les, but it's my
side that's doin' the work. After we've blasted her this time you two
can go in the boat an' see what there is to git hold of, but two of my
men must go along.' So me an' Andy had to go on deck, an' two big
fellers was detailed to go with us in the little boat when the time
come, an' then the bat'ry man he teched her off.

"Well, sir, the pop that followed that tech was somethin' to remember.
It shuck the water, it shuck the air, an' it shuck the hull we was on.
A reg'lar cloud of smoke an' flyin' bits of things rose up out of the
Mary Auguster; an' when that smoke cleared away, an' the water was all
b'ilin' with the splash of various-sized hunks that come rainin' down
from the sky, what was left of the Mary Auguster was sprinkled over the
sea like a wooden carpet fur water-birds to walk on.

"Some of the men sung out one thing, an' some another, an' I could hear
Tom Simmons swear; but Andy an' me said never a word, but scuttled down
into the boat, follered close by the two men who was to go with us.
Then we rowed like devils fur the lot of stuff that was bobbin' about
on the water, out where the Mary Auguster had been. In we went among
the floatin' spars and ship's timbers, I keepin' the things off with an
oar, the two men rowin', an' Andy in the bow.

"Suddenly Andy give a yell, an' then he reached himself for'ard with
sech a bounce that I thought he'd go overboard. But up he come in a
minnit, his two 'leven-inch hands gripped round a box. He sot down in
the bottom of the boat with the box on his lap an' his eyes screwed on
some letters that was stamped on one end. `Pidjin-pies!' he sings out.
`'Tain't turkeys, nor 'tain't cranberries but, by the Lord Harry, it's
Christmas pies all the same!' After that Andy didn't do no more work,
but sot holdin' that box as if it had been his fust baby. But we kep'
pushin' on to see what else there was. It's my 'pinion that the
biggest part of that bark's cargo was blowed into mince-meat, an' the
most of the rest of it was so heavy that it sunk. But it wasn't all
busted up, an' it didn't all sink. There was a big piece of wreck with
a lot of boxes stove into the timbers, and some of these had in 'em
beef ready b'iled an' packed into cans, an' there was other kinds of
meat, an' dif'rent sorts of vegetables, an' one box of turtle soup. I
looked at every one of 'em as we took 'em in, an' when we got the
little boat pretty well loaded I wanted to still kee