Down East

From Nantucket around Cape Cod, across Massachusetts Bay to Norman's Woe ("It was the schooner Hesperus") and Gloucester, behind Cape Ann, through Casco Bay and up the jagged coast of Maine toward Eastport, Franklin Roosevelt last week piloted his 45-ft. Amberjack II on the sportiest, saltiest vacation the country had ever watched its President take. He dressed in old flannel trousers and a grey sweater under oil skins. He did not bother too much about shaving. Sun and spray tanned his face, widened his grin. He smacked over codfish balls, baked beans, brown bread. And even the crustiest old Down Easterners had to admit that he was a crackerjack seaman under full sail.

First mate of his sleek white schooner was Son James. The rest of the crew was made up of Sons Franklin Jr. and John, five young friends. In the IPs foamy wake followed a strangely assorted flotilla: the destroyers Ellis and Bernadou: official guardians of the President's safety; the Coast Guard cutter Cuyahoga carrying secret service men; the ketch Mary Alice and the powerboat Comanche, loaded to the gunwales with newshawks; the black Gloucesterman Old Glory swarming with news photographers who were never allowed to get within camerashot of the II at sea.

Skipper Roosevelt was coasting up Cape Cod toward the Pilgrim Tower at its tip when the Bernadou sped up from behind, put Assistant Secretary of State Moley aboard the Amberjack II for an hour's talk with the President. Mumbling polite nothings to the Press, Braintruster Moley flew off in a blue Naval seaplane for New York where he sailed next day for the London Economic Conference (see p. 17).

At Provincetown citizens gathered to greet the President, give him an expensive ship's model. But said Skipper Roosevelt to his crew: "Let's fool the Press and go on to Gloucester without stopping." So on they went, driving through the rough dark to drop the hook at midnight.

Next morning the President tarried at Gloucester to have some fun. Aboard the Amberjack II he received Captain Ben Pine of the racing fisherman Gertrude L. Thebaud. Their last meeting was in Washington whither "Cap'n" Pine had sailed the Thebaud to ask for a higher tariff on fish (TIME, May I). The President was given an oil painting of the Thebaud which moved him to exclaim: "I think the painting is particularly lovely and I'll hang it in my study in the White House. (Gesturing toward the Thebaud) Isn't she a grand vessel! Look at her lines. Cap'n Pine, you should be proud to own her." But when a few minutes later he was made an honorary member of the Gloucester Master Mariners Association, Master Mariner Roosevelt mused aloud: "I don't think I could take the Thebaud out to the Banks," Cap'n Pine flatly contradicted the President of the U. S. to his face.

President Roosevelt shaved and put on a clean white shirt (but no tie) to receive his other Gloucester callers--Col. Edward Mandell House, who summers nearby, and Director of the Budget Douglas to talk about pension cuts. Then the Amberjack II put-putted through the Annisquam Canal to miss rough water off Cape Ann and sailed on to Little Harbor, N. H. for the night. There next morning 15-month-old Granddaughter Sara Delano Roosevelt spent a few minutes in the President's arm, expressed delight with the Amberjack II's glittering brass work.

Portland was skipped. Sons Franklin Jr. and John got aboard at Chandler's Cove, ten miles farther up the coast. There, too, the Democratic women of Maine gave the President a ship's clock which would go into the White House study.

On the driving run to Pulpit Harbor old salts gasped at the President's dexterity in zig-zagging the Amberjack II, rail down and all canvas drawing, through a labyrinth of coastal islands. Even the agile destroyers could not thread the risky channel at such breakneck speed, had to take to open water.

Pulpit Harbor was easy to enter but hard to leave next morning when a balky motor refused to kick the little schooner out into the wind. Naval mechanics found a broken valve spring, had to send to Camden for a new one. The President did some public business with Private Secretary Early, who was aboard the Ellis, received two lobsters from an 87-year-oldster who claimed he was the oldest Democratic voter in Maine, signed a musty old hotel register just below ''U. S. Grant, 1873."

At Southwest Harbor on Mt. Desert Island Mrs. Roosevelt popped in to spend a brief hour with her husband. Then she motored on toward Campobello, N. B., the President's destination. Son James took the Bernadou back to Boston to vote as a delegate in Massachusetts' Repeal convention. Scheduled to return on the Bernadou was Ambassador-at-Large Norman H. Davis, just back from the Geneva Arms Conference. He and the President would talk things over as the Amberjack II cruised north into colder weather.

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