Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 November 1875 — “Mother’s Boy” at Sea. [ARTICLE]

“Mother’s Boy” at Sea.

Barry’ was a duckling who sometimes preferred staying in tte water. I don’t know what Barry thought about it, but his mother often felt that “ Mother’s Boy” was growing out* of her reach. He had been broughfup at her side. It gave her a little pang to see him reStive when she tried to keep him there. And it must be said that when Barry climbed up to the ledge called the “White Boar,” and sat looking off on the ocean, he had a vague longing to be out qn that lovely sheet of water, shining in the 'sun, tuhibling into bright green waves, and stretching so far, so far down te Xhe sunset, where the red rays blurred ouvlhe. horizon. Somewhere beyond that crystal gate in the south was his father’s big ship—sailing among the spice islands, maybe; or gliding by shores where strange birds and

beasts and painted savages were dotted along, as in the pictures of a geography. The Sagadunk fishermen used th go out of the harbor early in the morning and re-, turn late at night. Barry sometimes saw them from his chamber window as he dressed himself at sunrise. They spread their sails like wings; the soil morning breeze sprang up; and so they sailed away ana disappeared down the far-off horizon. They seined to sail into the sky. One day Barry privately inquired of “ Old Kutch,” who was a famous fisherman of Sagadunk, if he ever saw his father’s ship, the Flying Fish, out at sea. The old fisherman said: “Never, so far as I know’ed of,” which was not satisfactory to Master Barry. He thought . “ Old Kutch” must see the whole world when he got below that dim horizon. “ I know my papa’s ship, and if I w’ere to go with you 1 might show her to you, and find my papa,” said Barry. Old Kutch laughed. “ But your mar, wouldn’t let you go so far away, my little man.” Barry’s countenance fell, but he explained : “She would be so glad if I brought back my P a P a that she wouldn’t care if I did go without her knowing it.” Barry was on dangerous ground for “ Mother’s Boy.” After many mysterious talks and movements, which took several days, Old Kutch agreed that Master Barry should get up early some fine morning and steal away to the boat at the wharf. At night Barry scarcely slept aS all; and when he dreamed it was of curious and often frightful sights in foreign lands. When day broke he w r as in such haste that he scarcely dressed himself. He might have gone out at the door; but, creeping past his mother’s chamber, he got out by the hall-window, stole down through the orchard, scrambled over the stone-wall, slid down the bank, and was soon on board the Polly Ann, commanded by Capt. Kutch. It was a great adventure. He was going to sea in search of his father. His heart was a little heavy when he looked back at the old farm-house where he had left his mother. But the Polly Ann was under way, and, with a curious sort of feeling in his throat, he watched the village fade away. He was at sea. It would not be pleasant for me to tell you of all the troubles that befell Master Barry that day. In the first place 'he was very hungry; and he ate a great deal of a nice luncheon which one of the fishermen produced from a big basket . strangely 1 ike one of his mamma’s. Then, when he had satisfied his hunger, his luncheon did not agree with him at all. He felt very queer. Everything seemed going around. His stpmach was all in a whirl. He was seasick, and he lost all interest in what was going on about him. The Polly Ann was very lively, and, although she was anchored on the fishing-grounds, she bounced about at a great rate. The sun was hot, and, as Barry looked over the edge of the bulwark where lie lay, he saw nothing but horrid, tumbling waves everywhere. - No land in sight, unless a low cloud on the dull, gray horizon were land. He w r as homesick; and if hi cried silently behind the ill-smelling tarpaulin that screened him I do not think any of my boy-readers should laugh at him. I have been in just such a plight, and probably did just as Barry did. What was w-orse, there was no sign of the Flying Fish, or anything that looked like her. Once in a while, a brown sail crept up from the horizon, drifted along against the sky, and melted away into the dim distance. It w r as “a down-East coaster, loaded with lime,” Old Kutch would say, unless he was too busy with his fish to say anything. Barry only wanted to get home once more. t . “ Oh, what will my poor, dear mamma say?” he moaned. v “ Y r ou oughter thought of that afore,” Capt. Kutch made answer. And so he should have. Meantime, was Mrs. Dingle going up and down the beach, crying out for her “Mother’s Boy?” Strange to say, she was doing nothing of the sort. She sat at the gable window that overlooked the sea, and, as she sewed or read, she glanced out over the sapphire w’aters of the bay and over the shining waves that rippled toward the sunset as brightly and silvery as though there were no such thing as seasickness and discomfort in all the world. She was possibly thinking of the hen and her willful duckling. That night, when the stars came out and the Polly Ann drifted up Sagadunk harbor, the most tired,"weary and homesick little chap you ever heardof scrambled out into the small boat which was to take him ashore. Mrs. Dingle, somehow, happened to be on the landing; and when Barry jumped into her arms and cried: “ I couldn’t find papa!” she only hugged him tight and whispered: “Mother’s Boy.” It seemed an age to Barty since he had been gone. The familiar little bed, with its blue-and-white check cover, looked like an old friend from foreign parts; and the hollyhocks in the parlor fire-place were fresher and brighter by candle-light than any hollyhocks he ever saw. I need not tell you how Barry settled affairs with his mamma. When he found Old Kutch, after that, one leisure day ashore, that venerable skipper asked him when he proposed going again on a voyage of discovery. Barry replied: “ I shall not be so naughty and run away again, for I am ‘ Mother’s Boy,’ you see.” “ Why, she knowed it all the time.” And so she did; and when she let Barry go off in charge of Old Kutch she was trying two experiments—one bn herself and one on “ Mother’s Boy.” — Cyrus Martin, Jr., in St. Nicholas for November.

Of the 1,200,000,000 human beings inhabiting the globe, 360,000,000 have no paper nor any writing material of any kind. Five hundred millions of the Mongolian races use a paper made from the stalks and leaves of plants; 10,000,000 employ for graphic purposes tablets of woods; 130,000,000—the Persians, Hindoos, Armenians and Syrians—have paper jnade from cotton, while the remaining 300,000,000 use ■the ordinary staple. The annual consumption of this latter number is estimated at 1,800,000,000 pounds, an average of six pounds to a person, which h;is increased from two and a half pounds during the last fifty years. To produce this amount of paper, 200,000,000 pounds of woolen rags, 800,000,000 pounds of cotton rags, straw, wood and other materials are yearly consumed. The paper is manufactured in 3,960 paper mills, employing 90;000 male and 180,000 female laborers. The proportionate amounts manufactured of the different kinds of papers are stated to be, of writing paper 300,000,000 poynds; of printing paper, 900,000,000 pounds; of wall paper, 400,000,000 pounds, and 200,000,000 pounds of cartoons, blotting paper, etc. — Rowell's Newspaper Reporter. It’s a bad omen to owe men.