ring gold earrings and a gaudy handkerchief.

"When I was a young feller I made a voyage or two in an old hooker called
the _Pearl of Asia_. Her old man at that time was old Captain Gillson, him
that had the gold tooth an' the swell ma'ogany fist in place o' the one
that got blowed off by a rocket in Falmouth Roads. Well, I was walkin' out
with a young woman at Liverpool--nice young thing--an' she give me a ring
to keep to remember 'er by, the day before we sailed. Nice thing it was; it
had 'Mizpah' wrote on it.

"We 'ad two or three fellers in the crowd for'ard that voyage as would
'andle anything as wasn't too 'ot or too 'eavy which explains why I got
into a 'abit of slippin' my bits o' vallybles, such as joolery, into a bit
of a cache I found all nice and 'andy in the planking' back o' my bunk.

"We 'ad a long passage of it 'ome, a 'undred-and-sixty days from Portland,
Oregon, to London River, an' what with thinkin' of the thumpin' lump o' pay
I'd have to draw an' one thing an' another, I clean forgot all about the
ring I'd left cached in the little place back o' my bunk yonder.

"Well, I drew my pay all right, and after a bit I tramped it to Liverpool,
to look out for another ship. An' the first person I met in Liverpool was
the young woman I 'ad the ring of.

"'Where's my ring?' she says, before I'd time to look round.

"Now, I never was one as liked 'avin' words with a woman, so I pitched her
a nice yarn about the cache I 'ad at the back o' my bunk, an' 'ow I vallied
'er ring that 'igh I stowed it there to keep it safe, an' 'ow I'd slid down
the anchor cable an' swum ashore an' left everything I 'ad behind me, I was
that red-'ot for a sight of 'er.

"'Ye didn't,' she says quite ratty, 'ye gave it to one o' them nasty yaller
gals ye sing about.'

"'I didn't,' I says; 'Ye did,' she says; 'I didn't,' says I. An' we went on
like that for a bit until I says at last, 'If I can get aboard the old
_Pearl_ again,' I says, 'I'll get the ring,' I says, 'an' send it you in a
letter,' I says, 'an' then per'aps you'll be sorry for the nasty way you've
spoke to me,' I says.

"'Ho, yes,' she says, sniffy-like, 'per'aps I will, per'aps I won't,' an'
off she goes with 'er nose in the air.

"My next ship was for Frisco to load grain; and I made sure of droppin'
acrost the _Pearl_ there, for she was bound the same way. But I never did.
She was dismasted in the South Pacific on the outward passage, and had to
put in to one o