It was made to
punch storms. To touch that bow is to rest one's hand on the cosmic
nose of things. To look at it is to realize that expense cut no
figure where it was concerned. And every time our sailing was
delayed, or a new expense was tacked on, we thought of that
wonderful bow and were content.
The Snark is a small boat. When I figured seven thousand dollars as
her generous cost, I was both generous and correct. I have built
barns and houses, and I know the peculiar trait such things have of
running past their estimated cost. This knowledge was mine, was
already mine, when I estimated the probable cost of the building of
the Snark at seven thousand dollars. Well, she cost thirty
thousand. Now don't ask me, please. It is the truth. I signed the
cheques and I raised the money. Of course there is no explaining
it, inconceivable and monstrous is what it is, as you will agree, I
know, ere my tale is done.
Then there was the matter of delay. I dealt with forty-seven
different kinds of union men and with one hundred and fifteen
different firms. And not one union man and not one firm of all the
union men and all the firms ever delivered anything at the time
agreed upon, nor ever was on time for anything except pay-day and
bill-collection. Men pledged me their immortal souls that they
would deliver a certain thing on a certain date; as a rule, after
such pledging, they rarely exceeded being three months late in
delivery. And so it went, and Charmian and I consoled each other by
saying what a splendid boat the Snark was, so staunch and strong;
also, we would get into the small boat and row around the Snark, and
gloat over her unbelievably wonderful bow.
"Think," I would say to Charmian, "of a gale off the China coast,
and of the Snark hove to, that splendid bow of hers driving into the
storm. Not a drop will come over that bow. She'll be as dry as a
feather, and we'll be all below playing whist while the gale howls."
And Charmian would press my hand enthusiastically and exclaim:
"It's worth every bit of it - the delay, and expense, and worry, and
all the rest. Oh, what a truly wonderful boat!"
Whenever I looked at the bow of the Snark or thought of her water-
tight compartments, I was encouraged. Nobody else, however, was
encouraged. My friends began to make bets against the various
sailing dates of the Snark. Mr. Wiget, who was left behind in
charge of our Sonoma ranch was the first to cash his bet. He
collected on New Year's Day, 1907. After that the bets came fast
and furious. My friends surrounded me like a gang of harpies,
making bets against every sailing date I set. I was rash, and I was
stubborn. I bet, and I bet, and I continued to bet; and I paid them
all. Why, the women-kind of my friends grew so brave that those
among them who never bet before began to bet with me. And I paid
them, too.
"Never mind," said Charmian to me; "just think of that bow and of
being hove to on the China Seas."
"You see," I said to my friends, when I paid the latest bunch of
wagers, "neither trouble nor cash is being spared in making the
Snark the most seaworthy craft that ever sailed out through the
Golden Gate - that is what causes all the delay."
In the meantime editors and publishers with whom I had contracts
pestered me with demands for explanations. But how could I explain
to them, when I was unable to explain to myself, or when there was
nobody, not even Roscoe, to explain to me? The newspapers began to
laugh at me, and to publish rhymes anent the Snark's departure with
refrains like, "Not yet, but soon." And Charmian cheered me up by
reminding me of the bow, and I went to a banker and borrowed five
thousand more. There was one recompense for the delay, however. A
friend of mine, who happens to be a critic, wrote a roast of me, of
all I had done, and of all I ever was going to do; and he planned to
have it published after I was out on the ocean. I was still on
shore when it came out, and he has been busy explaining ever since.
And the time continued to go by. One thing was becoming apparent,
namely, that it was impossible to finish the Snark in San Francisco.
She had been so long in the building that she was beginning to break
down and wear out. In fact, she had reached the stage where she was
breaking down faster than she could be repaired. She had become a
joke. Nobody took her seriously; least of all the men who worked on
her. I said we would sail just as she was and finish building her
in Honolulu. Promptly she sprang a leak that had to be attended to
before we could sail. I started her for the boat-ways. Before she
got to them she was caught between two huge barges and received a
vigorous crushing. We got her on the ways, and, part way along, the
ways spread and dropped her through, stern-first, into the mud.
It was a pretty tangle, a job for wreckers, not boat-builders.
There are two high tides every twenty-four hours, and at every high
tide, night and day, for a week, there were two steam tugs pulling
and hauling on the Snark.
