Mr. Dooley Says

by Finley Peter Dunne

  OCEAN TRAVEL

  "I see this here new steamboat has broke all records. It come acrost th'Atlantic Ocean in four days. Passengers that got aboord at Liverpool onSaturday were in New York Friday afthernoon."

  "But that's more thin four days."

  "Not be nautical time, said Mr. Dooley. Ye mustn't figure it out th'way ye do on land. On land ye niver read that 'Th' Thunderbolt limitedhas broken all records be thravellin' fr'm New York (Harrisburg) toChicago (Fort Wayne) in eight hours.' But with a steamboat 'tisdifferent. Ye saw a lot iv time off ayether end an' what's left is th'v'yage. 'Th' Conyard line's gr-reat ocean greyhound or levithin iv th'seas has broken all records iv transatlantic passages except thim madebe th' Germans. She has thravelled fr'm Liverpool (a rock so far off th'coast iv Ireland that I niver see it) to New York (Sandy Hooklightship) in four or five days. Brittanya again rules th' waves.' So ifye've anny frinds inclined to boast about makin' a record ask thim didthey swim aboord at Daunt's Rock an' swim off at th' lightship. If theydidn't, refuse to take off ye'er hat to thim. To tell how long it takesto cross th' Atlantic compute th' elapsed time fr'm boordin' house toboordin' house. It's fr'm a week to ten days depindin on th' time ye goto bed whin ye come home. Manny a man that come over on a five-day boathas had th' divvle iv a time explainin' to his wife what he did with th'other two days. No record iv thransatlantic thravel takes into accountth' longest, roughest an' most dangerous part iv th' passage, which isthrough th' New York custom house.

  "But 'tis wondherful annyhow. 'Tis wondherful that a man shud cross th'Atlantic ocean annyhow an' 'tis enough to make ye dizzy to think iv himcrossin' it in an iron boat that looks like a row iv office buildings.Th' grand times they must've had. Time was whin a man got on a boat an'was lost f'r a week or ten days. Now, be hivens, through th' wondhers ivmodhern science he's hardly settled down to a cigar an' a game ivpinochle with another fugitive that he's just met, whin a messenger boycomes down th' deck on his bicycle an' hands him a tillygram with gladtidings fr'm home. Th' house is burned, th' sheriff has levied on hisfurniture or th' fam'ly are down with th' whoopin' cough. On th' otherhand we know all about what they are doin' on boord th' levithin. Justas ye'er wife is thinkin' iv ye bein' wrecked on a desert island orfloatin' on a raft an' signallin' with an undershirt she picks up th'pa-aper an' reads: 'Th' life iv th' ship is Malachi Hinnissy, a wealthybachelor fr'm Pittsburg. His attintions to a widow from Omaha are mostmarked. They make a handsome couple.'

  "Well, sir, they must 've had th' gloryus time on boord this new boat.In th' old days all ye knew about a ship was that she left Liverpooland landed in New York afther a most disthressin' v'yage. Now ye r-readiv th' gay life aboord her fr'm day to day: 'Th' tie in th' billyardtournymint was played off last night. Th' resthrants are crowded nightlyan' great throngs are seen in Main Sthreet undher th' brilliantilluminations. Th' public gardens are in full bloom an' are muchfrequented be childher rollin' hoops and sailin' boats in th' artificiallake. Th' autymobill speedway gives gr-reat satisfaction. Th' openingday iv th' steeplechase races was a success. Th' ilivator in th' leftannex fell thirteen stories Thursday, but no wan was injured. Th'brokerage house iv Conem an' Comp'ny wint into th' hands iv a receiverto-day. Th' failure was due to th' refusal iv th' banks to lend annymore money on hat pools. Th' steeple iv th' Swedenborjan Church isundher repair. Th' _Daily Fog Horn_ has put in three new color pressesan' will begin printin' a colored supplement Sunday next.' An' so itgoes. It ain't a boat at all. It's a city.

  "At laste I thought it was but Hannigan that come over in it says it'sa boat. 'Ye must've had a grand time,' says I, 'in this floatin' palace,atin' ye'er fill iv sumchuse food an' gazin' at th' beautifully jooledladies,' says I. 'Ah,' says I, 'th' wondhers iv science that cud puttogether a conthrivance th' like iv that,' says I. 'It's a boat,' sayshe. 'That's th' best I can say about it,' says he. 'Did ye not glidenoiselessly through th' wather?' says I? 'I did not,' says he. 'Divvleth' glide. We bumped along pretty fast an' th' injines made noises likeinjines an' th' ship creaked like anny ship.' 'An' wasn't th' foodfine?' 'It depinded on th' weather. There was plenty iv it on good days,an' too much iv it on other days.' 'An' th' beautifully jooled ladies?''No wan knew whether th' ladies were beautifully jooled except th' ladythat searched thim at th' custom house.

  "'Don't ye make a mistake, Dooley,' says he. 'A boat's a boat. That'sall it is. Annything ye can get at sea ye can get betther on land. Amillyonaire is made as comfortable on an ocean liner as a longshoremanon earth an' ye can play that comparison all th' way down to th'steerage. Whin I read about this here floatin' palace I says to mesilf:I'll add a little money and go acrost in oryental luxury. Whin I gotaboord th' decks were crowded with happy people worryin' about theirbaggage an' wondherin' already whether th' inspector in New York wud getonto th' false bottom iv th' thrunks. I give th' old an' enfeebledEnglish gintleman that carried me satchel a piece iv silver. He touchedhis cap to me an' says Cue. Cue is th' English f'r I thank yekindly in Irish. He carrid me bag downstairs in th' ship. We kept goin'down an' down till we touched bottom, thin we rambled through long lanesneatly decorated with steel girders till we come to a dent in th' keel.That was me boodoor. At laste part iv it was. There were two handsomeberths in it an' I had th' top wan. Th' lower wan was already occypiedbe a gintleman that had started to feel onaisy on th' way down f'mLondon an' was now prepared f'r th' worst. I left him to his grief an'wint up on th' roof iv th' ship.

  "'It was a gay scene f'r th' boat had started. Long rows iv ladies werestretched on invalid chairs with shawls over thim, pretindin' to readan' takin' deep smells at little green bottles. Three or four hundherdmen had begun to walk around th' ship with their hands folded behindthim. A poker game between four rale poker players an' a man that didn'tknow th' game but had sharp finger-nails was already started in th'smokin'-room. About that time I begun to have a quare sinsation. Ihaven't been able to find out yet what it was. I must ask Dock O'Leary.I wasn't sea-sick, mind ye. I'm a good sailor. But I had a funny feelin'in me forehead between me eyes. It wasn't a headache exactly but a kindiv a sthrange sinsation like I used to have whin I was a boy an' thriedto look cross-eyed. I suppose it was th' strong light. I didn't haveanny aversion to food. Not at all. But somehow I didn't like th' smelliv food. It was disagreeable to me an' it seemed to make th' place in mehead worse. Sivral times I wint to th' dinin'-room intindin' to jine th'jovyal comp'ny there but quit at th' dure. It was very sthrange. I don'tknow how to account f'r it. Very few people were sea-sick on th' v'yage,but sivral hundherd who were injyin' paddlin' a spoon in a cup iv beeftea on deck spoke iv havin' th' same sinsation. I didn't speak iv it toth' ship's doctor. I'd as lave carry me ailments to a harness maker asto a ship's doctor. But there it was, an' fr'm me pint iv view it wasth' most important ivint iv th' passage.

  "Next to that th' most excitin' thing was thryin' to find annybody thatwud take money fr'm me. It's a tur-rble awkward thing to have to forcemoney on an Englishman in a uniform like an admiral's an' talkin' withan accent that manny iv th' finest people on th' deck were thryin' toimitate, but I schooled mesilf to it. An' sthrange to say they niverrefused. They were even betther thin that. I was lavin' th' ship whinth' fellow that pulled th' plug out iv th' other man's bath f'r metouched me on th' shoulder. I turned an' see a frindly gleam in his eyethat made me wondher if he had a knife. I give him what they call fivebobs over there, which is wan dollar an' twinty cints iv our money. Hetouched his cap an' says Cue. I was greatly moved. But it's done wanthing f'r me. It's made me competint f'r anny office connected with th'legal departmint iv a sthreet railway. Be hivens, I cud hand a piece ivchange to a judge iv th' supreem coort. I hear th' Conyard line haspassed a dividend. They ought to make a merger with th' head stoort,'says he.

  "An' there ye ar-re. A boat's a boat aven whin it looks like a hotel.But it's wondherful annyhow. Whin ye come to think iv it 'tis wondherfulthat anny man cud cross th' Atlantic in annything. Th' Atlantic Ocean isa fine body iv wather, but it's a body iv wather just
th' same. Itwasn't intinded to be thravelled on. Ye cud put ye'er foot through itannywhere. It's sloppy goin' at best. Th' on'y time a human being canfloat in it is afther he's dead. A man throws a horseshoe into it an'th' horseshoe sinks. This makes him cross an' he builds a boat iv th'same mateeryal as a millyon horseshoes, loads it up with machinery,pushes it out on th' billows an' goes larkin' acrost thim as aisy as yeplaze. If he didn't go over on a large steel skyscraper he'd take a dureoff its hinges an' go on that.

  "All ye have to do is to tell him there's land on th' other side iv th'ragin' flood an' he'll say: 'All right, I'll take a look at it.' Ye talkabout th' majesty iv th' ocean but what about th' majesty iv this herelittle sixty-eight be eighteen inches bump iv self-reliance that treatsit like th' dirt undher his feet? It's a wondher to me that th' oceandon't get tired iv growlin' an' roarin' at th' race iv men. They don'tpay anny heed to it's hollering. Whin it behaves itsilf they praise itas though it was a good dog. 'How lovely our ocean looks undher ourmoon.' Whin it rises in its wrath they show their contimpt f'r it bebein' sea-sick into it. But no matther how it behaves they niver quitusin' its face f'r a right iv way. They'll niver subjoo it but it niverbates thim. There niver was a time in th' history iv little man'ssthruggle with th' vasty deep that he didn't deserve a decision onpoints."

  "Well, it's all very well, but f'r me th' dhry land," said Mr. Hennessy."Will ye iver cross th' ocean again?"

  "Not," said Mr. Dooley, "till they asphalt it an' run th' boats onthrolleys."