Besides the four men of the
crew a man was going with us who wanted a passage to this island. As
he was scrambling into the bow, an old man stood forward from the
crowd.
'Don't take that man with you,' he said. 'Last week they were taking
him to Clare and the whole lot of them were near drownded. Another
day he went to Inisheer and they broke three ribs of the curagh, and
they coming back. There is not the like of him for ill-luck in the
three islands.'
'The divil choke your old gob,' said the man, 'you will be talking.'
We set off. It was a four-oared curagh, and I was given the last
seat so as to leave the stern for the man who was steering with an
oar, worked at right angles to the others by an extra thole-pin in
the stern gunnel.
When we had gone about a hundred yards they ran up a bit of a sail
in the bow and the pace became extraordinarily rapid.
The shower had passed over and the wind had fallen, but large,
magnificently brilliant waves were rolling down on us at right
angles to our course.
