“Bob, you have not been round the world for nothing. I see my blot, and you have hit it; you deserve to know all about the matter now. Match me that button, and you shall have ten guineas.” The two sailors stared at the bead of Indian gold which Mordacks pulled out of his pocket. Buttons are a subject for nautical contempt and condemnation; perhaps because there is nobody to sew them on at sea; while ear-rings, being altogether useless, are held in good esteem and honor. “I have seen a brace of ear-rings like it,” said old Joe, wading through deep thought. “Bob, you knows who was a-wearing of 'em.” “A score of them fishermen, like enough,” cautious Bob answered; for he knew what his father meant, but would not speak of the great free-trader; for Master Mordacks might even be connected with the revenue. “What use to go on about such gear? His honor wanteth to hear of buttons, regulation buttons by the look of it, and good enough for Lord Nelson. Will you let us take the scantle, and the rig of it, your honor?” “By all means, if you can do so, my friend; but what have you to do it with?” “Hold on a bit, Sir, and you shall see.” With these words Bob clapped a piece of soft York bread into the hollow of his broad brown palm, moistened it with sugary dregs of ale, such as that good city loves, and kneading it firmly with some rapid flits of thumb, tempered and enriched it nobly with the mellow juice of quid. Treated thus, it took consistence, plastic, docile, and retentive pulp; and the color was something like that of gold which had passed, according to its fate, through a large number of unclean hands. “Now the pattern, your honor,” said Bob, with a grin; “I could do it from memory, but better from the thing.” He took the bauble, and set it on the foot of a rummer which stood on the table; and in half a minute he had the counterpart in size, shape, and line; but without the inscription. “A sample of them in the hollow will do, and good enough for the nigger-body words--heathen writing, to my mind.” With lofty British intolerance, he felt that it might be a sinful thing to make such marks; nevertheless he impressed one side, whereon the characters were boldest, into the corresponding groove of his paste model; then he scooped up the model on the broad blade of his knife, and set it in the oven of the little fire-place, in a part where the heat was moderate. “Well done, indeed!” cried Mr. Mordacks; “you will have a better likeness of it than good Mother Precious. Robert, I admire your ingenuity. But all sailors are ingenious.” “At sea, in the trades, or in a calm, Sir, what have we to do but to twiddle our thumbs, and practice fiddling with them? A lively tune is what I like, and a-serving of the guns red-hot; a man must act according to what nature puts upon him. And nature hath taken one of my legs from me with a cannon-shot from the French line-of-battle ship--Rights of Mankind the name of her.” CHAPTER XXVII THE PROPER WAY TO ARGUE