nning it so nicely. Take me up on deck,
please."

"Come, be careful o' that chest," said Captain Uriah T. Potter to the
minions, as they moved it up to be weighed.

"Heaviest tea that iver _I_ handled," groaned the first minion.

"All the more duty for you sharks. O' course it's heavy, being
compressed: an' strong, too. Guess you don't oft'n get tea o' this
strength in your country, anyway. Give a man two pinches o'
Wapshott's best, properly cooked, an' I reckon it'll last _him_.
You won't find him coming to complain."

"No?"

"No. But I ain't sayin' nuthin'," added Captain Potter, "about his
widder."

And his smile, as he regarded his hearers, was both engaging and
expansive.

CHAPTER XVII.

HOW ONE THAT WAS DISSATISFIED WITH HIS PAST SAW A VISION, BUT
DOUBTED.

Caleb Trotter watched his master's behaviour during the next few days
with a growing impatience.

"I reckon," he said, "'tes wi' love, as Sally Bennett said when her
old man got cotched i' the dreshin'-machine,' you'm in, my dear, an'
you may so well go dro'.'"

Nevertheless, he would look up from his work at times with anxiety.

"Forty-sax. That's the forty-saxth time he've a-trotted up that
blessed beach an' back; an' five times he've a-pulled up to stare at
the watter. I've a-kep' count wi' these bits o' chip. An' at night
'tes all round the house, like Aaron's dresser, wi' a face, too, like
as ef he'd a-lost a shillin' an' found a thruppeny-bit. This 'ere
pussivantin' [1] may be relievin' to the mind, but I'm darned ef et
can be good for shoe-leather. 'Tes the wear an' tear, that's what
'tes, as Aunt Lovey said arter killin' her boy wi' whackin'."

The fact is that Mr. Fogo was solving his problem, though the process
was painful enough. He was concerned, too, for Caleb, whose rest was
often broken by his master's restlessness. In consequence he
determined to fit up a room for his own use. Caleb opposed the
scheme at first; but, finding that the business of changing diverted
Mr. Fogo's melancholy, gave way at last, on a promise that
"no May-games" should be indulged in--a festival term which was found
to include somnambulism, suicide, and smoking in bed.

The room chosen lay on the upper storey at the extreme east of the
house, and looked out, between two tall elms, upon the creek and the
lepers' burial-ground. It was chosen as being directly over the room
occupied by Caleb, so that, by stamping his foot, Mr. Fogo co