"So fair and foul a day I have not seen,'" the man muttered; and both Joshua and Susan thought, "How strangely yet how beautifully he speaks!" Susan made the tea down stairs, and she and Joshua sat quietly by, while the man and his daughter ate like starved wolves. It was a bitterly-painful sight to see. "I think we had better go now, Susan," whispered Joshua. They would have left the room without a word; but the man said,-- "What is your name, and what are you?" "My name is Joshua Marvel, and I'm going to be a sailor." "'There's a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft,'" said the actor, "'to keep watch for the life of poor Jack.'" "That's what Praiseworthy Meddler says," said Joshua, laughing. "I shall come and see you again, if you will let me." "Come and welcome." "Goodnight, sir." "Goodnight, and God bless you, Joshua Marvel!" Minnie went to the door with Joshua and Susan, and looking at Joshua, with the tears in her strangely-beautiful eyes, said, "Goodnight, and God bless you, Joshua Marvel!" She raised herself on tiptoe, and Joshua stooped and kissed her. After that, Susan gave her a hug, and she returned to her father, and lay down beside him. When he arrived home, Joshua told Dan of the adventure, and how he had spent the fourteen pence. Dan nodded his head approvingly. "You did right," he said,--"you always do. I should have done just the same." Then they took the odd volume of Shakspeare from the shelf, and read the Ghost scenes in "Hamlet" before they said goodnight. CHAPTER VII. EXPLAINS WHY PRAISEWORTHY MEDDLER REMAINED A BACHELOR. Here is Praiseworthy Meddler, sitting in the best chair in a corner of the fireplace in the little kitchen in Stepney. In his low shoes and loose trousers, and blue shirt open at the throat, he looks every inch a sailor; and his great red pock-marked face is in keeping with his calling. On the other side of the fireplace, facing Praiseworthy Meddler, is Mr. George Marvel; next to Praiseworthy Meddler is Mrs. Marvel; on a stool at her father's feet sits Sarah; and Joshua sits at the table, watching every shade of expression that passes over his mother's face. The subject-matter of the conversation is the sea; and Praiseworthy Meddler has been "holding forth," as is evidenced by his drawing from the bosom of his shirt a blue-cotton pocket-handkerchief, upon which is imprinted a ship of twelve hundred tons burden, A 1 at Lloyd's for an indefinite number of years. The ship is in full sail, and all its canvas is set to a favorable breeze. Upon this blue vessel Praiseworthy Meddler dabs his red face in a manner curiously suggestive of his face being a deck, and the handkerchief a mop. When he has mopped his deck, which appears to be a perpetually-perspiring one, he spreads his handkerchief over his knee to dry, and says, as being an appropriate tag to what has gone before,-- "There is no place on earth like the sea."