{"product_id":"2940153449883","title":"The Voyage of the Arrow","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn setting down this tale, I will say at the beginning that I am only a sailorman, and rough. Therefore, if I offend, I crave pardon, for my knowledge is only that of the sea, and my manners are ocean-bred. If any one is too delicately constituted to listen to a man like myself, and prefers a tale of gentleness and delicate desire, he had best pass over this narrative of part of my life, which has already received so much publicity. I know many people hold off from me. I know some sweet-scented sea lawyers who fancy they have a taste for description have called me many hard names, and that many honest folk hold away from me because of it. This and much more. But I have gone my way insilence and lived according to the little voice within me, as a strong man should. And it is not weakness now that prompts me to speak. I feel it my duty, and will tell what I know and remember about the part of my life which the public have chosen to discuss so freely.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cp\u003eI do not know who will believe a sailor’s tale, for sailors have been known to enlarge on their yarns, but my father was a sailor before me and was an honest man. So were many of the Gores, and I myself have been master of a deep-water clipper-ship.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn spite of this I hardly feel that I have reached an exalted pinnacle of human fame, for most people do not regard me as a success, nor am I held up as a shining example of what man might accomplish in his life’s work, although I was captain of the Southern Cross—until I ran her ashore and lost her on the Irish coast.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cp\u003eThis was all owing to misdirected effort—that is, her loss was; for, after slaving twelve years fore and aft to get command of a ship and at last getting one, I tried to break the record from Hongkong to Liverpool. I did this by five days, and instead of holding offshore until the weather moderated, I overran my distance during a foggy, driving gale and left the whitening ribs of the Southern Cross to mark the success of my endeavour. Had I made harbour, my name would have gone down to posterity as that of the best sailor afloat, and I would have had the pick of the whole deep-water fleet, instead of being forced, as I was, to sign on as mate of the Arrow.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cp\u003eIt made my eyes misty and something rose in my throat as I did this. I, a man of twenty-nine, signing the papers for a mate’s berth just as I had done years ago when barely twenty.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"PublishDrive","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47070364172528,"sku":"2940153449883","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940153449883_p0.jpg?v=1764052546","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940153449883","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}