"Ready--all ready." "Ready with the anchor!" "All ready the anchor, sir!" "Down with your jib! Down with jumbo! Let go your fore halyards! Watch out now--ready--let go your anchor!" Rattle--whizz--whir-r-r--splash! clink--and the Johnnie Duncan of Gloucester was safe to her mooring. And not till then did our skipper, ten hours to the wheel, unclinch his grip, hook the becket to a spoke, slat his sou'wester on the wheel-box and ease his mind. "Thank the Lord, there's a jeesly blow behind us. There's some outside'll wish they had a shore job before they get in. Hi, boys, when you get her tied up for'ard, better all go below and have a bite to eat. Let the mains'l stand and give it a chance to dry." Then he looked about him. "And I didn't notice that anybody passed us on the way." There was a whole lot in that last. After eating a bite, I went over in the dory to the lighthouse on the jetty, where seamen's mail was taken care of. After leaving my letters I stopped to watch some of the fleet coming. It was easy enough to pick them. The long, slick-looking, lively seine-boat in tow and the black pile of netting on deck told what they were, and they came jumping out of the mists in a way to make a man's heart beat. There was a man standing on the jetty. He was master of a three-masted coaster, he told me. "You come off one of them Gloucester mackerel-catchers?" he asked me. I said yes. "That new-looking one that came in a while ago?" I said yes again. "I was watching her--she's a dream--a dream. I never see anything like them--the whole bunch of 'em. Look at this one--ain't she got on about all she can stand up under though? My soul, ain't she staggering! I expect her skipper knows his business--don't expect he'd be skipper of a fine vessel like that if he didn't. But if 'twas me I'd just about take a wide tuck or two in that ever-lastin' mains'l he's got there. My conscience, but ain't he a-sockin' it to her! I s'pose that's the way some of your vessels are sailed out and never heard from again--that was never run into, nor rolled over, nor sunk in a reg'lar way, but just drove right into it head-first trying to make a passage and drowned before ever they could rise again. Well, good-luck to you, old girl, and your skipper, whoever he is, and I guess if your canvas stays on you'll be to anchor before a great while, for you're making steamboat time. Go it, old girl, and your little baby on behind, go it! There ain't nothing short of an ocean liner could get you now. Go it! a sail or two don't matter--if it's a good mackerel season I s'pose the owners don't mind if you blow away a few sails. Go it, God bless you! Go it! you're the lads can sail a vessel, you fishermen of Gloucester. Lord, if I dared to try a thing like that with my vessel and my crew and the old gear I got, I rather expect I'd have a rigger's bill by the time I got home--if ever I got home carryin' on like that in my old hooker."