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\ the “Polares,” the star he was watching for.
NUMBER 26.
OLMSTEAD & C0., PUBLISHERS.
GEORGE TREVANION; THE YOUNG MID-
SHIPMAN,
About the year 1841, a fine merchantman, of
1,000 tons, named the “Antelope,” returning from
the South Seas, was ‘steering up the Atlantic
under a heavy press of sail, with very heavy over-
cast weather. She was somewhere in the latitude
of Cape Ortegal, the southern cape of the Bay of
Biscay, but the sky having been clouded for many
days, there had been. no possibility of taking the
meridian altitude of the sun, and, as the nights had
been as beclouded as the days, there had been as
little opportunity for taking an observation.
The ship was running for the British Channel
before a hard south-west gale, and it was of con-
siderable importance that she should reach some
port in England without delay, for her captain was
not only charged with dispatches that required im-
mediate delivery, but the ship itself was short of
provisions, and almost without that necessary arti-
cle, water. The only chronometer on board hap-
pened not to be very good, and the sky had been
overcast for more than a week, hence the captain
was uncertain of his longitude to the extent of a
degree at least, and as it was a dangerous thing to
run for land in stormy weather, when the ship’s
place was not known, he was extremely nervous.
He did not like to lose a magnificent wind, before
which the ship spun along at the rate of ten knots
an hour, under a reefed topsail, and close-reefed
maintopsail. While daylight lasted it was pretty
safe to go on, but as soon as the dull and dreary
« night set in, amidst the doubts and difficulties of
channel navigation, it seemed highly advisable for
.the-ship to lay.te, and wait for: the daylight... She
was accordingly brought into a proper position, and
her course was stopped for the night. The captain
~ went to his berth, and the ship being put under the
charge of the mate, all was considered settled for
the night.
But while all were sleeping or watching upon
deck, there was a young midshipman, George Tre-
yanion, not quite seventeen years old, on board,
who, having been trained in practical mathematics
by Woodthorpe Collett, and in practical navigation
by Jameison, thought himself a match for the diffi-
culties of his situation. By the dim light of a lit-
tle swinging lamip, let us watch him poring over a
chart. He had thought over the whole matter
well, and felt sure that if, by any means, he could
keep in the latitude of fifty degrees, or witbin ten
or a dozen miles of either side of that parallel, the
ship would have clear ground to run over for three
degrees, of longitude at least, greatly within which
he felt sure the error of the chronometer must lie.
But how was he to determine this point with any
degree of certainty in such weather? This was
what had puzzled the captain, and this was what
was puzzling him. ;
_- After pondering and pondering away, with his
head on his hand, for some hours, he at last be-
thought him of the pole star, which is truly the
sailor’s friend, and having fixed his sextant by the
cabin light at the angle about which he knew the
latitude must give the altitude of the pole, he cast
his boat-cloak over his shoulder, went on deck, sta-
tioned himself on the larboard side of the quarter-
deck, with the instrument sheltered from the rain
and spray under his ‘cloak, and firmly grasped in
his right hand, while he kept his eye steadfastly
fixed on that part of the heavens in which he hoped,
by some momentary opening in the clouds, to de-
tect the bright star of his mighty fortunes, He
patiently waited for more than an hour before any-
“thing occurred like a chance, by which time his
limbs had become cramped and stiffened by the
constraint of one posture, while his eye ached and
throbbed in its vain attempts to pierce the thick
course of clouds sweeping past him,
At last, however, he suddenly got a glimpse of
the star, and although it glimmered so faintly
through the fleecy,mist as to be but slightly dis-
cernible, he knew, from its altitude, that it must be
The
horizon was very indistinctly seen in the dark;
nevertheless, he succeeded in bringing the star in
contact with the edge of the sea in the north,
- where, fortunately, there chanced at that moment
to occur a faint gleam in the lower atmosphere.
Uf
Wf
UYyitty
“ONLY A LIT
not more than twenty miles from the captain’s cal-
culation, and quite enough to keep the ship safe
for some hours more. But, as he rightly consid-
ered, one isolated observation, made under such
t
TLE WHILE.”
| course lay within the lines marked along the chart
; a8 a sure track, and that she might be put before
the wind with safety. Having demonstrated all
this to the mate of the ship, by a series of argu-
circumstances, could not be depended upon. Je | ments founded thereon, it was agreed to call up the
hastened upon deck again, and presently, that is | captain, and give him the results of the investiga-
within half-an-hour, caught a second sight of the | tion, with a view to have the ship put about. The
friendly “light-house” in the sky. The result | captain was, therefore, called up, and, although not
agreed with that of the first observation within five | well pleased at being woke up in the middle of his
miles, and, of course, gave him such confidence | sleep, felt it a duty to investigate the whole of the
that he communicated his success to the chief mate, calculations ; and so convinced wag he of their ac-
and urged upon him the propriety of calling up the | curacy, that he immediately gave orders to put the
He ran below as quick as a monkey, read off the
angle, computed the latitude, and found it to be
*
captain and of continuing the course homeward.
To this, however, the mate strongly objected.
“What can a boy like you determine upon?. You
must wait,” said he, “till you have eaten another
thousand pounds of pudding before you can give
an opinion,”—and advised him to go to his ham-
mock. “In such a dim night as this, and with
such an uncertain horizon,” continued he, not quite
displeased with the youngster’s p » “it is
impossible to rely upon such observations in run-
ning into the channel with such a wind; besides
which, your observations are both to the north, my
young fellow, which you know is only one side of
the question.”
“Then I will take the other side,” said the young
midshipman to himself. So he very quietly took
up his former place below, and began to fish for a
star on the southern side of the zenith, and, after
a little poking about in the ephemeris, was rejoiced
to find that a brilliant planet, Jupiter, came to the
meridian before midnight. On deck he went again,
sextant in hand, and although he possessed no
very certain means of telling “the time at ship,” he
watched resolutely for the planet, and at last
caught it for a moment, not very far from the meri-
dian, as he knew from his compass-bearing. With
a flushed cheek, and a hand trembling so that he
could scarcely hold the pencil, he worked out the
latitude, and found it to differ from the mean of
the two results by the pole star, a little more than
ten miles. A second cast at the planet, after it
had passed the meridian a few minutes, gave, when
properly reduced, a latitude which differed only
five miles from the first. Putting all these obser-
vations together, he felt certain that the ship's
ee - a
j ship before the winds, complimenting George for
| bis extraordinary cleverness and perseverance.
The ship was accordingly set free before the
wind ; a reef was shaken out of the mainsail, and
| away she went homewards, through the dullness of
the night, with perfect. confidence. Before day
| dawned she had spun over nearly a hundred miles,
| aud before midday, all on board had the satisfac-
ition of di ing the well-k Lizard Point,
| with its two light-houses shining brightly in the
, Sun, .
| This little episode in the life of George was of
| Very great importance to him, for the captain hav-
ing retired from the sea service with the comple-
tion of that voyage, the mate was put in his place,
who, confident in the nautical abilities of George,
promoted him to the office he had vacated; the
same course of steady perseverance in a few years
obtained for George the command. of the ship,
which he now holds in the esteem and confidence
of his employers.
+++
QUEEN VICTORIA AND THE BIBLE,
It was a noble and beautiful answer of the queen,
the monarch of a free people, reigning more by
love than law, because seeking to reign in the fear
of God—it was a noble answer she gave to an Afri-
can prince, who sent an embassage with costly
presents, and asked her in return to tell him the
secret of England's greatness and England’s glory}
and the beloved queen sent him, not the number
of her fleet, not the number of her armies, not the
account of her boundless merchandise, not the de-
tails of her inexhaustible wealth—she did not, like
22 SCHOOL STREET, BOSTO
Hezekiah in an evil hour, show the ambassador her
diamonds and her rich ornaments, but handing him
a beautifully bound copy of tue Bisce, she said,
“Tell the prince that this is the secret of England’s
greatness.”
——
“CAPITAL FUN,”
It was a little past twelve o'clock, and a merry
group of boys were seated on the young gras un-*
der the trees that shaded the academy play-grounds.
A‘little later they would be scattered in every: ¢y
direction at their play; but first they must attend
to the contents of the well-filled pails and baskets
where their dinners were stored away.”
“I should like to know,” said Howard Colby,
“why Joe Green never comes out here to eat his
dinner with the rest of us, but always sneaks off
somewhere till we all get through.”
“Guess he brings so many goodies he is afraid
we shall rob him,” said another. .
“Poh!” said Will Brown, throwing himself back
upon the grass, “more likely he does not bring any
thing at all. I heard my father say the family must
be badly pinched since Mr. Green was killed; and
mother said she didn’t pity them, for folks had no
business to be poor and proud.”
“Well,” said Sam Merrill, “I know Mary Green: *
asked my mother to let her have her plain sewing
to do; but then folks do that sometimes that aren’t
very poor.”
“And Joe is wearing his winter clothes all this
warm weather, and his pants are patched behind;
I saw them,” said Howard Colby, with a very com-
placent look at his new spring suit of light gray.
» 4] tell you what, boys,” said Will Drowa, “le.'s
look to-morrow and see what the old fellow does
bring, any way. You know he is always in his seat
by the time the first bell rings, and we can get a
peep into his basket and then be in season for the
rolleall.” 3. : :
The boys agreed to this, all but Ned Collis, who
had sat quietly eating his dinner and taking no part
in the conversation. Now he simply. remarked, as
he brushed the crumbs from his lap, “I can't see
what fun there will be in that, and it looks real
mean and sneaking to me. I'm sure it’s none of
our business what Joe brings for dinner, or where
he goes to eat it.”
“You're always such a granny, Ned Collins,”
said Will.Brown, contemptuously. “You've got
every one of your old aunt Sally’s notions.”
Ned could not bear to be laughed at, and it made
him a little angry to hear his kind old aunt sneered
at, but his eyes only flashed for a minute, and then
he sprang up, shouting,“Hurrah, boys, for football !”
and in five minutes the whole playground was,ia an
uproar of fun and frolic.
The next morning, at the first stroke of the bell,
a half dozen roguish faces peeped into the school-
room, and, sure enough, there was Joe Green busily
plying his pencil over the problems of the algebra
lesson. It was but the work of an instant to hurry
into the little clothes-room, and soon the whole
group were pressing round Will Brown, as he held
the mysterious basket in his hand. Among them,
in spite of the remonstrance of yesterday, was Ned
Collins, with his face fairly crimson with shame, or
something else; we shall see.
“It’s big enough to hold a day’s ration for a reg-
iment,” said Howard Colby, as Will pulled out a
nice, white napkin. Next came a whole newspaper,
a large one, too; and then in the bottom of the
basket was one poor little cold potatoe, That was
all. Will held it up with a comical grimace, and
the boys laughed and cheered as loudly as they
dared in the school-house.
“See here,” said Howard, “let’s throw it away
and fill the basket with coal and things; it will be
such fun to see him open it.”
The boys agreed, and the basket was soon filled
and the napkin placed carefully on the top, and
before the bell commenced tolling they were on
their way down stairs, me oe
Ned Collins was the last one to leave the room,
and no sooner did the last head disappear than,
al
Ve
wee a ee
ero
quick as flash, he emptied the coal into the box © *
again, replaced the paper, and half filled the basket,
large as it was, with the contents of the bright tin
pail that aunt Sally delighted to store with daintles
for her darling’s dinner. _ Ned was in his seat al-
most as soon as the rest, and all through the fore-
oe fy
