'Tis all my eye an' Betty Martin! What I zay es,
'tis these times, there's such a dale o' folk, a dale of puzzivantin'
fellers; the world's to small."

With these words there flashed across me a vision of Drake crushed
into our modern life by the shrinkage of the world; Drake caught in the
meshes of red tape, electric wires, and all the lofty appliances of our
civilization. Does a type survive its age; live on into times that
have no room for it? The blood is there--and sometimes there's a
throw-back.... All fancy! Eh?

"So," I said, "you failed?"

Prawle wriggled.

"I wudden' goo for to zay that, zurr--'tis an ugly word. Da-am!" he
added, staring at his boots, "'twas thru me tu. We were along among the
haythen, and I mus' nades goo for to break me leg. The capt'n he wudden'
lave me. 'One Devon man,' he says to me, 'don' lave anotherr.' We werr
six days where we shuld ha' been tu; when we got back to the ship a
cruiser had got her for gun-runnin'."

"And what has become of Captain Pearse?"

Prawle answered, "Zurr, I belave 'e went to China, 'tis onsartin."

"He's not dead?"

Prawle looked at me with a kind of uneasy anger.

"Yu cudden' kell 'en! 'Tis true, mun 'll die zome day. But therr's not a
one that'll show better zport than Capt'n Zach'ry Pearse."

I believe that; he will be hard to kill. The vision of him comes up,
with his perfect balance, defiant eyes, and sweetish smile; the way the
hair of his beard crisped a little, and got blacker on the cheeks; the
sort of desperate feeling he gave, that one would never get the better
of him, that he would never get the better of himself.

I took leave of Prawle and half a crown. Before I was off the quay I
heard him saying to a lady, "Bane in collision, marm! Like to zee over
her?"

After lunch I rode on to Moor. The old place looked much the same; but
the apple-trees were stripped of fruit, and their leaves beginning to go
yellow and fall. One of Pasiance's cats passed me in the orchard hunting
a bird, still with a ribbon round its neck. John Ford showed me all his
latest improvements, but never by word or sign alluded to the past. He
inquired after Dan, back in New Zealand now, without much interest; his
stubbly beard and hair have whitened; he has grown very stout, and I
noticed that his legs are not well under control; he often stops to lean
on his stick. He was very ill last winter; and sometimes, they say, will
go straight off to sleep in the middle