"Is the fool deaf? Can ye use a needle and thread?"

"After a rough fashion, sir, and I can knit a bit."

"Mr. Waters?"

A man with a gold band round his cap stepped forward and touched it.

"Take him to the sail-maker. He can help to patch the old fore-stay-sail
on the forecastle. And you can--"

The rest of the order was in a low voice, but Mr. Waters saluted again
and replied, "Yes, sir."

The captain saluted Mr. Waters, and then as Alister moved off, he said,
"You're not sick, I see. Have you sailed before?"

"From Scotland, sir."

Whether, being a Scotchman himself, the tones of Alister's voice, as it
lingered on the word "Scotland," touched a soft corner in the captain's
soul, or whether the blue eyes met with an involuntary feeling of
kinship, or whether the captain was merely struck by Alister's
powerful-looking frame, and thought he might be very useful when he was
better fed, I do not know; but I feel sure that as he returned my new
comrade's salute, he did so in a softened humour. Perhaps this made him
doubly rough to me, and I have no doubt I looked as miserable an object
as one could (not) wish to see.

"_You're_ sick enough," he said; "stand straight, sir! we don't nurse
invalids here, and if you stop you'll have to work for your food,
whether you can eat it or not."

"I will, sir," said I.

"Put out your hands."

I did, and he looked keenly, first at them, and then, from head to foot,
at me. And then to my horror, he asked the question I had been asked by
the man who robbed me of my shilling.

"Where did you steal your slops?"

I hastened to explain. "A working-man, sir, in Liverpool, who was kind
enough to advise me, said that I should have no chance of getting work
on board ship in the clothes I had on. So I exchanged them, and got
these, in a shop he took me to," and being anxious to prove the truth of
my tale, and also to speak with the utmost respect of everybody in this
critical state of my affairs, I added: "I don't remember the name of the
street, sir, but the shop was kept by a--by a Mr. Moses Cohen."

"By Mister--_who_?"

"Mr. Moses Cohen, sir."

When I first uttered the name, I fancied I heard some sniggering among
the sailors who still kept guard over me, and this time the captain's
face wrinkled, and he turned to another officer standing near him and
repeated,

"Mister Moses Cohen!" and they both burst into a fit of laughter, which
became a roar among the subordinates,