FRANK BULLEN.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1784, 15 June 1906, Page 3

FRANK BULLEN.

1 THE THOSE POET OF TIIE SEA.”

From the clay whon, as an unknown author, Frank Bullon launched his lirst book, “ The Cruiso of tho Cachalot,’’ his famo as tho proso poet of tho soa has stoadily grown. It was a great achievement to attain distinction at a bound, and still more remarkable when the limitations of the author’s oarly life aro rememberod. Here was a man who almost from his infancy tastod the bitter pangs of child poverty in a great city, being left so young to tho rough motherhood of the streets, as he tells us in his own words. “ I belonged to tho ignoble company of the unwanted, In spite of hard usage, scanty fare, and overwork, I ridicuously persisted in living, until at the approach of my twelfth yoar an eligible opening presented itself for me to go to sea.’ 1 For the next year or two the boy lived tho life of a sea waif, voyaging to tho West Indies, to Africa, to India, with enough adventure in tho way of wreck and rough treatment to effectually take the edge olf the sea for the average lad. Bitter struggles to live on shore, at an age when most boys still know the delights of home and school, sandwiched in between his trips to sea, were the normal lot of the helpless orphan, till on a certain auspicious day he found himself, to his great delight, though yet a lad, shipped as an ordinary seaman at 30s a month, bound for the port of Melbourne. During the voyage, which lasted 155 days, the crew broached the cargo, and, all unknown to the cap* tain, had fared better than sailor men usually do at sea; and Bullen, afraid of being associated with them should discovery lead to their arrest, escaped from the vessel as she lay at Sandridge pier, and, aided by the darkie cjok of a Sydney steamer, who smuggled him aboard, made his way round to Sydney as a stowaway, on board the old "Wonga Wonga, F-

.or some months he saw life under pleasanter conditions, as lamp boy on a little steamer that ran regularly from Sydney to Grafton, and afterwards in one of the vessels of the old A.U.B.N. Company’s fleet, till, as he says in the “Log of a Sea Waif,” “ it suddenly occurred to me that I would like to go Home again. That is one of the most incomprehensible things imaginable to me. Never during the first 13 years of my life at sea did I have any home in England or one friendly face to welcome me back there. Yet, however woll I was treated in foreign countries or ha the Australian colonies, the sight of my homeland never failed to make a lump come into my throat and raise a feeling of wordless love for her in my breast.” After returning to England and another voyage to the East, he shipped once more for the South, this time on board a fine clipper, bound to Port Chalmers, N.Z. On arrival at “ port,” as the Dunedin people call it, he went ashore every evening, and enjoyed such modest attractions as the place afforded, the most exciting being a sing-song in a room at the back of a hotel. Then came Sunday, spent in fishing till the evening, when with a shipmate he went ashore again, and, attracted by the sound of music, they made their way to the place whence the melody came, to find that a meeting of some kind was in progress. It was a mission service, conducted in the upper storey of an old bond, by a body of devoted Christian workers, who warmly welcomed the stranger lads, who after some hesitation had entered. Before Bullen left the meeting that happened which changes all things in the lives of men, and, “ in a moment,” as he says, “ the hidden mystery was made clear to me.” Then came a long interval during which our hero passed through further adventures, which were afterwards embodied in “ The Cruise of the Cachalot,” and have furnished material for many a fine story of the deep—he has written no fewer than 16 other books—and then he returned to the place of his first love. Those who know Bullen V books will remember with what pleasure he always refers to Port Chalmers. He says once : “ How my heart throbs as I write the name of I that place—to me the dearest spot uplon the whole earth’s surface! ”