COLUMBUS DAY RIDDLE

Ship Shape by Dorothy Osborne
GAMES Magazine---October, 1985

In fourteen hundred ninety-eight
Carumba crossed the ocean great.
With three small ships he made his trek:
The Scout, the Search, the Hunt and Peck.

Aboard each ship Carumba placed
A captain bold and handsome-faced.
The surnames of these captains three
Were Bloodguts, Fisheye, and McCree.

Upon the boat that first reached land
The valiant Fisheye had command.
Carumba nobly shared his ship
With Captain Bloodguts on the trip;
Their craft, though made to veer and lurch
By storms, came sooner than the Search.
Across the waters tempest-blown
The Scout's commander sailed alone.

Tell me, reader, if you can,
Which boat was captained by which man?
Aboard which vessel stout and true
Did brave Carumba sail the blue?
Which good ship landed unsurpassed,
Which one came second, which one last?

Answer (in verse):

The Scout, by Fisheye ably manned,
Was first of all to reach the land.
Carumba on the Hunt and Peck
Came next, with Bloodguts on the deck.
The Search was last, and plied the sea
Commanded by the bold McCree.