I had a pretty good notion of the characters of the men individually, having been for upwards of a year on board ship with them; and Billy knew them even better than I did, because of his nearness to them in the forecastle. A ship is a little world, and there, as in the great world, there are good and bad, and some that are neither good nor bad, for there are a good many colours, as you may say, betwixt white and black. The crew of the _Lovey Susan_, to be sure, was made up rather of evil-disposed than of well-disposed, for it was recruited by Wabberley and Chick, as I said at the beginning of my story, and you know what I thought of them. The better sort among them being few, could not prevail against the many, and especially against a man like Hoggett, who was so exceeding strong and masterful. Now it was a part of my scheme to sunder the sheep from the goats, if I may say so; and they being all on the rock I could do this, I hoped, without seeming to make any distinction among them, at any rate at first. For when I spoke of their working for their living, I did not have the rock in mind as the scene of their labours, but the island. To feed so many, we should need to enlarge our plantation, and this would mean work; and I had already thought, with leaping heart, of another task we might put in hand when I had brought the men to a proper humbleness and docility. But since there would not be at first enough work for all of them, nor indeed would it be safe to employ them all, I had resolved to begin with the least wicked of them. As we sat at breakfast, therefore, Billy and I conned over their names, passing judgment on them, as it were. "What about Clums?" I said. "He's a fat fool," says Billy, "but there ain't no harm in him, away from Hoggett. But he can't do anything but cook, and I can cook as well as him now." "Well, he must learn to do other things," I said. "And Jordan?" "Not by no means," says Billy. "He speaks you pretty fair, but he's a sly wretch, the sort of man to pick your grub when you warn't looking." "What do you say to Hoskin, then?" I asked. "Why, I don't think much of Hoskin," says he; "but I'll say this for him, that he's about the only man of 'em that didn't kick and cuff me, though he looked on when the others did. But what about Mr. Bodger?"