't money enough on board to buy the smallest ham."

"How are you goin' to mend matters, lad, while the price of oysters
keeps down as it is now?" Darius asked, beginning to understand that
Jerry had something in his head which might serve us.

"I'm told that Commodore Barney keeps his men jumpin' so lively at
fightin' that they don't have time for anythin' else," the lad said
slowly, as if speaking to himself, and I wondered if he counted that
the commodore could raise the price of oysters.

"I reckon that's the straight truth," Darius replied. "It ain't his
way to keep cats that don't catch mice."

"Then why is it we can't make a trade to help supply the commodore
with fish an' oysters? Even though he didn't give very much for the
freights we brought in, it wouldn't be a case of losin' three or four
days out of every ten runnin' up to Baltimore."

Even then I failed to understand his scheme, and said as much, whereat
the lad cried impatiently:

"You must be thick-headed, Amos Grout, if you can't see what I'm
drivin' at. The matter has been in my mind these two months past, so
now I propose that we go to Commodore Barney--he surely will hear what
we've got to say--, an' try to make a trade. He buys more'n half of
all his provisions, for the men of the fleet don't get time to do much
fishin', an' we could let ourselves an' the pungy outright, or agree
upon a price for what we bring in."

It wasn't at all a bad scheme, now that our regular business was so
dull; but I questioned if the commodore would listen to such as we
were, long enough to understand what kind of a bargain we had to
offer.

"I'll go bail that you won't have any trouble in gettin' speech with
Joshua Barney, an' for so long as the business warrants, pervidin' you
can catch him when he's got a few spare minutes on his hands," Darius
said quickly, and from his tone I understood that he heartily approved
of Jerry's scheme.

"But where shall we find the fleet?" I asked, and to the question
Jerry made answer:

"We've been countin' on runnin' in to see our folks at Benedict, an' I
warrant that there we'll get news of the commodore. If not, it won't
cost so very much time to have a look around the lower end of the
bay."

"Yes, an' be snapped up by some bloomin' Britisher," I said, having no
desire to mix in where people were fighting with such playful weapons
as cannon and rifles.

"We should be able to keep out of the way of danger," Jerry repli