Dick Sands

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Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen

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Title: Dick Sand A Captain at Fifteen
Author: Jules Verne
Release Date: April 15, 2004 [EBook #12051]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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Dick Sand; or, a Captain at Fifteen by Jules Verne
[Redactor's Note: _Dick Sand; or, a Captain at Fifteen_, number V018 in the T&M listing of the works of Jules Verne, is a translation of _Un capitaine de quinze ans (1878)_. This translation was first published by George Munro (N.Y.) in 1878 and reprinted many times in the U.S. This is a different translation from that of Ellen E. Frewer who translated the book for Sampson and Low in London entitled _Dick Sands, the Boy Captain_. American translations were often free of the religious and colonial bias inserted by the English translators of Verne's works.]
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DICK SAND;
or,
A CAPTAIN AT FIFTEEN.
By JULES VERNE,
_Author of "Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon," "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea," "The Mysterious Island," "Tour of the World in Eighty Days," "Michael Strogoff," etc., etc._
A. L. BURT COMPANY, PUBLISHERS
52-58 Duane STREET, NEW YORK.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS.
_

PART I._


CHAPTER I
. The Brig-Schooner "Pilgrim."


CHAPTER II
. Dick Sand.


CHAPTER III
. The Wreck.


CHAPTER IV
. The Survivors of the "Waldeck."


CHAPTER V
. "S. V."


CHAPTER VI
. A Whale in Sight.


CHAPTER VII
. Preparations.


CHAPTER VIII
. The Jubarte.


CHAPTER IX
. Captain Sand.


CHAPTER X
. The Four Days which Follow.


CHAPTER XI
. Tempest.


CHAPTER XII
. On the Horizon.


CHAPTER XIII
. Land! Land.


CHAPTER XIV
. The Best to Do.


CHAPTER XV
. Harris.


CHAPTER XVI
. On the Way.


CHAPTER XVII
. A Hundred Miles in Ten Days.


CHAPTER XVIII
. The Terrible Word.
_

PART II._


CHAPTER I
. The Slave Trade.


CHAPTER II
. Harris and Negoro.


CHAPTER III
. On the March.


CHAPTER IV
. The Bad Roads of Angola.


CHAPTER V
. Ants and their Dwelling.


CHAPTER VI
. The Diving-Bell.


CHAPTER VII
. In Camp on the Banks of the Coanza.


CHAPTER VIII
. Some of Dick Sand's Notes.


CHAPTER IX
. Kazounde.


CHAPTER X
. The Great Market-day.


CHAPTER XI
. The King of Kazounde is Offered a Punch.


CHAPTER XII
. A Royal Burial.


CHAPTER XIII
. The Interior of a Factory.


CHAPTER XIV
. Some News of Dr. Livingston.


CHAPTER XV
. Where a Manticore may Lead.


CHAPTER XVI
. A Magician.


CHAPTER XVII
. Drifting.


CHAPTER XVIII
. Various Incidents.


CHAPTER XIX
. "S. V."


CHAPTER XX
. Conclusion.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
DICK SAND
_

PART I._


CHAPTER I
.
THE BRIG-SCHOONER "PILGRIM."
On February 2, 1876, the schooner "Pilgrim" was in latitude 43° 57' south, and in longitude 165° 19' west of the meridian of Greenwich.
This vessel, of four hundred tons, fitted out at San Francisco for whale-fishing in the southern seas, belonged to James W. Weldon, a rich Californian ship-owner, who had for several years intrusted the command of it to Captain Hull.
The "Pilgrim" was one of the smallest, but one of the best of that flotilla, which James W. Weldon sent each season, not only beyond Behring Strait, as far as the northern seas, but also in the quarters of Tasmania or of Cape Horn, as far as the Antarctic Ocean. She sailed in a superior manner. Her very easily managed rigging permitted her to venture, with a few men, in sight of the impenetrable fields of ice of the southern hemisphere. Captain Hull knew how to disentangle himself, as the sailors say, from among those icebergs, which, during the summer, drift by the way of New Zealand or the Cape of Good Hope, under a much lower latitude than that which they reach in the northern seas of the globe. It is true that only icebergs of small dimensions were found there; they were already worn by collisions, eaten away by the warm waters, and the greater number of them were going to melt in the Pacific or the Atlantic.
Under the command of Captain Hull, a good seaman, and also one of the most skilful harpooners of the flotilla, was a crew composed of five sailors and a novice. It was a small number for this whale-fishing, which requires a good many persons. Men are necessary as well for the management of the boats for the attack, as for the cutting up of the captured animals. But, following the example of certain ship-owners, James W. Weldon found it much more economical to embark at San Francisco only the number of sailors necessary for the management of the vessel. New Zealand did not lack harpooners, sailors of all nationalities, deserters or others, who sought to be hired for the season, and who followed skilfully the trade of fishermen. The busy period once over, they were paid, they were put on shore, and they waited till the whalers of the following year should come to claim their services again. There was obtained by this method better work