was busily fitting a new
thwart into Mr. Fogo's boat, and singing with extreme gaiety--

"Oh, where be the French dogs?
Oh! where be they, O?
They be down i' their long-boats,
All on the salt say, O!"

What with the song and the hammering, he did not hear his master's
approach.

"Up flies the kite,
An' down flies the lark, O!
Wi' hale an' tow, rumbleow--"

"Good-morning, Caleb."

"Aw, mornin' to 'ee, sir. You took me unawares--

"All for to fetch home,
The summer an' the May, O!
For summer is a-come,
An' winter es a-go.'"

"Caleb, I have seen a ghost."

The mallet stopped in mid-descent. Caleb looked up again
open-mouthed.

"Tom Twist and Harry Dingle!"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Figger o' speech, sir, meanin' 'Who'd ha' thought et?' Whose ghost,
sir, ef 'taint a rude question?"

Mr. Fogo told his story.

At its conclusion, Caleb laid down his mallet and whistled.

"'Tes the leppards, sure 'nuff, a-ha'ntin' o' th' ould place.
Scriptur' says they will not change their spots, an' I'm blest ef et
don't say truth. But deary me, sir, an' axin' your pardon for sayin'
so, you'm a game-cock, an' no mistake."

"I?"

"Iss, sir. Two knacks 'pon the floor, an' I'd ha' been up in a
jiffey. But niver mind, sir, us'll wait up for mun to-night, an'
I'll get the loan o' the Dearlove's blunderbust in case they gets
pol-rumptious."

Mr. Fogo deprecated the blunderbuss, but agreed to sit up for the
ghost; and so for the time the matter dropped. But Caleb's eyes
followed his master admiringly for the rest of the day, and more than
once he had to express his feelings in vigorous soliloquy.

"Niver tell me! Looks as ef he'd no more pluck nor a field-mouse;
an' I'm darned ef he takes more 'count of a ghost than he wud of a
circuit-preacher. Blest ef I don't think ef a sperrit was to knack
at the front door, he'd tell 'un to wipe hes feet 'pon the mat, an'
make hissel' at home. Well, well, seein's believin', as Tommy said
when he spied Noah's Ark i' the peep-show."

Footnote, Chapter XVII
[1] I cannot forbear to add a note on this eminently Trojan
word. In the fifteenth century, so high was the spirit of the
Trojan sea-captains, and so heavy the toll of black-mail they
levied on ships of other ports, that King Edward IV sent
poursuivant after poursuivant to threaten his displeasure.
The messengers had their ears slit