He did not move about at all. He sat upon an old box, in front of a closed grocery store, near the ferry-house, deciding to watch and wait until the boat started. "Dullest time I ever had!" he thought; "and it will cost me six cents to get back. You have to pay something everywhere you go. I wish that boat was ready to go now." It was not ready, and it seemed as if it never would be; meanwhile the Crofield boy sat there on the box and studied the ferry-boat business. He had learned something of it from his guide-book, but he understood it all before the gates opened. He had not learned much concerning any part of Staten Island, beyond what he already knew from the map; but shortly after he had paid his fare, he began to learn something about the bay and the lower end of New York. "I'm glad to be on board again," he said, as he walked through the long cabin to the open deck forward. In a few minutes more he drew a long breath and exclaimed: "She's starting! I know I'm on the right boat, too. But I'm hungry and I wish I had something to eat." There was nothing to be had on board the boat, but, although hungry, Jack could see enough to keep him from thinking about it. "It's all city; and all wharves and houses and steeples,--every way you look," he said. "I'm glad to have seen it from the outside, after all." Jack stared, but did not say a word to anybody until the ferry-boat ran into its dock. "If I only had a piece of pie and a cup of coffee!" Jack was thinking, as he walked along by the wharves, ashore. Then he caught sight of the smallest restaurant he had ever seen. It was a hand-cart with an awning over it, standing on a corner. A placard hanging from the awning read: "Clams, one cent apiece; coffee, five cents a cup." "That's plain enough!" exclaimed Jack. "She can't put on a cent more for anything." A stout, black-eyed woman stood behind a kind of table, at the end of the cart; and on the table there were bottles of vinegar and pepper-sauce, some crackers, and a big tin coffee-heater. [Illustration: _Coffee and clams._] "Clams?" she repeated. "Half-dozen, on the shell? Coffee? All right." "That's all I want, thank you," said Jack, and she at once filled a cup from the coffee-urn and began to open shellfish for him. "These are the smallest clams I ever saw," thought Jack; "but they're good." They seemed better and better as he went on eating; and the woman willingly supplied them. He drank his coffee and ate crackers freely, and he was just thinking that it was time for him to stop when the black-eyed woman remarked, with an air of pride, "Nice and fresh, ain't they? You seem to like them,--thirteen's a dozen; seventeen cents." "Have I swallowed a dozen already?" said Jack, looking at the pile of shells. "Yes, ma'am, they're tiptop!" After paying for his supper, there were only some coppers left, besides four one-dollar bills, in his pocket-book.