n'ther helped send the Spanish Armada to the bottom
where it belonged. Many and many 's the time I 've heard him tell
about it, and I judge from what he said he must have done most of the
job himself, though I reckon old Cap'n Drake may have helped some."
(Here the Captain chuckled.) "He never came back from his last
voyage,--overhauled by pirates more 'n likely. That was twenty years
ago, and I 've been following the sea myself ever since. I was wrecked
off the Spanish Main on my first voyage, and I 've run afoul of
pirates and come near walking the plank more times than one, I 'm
telling ye, but somehow I always had the luck to get away! And here I
be, safe and sound."

At this point the lobsters made a commotion in the wooden puncheon,
and the Captain turned his attention to them. "Jest spilin' to get
out, ain't ye?" he inquired genially. "Look here, boy," to Daniel,
"that water's bilin'. Heave 'em in."

Daniel held his squirming victims over the pot, and not without a
qualm of pity dropped them into the boiling water. Then he ventured to
ask a question. "What is sea gold, Captain Sanders?"

"Things like them," answered the Captain, jerking his thumb at the
lobsters, which were already beginning to turn a beautiful red color
as they boiled in the pot; "as good gold as any that was ever dug out
of mines ye can get for fish, and there never was such fishing in all
the seas as there is along this coast! My! my! I 've seen schools of
cod off the Cape making a solid floor of fish on the water so ye could
walk on it if ye were so minded, and as for lobsters, I 've caught 'em
that measured six and seven feet long! Farther down the coast there
are oysters so big one of 'em will make a square meal for four or five
people. It 's the truth I 'm telling ye."

Goodman Pepperell smiled. "Thomas," he said, "thou hast not lost thy
power of narration!"

Captain Sanders for an instant looked a bit dashed, then he said,
"Well, believe it or not, Josiah, it 's the truth for all that. Why,
talk about the land of Canaan flowin' with milk and honey! This here
water 's just alive with money! Any boy could go out and haul up a
shilling on his own hook any time he liked."

Daniel, his eyes shining and his lips parted, was just making up his
mind that he would rather be the captain of a fishing-smack than
anything else in the world, since he knew he could n't be a pirate,
when his mother came to the fireplace with a layer of corn-meal d