The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Money Box, by W.W. Jacobs

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Title: The Money Box
Odd Craft, Part 1.

Author: W.W. Jacobs

Release Date: April 29, 2004 [EBook #12201]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MONEY BOX ***

Produced by David Widger

ODD CRAFT

BY

W. W. JACOBS

1909

THE MONEY-BOX

Sailormen are not good 'ands at saving money as a rule, said the
night-watchman, as he wistfully toyed with a bad shilling on his
watch-chain, though to 'ear 'em talk of saving when they're at sea
and there isn't a pub within a thousand miles of 'em, you might think
different.

[Illustration: "Sailormen are not good 'ands at saving money as a rule."]

It ain't for the want of trying either with some of 'em, and I've known
men do all sorts o' things as soon as they was paid off, with a view to
saving. I knew one man as used to keep all but a shilling or two in a
belt next to 'is skin so that he couldn't get at it easy, but it was all
no good. He was always running short in the most inconvenient places.
I've seen 'im wriggle for five minutes right off, with a tramcar
conductor standing over 'im and the other people in the tram reading
their papers with one eye and watching him with the other.

Ginger Dick and Peter Russet--two men I've spoke of to you afore--tried
to save their money once. They'd got so sick and tired of spending it
all in p'r'aps a week or ten days arter coming ashore, and 'aving to go
to sea agin sooner than they 'ad intended, that they determined some way
or other to 'ave things different.

They was homeward bound on a steamer from Melbourne when they made their
minds up; and Isaac Lunn, the oldest fireman aboard--a very steady old
teetotaler--gave them a lot of good advice about it. They all wanted to
rejoin the ship when she sailed agin, and 'e offered to take a room
ashore with them and mind their money, giving 'em what 'e called a
moderate amount each day.

They would ha' laughed at any other man, but they knew that old Isaac was
as honest as could be and that their money would be safe with 'im, and at
last, after a lot of palaver, they wrote out