Two Years Before the Mast · Chapter
XX explained
The monotony of life on the beach is broken by the arrival of two vessels, the Italian ship Rosa and the brig Catalina, bringing a diverse crew from many nations.
What happens
The monotony of life on the beach is broken by the arrival of two vessels, the Italian ship Rosa and the brig Catalina, bringing a diverse crew from many nations. The beach becomes lively with singing and socializing. Later, the ship Alert arrives under Captain Thompson's command, bringing letters and news from home. The Pilgrim departs, and the crew settles into routine work, including a week dedicated to gathering wood.
Themes in this chapter
Cultural Encounter and Otherness
The beach becomes a microcosm of global diversity, with sailors from nearly every nation singing songs in their native languages and sharing traditions.
Isolation and Longing
The narrator's intense emotional response to receiving letters and newspapers from home underscores the deep longing for connection and news from a distant world.
Labor and Economy
The crew's routine of curing hides, clearing vats, and gathering wood illustrates the relentless physical labor that underpins the hide trade.
Characters to notice
- Richard Henry Dana Jr.
Receives letters and newspapers from home via the Alert, reads them eagerly, and engages in daily work and social activities on the beach.
- Captain Thompson
Takes command of the Alert, sending down topgallant masts and unreeving rigging on his first day.
- Captain Faucon
Assumes command of the Pilgrim, wears a green jacket and high leather cap, and quotes Latin to the narrator.
- Nicholas
Visited by Frenchmen from the Rosa's crew in the evenings.
- Old Schmidt
An Austrian in charge of the Rosa's house, speaks four languages, lends books to the narrator, and gets drunk on holiday.
- Old Wilson
An old Scotchman in charge of the Catalina's house, keeps to himself, and is described as pragmatical and solemn.
- Mr. S⸺
Receives letters from home and shares news with the crew.
Key passages
“We had now, out of forty or fifty, representatives from almost every nation under the sun: two Englishmen, three Yankees, two Scotchmen, two Welshmen, one Irishman, three Frenchmen... one Otaheitan, and one Kanaka from the Marquesas Islands.”
The beach community included sailors from England, America, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, France, Holland, Austria, Spain, Chile, Italy, the Sandwich Islands, Tahiti, and the Marquesas.
Highlights the extraordinary diversity of the crew.
“Nothing carries you so entirely to a place, and makes you feel so perfectly at home, as a newspaper. The very name of 'Boston Daily Advertiser' 'sounded hospitably upon the ear.'”
A newspaper from home is the most powerful way to feel connected to a distant place, and even the title of the Boston Daily Advertiser felt welcoming.
Expresses the emotional comfort of receiving news from home.
“Captain Faucon came quietly up to me, as I was at work, with my knife, cutting the meat from a dirty hide, asked me how I liked California, and repeated—'Tityre, tu patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi.'”
Captain Faucon approached me while I was cutting meat from a hide and quoted a line of Latin poetry from Virgil, asking how I liked California.
Shows Captain Faucon's education and a moment of unexpected intellectual connection.
