'Here am I grateful for this £30 job,' growled the captain. 'The wife and young uns may now eat and drink for three months, and for three months the thought of to-morrow morning shan't keep me awake. Holy Jemmy! But it's on the quarter-deck where the hearts of stone are wanted. To those fellows forward the getting a ship's as easy as an oath. Do you or I get ships as easily as we swear?' 'No, not by all that I'm worth!' answered Tweed. 'Captain, I have followed the sea for twenty years, and I'll tell you how it stands with me now: in my cabin you'll find a sea-chest; it's painted green--green it should be; it's the colour of my life. In that sea-chest is all that I own in the world, saving a matter of a few pounds stowed away ashore. Twenty years of the sea, and nothing but a bloomed green sea-chest to show for it!' exclaimed Tweed, with so much blood in his face that his grog-blossoms made him look as if he had burst into a dangerous rash. Thus these worthies discoursed, as they walked the quarter-deck, awaiting the arrival of Mr. Vanderholt and party. They had been shipmates in prior times, were in some fashion connected, had frequently of late met ashore, and had grown intimate during the time occupied by the refitting of the _Mowbray_. We are not to confound the discipline of this little schooner with that of a great Indiaman. Men who had commanded fruiters were not commonly distant to their mates when they afterwards handled small vessels. Forward the seamen growled in talk indistinguishable to the quarter-deck walkers. 'What sort of boss is th' ole man going to turn out?' exclaimed one of the seamen, staring aft. 'I don't like his looks. But when once I've signed a vessel's articles I'm for outweathering the skipper, if he was the devil himself. He'll get no change out of Joseph Dabb, and it's extraordinary, bullies, that Joseph Dabb should be my name.' 'If there's no eddication in the fok'sle of this vessel, fired if there oughtn't to be enough aft to enable all hands to spell the word "lush,"' said a dark, heavy-browed man, gazing with a deep and surly smile at the plump figure of Tweed, as he walked, rolling about like a butterbox in a seaway, alongside the captain. 'I never see a face in all my time more beautifully decorated. How many pints go to one of them blossoms? We shall be hearing of him singing "We're all a-noddin'" in some middle watch, when there's onusual need for a bright look-out.' 'I was spliced three weeks ago,' exclaimed a red-headed seaman. 'I'm a-missing of Sally, my joys. I feel gallus like going home again.' He eyed the land about the West India Docks, and extended his arms, amidst a rumble of laughter and much spitting of yellow froth over the bows. 'I don't expect to see my old 'oman again,' exclaimed a seaman, standing upright with his arms folded. 'If she don't die, she'll make tracks, and, foreseeing of that, I sold off my household furniture yesterday.'