Cody and Dock and I were on watch in the wee hours of the morning when Cody shouted, “There—ahoy!”
I peered into the darkness. “What? Where?”
“There—see that dark shape thingy?”
We stared at Cody’s dark shape thingy, until we realized it was only a low cloud.
A half hour later, Cody called, “Ahoy!”
“Where?”
“There—lights!”
“You mean those moving lights—those boat lights?”
“Crumbs,” he said.
But then, just before dawn, there it was, a dark shape peeking out behind blue-gray clouds.
“Ahoy ahoy ahoy!” Cody shouted. “Ahoy, see there?”
It was a mountain. Land. Land ho!
“Oh, mountain,” Cody sang, “oh, beautiful mountain of mine!”
The land, the land, the land! Oh, blessed, blessed land. Oh, sweet, sweet land!
We roused everyone else, and within a few hours we were sailing along the southern coast of Ireland. It is such a relief to be able to steer by land instead of compass. Oh, land!
Uncle Dock was in fine form. He stood at the rail, reciting part of a poem. He said it’s from “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”:
“Oh! dream of joy! is this indeed
The lighthouse top I see?
Is this the hill? Is this the kirk?
Is this mine own countree?”
When I asked him to repeat it so I could copy it down, he said that the word country is spelled countree. I liked that. I had to ask him what a kirk was. He said it was a church. Sure enough, from where we stood, we could see both a lighthouse and a church.
So we all recited it again with Uncle Dock, and when we finished, Cody added, “Oh, Rosalie!”
Uncle Dock said, “Why’d you say that?”
Cody said, “I dunno. It just seemed to fit somehow.”
We’ve come up along the southwest coast, and now we are nearing Crosshaven. The weather is kind and the sun is shining brighter than ever to light up the rocky cliffs and nubby green fields of Ireland. We’ve passed old castles and farms, cows grazing, and tiny cars puttering along. I want to pump up the inflatable dinghy and rush to shore.
But a fight has broken out down below between Uncle Stew and Uncle Mo. Much shouting going on and the sound of things being thrown about.