I couldn't tell him. But it was time to show up aboard the oil-ship, and I did; and we lay in the harbor for two days, and when we did put out, it was in weather that any longshoreman could have told was going to be thick even if 'twouldn't be rough outside. About forty miles to the east'ard of Bayport is Horseshoe Shoal. In thick weather inbound vessels once in a while went enough out of their reckoning to fetch up there; but anything outbound generally gave it a wide berth, because there was no need to be cutting close to it. It was a long sand-spit shoaling up so easy that in smooth weather a deep-draft ship could slide up on it while she was yet a long way from where any surf showed on it. In less than four hours out of Bayport the _Yucatan's_ bow fetches up nice and easy on Horseshoe and stays there. It was thick by now, with no sea to speak of; but there was a long swell and we were deep loaded, which meant that we were almost down to our main deck, and we carried an open rail amidships, which meant that when a swell heaved up against our side it didn't have to roll very high to roll aboard, and after rolling aboard it just naturally kept on rolling across our deck and over on the other side. It was like seeing surf breaking over a rock in the ocean; and to men not used to a deep-loaded oil-ship, and not knowing too much of the sea anyway, it wasn't hard to understand why they might think they were in great danger. Anyway, the seamen or deck-hands or seagoing laborers--whatever it was they shipped for--soon began to pick out safe, high spots and to cling tight to them. Any shipmaster that wanted to could, of course, have stopped all that with ten words; but says Captain Clarence, waving his hand and singing out from the bridge: "Have no fear, my lads. Trust to me. I will bring you safe out of this." Which was a new one, he being, according to Wheezer's account of him, more often given to damning their hides and blue lights and in other little ways putting the fear of the bridge into the deck of what ships he'd ever been master of. "Have no fear, my men, I'll guard your lives," says Captain Clarence. And it sounded fine, only a couple of wrecking tugs would have walked her off, and certainly her own engines ought to have backed her off, if he'd only stop making speeches and try them. But Wheezer never said that Captain Clarence was any fool, and he probably knew what he was doing every minute. He went for'ard now and hove the lead a few times, and then hove it aft, and then came back to the bridge looking more solemn than before; and, looking up at him, there was no doubt that most of the crew thought if they didn't get off that ship, and in a hurry, they were gone.