e without a drop," I heard one call out.

"No; not to save your lives, I wouldn't!" he shouted back, his boat
striking the beach. Springing out and catching Emily by the shoulder,
pushing her before him,--"Go into the Hulk, child." Then, lowering his
voice to me, "They are all alike, d--- them, all alike. Just such a gang!
I know 'em, I know 'em. Get you a drink? I'll see you dead first, d---
you. See you dead first; do you hear?"

His face was livid, his eyes blazing with anger. The crew turned and shot
up the river, grumbling as they went. Brockway unloaded his boat,
clutching the tongs as if they were weapons; then, tying the painter to a
stake, sat down and watched me at work. Soon Emily crept back and slipped
one hand around her grandfather's neck.

"Do you think you can ever do that, little Frowsy-head?" he said, pointing
to my sketch. I looked up. His face was as serene and sunny as that of the
child beside him.

Gradually I came to know these people better. I never could tell why, our
tastes being so dissimilar. I fancied, sometimes, from a remark the old
man once made, that he had perhaps known some one who had been a painter,
and that I reminded him of his friend, and on that account he trusted me;
for I often detected him examining my brushes, spreading the bristles on
his palm, or holding them to the light with a critical air. I could see,
too, that their touch was not new to him.

As for me, the picturesqueness of the Hulk, the simple mode of life of the
inmates, their innate refinement, the unselfish devotion of little Emily
to the old man, the conflicting elements in his character, his
fierceness--almost brutality--at times, his extreme gentleness at others,
his rough treatment of every stranger who attempted to land on his shore,
his tenderness over the child, all combined to pique my curiosity to know
something of his earlier life.

Moreover, I constantly saw new beauties in the old Hulk. It always seemed
to adapt itself to the changing moods of the weather,--being grave or gay
as the skies lowered or smiled. In the dull November days, when the clouds
drifted in straight lines of slaty gray, it assumed a weird, forbidding
look. When the wind blew a gale from the northeast, and the back water of
the river overflowed the marsh,--submerging the withered grass and
breaking high upon the foot-bridge,--it seemed for all the world like the
original tenement of old Noah himself, derelict ever since his
di