g around."

"I shall hang around, sir. I can't afford to be ashamed of myself."

"I think you have said quite enough, father," stated Polly Candage, with
vigor.

'"I have heard of adopting families before," said the irreconcilable
one, "but I never heard of any such wholesale operation as this. I'm
thinking I'll go climb a tree."

They embarked in the dory. Mr. Speed and Dolph splashed their oars and
rowed, exchanging looks and not venturing to offer any comment.

"You might auction 'em off to farmers for scarecrows," pursued Captain
Candage, still worrying the topic as a dog mouths a bone. "They ain't
fit for no more active jobs than that."

"I do hope you'll forgive my father for talking this way," pleaded Polly
Candage. She raised brimming eyes to the sympathetic gaze of the young
man beside her. "He doesn't understand it the way I do."

"Perhaps I don't exactly understand it myself," he protested.

"But what you are doing for them?"

"I haven't done anything as yet except start trouble for them. Now I
must do a little something to square myself."

"There's a reward for good deeds, Captain Mayo, when you help those
who cannot help themselves. I believe what the Bible says about casting
bread on the waters. It will return to you some day!"

He smiled down on her enthusiasm tolerantly, but he was far from
realizing then that this pretty girl, whose eyes were so bright
behind her tears, and whose cheeks were flushed with the ardor of her
admiration, was speaking to him with the tongue of a sibyl.

XIII ~ A CAPTAIN OP HUMAN FLOTSAM

O what is that which smells so tarry?
I've nothing in the house that's tarry.
It's a tarry sailor, down below,
Kick him out into the snow!
Doo me axna, dinghy a-a-a ma!
Doo me ama-day!
--Doo Me Ama.

Captain Candage growled and complained so persistently during the trip
to the main that Mayo expected to be deserted by the querulous skipper
the moment the dory's prow touched the beach. But the skipper came
dogging at his heels when Mayo set off up the one street of Maquoit.

"May I come along with you?" asked the girl at his side. "I can see that
you are thinking up some plan. I do Hope I may come!" He gave her his
aim for answer.

"I haven't been into this port for some time, Captain Candage, but the
last trip I made here, as I remember, a man named Rowley, who runs the
general store, was first sele