The students wandered idly through the deserted streets, and it was noticeable that but few of them paid any attention to their surroundings. A group of the seamen sat on the quay above the bridge, apparently engaged in an animated discussion. Though the Finnish women were pulling about in boats on the narrow river, the boys were not interested in their movements. Their conversation did not relate to Finland or the Finns. Scott, the joker, was in the centre of the ring, and did the greater part of the talking, and of course the subject was that which had been introduced at the picnic on the island. Without having any distinct plan in the beginning, Scott had become a leader among the democratic element of the ship. His crude ideas, which had formed themselves into objections to the De Forrest scheme, were now seeking recognition as a plan. He had been laboring very earnestly to defeat the wishes of the cabin "nobs," as he persisted in calling them. "We can't go for such a fellow as Cantwell," said one of the students. "He is a conceited and overbearing fellow." "I don't care a fig for Cantwell, personally," replied Scott. "It is the principle of the thing that I'm looking after. I know that Cantwell is unpopular in the steerage as well as in the cabin. But there's a conspiracy against him. Just as soon as he had earned his rank, the fellows in the cabin put their heads together to cheat him out of it. I was appointed on the committee, and they called a meeting in the cabin, where I was not allowed to go, to prevent me from attending. Was that fair?" "No, no!" responded the seamen. "Right! Besides, I want those swells in the cabin to know that we are a power." "But they came to us before the meeting on the island," suggested one of the group. "Yes; just so. But what did they come for? To know if we approved the plan? Not a bit of it. The plan was cooked up in the cabin. They came to us just as the politicians go to the dear people--for votes. They argued, talked, and begged for our votes at the meeting. By and by they will get up a plan by which no fellow shall be promoted from the steerage to the cabin. Cantwell and Victory! That's my motto." "I say, Scott, don't you think it is absurd for us to vote for the most unpopular fellow in the ship?" asked Wainwright. "No, I don't. He's the only fellow in the cabin that is not in the ring, and therefore the only one we can vote for. Don't you see it?" "I don't want to vote against Captain Lincoln," another objected. "He is a first-rate fellow, and a good sailor." "But Lincoln went in for this plan, was present at the meeting, and voted in favor of it," replied Scott. "I like Lincoln as well as any fellow, but I don't like this trying to keep any one out of the place he has fairly earned." "That's so," said a dozen of the boys.