Rio Dulce Chisme Vindicator

[XIsle]

Blown off course in the Pacific in 1814, the New York trading ship Neptune encountered a small island, half a mile long, that was not marked on any chart. The crew were putting a boat ashore when a lookout spotted an oar erected on the summit of a rocky hill, and beneath it they saw a bearded, emaciated man jumping excitedly from rock to rock. They pointed to the boat, and he seized the oar, plunged into the surf, and swam out to meet it.

The man’s clothes were tattered and his beard a foot long. As he collapsed in relief and gratitude, the crew noted that his oar was covered with minute carven letters. Its broad end bore this inscription:

This is to acquaint the person into whose hands this Oar may fall, that DANIEL FOSS, a native of Elkton, in Maryland, one of the United States of America, and who sailed from the port of Philadelphia, in 1809, on board the brig Negociator, bound to the Friendly Islands, was cast upon this desolate island the February following, where he erected a hut, and lived a number of years, subsisting on seals — he being the last who survived of the crew of said brig, which ran foul of an island of ice, and foundered on the 26th Nov. 1809.

Said Foss earnestly requests that information of his fate and that of his shipmates may be made known to their friends in America.

The Negociator had foundered on an iceberg while en route to Tonga. Twenty-one escaped in a small boat, but after nine weeks at sea only two remained when they encountered the island, and the violent surf destroyed the boat and killed Foss’ remaining companion as they landed. Foss emerged with only the oar, which he put to myriad uses in the ensuing four years, killing the seals that congregated on the rocks and inscribing its surface elaborately with a calendar, a hymn to chant on the Sabbath, and eventually a comprehensive record of his travails, averaging 12 letters a day.

Foss recovered quickly aboard the Neptune, which returned him directly to his native country, where in time he would publish an account of his adventures. “My much regarded Oar, on which I had wrought so much, was viewed by all on board as a very great curiosity, which I have since my return presented to the keeper of the Philadelphia Museum, where it is lodged for the inspection of the curious.”

Source: http://books.google.com/books?id=ofEOAAAAYAAJ&lpg=PA905&ots=hWUzf2fjMe&dq=narrative%20of%20daniel%20foss&pg=PA883#v=onepage&q=narrative%20of%20daniel%20foss&f=false

[elpolvo]

[moosekisser]

dear dusty old friend
your werdz bout me dont offend
such wisdom you lend


in other werdz... i resemble that remark