o stern. Our limited marine experience
would not have qualified us to pass an _ex cathedra_ judgment upon the
seaworthiness of a mud-scow; but Bush, with characteristic impudence
and versatility of talent, discoursed learnedly to the skipper upon
the beauty of his vessel's "lines" (whatever those were), her spread
of canvas and build generally,--discussed the comparative merits
of single and double topsails, and new patent yard-slings, and
reef-tackle, and altogether displayed such an amount of nautical
learning that it completely crushed me and staggered even the captain.

I strongly suspected that Bush had acquired most of his knowledge of
sea terms from a cursory perusal of Bowditch's _Navigator_, which
I had seen lying on the office table, and I privately resolved to
procure a compact edition of Marryat's sea tales as soon as I should
go ashore, and overwhelm him next time with such accumulated stores of
nautical erudition that he would hide his diminished head. I had a dim
recollection of reading something in Cooper's novels about a ship's
deadheads and cat's eyes, or cat-heads and deadeyes, I could not
remember which, and, determined not to be ignored as an inexperienced
landlubber, I gazed in a vague way into the rigging, and made a
few very general observations upon the nature of deadeyes and
spanker-booms. The captain, however, promptly annihilated me by
demanding categorically whether I had ever seen the spanker-boom
jammed with the foretopsailyard, with the wind abeam. I replied
meekly that I believed such a catastrophe had never occurred under
my immediate observation, and as he turned to Bush with a smile of
commiseration for my ignorance I ground my teeth and went below to
inspect the pantry. Here I felt more at home. The long rows of canned
provisions, beef stock, concentrated milk, pie fruits, and a small
keg, bearing the quaint inscription, "Zante cur.," soon soothed my
perturbed spirit and convinced me beyond the shadow of a doubt that
the _Olga_ was stanch and seaworthy, and built in the latest and most
improved style of marine architecture.

I therefore went up to tell Bush that I had made a careful and
critical examination of the vessel below, and that she would
undoubtedly do. I omitted to state the nature of the observations
upon which this conclusion was founded, but he asked no troublesome
questions, and we returned to the office with a favourable report of
the ship's build, capacity, and outf