nearest dry spot. I have always
regretted his persistence at this task, for which at that time he was
totally unfit.

However, the scraping and sanding and scrubbing were ended at last,
and I will say that I believe we made a very creditable job of it. We
could not give back to our barque the soundness of her youth, her
sea-going prime, but I think we made her scrupulously clean and sweet;
and I shall not forget the jubilant sense of achievement which spurred us
on all through the scorching hot day upon which we really installed
ourselves.

Ted had rigged an excellent table between the saloon stanchions, and
three packing-cases with blankets over them looked quite sumptuous and
ottoman-like, as seats. Our bedding was arranged in the solid hardwood
bunks which had accommodated the captain and mates of the _Livorno_
what time she made her first exit from the harbour of Genoa. Our
stores were neatly stowed in various lockers, and in Ted's famous
'sideboard'; our kitchen things found their appointed places in the
galley; our incongruous skylight roof, with its guttering and adjacent
tanks, awaited their baptism of rain; my father's books were arranged
on shelves of Ted's construction; our various English belongings,
looking inexpressibly choice, intimate, and valuable in their new
environment, were disposed with a view to convenience, and, be it
said, to appearances; and--here was our home.

We were all very tired that night, but we were gay over our supper,
and it was most unusually late before I slept. Late as that was,
however, I could see by its reflected light on the deck beams that my
father's candle was burning still. And when I chanced to wake, long
afterwards, I could hear, until I fell asleep again, the slight sound
he made in walking softly up and down the poop deck--a lonely man who
had not found rest as yet; who, despite bright flashes of gaiety, was
far from happy, a fact better understood and more deeply regretted by
his small son than he knew.

V

My first serious preoccupation regarding ways and means--the money
question--began, I think, in the neighbourhood of my eleventh
birthday, and has remained a more or less constant companion and
bedfellow ever since.

Now, as I write, I am perhaps freer than ever before from this sordid
preoccupation; not by reason of fortunate investments and a plethoric
bank balance, but because my needs now are singularly few and
inexpensive, and the future--that Da