disheveled
youngsters would rush down to meet it, running along beside it through
the surf like a cortege of nereids and tritons, noisily begging for a
handful of _cabets_!

A market was being improvised right on the beach, and sales were going
on in a hub-bub of shouting, cursing, and shaking of fists. The wives
of the captains, intrenched behind their overflowing baskets, were going
it hammer and tongs with the fish-women who would retail the catch next
day at Valencia. When it came to the weighing, the fights would start
all over again. The owners would try to keep out the big fish, _las
piezas gordas_; while the buyers would object to including the small
fry. Rough scales were being fashioned of baskets hung on ropes, big
stones serving as weights. Some gamin from the village, who had been to
school, was always on hand to volunteer as book-keeper for the owners,
entering the sales in pencil on almost any piece of paper.

The vendors would move the baskets they had bought around with their
feet, while the beach-combers looked on covetously. Let a fish slip off
and it vanished as though through a hole in the sand. Whenever a new
pair of boats came in the crowd would run to a new section of the shore
and people from Valencia who had dropped down to see the sight, would
find themselves nearly swept off their feet by the rude scrambling mob.

That was a great day for Dolores. For years she had figured on the beach
as one in the riot of vendors merely. How she had longed to rise to the
class of owners, still to haggle, of course, but to dictate terms, from
a vantage point, to that dirty turbulent crowd of lower scum! And now
her dream of glory was being realized! She stood sniffing at the air
through that disdainful nose of hers, straightening up full height
behind her array of baskets; while Tonet--educated in the Royal Navy, if
you please--was tending the scales and setting down the figures.

Her keel barely awash in the surf, the _Mayflower_ was waiting for the
oxen to drag her up high and dry. The Rector was still aboard, helping
his men furl the sail. At times he would stop and look ashore, watching
his wife fighting tooth and nail there, and calling out the figures
which his brother was to set down. What a woman! Could a queen be
prettier! And the poor fellow's chest heaved with pride and joy at the
thought that Dolores owed all that glory to him, to him alone.

Forward, on the tip of the bow, Pascualet reared h