"Now you know, Jack, you have said so, often." "I have said they must have stood up to row, and so--" "You would have had awful confusion, Jack. You must have order between decks when you're going into action. Besides, the rowers had cushions." "That old heresy of yours again." "Well, but Jack, they _had_ cushions. Didn't the rowers who were marched across the Isthmus to man the ships which were to surprise the Piraeus, carry their oars, thongs and cushions?" "If they did, your conclusion doesn't follow, father, that they sat on them to row." "You hear, Mr. Brown," said the Captain; "he admits my point about the cushions." "Oh, father, I hope you used to fight the French more fairly," said Hardy. "But didn't he? Didn't Jack admit my point?" "Implicitly, sir, I think," said Tom, catching Hardy's eye, which was dancing with fun. "Of course he did. You hear that, Jack. Now my notion about triremes--" A knock at the door interrupted the Captain again, and Blake came in and was introduced. "Mr. Blake is almost our best scholar, father; you should appeal to him about the cushions." "I am very proud to make your acquaintance, sir," said the Captain; "I have heard my son speak of you often." "We were talking about triremes," said Tom; "Captain Hardy thinks the oars must have been twenty feet long." "Not easy to come forward well with that sort of oar," said Blake; "they must have pulled a slow stroke." "Our torpid would have bumped the best of them," said Hardy. "I don't think they could have made more than six knots," said the Captain; "but yet they used to sink one another, and a light boat going only six knots couldn't break another in two amid-ships. It's a puzzling subject, Mr. Blake." "It is, sir," said Mr. Blake; "if we only had some of their fo'castle songs we should know more about it. I'm afraid they had no Dibdin." "I wish you would turn one of my father's favorite songs into anapaests for him," said Hardy. "What are they?" said Blake. "'Tom Bowling,' or 'The wind that blows, and the ship that goes, and the lass that loves a sailor.'" "By the way, why shouldn't we have a song?" said Tom. "What do you say, Captain Hardy?" The Captain winced a little as he saw his chance of expounding his notion as to triremes slipping away, but answered: "By all means, sir; Jack must sing for me though. Did you ever hear him sing 'Tom Bowling!'" "No, never, sir. Why, Hardy, you never told me you could sing." "You never asked me," said Hardy, laughing; "but if I sing for my father, he must spin us a yarn." "Oh yes; will you, sir!" "I'll do my best, Mr. Brown; but I don't know that you'll care to listen to my old yarns. Jack thinks everybody must like them as well as he, who used to hear them when he was a child." "Thank you, sir; that's famous. Now Hardy, strike up." "After you. You must set the example in your own rooms."