OVER THE SIDE

[Illustration: "Over the Side."]

Of all classes of men, those who follow the sea are probably the most
prone to superstition. Afloat upon the black waste of waters, at the
mercy of wind and sea, with vast depths and strange creatures below them,
a belief in the supernatural is easier than ashore, under the cheerful
gas-lamps. Strange stories of the sea are plentiful, and an incident
which happened within my own experience has made me somewhat chary of
dubbing a man fool or coward because he has encountered something he
cannot explain. There are stories of the supernatural with prosaic
sequels; there are others to which the sequel has never been published.

I was fifteen years old at the time, and as my father, who had a strong
objection to the sea, would not apprentice me to it, I shipped before the
mast on a sturdy little brig called the _Endeavour,_ bound for Riga. She
was a small craft, but the skipper was as fine a seaman as one could wish
for, and, in fair weather, an easy man to sail under. Most boys have a
rough time of it when they first go to sea, but, with a strong sense of
what was good for me, I had attached myself to a brawny, good-natured
infant, named Bill Smith, and it was soon understood that whoever hit me
struck Bill by proxy. Not that the crew were particularly brutal, but a
sound cuffing occasionally is held by most seamen to be beneficial to a
lad's health and morals. The only really spiteful fellow among them was
a man named Jem Dadd. He was a morose, sallow-looking man, of about
forty, with a strong taste for the supernatural, and a stronger taste
still for frightening his fellows with it. I have seen Bill almost
afraid to go on deck of a night for his trick at the wheel, after a few
of his reminiscences. Rats were a favourite topic with him, and he would