Here I must relate a tragically comic incident that took place a few days before we reached Karlshamn. We were in the Baltic, and were tacking in a northerly wind up along the east coast of Sweden. We met a number of ships coming out, bowling along at great speed in this for them favorable breeze. One morning about 4 o'clock the captain comes on deck and told us we had to look out for these China Traders, as he called all ships coming out of the Baltic loaded with lumber. 'About four o'clock, A.M.', he said, 'every man on those ships is down, drinking coffee, and then they neither see nor hear anything.' At this time it was broad daylight long before 4 o'clock.
The law of the sea is that a ship sailing as we were, but the wind, should hold its course as against any ship it meets sailing with the wind astern. Sure enough, a little after 4 o'clock, here comes a big bark booming along at great speed toward our port bow. We held our course, according to law. It appeared as if the stranger would collide with us; but it held its course. We told our captain, and he came running on deck. 'That's just what I though,' he said, 'now every man of them is drinking coffee, and they neither see nor hear.'
We got hold of a big brass trumpet, and went forward. Our men all went along, as we had figured that the stranger would hit us rather aft of midships and would probably cut us nearly in two. Our captain put the trumpet to his mouth and called as loud as he could, 'Ship ahoy,' several times. Now the stranger was so near it seemed as if collision was inevitable, and we were standing all ready, some of the men in their night clothes, to jump over on the stranger as they ran us down. Finally we saw a man coming, bare-headed, out of the cabin of the other ship, and when he saw us he grabbed the whell and swung her starboard, but not a second to early to avoid hitting us. As soon as our captain saw we were not hit, he bagan to belabor the officers of the bark with strong language, firs using English; but then he must have thought they probably did not understand English. Then he bagan to use German, with a long line of imprecations. But then the stranger had gone so far past us that we could see its stern, and there stood, in big letters, the name of its home port, Kragerø. Then our captain cursed them in Norwegian and told them what fools they were. The men on the bark did not answer a word; only stared at us. They had probably been as much or more scared than we were.