Posted by Ed Kiser on January 13, 2007 at 18:57:41 from 205.188.117.66 user Kisered.
In Reply to: When did Swallow get swamped? posted by Owen Roberts on January 13, 2007 at 12:10:51:
Some "adventures" happened before the time of SA, as when Daddy taught them how to sail in Falmouth harbour.
In SA, the Amazons referred to previous camping when Uncle Jim was "one of us" and also told of when they used to explore using the Beckfoot rowboat until Uncle Jim bought the Amazon for them. There were holes for pegs in the campsite at WCI where the Amazons' tent had been previously set up, most likely sometime last year, when Uncle Jim was not so involved in his book.
One event that is totally undocumented is that time between WD and SW. We are led to believe that the time between these two stories is very brief, perhaps taking place almost immediately. In WD, John lost Jim's anchor. Yet in SW, the Goblin was once again outfitted with an anchor that was not referred to as the kedge anchor, so it seems that an official anchor was once again on board. It is not defined as to whether it was a newly purchased one to replace the old one, or whether by dredging they were able to recover the lost one. Wondered where that anchor came from...
Whenever the referenced event of Nancy towing the Swallow too fast behind the Beckfoot launch seems to contradict Nancy's own vehement refusal at the end of SA for the Amazon to be towed home behind the launch. Such a swamping of Swallow hopefully was done in very shallow water, as we saw in SD how quickly the Swallow went down after hitting Pike Rock and the resulting breaking of a plank or two.
As for swamping of the Swallow: I am still a bit surprised on that first trip from Holly Howe to WCI in the Swallow as told in SA, as heavily laden it was with camping equipment with the gunwale so near to being awash, and with Roger not being able to swim, and considering how normal it is for a small sailboat to heel over with the wind, perhaps dunking its lee gunwale, that the initial voyage was made without mishap of a very serious nature.
Amid their "adventures" there were those moments of some degree of real danger:
The sinking of the Swallow in SD.
Roger's slip and near fall while climbing the moutain in SD.
Dick's rescue of the sheep in WH.
In WH, the saw a fish trapped in the ice, and they all gather close by to look at it, with the ice starting to crack under their combined load, very closely to dumping them all into that frozen lake.
In WH, the D's sailing through the blizzard to the NP.
The drifting of Goblin past Beach End Bouy and subsequent stormy sailing.
The marooning of the "Egyptians" on The Wade in SW.
In this compilation of hazards, I choose to ignore those "made up" in ML, PD, and GN.
One might want to argue if GN was one of the "made up tales" but in it is the admission that Mrs. McGinty of CC was used as the source of the name for the locals' family name. So at least the name was made up if not the entire story.
GN seems to me to be the "Curtain Call" of the three principal groups, the SA's, the Amazons, and the D's. Somehow, the D&G's, Eels, Tom Dudgeon became more minor players in the series and so did not appear in that last production. It was as if Ransome was saying goodby to his own creations. Perhaps, the Coots in the North was an attempt at an encore performance that never really came off, or perhaps this was indeed to be the Final Performance, with the D&G's now being invited for that final bow - but it never came off.
I wish that one had been finished. So disappointing to just STOP that story's reading, and realize that there is no more.
But perhaps we do not truly have an appreciation of the work and time and dedication writing a book of this caliber can be. After all it was Captain Flint in SA that warned them to never to try to write a book. Maybe already at that stage, AR was already aware of what such an effort can take.
Let us be glad he did make those efforts, and did them so well.
Ed Kiser, Kentucky