son who carried out the sinking is the best way of ensuring that the only witness cannot talk to the authorities. Such elimination of witnesses is common in English smuggling stories. East Anglia or the Wirral have areas that can be described as lowlands, with deep creeks cut into the mud and sand by the flow of the tide. They are quite literally a navigational maze. The song could be an allegory, with the detested customs officers insultingly characterized as Turks. The ditty, completely comprehensible to contemporary listeners, would give the authorities no cause for action against any individual. Ballads of this type were common in English political life, and are the origins of many nursery rhymes. The facts behind the story will probably never be known, and it is to be hoped that the mystery will persist to fascinate future generations. Once again, thank you to Walter Rybka for a stimulating article on an intriguing subject. PAUL QUINN Stafford, England
That Haunting Lowlands Song "The Golden Vanity" lyrics Capt. Rybka gives are substantially the same as those found in Songs of the Sea and Sailor 's Chanteys: Selected and Arranged by Robert Frothingham, Houghton Mifflin, 1924. While the version that Capt. Rybka uses, from Stan Hugill ' s collection, contains all of Frothingham's verses and includes the hauling refrain, it is more ballad than chantey. As the number passed from worksong to barroom and parlor minstrelsy, elaboration has taken place. The added stanzas might be called performance stretch-out; in Frothingham the boy does not swim to starboard and then to larboard and does not call up to his mates. He does not "bare his breast," merely "takes an auger," and he does not say he's "weary with the tide." Frothingham' s captain does not say, ''I'll shoot you and I'll kill you," he says, "I'll kill you if you come on deck." Besides redundancies, certain substitutes do not improve the flavor. Instead of "they buried him in his hammock," Frothingham's end line is "we lifted him so tenderly and sewed him in a hide"; then, "we said a short prayer o'er him and dropped him in the tide." But then, "He' s sailing in the Lowlands low." JOHN WHORF Hingham, Massachusetts SEA HISTORY 78, SUMMER 1996
American Seamen under Attack Thank you for opening up a discussion of the decline of America's merchant marine (SH77, "America's Orphan" by David O'Neil), a concern now redoubled by a current drive to overthrow the Jones Act. One recurring claim is that it costs too much to ship American, because American seamen are overpaid. American mariners are well paid, but let's look at why they are and let's look at correct numbers. Going to sea today means minimum manning with three section watches and port calls that average between eight and twelve hours of intense work preceded and followed by the rigors of docking and undocking. Then it's back to sea watch rotation . It's boring work punctuated by frenzied port calls. To get trained, responsible personnel requires pay scales that acknowledge the skill, responsibility and personal sacrifice of isolation from family and friends for long periods of time. Philippine seamen, trained at maritime schools and English-speaking, are in high demand. They earn the International Labor Organization rates of about $356permonthforaseaman. ButAmerican labor should be expected to work for wages that enable them to live in the American economy and that are comparable to pay for other skilled US labor. American seamen work long hours at sea for two good reasons: First, there is little to do with leisure time, so one may as well work. Second, it is to the advantage of the owner to pay overtime, rather than hire another sailor to do essential work, since the benefits package has already been paid for that sailor and needn't be paid again. In addition to regular duties, overtime is also spent on maintenance, thereby allowing our merchant ships to routinely operate 330 to 350 days a year and maximize the rate of return on the capital investment by the ship's owner. The object is to keep the ship working with as little interruption as possible. There have been exaggerated claims about the cost of operating American ships. But two years ago a study was done comparing the cost in pay and benefits of running a merchant vessel versus a US Coast Guard vessel with the same size crew. The results showed that the costs were virtually identical. It' s time to stop blaming America's professional mariners for not being willing to work for third world wages . EDWARD V. KELLY, Vice President American Maritime Officers Washington, DC
In Drake's Wake I read with interest your note in "Letters" in Sea History 76 dealing with Cape Hom. You are indeed right as to Drake' s landing on Cape Hom. I landed on the Horn in 1964 and wrote of this unforgettable experience for Sealiftmagazine (October 1964). There definitely is a landing place, wood and fresh water. As to Burnham Bank, aboard the scientific survey ship USNS Eltanin we spent the best part of a day looking for Elizabeth Island. We found only deep water and believe that had there once been an island there it had since been wiped away by an earthquake. WILLIAM J. HARDING New York, New York Tenacious Iberian Flavor in Africa Your article on Portuguese exploration ("The Cape Horn Road, Part VII'') in Sea History 77 helps recall much learning so delightfully accumulated but now pretty much lost except when revived by such an entertaining and interesting account! Portuguese presence on the West African coast is surprisingly tenacious. Even in my decade on the coast, the 1960s, much of it spent in Nigeria, one encountered unusual vestiges. You might have mentioned Lagos, principal city of Nigeria, named for the village in Portugal which Drake worked over at one point, I believe. The city of Elmina in Ghana (formerly Gold Coast) doesn' t refer to a mine, but Europeans invariably think it does. And other village names evoke Iberian flavor. There was aBrazilian Quarter in Lagos, just adjacent to our Texaco offices, long shown on maps, characterized by odd shapes-big wooden buildings with unusual projecting balconies. These had been built and rebuilt by European hands, not African. They were used as tenements from which owners hung over balconies and out windows calling to friends on the street or across the way. H.B . HUBBELL Rowayton, Connecticut ERRATA In Sea History 77, in our discussion of the film "Ghosts of Cape Horn" (p. 6), we overlooked the producer James R. Donaldson III of New York, to whom we owe great thanks. In his painting of Young America (cover and p. 7), William G. Muller depicted the clipper leaving New York in 1873, not in 1853; the vessel was built in 1853. And on page 17, the Portuguese city on the West Coast of Africa is Elmina, not Elmira. ,t
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