n wind and water before I so much as
know that I am engaged. What think ye, heh? Should I lay myself boldly
alongside, d'ye see, and ply her with small arms, or should I work
myself clear and try a long range action? I am none of your slippery,
grease-tongued, long-shore lawyers, but if so be as she's willing for a
mate, I'll stand by her in wind and weather while my planks hold out.'

'I can scarce give advice in such a case,' said I, 'for my experience is
less than yours. I should say though that you had best speak to her from
your heart, in plain sailor language.'

'Aye, aye, she can take it or leave it. Phoebe Dawson it is, the sister
of the blacksmith. Let us work back and have a drop of the right Nants
before we go. I have an anker newly come, which never paid the King a
groat.'

'Nay, you had best leave it alone,' I answered.

'Say you so? Well, mayhap you are right. Throw off your moorings, then,
and clap on sail, for we must go.'

'But I am not concerned,' said I.

'Not concerned! Not--' he was too much overcome to go on, and could
but look at me with a face full of reproach. 'I thought better of you,
Micah. Would you let this crazy old hulk go into action, and not stand
by to fire a broadside?'

'What would you have me do then?'

'Why, I would have you help me as the occasion may arise. If I start
to board her, I would have you work across the bows so as to rake
her. Should I range, up on the larboard quarter, do you lie, on the
starboard. If I get crippled, do you draw her fire until I refit. What,
man, you would not desert me!'

The old seaman's tropes and maritime conceits were not always
intelligible to me, but it was clear that he had set his heart upon my
accompanying him, which I was equally determined not to do. At last
by much reasoning I made him understand that my presence would be more
hindrance than help, and would probably be fatal to his chances of
success.

'Well, well,' he grumbled at last, 'I've been concerned in no such
expedition before. An' it be the custom for single ships to engage, I'll
stand to it alone. You shall come with me as consort, though, and stand
to and fro in the offing, or sink me if I stir a step.'

My mind was full of my father's plans and of the courses which lay
before me. There seemed to be no choice, however, as old Solomon was
in dead earnest, but to lay the matter aside for the moment and see the
upshot of this adventure.

'Mind, Solomon,' said I, 'I