singly.
"I'm tellin' you as it was told to me, but I never stopped to
inquire into the matter so close before. Seems like folks wouldn't
know so much about mermaids if they hadn't seen 'em; an' yet
accordin' to all accounts the victim is bound to get drownded."

"P'raps," suggested Trot softly, "someone found a fotygraph of one
of 'em."

"That might o' been, Trot, that might o' been," answered Cap'n Bill.

A nice man was Cap'n Bill, and Trot knew he always liked to explain
everything so she could fully understand it. The aged sailor was not
a very tall man, and some people might have called him chubby, or
even fat. He wore a blue sailor shirt with white anchors worked on
the corners of the broad, square collar, and his blue trousers were
very wide at the bottom. He always wore one trouser leg over his
wooden limb and sometimes it would flutter in the wind like a flag
because it was so wide and the wooden leg so slender. His rough
kersey coat was a pea-jacket and came down to his waistline. In the
big pockets of his jacket he kept a wonderful jackknife, and his
pipe and tobacco, and many bits of string, and matches and keys and
lots of other things. Whenever Cap'n Bill thrust a chubby hand into
one of his pockets, Trot watched him with breathless interest, for
she never knew what he was going to pull out.

The old sailor's face was brown as a berry. He had a fringe of hair
around the back of his head and a fringe of whisker around the edge
of his face, running from ear to ear and underneath his chin. His
eyes were light blue and kind in expression. His nose was big and
broad, and his few teeth were not strong enough to crack nuts with.

Trot liked Cap'n Bill and had a great deal of confidence in his
wisdom, and a great admiration for his ability to make tops and
whistles and toys with that marvelous jackknife of his. In the
village were many boys and girls of her own age, but she never had
as much fun playing with them as she had wandering by the sea
accompanied by the old sailor and listening to his fascinating
stories.

She knew all about the Flying Dutchman, and Davy Jones' Locker, and
Captain Kidd, and how to harpoon a whale or dodge an iceberg or
lasso a seal. Cap'n Bill had been everywhere in the world, almost,
on his many voyages. He had been wrecked on desert islands like
Robinson Crusoe and been attacked by cannibals, and had a host of
other exciting adventures. So he was a delightful comrade for the
li