p."

The captain's rough, hard hand went out and caught the woman's thin
fingers. A peculiar cadence came into his voice.

"All ye have? Do you think I don't know it? That's why I was under her
bowsprit."

"AGAINST ORDERS"

"Here comes Captain Bogart--we'll ask him," said the talkative man.

His listeners were grouped about one of the small tables in the
smoking-room of the Moldavia, five days out. The question was when the
master of a vessel should leave his ship. In the incident discussed
every man had gone ashore--even the life-saving crew had given her up:
the master had stuck to his post.

The captain listened gravely.

"Yes--if there's one chance in a thousand of saving her. Regulations
are pretty plain; can't forget 'em unless you want to," and he walked
on.

That night at dinner I received a message to come to the captain's
cabin. He had some coffee that an old Brazilian had sent him. His
steward hailed from Rio, and knew how to grind and boil it.

Over the making the talk veered to the inquiry in the smoking-room.

"When ought a commander to abandon his ship, Captain?" I asked.

"When his passengers need him. Passengers first, ship next, are the
orders. They're clear and exact--can't mistake 'em."

"You speak as if you had had some experience." A leaf from out the
note-book of a live man doing live things is as refreshing as a bucket
of cool water from a deep well.

"Experience! Been forty years at sea."

"Some of them pretty exciting, I suppose."

"Yes. Half a dozen of 'em."

He emptied his cup, rose from his seat, and pushing back his chair,
began pacing the floor, stepping into the connecting chart-room,
bending for an instant over the map, and stepping back again, peering
through the small window a-grime with the spray of a north-easter.

My question, I could see, had either revived some unpleasant memory or
the anxiety due to the sudden shift of wind--it had been blowing
south-west all day--had made him restless.

As my eyes followed his movements I began to realize the enormous size
of the man. Walking the deck, head up, body erect, his broad shoulders
pulled back, his round, solid girth tightly confined in his simple
uniform, he looked the brawny, dominant, forceful commander that he
was--big among the biggest passengers. Here, pacing the small cabin,
his head almost touching the ceiling, his great frame filled the small
narrow room as an elephant would fill a boudoir. Ever