Chapter 1 A blue-nose ancestry with Yankee proclivities—Youthful fondness for the sea—Master of the shipNorthern Light—Loss of theAquidneck—Return home from Brazil in the canoeLiberdade—The gift of a "ship"—The rebuilding of theSpray-Conundrums in regard to finance and calking—The launching of theSpray. In the fair land of Nova Scotia, a maritime province, there is a ridge called North Mountain, overlooking the Bay of Fundy on one side and the fertile Annapolis valley on the other. On the northern slope of the range grows the hardy spruce-tree, well adapted for ship-timbers, of which many vessels of all classes have been built. The people of this coast, hardy, robust, and strong, are disposed to compete in the world's commerce, and it is nothing against the master mariner if the birthplac…