Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 November 1883 — A Norwegian Sea-Dog. [ARTICLE]

A Norwegian Sea-Dog.

He was a wild-looking fellow, our pilot, and an artist in search of character sketches would have greeted his appearance with delight. A tall, thin body, clad in worn, patched clothes, that were all too light and thin for seafaring work, even in summer time. Above the body a gaunt and almost haggard face, that was scarred with deep lines in the upper part and covered with a tangled bed of tow-like hair in the lower portion, as liungrylooking, half-clothed a specimen of humanity as it would be easy to pick up, even upon the coast of Norway. Yet he had a bright, keen eye, a steady hand at the tiller, and the way in which he ejaculated the few orders he had to give ah owed that knowledge of hi* work had not been starved or frozen out of him. He would, I am sure, have been a first-rate man for a vessel in distress, from the prompt and efficient manner in which he repaired his own deficiencies. His work had not been finished half an hour before the forecastle was literally astounded at the capacity for stowing away provisions that he displayed. The style in which he could gulp down half a tumbler of rum was as refreshing to a looker-on as the liquor evidently was to himself, and as he went over the ship’s side, buttoning up an old pilot-coat that had been found for his benefit, it was evident that his poverty and not his will compelled him to put up with scanty raiment. It is better to be a pilot in Sweden than in Norway, to judge from waist measurement and outer clothing.