CHAPTER 35
John Fleming Wilson
I must down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way, and the whale's way where the wind 's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And a quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.
john masefield.
John FLEMING WILSON once wrote a sea story, most of the action of which took place on board a ship off its course. So prolonged was the voyage over distant wastes of the Pacific Ocean that i t seemed the com munity life formed b y the few passengers would g o on forever. The main characters were a dour Scotch man and his young wife, a missionary girl returning t o b e married, and a n adventurer. Day after day, with helpless dissatisfaction, the Scotchman observed the friendship between his wife and the adventurer, the latter’s face “ever ruddied b y his love for her”; and ever, a s these two came into her presence, the mis sionary girl “held her left hand i n her right that n o breath o f this fiery passion might touch her engage ment ring”. Style h e had, and mastery o f the subjec tive, though h e wrote objective stories, and often i n his writings there are memorable passages—with a registry, eloquent and re-echoing, upon the apprecia tion, o f the kind that marks genuine literature and makes classics. I n addition t o numerous boys' stories and sea stories still uncollected i n magazines, h e was the author o f the following books: The Land Claimers, 1911; Across the Latitudes, 1911; The Man Who Came Back, 1912; The Princess o f Sorry Valley, 1913; Tad Sheldon, Boy Scout, 1913; Tad Sheldon's Fourth o f July, 1913; The Master Key, 1915; Dough Candles,
