work. By the application of a jet of water, forced by an hydraulic pump through a tube down the outside of the spile while it is being screwed into the sand, a puddling of the same is kept up, which relieves the strain upon the screw-flanges, and saves fourteen-fifteenths of the time and labor usually expended by the old method of inserting the screw spile. This invention was a happy thought of Captain Brown.
The government has purchased a piece of land at Lewes for the site of a fort. Some time in the future there will be a railroad terminating on the pier, and coal will be brought directly from the mines to supply the fleets which will gather within the walls of the Breakwater. Here, free from all danger of an ice blockade, this port will become a safe and convenient harbor and coaling station during the winter time for government and other vessels.
At dusk on Sunday evening the collector of the port, Captain Lyons, and his friends, took me in their carriage back to Love Creek, where Mr. Webb insisted upon making me the
recipient of his hospitality for the night. A little crowd of women from the vicinity of the swamp were awaiting my arrival to see the canoe. One ancient dame, catching sight of the alcohol-stove which I took from my vest-pocket, clapped her thin hands and enthusiastically exclaimed, “What a nice thing for a sick-room-the best nuss-lamp I ever seed!” Having satisfied the curiosity of these people, and been much amused by their quaint remarks, I was quietly smuggled into Mr. Webb’s “best room,” where, if my spirit did not make feathery flights, it was not the fault of the downy bed in whose unfathomable depths I now lost myself.
Before leaving Delaware I feel it an imperative duty to the public to refer to one of her time-honored institutions.
Persons unacquainted with the fact will find it difficult to believe that one state of the great American Republic still holds to the practice of lashing men and women, white and black. Delaware — one of the smallest states of the Union, the citizens of which are proverbially generous and hospitable, a state which has produced a Bayard — is, to her shame we regret to say, the culprit which sins against the spirit of civilization in this nineteenth century, one hundred years after the fathers of the Republic declared equal rights for all men. In treating of so delicate a subject, I desire to do no one injustice; therefore I will let a native of Delaware speak for his community.
“DOVER, DELAWARE, August 2, 1873.