crossing the Atlantic in a schooner of two hundred tons, in
presence of those who have more than once reached the Indian
Ocean in a fishing-smack of fifty, and have beaten in the
homeward race the ships in whose company they sailed! It is not
many years since there was here a fishing-skipper, whose surname
was "Daredevil," and who sailed from this port to all parts of
the world, on sealing voyages, in a sloop so small that she was
popularly said to go under water when she got outside the lights,
and never to reappear until she reached her port.

And not only those who sail on long voyages, but even our local
pilots and fishermen, still lead an adventurous and untamed life,
less softened than any other by the appliances of modern days. In
their undecked boats they hover day and night along these stormy
coasts, and at any hour the beating of the long-roll upon the
beach may call their full manhood into action. Cowardice is
sifted and crushed out from among them by a pressure so constant;
and they are withal truthful and steady in their ways, with few
vices and many virtues. They are born poor, and remain poor, for
their work is hard, with more blanks than prizes; but their life
is a life for a man, and though it makes them prematurely old,
yet their old age comes peacefully and well. In almost all
pursuits the advance of years brings something forlorn. It is not
merely that the body decays, but that men grow isolated and are
pushed aside; there is no common interest between age and youth.
The old farmer leads a lonely existence, and ceases to meet his
compeers except on Sunday; nobody consults him; his experience
has been monotonous, and his age is apt to grow unsocial. The old
mechanic finds his tools and his methods superseded by those of
younger men. But the superannuated fisherman graduates into an