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and he said to Father "where did 'e come from Ken?" Father said thai we
had been out in the Bay all night. "Couldn't have." "We were there;' said
Father, "because we were right off the bite [bight] when that steamer come
in here to Ryan's." "Haven't been a steamer in to Ryan's in three days,"
said Uncle Baxter, "and no vessel came in here last night." So we figured
that it must have been the Phantom Ship, and when she headed in toward
Catalina about 9 o'clock that mllst have been a sign for us lO head in there
too. If we had we wouldn't have been out in the stonn at all. It sure did
blow from the South East too and that's they say always happens.!
The narralive opens with an interpretation of the phenomenon: "lhere is a phantom ship
seen in Trinity Bay which is a sure sign of a bad blow," and "people think it's the ghost of
old 'Lion'," followed by a minute reconstruction of the event in tenns of location, time,
weather conditions and manoeuvring. So, the narrative is offered to substantiate the
proposed meaning of the phenomenon. A ship is Spoiled at some distance and coming
straight by both fishennen. Relying on their knowledge of the area and locil! ships,
successive logical deductions are made as to the ship's identification. At that point, nothing
yet arouses the men's suspicion of a phantom. Even the gale, the worst in the experience
of the elder one, and towlly unpredictable, is not yet interpreted as having any relation to
the uncanny. The stonn is such that they only just manage to land but way off their
harbour. The revelation, finally, is prompted by a third, who squarely disproves their
logical assumptions as to the ship's identity and even their location. Confrol1led with the
evidence of their misjudgement, the only explanation left is that of "the" phantom ship.
The definite article suggests their hearsay of a phantom in the area yet not their suspicion to
have encountered it until all other possibilities have been tested. Acknowledging their
reason's defem, they draw the--again--Iogical conclusion that the ship must have been the
phantom and its flashlike occurrence prior the storm related to it. The supernatural
interpretation, finally, is inferred from the empirical knowledge that such an unsuspected
and panicularly heavy stornl has occurred following all previous sightings of the phantom
in the area.
It is hard to queslion the analytical rigour of this interpretation or the percipients'
concern for objectivity in relating their adventure. As Hufford argued about local Old Hag
personal experience narratives and, more recently, Diane Goldstein about ph.mtom ships,
such factual and unsensational accounts allow no simple dismissal of such reports as
cultural tradition, sham or incompetent observation--a fortiori that of a familiar
I MUNFLA ms 63-00IT. p. 100-03.