eakfast," and now to the card in his hand on which a few hours ago he
had written:

"First waltz--Jo."

III. THE LADY LETTY

Another day passed, then two. Before Wilbur knew it he had settled
himself to his new life, and woke one morning to the realization that
he was positively enjoying himself. Daily the weather grew warmer. The
fifth day out from San Francisco it was actually hot. The pitch grew
soft in the "Bertha Millner's" deck seams, the masts sweated resin.
The Chinamen went about the decks wearing but their jeans and blouses.
Kitchell had long since abandoned his coat and vest. Wilbur's oilskins
became intolerable, and he was at last constrained to trade his
pocket-knife to Charlie for a suit of jeans and wicker sandals, such as
the coolies wore--and odd enough he looked in them.

The Captain instructed him in steering, and even promised to show him
the use of the sextant and how to take an observation in the fake short
and easy coasting style of navigation. Furthermore, he showed him how to
read the log and the manner of keeping the dead reckoning.

During most of his watches Wilbur was engaged in painting the inside
of the cabin, door panels, lintels, and the few scattered moldings; and
toward the middle of the first week out, when the "Bertha Millner"
was in the latitude of Point Conception, he and three Chinamen, under
Kitchell's directions, ratlined down the forerigging and affixed the
crow's nest upon the for'mast. The next morning, during Charlie's watch
on deck, a Chinaman was sent up into the crow's nest, and from that time
on there was always a lookout maintained from the masthead.

More than once Wilbur looked around him at the empty coruscating indigo
of the ocean floor, wondering at the necessity of the lookout, and
finally expressed his curiosity to Kitchell. The Captain had now taken
not a little to Wilbur; at first for the sake of a white man's company,
and afterward because he began to place a certain vague reliance upon
Wilbur's judgment. Kitchell had reemarked as how he had brains.

"Well, you see, son," Kitchell had explained to Wilbur, "os-tensiblee
we are after shark-liver oil--and so we are; but also we are on any lay
that turns up; ready for any game, from wrecking to barratry. Strike
me, if I haven't thought of scuttling the dough-dish for her insoorance.
There's regular trade, son, to be done in ships, and then there's
pickin's an' pickin's an' pickin's. Lord, the ocean'