n the market today," he informed Otie.

"They don't care how money goes so long as they didn't have to sweat
earning it. Slinging it like they'd sling beans!"

Back on its circling course swished the darting tender. This time the
purring motor whined into silence and the boat came drifting alongside.

"On board _Polly!_" hailed one of the yachtsmen, a man with owner's
insignia on his cap.

The master of the old schooner stuck his lowering visage farther over
the rail, but he did not reply.

"Isn't this _Polly_ the real one?"

"No, it's only a chromo painting of it."

"Thank you! You're a gentleman!" snapped the yachtsman.

"Oh, hold on, Paul," urged one of the men in the tender. "There's a
right way to handle these old boys." He stood up. "We're much interested
in this packet, captain."

"That's why you have been making a holy show of her, playing ring around
a rosy, hey?"

"But tell me, isn't this the old shallop that was a privateer in the war
of eighteen twelve?"

"Nobody aboard here has ever said she wasn't."

"Well, sir, may we not come on board and look her over?"

"No sir, you can't."

"Now, look here, captain--"

"I'm looking!" declared the master of the _Polly_ in ominous tones.

"We don't mean to annoy you, captain."

"Folks who don't know any better do a lot of things without meaning to."

Captain Candage regularly entertained a sea-toiler's resentment for men
who used the ocean as a mere playground. But more especially, during
those later days, his general temper was touchy in regard to dapper
young men, for he had faced a problem of the home which had tried his
soul. He felt an unreasoning choler rising in him in respect to these
chaps, who seemed to have no troubles of their own.

"I am a writer," explained the other. "If I may be allowed on board I'll
take a few pictures and--"

"And make fun of me and my bo't by putting a piece in the paper to
tickle city dudes. Fend off!" he commanded, noticing that the tender was
drifting toward the schooner's side and that one of the crew had set a
boat-hook against the main chain-plate.

"Don't bother with the old crab," advised the owner, sourly.

But the other persisted, courteously, even humbly. "I am afraid you do
not understand me, captain. I would as soon make jest of my mother as of
this noble old relic."

"Go ahead! Call it names!"

"I am taking off my hat to it," he declared, whipping his cap from his
head. "My father's grandfa