e tide was going to fall so far. This same happened the
very last time I was down yer wi' old Blimie--old Sublime, us calls
'en. 'Let's get out o' this!' he said. 'Leave the blasted nets an'
let's get out o' it quick!' But I 'ouldn't let 'en, not I--us had three
thousand shrimps thic night; an' he very nearly cried, he did. '_Tis_
some mates I've had for thees yer job. Most of 'em won't come when they
can pay the brewer any other way. _I'll_ never come out again wi' the
last three on 'em, not if I starves for it. One of 'em went to sleep;
t'other cuden' see the buoys; an' old Blimie was blind and not willing
neither. 'Wer be the cursed things?' he'd say. 'Back!' I'd say. 'Back
oars! You'm on top o' it!' 'Well, I be backing, bain't I?' he'd say,
an' go on pulling jest the same. Then 'er said 'er was ill and wanted
to go home. _He_ won't come no more, not if he starves, an' me too.
I won't hae 'en!"

A ripple came down from the east. The sound of its _lap-lap-lap_ under
the boat stole on one's ears sleepily, but it roused Uncle Jake to
quick action. "Do 'ee see thees little cockle on the water?" he said.
"Do 'ee feel the life o'it in the boat? Must get out of thees yer, else
we shan't never find the buoys."

We picked up the buoys--those we had shifted out of line were hard to
find, for the stars were now all hidden by cloud--and a little breeze
followed the ripple from the east. Rowing along under the cliffs, even
inside some of the rocks, through passages that only Uncle Jake is sure
of, we caught the young flood tide. The north-easter, that blew out
freshly from the Seacombe valley, chilled us to the bone.

Seacombe was asleep. No one was on the Front. We had to carry the nets
up from the water's edge to the seawall before our utmost straining
could drag the _Moondaisy_ up the bank of shingle. For more than an
hour we hauled.

When at last it was over, I brought Uncle Jake in house and made him a
cup of cocoa. We had been nine hours' rowing. Though he could have done
the same again, without food or rest, he looked a little haggard. It
seemed impossible to believe that the grey old man with disordered hair
and beard, clothed in rags and patches, sipping cocoa in a windsor
chair, was that same alert shadow who had been reckoning up life, so
humorously and wisely, in the darkness under the cliffs. He referred
again to the winter's pinch. It must mean that he has not enough money
put by from summer for the days coming,