“We put up a bottle somewhere, and then we dub at it.” “Is that all you do?” “On Thursdays our club meets. Then we have singing.” “And do you read at all?” “No, sir, I can’t say as I ever do, sir. I don’t want much reading after the shutters are up.” “I should have thought that you’d have been a great reader. Don’t you find your work very interesting?” “Oh. It’s all right, sir. Like any other work.” “Yes. But. Take these woollen things, for instance. Don’t you think of all the hands it has passed through? Don’t you think of the sheep up on the hills, and the shepherds piping to them, and the great lonely downs, eh, with nothing but sheep-bells and the wind?” “No, sir. Not in that light exactly.” “And then, don’t you think of the brooks where they wash and shear? And then the great combs and looms, with so many people combing and weaving and spinning, all helping to make this?” He picked up the warm woollen shirt, and handled it. “And don’t you think of the people who will wear these things?” “No, sir. You see, I’m only a shopman. Mr. Treloar, the owner, he thinks of all these things.” “And will not you be a shop-owner, sometime, if you save and work hard?” “No, sir. Oh no, sir. I’m only a shopman.” “Yes; but could you not become a shop-owner? Would you not like to be one?” “No, sir. I can’t say as I should, sir.” “What would you like to be?” “Of all things, sir?” “Yes.” “I don’t know, sir. That’s rather a big order, sir.” “Think.” “I think, sir, I’d like to be. Don’t let Mr. Burls hear, sir. He’s listening. I’d like to be one of these buccaneers, sir. Fellows what goes about fighting the Spaniards. They live an open-air life. Not like here, sir. Oh, I’d like to lie by a camp-fire, sir, with a lot of big bronzed men. And to have a gun, sir. And then to attack a city full of treasure.” “But I should think that was very dangerous. Isn’t it?” “No, sir. Not by all accounts, sir. A poor lot, sir, the Spaniards. They’re not like us, you know, sir. Our fellows are a bull-dog lot, sir. The bull-dog breed, sir.” “Really!” “Oh yes, sir. Why, sir, only a day or two ago there come the news-letter from Plymouth. I dare say you saw it, sir. And there was a Virginia ship at Salcombe, it says. Did you see that bit, sir? And a forger was escaping from the constables, and he got on board this ship and bribes the captain, and he carries the man off safe, with the men-of-war all firing broadsides on him. Oh, it must be fine to hear the cannon-balls coming whizz.” “Indeed! A forger, you say?” “A forger, sir; but he’d done other things as well, sir, of course. And he’d a lady with him, too, sir.” “But you wouldn’t like to be that sort of man?” “No, sir.” “What would you do to the forger, if you caught him?” “I should give him up to the constables, sir.” “And the ship-captain?” “I don’t know, sir. I haven’t thought about it much, sir.” “You would support the laws, I hope?” “Oh yes, sir.” “Even if he were a buccaneer.”