Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 July 1875 — Our Young Folks. [ARTICLE]

Our Young Folks.

WILD ROSE OF CAPE COD.

BY SARAH J. PRICHARD.

Nearly all the roses in Massachusetts are born in June, but Wild, the little daughter of Capt. John Rose, was born in December, and on Cajie Cod, too. Ah, what a struggle it is to live at all on Cape Cod in December. You have only a narrow strip of sand to cling to, and the Atlantic Ocean (even when it is not in a great rage) clutches away wjth one single wave of its watery hand an acre or two of sand, while the cold waters of Cape Cod Bay sweep right in on the other side, within sight, too, the arm of sand is so thin and worn and wasted away. Look on your map at the State of Massachusetts and see if I am not right about it. Well, on Cape Cod, as I sajd, Wild Rose was born; but that was twelve years ago, and so this last December was celebrated her twelfth birthday. It wasn’t much o a celebration, to be sure, for there weren’t many persons to celebrate it—only Mrs. Rose and Johnny and Wild herself, for Capt. Rose was gone on a fishing trip. At tea that night there was upon the table a big loaf of ginger-cake—“frosted,” too—and around about it—not on „it, mind you—twelve small tallow candles. “ Twelve dips,” Johnny said, “thatmade most as much light as the Highland itself.” And Johnny ought to know-, for the keeper of Cape Cod light is a great friend of Johnny’s and often in summer lets the lad go up with him to see him " light up.” This Highland Light stand® out on the bleak cape, and is oftentimes the first light that greets the sight of seamen when approaching the coast of New England from over the Atlantic Ocean. Even in summer the wind blows so hard at the Highland that it blows the wings of young turkeys over their heads, and in winter it blows nobody knows how hard. I’m quite certain that you have never seen a home like Wild Rose’s home. It is hidden away in the very bottom of a big hollow in the sand, and is protected on all sides by a high fence to keep the sand from covering it up. In the first place the house had been built upon piles driven into the sand, but the fence was afterward added, and outside of the fence was a barricade of seaweed. Over the stilts, fence, seaweed and all was the fisherman’s cabin, as snug and ivarm and comfortable as anything on Cape Cod could be. Not far away, on the Atlantic coast, w r as a Charity House, not a “ poorhouse,” where poor folks could go and live w hen they hadn’t anyw here else to live, but a rude room inclosed by a rude outside, into which a poor shipwrecked mariner might crawl and possibly save himself from freezing to death until help should arrive. Wood and matches and straw’ are supposed to be kept in every Charity House along the coast. Johnny Rose was two years younger than his only sister Wild, but a ten-year-old lad on Cape Cod knows more of the sea and ships and fishing than the wisest grown-up in the world who lives inland.

The Little Katie was Capt. Rose’s fishing schooner, and the Little Katie was frozen fast in the ice more than six weeks ago, right in sight from the land up the bank above the cabin. Tw’o weeks passed by and still the ice held the fishing-boats and would not let them go. Stout little steam-tugs went rasping away with firm bows and good intent at the ice day after day in order to break it up and tow the boats out of danger, but the cold came down stronger than ever and knit the icecakes firmer and firmer. Every day Johnny bundled up until he looked like I don’t know what, made the toilsome journey over to the Highland to look through the “ glass” at his father’s schooner, and every night for two weeks, with a face on fire from the friction of the w ind, he came back with the good news, “No signal up yet.” No signal up yet meant that there was still something left to eat and wood to burn on the Little Katie, and hope also of getting free from the ice without sinking. Now and then a neighbor came down into the hollow and walked right jn without knocking at the cabin door, to inquire how Mrs. Rose was getting on, and to say, yet again, “ Cape Cod has seen harder times than this, Mrs. Rose. Keep up a stout heart and we’ll have the fleet safe into Providence harbor before many days.” And then Mrs. Rose would put out a bright look and say, in a cheery voice, “ Oh, I hope so,” but in her heart she feared all things, for did she not know that every dwelling on Cape Cod had its widow, sooner or later ?

At last there came a clay when Mrs. Rose said that Wild might go to the light with Johnny to learn the news. The two children set oft - in high glee. The sky was clear, and the wind was blowing from the west. The Highland Lighthouse was not more than a mile away, and what cmdd happen to the children? Nevertheless, Mrs. Rose gave them many commands. They were to return as soon as they found out what news from the Little Katie, and if it should snow they were to go back or forward, whichever way should be the nearer, and if near the coast they were to go to the Charity House in the bank and wait there for rescue. The wind helped them on their way, and, to write the exact truth, blew so hard and so fast that it came very near blowing them past the light-house over the high bank into the ocean. “ It’s a tough day, a tough day, even for the Cape,” said the light-keeper when they reached the light-house, “ and the boats have drifted, johnny. For the life of me, I can’t make out the Little Katie but Johnny made het out without the slightest difficulty. Of course he did! Does not every Cape Cod boy know his father’s boat ? More than all, "there hung the signal of distress. The light-keeper saw it, and Wild looked at it, and Johnny looked again, and declared that, “ Come what would, he'd get out there and find out what the matter was.” Then the i* glass” was put away and they all went down, and the children, thoroughly warmed, started for home. A little cloud over Cape Cod Bay grew and came neare/luid spread out more and more, and. at last began to drop down white, like snow, on the “ Come! pitch into it as fast as you can while we can see,” said Johnny, seizing Wild's hand and bowing to the -wind. “ We’re three-quarters home, and we’ll make it in no time.” It was not dark and Johnny knew the sandmarks well. Here a bunch of pov-erty-grass and there a forlorn little clump of "bayberry, whose outlines he knew just as he knew the outlines of the boats and sails, served to guide him when the air was thick with snow. “ We’re lost!” said Wild, pulling back and trying to stop Johnny; the sturdy little fellow declared that they weren't lost at all; didn’t he know all about it? hadn’t he “ fogged” it many a time to the light 'andback? Why, there, right ahead, was

a pole that fa knew. Of course it was, right on top of home? and there was mother calling this minute, not fifty feet away. All of which statements w«e and in five fninutes they were safe in> the cabin and had told their news froiw the fice-boimd boats. “ Nothing to eat, maybe, and cold, perhaps. Not sick, I nope,” said Mrs. Wild; and then, in rather a dismal way, she set forth thq little table for their evening meal. , “ I should think you’d feel gladder about our getting home safe,mother,” said Wild; “ for just see how it snows.” “lam,” said Mrs. Wild; “but I w’as thinking about some way to help your father.” “ Do you think there is a way?” asked Wild. “ You know the boats can’t get there, and the ice isn’t safe.” “If I was God,” said Johnny, “I’d fetch a big wind along that ’nd cracker that ice up small as fish-scales in no time.” . « ".Yes, and sink every boat in no time!” suggested Wild, with scorn. “ Oh, dear!” said Johnny. “ I guess I was in too much of a burry; but something’s got to be done!” The wind had been blowing two hours after dark, and the snow and sand were whirling about in a • long, long round dance, after the fashion of Cape Cod sand and snow, when Wild called, out of the darkness to Johnny: “ Are you asleep ?” Johnny guessed he wasn’t asleep, although he had been fast asleep when Wild’s voice reached him, and wanted to know what was the matter. “ I’ve thought of a w r ay, I guess, we can reach, the Little Katie, Johnny.” “ How?” Johnny was up in the bed leaning on his hands, interested in a moment. " You know that big hank of net twine of father’s ?” “ What of it?”—with disappointment. “ Don’t you believe ’twould reach?” “Whose goin’ to reach it, I should like to know ?”

“ When the wind blows right ” .“ What then, Wild Rose? Are you talking in your sleep?” “ Send a kite over,” suggested Wild, not heeding the interruption. “Whew!” exclaimed Johnny, sinking down into his warm lied again. He didn’t speak, and poor Wild thought he held her scheme in extreme derision; nevertheless, Johnny was thinking about it, even after his sister was sleeping. The next day it snowed all day. There was no chance to hear one word from the fishing-fleet. Johnny declared that he must go to the nearest neighbor’s house. He knew the way well enough; but it was after nine of the clock before he set forth. Presently he returned with his friend, Peter Petit, and the two lads spent the morning with barred door in Capt. Rose’s nehroom. Wild peeped into the place when the boys w’ere out of it eating their dinner and beheld, to her amazement, the skeleton of a huge kite. . “ Oh, Johnny, are you going to try it?” she cried, running out to him. At first Johnny was vexed that she had found out, but in a minute or two he was all over the pet and was in high glee when Wild and her mother also joined in the work. An hour before the sun went down across the bay the kite was done and the snow ceased to fall. It was too late to go to the Highland Light to see the signal on the Little Katie; it was too late to do anything with the kite, even had the wind been right. The next morning the wind blew just right, and almost at break of. day the boys set forth, accomnanied by five or six men, for idlers are always to be found on Cape Cod in winter. The kite was made of good stout paper, and it w’as covered with messages to the captain of the Little Katie, or any other captain over whose boat it might chance to fall or get entangled. The wind was off shore, and away went the kite, the men paying out the seine twine, but, alas! the kite went high above the boatsand did not reach them. It was cold work flying kite on that awful, ice-bound shore, but the novelty of it brought a crowd of men to the spot. To their own surprise they entered into the work with spirit, but every attempt they made that morning failed. The kite fell short, or flew too high, or went off in the wrong direction. “ Run home, laddies, and get your dinner, and get warm clear through to your bones,” said one of the men to Johnny and Peter about eleven of the clock, “ and we’ll see what can be done with the kite this afternoon.”

When Johnny reached home he declared that he 'wasn’t cold the least mite, nor hungry an atom, but he sat in front of a blazing drift-wood fire and ate like a giant, and got up to go the coast again. Wild didn’t see why she couldn’t go too. It was her father just as much as Johnny’s, and she gueesed she cared as much about the Little Katie as any of them did. And so Wild, bundled up until all resemblance to a twelve-year-old girl was lost, set forth toiling through the snow and sand to the coast. At a short distance in the rear Mrs. Rose followed on. It seemed to her, as she drew near the shore, that half the inhabitants of the next village were gathered to see the flying of a kite. It was just ready to start on its over-ice journey when Wild came upon the scene. “ Don’t you see there won’t be anything to catch hold of?” she said to Johnny. “Catch hold of?” repeated Johnny, who felt that he could not, in justice, despise Wild’s suggestion# any more. “ I’ll show you,” she said, “if you’ll hold on a minute. Tie some long strings, now and then, near the kite, that will hang down.” The strings were tied on, half a dozen of them at intervals, and away went the kite with more “string to it” than any other kite, ever flew. “’Twon’t reach! It flies too high! No go! Let out! Give it string! Hurrah!” as the kite seeming to meet wind in another current, began to flutter, turn and actually did fall on the ice within reaching distance of the Little Katie’s crew. Then such a shout as went up from Cape Cod shore, for .was there not a line fast from one of the ice-bound boats to the firm old mainland, and did it not mean that bread at least could be drawn across the frozen sea to the famishing? !■. The men on the Little Katie were pulling in the kite, which looked a good deal worn, but still Why gathered around it, and read in Johnnv's boy-hand the w ords: “Ifyou get the Kite, "don’t pull in the string, for we’U put something to eat on it if you are hungry, and you can pull it over. Everybody’s well over here. Wild and Johnny.” , Capt. Rose read the words and then he and his crew tried to shout back, but the wind carried their voices across the bay. Within the next twenty-four hours the cord'had been doubled and food, in small packages, went along the novel roadway from hour to hour, until miles ot seinetwine lay on the deck of the Little Katie

and many loaves of.bread,wijkh small packagesof ” salt meat,” Aiigaf,”tea add coffee, had been secured from the sea. The next morning the wind blew again on Cape Cod. The inhabitants were on tlie watch for the kite, and lo! it was seen rising in the air. On, on, it came. It sailed over the .heads of the group on the shore; it went right across the “ Wrist’! of Cape Cod. It would have gone out upon the ocean but for the Highland Lighthouse, that caught and held the great fluttering bird of man. Wild and Johnny were the first toreach the light, and cry out, “ What news »” to the keeper, who had just succeeded in recovering the poor, battered kite. “ Come and see with your young eyes.” Wild and Johnny found the words: “We had nothing to eat for two days. Now we’ll weather the ice, God willing, and get in all right. We’ve supplied The Mary from our stores.” * , And there, right at the door, the first comers-, who had followed the kite, were Mrs. Rose and the friends of the men of The Many. “ Whose idee was the kite?” asked an old fisherman. “Wild’s,” shouted Johnny. “ Johnny made it, though. I couldn’t make a kite,” said Wild; but not a soul, save Johnny, heard her, for the wild air about the light was ringing with the shout of “ Long live Wild Rose of Cape Cod!”— Christian Union.