“What’s wrong with Deal town?” said I. “Is it the neighborhood of the gibbet that damps the spirits of the place?” “What d’ye mean, Bill?” “Why, there’s nothing stirring along the beach. There are some two hundred craft off the town and the bench is as though it were in mourning; your luggers lie grim as a row of coffins, nothing moving amongst them but some shadow of old age--like old Jimmy Files, for example.” “It’ll be the press,” said my aunt. “Ho!” said I. “Is the king short-handed once more?” “There’s not only what’s called deficiency, but what’s termed disaffection,” said my uncle. “The vote this year was for a hundred and forty thousand Johnnys and Joeys. They vote, and Jack says be d--d to ye.” “Any men nabbed out of Deal?” said I. “Five boatmen last month,” answered Uncle Joe. “I should think they’d be glad to set them ashore wherever they be. Put a pressed Deal man into your forecastle and then fire your magazine.” “I’m a mate; they’ll not take me,” said I. “There’s been no press for some days that I’ve heard of,” said my uncle, “but you’d better get to the beach by way of the sand hills. The Johnnys don’t hunt rabbits. They beat the alleys out of Beach Street, and you hear of them Walmer way and down by the Dockyard.” He sat deep in an armchair, smoking a long clay pipe. His face shone, his little shining eyes followed the smoke that rose from his lips. His posture, his appearance as he sat with a stout leg across his knee and a shining silver buckle on his square-toed shoe, seemed to say: “What I’ve got is mine, and what I’ve got is enough. The Lord is good; and good too is this house and all that’s in it.” A small fire burnt briskly in the grate, and on the hob was a bright copper kettle with steam shooting from its split lip. The dance of the fire-flames ran feeble shadows through the steady radiance of the oil lamp, and the colors of the room were made warmer and richer by the delicate twinkling. My aunt knitted, and cousin Bess, with her chin in her hand, listened to the conversation. Upon the table was a large silver tray with glasses, decanters of rum and brandy, and silver bowl and ladle for the brewing of punch. These things supplied a completing and satisfying detail of liberal and handsome comfort. What happiness, thought I, to settle down ashore in such a house as this, with as many thousands as would keep me going just as Uncle Joe is kept going! When are those fine times coming for me? thought I; and there now happening a pause in the talk, whilst my uncle, lifting the kettle off the hob, brewed with skillful hand a small quantity of rum punch--the most fragrant and supporting of hot drinks, and loved a great deal too well in my time by skippers and mates whose conscience blushed only in their noses--I pulled from my pocket the boatman’s newspaper, and turned the sheet about, not reckoning, however, upon _now_ coming across anything fresh. “What have you there, William?” said Bess.