The Long Voyage Home

When George Boston went down to the sea this spring, he had a stout ship under him and a restless, lifelong dream to steer her by: he wanted to sail around the world by himself. Driven by his dream, Boston had built his ship, a 30-ft. auxiliary ketch, with his own hands on the lawn of his home in Swampscott, Mass. Two years ago, he coaxed the Fiddler's Green as far as Port Said before an attack of jaundice sent him home by freighter, his ship lashed ignobly on deck.

This time Bachelor Boston, 35, onetime Boston University football star and Navy demolitions expert, whistled up a wind that nestled firmly in the shoulder of his sail. The sea was a glassy, green highway. Twelve pleasant days later, Boston was stretching his legs in Bermuda.

Then Boston's luck abruptly vanished. "On the first night out of Bermuda it got rough. Two days later it got really rough. I couldn't eat. I couldn't sleep. My engine quit, but I was so sick I couldn't fix it. The loss of food and rest were doing things to me. The jaundice I had at Port Said returned. I got a touch of the malaria that had bothered me during the war. I got delirious--semiconscious, you could even say."

Buffeted by the ocean's roll, the dog Boston had picked up in Bermuda soon became a mass of welts and bruises. "I found it difficult to shoot Mudie," said Boston, "but it was the most humane thing to do. He sort of yelped and turned over." Alone again, Boston longed for any sort of companionship, wrote in his log: "Noticed a very small fish swimming near the rudder. I hope that he stays there. It will be nicer to have company."

Finally, 400 miles south of Bermuda, Boston gave up, wearily turned about and headed for Swampscott. Then he sprawled for three days on his bunk, too sick to set a course. "I heard the awesome sound of whale spouts in the fog. I felt that I was going up and down into nothing."

The voyage back was a terror. Off Cape Cod, Boston almost crashed into rocks; a ship nearly ran down Fiddler's Green. When Boston stumbled ashore in Swampscott one day last week, it was 3 in the morning. "I couldn't find anyone--not even a policeman--to take me home," he said. "I had to walk the quarter-mile." After 25 days at sea, Boston was a severe case of nervous exhaustion. "I've had it," he gasped. "I'll never try it again."

But by week's end Sailor Boston had changed his mind, decided that he will try again. "I just need someone to accompany me and a 40-foot boat," he said jauntily. "Then we'd make it for sure. I still have great affection for the sea."

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