nows that
she'll go t' pieces in the winter gales. I knows----"

The doctor lifted his hand. He was broadly smiling. "You have told me,"
said he, "quite enough. Go back to Wayfarer's Tickle. Leave me," he
added, "to see that Jagger learns the worthy trade of broom-making. You
have done me--great service."

"Ah, but," cried Jonas, gripping the doctor's hand, "_you_ cured my
little Sammy!"

The doctor mused. "It may be difficult," he said, by and by, "to fix
this wreck upon Jagger."

"Hist!" Jonas replied, stepping near. "The skipper o' the _Jessie
Dodd_," he whispered, pointedly, solemnly closing one eye, "is wonderful
weak in the knees."

Doctor and I went then in the sloop to Wayfarer's Tickle (the wind
favouring us); and there we found the handsome _Jessie Dodd_ lying
bedraggled and disconsolate on the Ragged Edge, within the harbour:
slightly listed, but afloat aft, and swinging with the gentle lift and
fall of the water. We boarded her, sad at heart that a craft so lovely
should come to a pass like this; and 'twas at once plain to us
sailor-men that 'twas a case of ugly abandonment, if not of
barratry--plain, indeed, to such as knew the man, that in conspiracy
with the skipper Jagger had caused the wreck of the schooner, counting
upon the isolation of the place, the lateness of the season, the
simplicity of the folk, the awe in which they held him--upon all this to
conceal the crime: as often happens on our far-off coast. So we took the
skipper into custody (and this with a high hand) unknown to Jagger--got
him, soon, safe into the sloop: so cowed and undone by the doctor's
manner that he miserably whined for chance to turn Queen's evidence in
our behalf. 'Twas very sad--nauseating, too: so that one wished to stop
the white, writhing lips with a hearty buffet; for rascals should be
strong, lest their pitiful complaints distress the hearts of honest men,
who have not deserved the cruel punishment.

Jagger came waddling down to the landing, his great dog at his heels.
"What you doin'," he demanded, scowling like a thunder-storm, "with that
man?"

"I next call your attention," the doctor answered, with a smile of the
most engaging sort, like a showman once I saw in the South, "to the most
be-_witch_ing exhibit in this vast concourse of wonders. We have
here--don't crowd, _if_ you please--we have here the skipper of the
schooner _Jessie Dodd_, cast away on the Ragged Edge at Wayfarer's
Tickle. He is--and I dir