Daily Inspiration Quote by Joshua Slocum

Slocum’s genius here is the way he shrinks a potentially dangerous encounter into a wry shrug. “They made a shrewd guess” sounds almost admiring, as if he’s complimenting the instincts of the very people who may be threatening him. That tonal choice does double duty: it keeps the narrator in control of the scene, and it casts the unknown “they” as pragmatic operators rather than villains. He’s not pleading for sympathy; he’s measuring the world the way a sailor does - by reading motives, not morals.

The second sentence is where the subtext spikes. “Some one said they came to arrest me” is a classic deflection: passive voice, anonymous source, no commitment. Then comes the evasive pivot - “and - well, let it go at that” - a piece of oral storytelling captured on the page. The dash signals a pause where the real story could spill out, then the deliberate refusal. That refusal is the point. Slocum suggests he knows more than he’s telling, and he’s choosing discretion over drama.

In context, this is the rhetoric of the lone voyager moving through ports and jurisdictions where being misunderstood could cost you your boat, your freedom, or your life. The line frames authority as just another weather system: unpredictable, best handled with tact. He turns a brush with coercion into proof of competence - he was interesting enough to “use,” and savvy enough to survive without giving the reader a clean, sensational account.