ockhead!" shouted the ancient mariner to Sylvanus;
"hev ye been so long aboard ship ye can't tell a stable when you see it?
Drive on, you slabsided swab!" The Captain's combination of lumbering
with nautical pursuits gave a peculiar and not always congruous flavour
to his pet phrases; but Sylvanus did not mind; he drove round the lane
and met Timotheus.

"We have just finished tea, Captain," said Mrs. Carruthers with her
pretty touch of a cultivated Irish accent; "but Marjorie will tell
Tryphosa to set yours on the table at once."

"All right, Honoria!" growled Mr. Thomas; "I'm in port here for the
night, and I'm a goin' to make fast; so be I hev to belay on to the lee
side of a stack of shingle bolts. Now, Marjorie, my pet, give daddy
another kiss, and run away for a bit. John, I want you right away."

With the latter words, the Captain took the Squire off to the far end of
the verandah, and sat down with his legs dangling over among the
flowers, causing his brother-in-law to do the same. "John," said he,
taking off his naval cap, and mopping his forehead, "you're all goin' to
be murdered to-night in your bunks, else I wouldn't ha' quit dock o'
Sunday."

"Whatever do you mean, Thomas?"

"I mean what I say, and well to you and yourn. Sylvanus was down at
Peskiwanchow, gettin' some things his brother left there, when he
shipped for you. There's a bad crew in that whiskey mill, and, fool as
he is, he was sharp enough to hear them unbeknown. Says one of 'em,
'Better get out the fire-engines from town,' and he laughed. Says
another, 'Guess the boys'll hev a nice bonefire waitin' for us, time we
get to Flanders.' Then the low-down slab-pilers got their mutinous heads
together, and says, 'The J.P. and the bailiff's got to be roasted
anyway, wisht we could heave Nash in atop.' I've left the cursing and
swearin' out, because it's useless ballast, and don't count in the deal
any more'n sawdust. Now, John, what do you think of that?"

"It looks serious, Thomas, if your man is to be depended on."

"My man depended on? Sylvanus Pilgrim to be depended on? There's no more
dependable able-bodied seaman and master mill-hand afloat nor ashore.
He's true as the needle to the pole and the gang-saw to the plank. Don't
you go saying wrong of Sylvanus."

"I must take Nash into confidence with us, and call up your informant,"
said the Squire, leading the Captain into the house and setting him
carefully down at the tea table, where Mr