like that."

Hiram, as foreman of the Ancients, felt piqued at this slighting
reference to his men, and showed it.

"They can pull ropes when you tell 'em to," he said. "Leastways, when
it comes to brains, I reckon they'll stack up better'n them Portygees
you used to have."

"I never pretended that them Portygees had any brains at all," said
the Cap'n, grimly. "They come aboard without brains, and I took a
belayin'-pin and batted brains into 'em. I can't do that to these
critters here. It would be just like 'em to misunderstand the whole
thing and go home and get me mixed into a lot of law for assaultin'
'em."

"Oh, if you're afraid to go outside, say so!" sneered Hiram. "But
you've talked so much of deep water, and weatherin' Cape Horn, and--"

"Afraid? Me afraid?" roared the Cap'n, spatting his broad hand on
his breast. "Me, that kicked my dunnage-bag down the fo'c's'le-hatch
at fifteen years old? I'll show you whether I'm afraid or not."

He knotted a hitch around the spokes of the wheel and scuffed hastily
forward.

"Here!" he bawled, cuffing the taut sheets to point his meaning,
"when I get back to the wheel and holler 'Ease away!' you fellers
get hold of these ropes, untie 'em, and let out slow till I tell you
stop. And then tie 'em just as you find 'em."

They did so clumsily, Cap'n Sproul swearing under his breath, and
at last the _Dobson_ got away on the port tack.

"Just think of me--master of a four-sticker at twenty-seven--havin'
to stand here in the face and eyes of the old Atlantic Ocean and yell
about untyin' ropes and tyin' 'em up like I was givin' off orders
in a cow-barn!"

"Well, they done it all right--and they done it pretty slick, so far
as I could see," interjected Hiram.

"Done it!" sneered the Cap'n. "Eased sheets here in this puddle, in
a breeze about stiff enough to winnow oats! Supposin' it was a blow,
with a gallopin' sea! Me runnin' around this deck taggin' gool on
halyards, lifts, sheets, and downhauls, and them hoss-marines
follerin' me up. Davy Jones would die laughin', unless some one
pounded him on the back to help him get his breath."

Now that his mariner's nose was turned toward the sea once again after
his two years of landsman's hebetude, all his seaman's instinct, all
his seaman's caution, revived. His nose snuffed the air, his eyes
studied the whirls of the floating clouds. There was nothing
especially ominous in sight.

The autumn sun was warm. The wind was sp