Black ink pen drawing of a sailing ship on rough waves with a dangling anchor and the script words a smooth sea never made a skilled sailor, on white paper.

Sailing ship and anchor with quote

Fine line · Black and grey · Flash

A black ink drawing of a three-masted sailing ship with striped sails rides on stylised, swirling waves. A dotted line hangs from the ship to an anchor, and the script caption reads a smooth sea never made a skilled sailor. The fine, hatched linework is in black on a plain off-white background, with the subject placed to the left and the text sitting beneath the ship.

Fine line Lettering Ship Sailing ship Wave Sea Anchor Sail Script Quote Text

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

You want to know why my nephew Dennis never went to sea, and I'll tell you, but you'll have to hold the lantern steady, because the wind's come round to the north again and the pier lamp has been spitting all evening. He wanted to be a mate on the Marigold out of Brixham. Hard tack, bad coffee, and a skipper called Ruddock who'd shout the sea into submission if he could. Dennis came down to the quay with his sea-chest and a grin that wouldn't come off his face.

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The Marigold went out on the Tuesday in a flat calm, sails hanging like wet washing, and the crew sat about the deck complaining of the heat. Ruddock sat on the hatch with a bottle and told them that a smooth sea never made a skilled sailor, and that a man who learned nothing from a calm would learn nothing from a gale either. Dennis laughed at him. He'd been reading the sayings painted over the bar at the Jolly Sailor, and he thought himself clever for it.

Three days later the glass fell like a stone down a well, and the Marigold was caught off the Start with her topsail blown to ribbons. Dennis was up the rigging before anyone told him to go, and the rest of the crew watched him fight that canvas like a man wrestling an eel. He came down white-faced and quiet, and he never laughed at old Ruddock again.

So when he came back to the harbour for good, he didn't go to sea. He took the lease on the sail loft by the lifeboat slip, and the first thing he did was hang a board above the door with the words painted on it, in his own careful hand. Go and look at it if you pass. The ship's still there, and the anchor's still hanging, and it's still true, more's the pity.