The Project Gutenberg EBook of Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March
1848, by Various

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Title: Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848

Author: Various

Editor: George R. Graham
Robert T. Conrad

Release Date: June 25, 2009 [EBook #29236]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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GRAHAM'S MAGAZINE.

VOL. XXXII. PHILADELPHIA, MARCH, 1848. No. 3.

THE CRUISE OF THE GENTILE.

BY FRANK BYRNE.

CHAPTER I.

_In which the reader is introduced to several of the dramatis personae._

On the evening of the 25th of March, in the year of our Lord one
thousand eight hundred and thirty-nine, the ship Gentile, of Boston,
lay at anchor in the harbor of Valetta.

It is quite proper, gentle reader, that, as it is with this ship and
her crew that you will chiefly have to do in the following yarn, they
should be severally and particularly introduced to your notice.

To begin, then. Imagine yourself standing on the parapet of St. Elmo,
about thirty minutes past five o'clock on the evening above mentioned;
the Gentile lies but little more than a cable's length from the shore,
so that you can almost look down upon her decks. You perceive that she
is a handsome craft of some six or seven hundred tons burthen,
standing high out of water, in ballast trim, with a black hull, bright
waist, and wales painted white. Her bows flare very much, and are
sharp and symmetrical; the cut-water stretches, with a graceful curve,
far out beyond them toward the long sweeping martingal, and is
surmounted by a gilt scroll, or, as the sailors call it, a
fiddle-head. The black stern is ornamented by a group of white figures
in bas relief, which give a lively air to the otherwise sombre and
vacant expression, and beneath the cabin-windows is painted the name
of the ship, and her port of register. The lower masts of this vessel
are short and stout, the top-masts are of great height, the extreme
points of the fore and mizzen-royal poles, ar