Robert M Ballantyne

The Coral Island Robert M Ballantyne

IT was a bright, beautiful, warm day when our ship spread her canvas to the breeze, and sailed for the regions of the south. Oh, how my heart bounded with delight as I listened to the merry chorus of the sailors, while they hauled at the ropes and got in the anchor! The captain shouted; the men ran to obey; the noble ship bent over to the breeze, and the shore gradually faded from my view, while I stood looking on with a kind of feeling that the whole was a delightful dream. The first thing that struck me as being different from anything I had yet seen during my short career on the sea, was the hoisting of the anchor on deck and lashing it firmly down with ropes, as if we had now bid adieu to the land for ever, and would require its services no more. "There, lass," cried a broad-shouldered jacktar, giving the fluke of the anchor a hearty slap with his hand after the housing was completed-"there, lass, take a good nap now, for we shan't ask you to kiss the mud again for many a long day to come!" And so it was. That anchor did not "kiss the mud" for many long days afterwards; and when at last it did, it was for the last time!