"There's no lunar to-night," said Captain Bottom, pausing at the quarter-deck rail, and addressing himself to the officer of the watch. "There's a goin' to be dirt, sir, there is; and them royals and topgallant-sails is got to cum in. Would'nt surprise me if we had to double-reef topsails afore mornin'. Tell you what it is, Mr. Higgins, there's that ar north star with a towel over her face again. Sink me if there'll be any lunar took to-night." The captain shook his head, gave his Panama a tip, and walking aft, stood beside the binnacle watching the compasses for several minutes. Then returning to where the officer of the watch stood, he resumed: "Never made a bad landfall in my life, Mr. Higgins. Never shall be said of Captain Price Bottom that he lost his reckonin'. It's judgment; yes, Mr. Higgins, it's good judgment and sound sense what makes a good sailor. A man may cram his skull till it hurts with Bowditch, but if he hain't sense he'll never be a sailor. Same in killin' whales. If a man hain't got sense, the whale is sure to get the advantage of him." Again he paused, as if courting a reply; but Mr. Higgins merely bowed assent to everything the captain said, every few minutes keeping an eye aloft at the sails. "Man what gets his navigation aboard ship knows his business. Got mine there; yes, sir! Did'nt know a Bowditch from a Bible when I went aboard ship. Can do my amplitude and variations now without looking at a nautical almanac. Can, sir, by Jove!" The ship bounded gallantly over the sea, leaving in her wake a long silvery train of phosphoric light. Drawing no response from Mr. Higgins, the captain raised his night-glass and scanned along the heavens to the west. "We'll get somethin' out o' that quarter, butt end foremost," said the captain, lowering his glass. Mr. Higgins was first officer of the ship, a position secured to him, not because he had worked his way up to it, but through the influence of a rich father, who was a large owner in the ship and her venture. He was a tall, well-formed, fine-looking young man, with delicate and well-cut features, and black hair. He was also a fine scholar and a perfect master of the theory of navigation, and a voyage or two to Europe had given him a slight knowledge of the practical part of it. Yet he was more an ornamental than a practical sailor; and it was this that made Captain Bottom, the whale-killer, hold him in no very high respect. Indeed, he had several times said, in the presence of Mr. Higgins, that it was all very well for a young gentleman to be a scholar; but a sailor what had his head full of books never made a fortune for his owners.