two, two, two, twice...


[ Follow Ups ] [ Post Followup ] [ Previous # Next ] [ Start New Thread ] [ TarBoard ]

Posted by Ed Kiser on July 14, 2004 at 04:08:01 from 64.12.116.73 user Kisered.

In COOT CLUB, the D's were learning how to sail, with Tom and the
Twins serving as their instructors. Dick was sailing the Teasel,
tacking in a somewhat narrow waterway, having to make the changes
of direction come very frequently, and apparently he was not doing
it according to the expectations of Port.


In CC CH23:

"Not so hard," Port kept saying. "Let her come round
gently, and she'll get a little bit for nothing."
"For nothing?"
"If you bring her hard round, the rudder stops her, and
you lose. Gently... Gently!"


Having thus received their training as able-seaman with their sailing
experience on the Broads, they then go to the Lake up north, and
finally get to sail their own sailboat, the Scarab. Nancy and Peggy
are nearby in the Amazon as the D's take their boat under sail for
their very first time. Nancy offers a bit of constructive criticism:

In PM CH15:

"What did I do wrong, tacking?" asked Dick.
"You were shoving the tiller across too suddenly... Stops
her... Go about when she's really moving, and let her almost
do it herself... Just ease her round till she's head to wind and
then put the tiler a bit further over. She'll shoot quite a bit
straight into the wind."


It appears that not all of the lessons learned on the Broads were
remembered, and Dick had to re-learn certain ones all over again.


There is another example of a lesson having to be relearned. In
PP CH3, Dick is explaining to Roger the business about how borings
are made into which explosive charges are placed to open up the mine.

"Look," said Dick. "They must have blasted with
gunpowder. You can see one side of the hole they bored for
their charge."
"Where?" said Roger. "Oh, yes. I see it," and he ran his
finger along a smooth and narrow furrow in the rock.


And yet, in PM CH24, Dick seems to have forgotten this technique that
he had explained to Roger. They were looking at their own mine, now
being worked by Slater Bob, and Dick questions him about the method:

"But how is it done?" asked Dick, and a yard or two further
back in the tunnel the old man took Dick's finger and rubbed it
along a narrow groove in the rock. "That's how," he said. "Yon's
what's left of a boring. You bore a hole to take your cartridge.
You bung him in, with a long fuse to him. You set a match to the
fuse and leg it for the open..."


It seems that the intellectual Dick, for all his erudition, sometimes
forgets things that he previously had learned.


There is another one of these pairs of similar occurances, this time
involved with fishing, and catching a rather big one. In SD CH15,
Roger goes into the water and falls on the fish, holding it in his
arms, and getting it to the shore before dropping the two pound trout.


Into these shallows Roger had splashed, and a few
moments later, splashing worse than ever, he scrambled ashore
with a big trout clasped in his arms.


This episode is somewhat similar to another situation involving catchinga large fish, this time, a pike. In BS, CH7, Pete is stomping on the bank, trying to drive the pike away from the weeds:


Pete, in his seaboots, took a further step, stamped in the
water, slipped, tried to recover himself and fell headlong. His
struggles made a bigger splash than ever he had made with
his boots.
"Ouch!" he yelled suddenly, and came splashing out
of the water on all fours. "Joe," he said. "I trod on him."


This time, Pete did not actually grab the fish, as Roger had done,
but he did touch it, stepping on it, which was sufficient to drive
it out into the open.


There is a bit of similarity in these two fishing tales, enough
perhaps to wonder if Ransome himself ever fell into the water
while trying to catch a fish.

Another pair of similar happenings has Roger slipping away from the
group to do something on his own. In PP, he leaves the line of
prospectors, and Indians his way through the bracken to accidentally
come upon the Gulch and there to discover the mine and its desired
treasure. In GN, Roger again leaves the bunch, and slips off to
get up to the watch station, a departure that allows him to be still
free after all the others are rounded up and locked up by the locals.

There is also the pair of events in which there is a problem with
smoke from the chimney not being drawn out properly. In WH, in
the Igloo, there was initially some problem with the smoke until
a more proper chimney was set up. In BS, the D&G's had a problem
with smoke in the cabin of their little boat, until a proper pot
was put in place as a chimney, and a conical "hat" put over it
to get it to draw properly.

There were two situations in which Dick almost lost his glasses. In
CC, Dick went overboard while quanting, and in WH, on the sledge in
the snowstorm, he almost lost them when they wrecked.

These are a few of the situations that remind us of other times
in other stories where we can see the similarity. It is all a part
of the fun of exploring All Things Ransome.

Ed Kiser, South Florida



Follow Ups:



Post a Followup

Name:
Eel-Mail:

Existing subject (please edit appropriately) :

Comments:

Optional Link URL:
Link Title:
Optional Image URL:

post direct to TarBoard test post first

Before posting it is necessary to be a registered user.


[ Follow Ups ] [ Post Followup ] [ TarBoard ]

Courtesy of Environmental Science, Lancaster

space