But the future, in those years, after all seemed unsubstantial; Captain Bradley believed in enjoying the present reality. A large share of the money that he earned he spent. He spent it extravagantly, spent it with a flush hand. In the China ports whither all of his charters led him, there were always a dozen or twenty American vessels lying in the roads. Lavish entertainment went the round of the fleet. "What’s a little money, more or less?" Captain Bradley was fond of saying. "Times are good, aren’t they? More will come" He was for ever buying pieces of cloisonné and rare porcelain for his empty house at home, silks and embroideries for his wife; things to be packed away in camphor wood chests after she was dead. The habit of extravagance grew upon him; he spent more money than he realized. In fact, from a selfish standpoint, Captain Bradley was a poor business man. Seamanship was his vocation; he understood few of the ins and outs of a financial order founded on usury. Its sentiment and psychology he understood not at all; these were considerations entirely alien to him. To his mind, money, to be clean, had to be straightforwardly earned. The plain transactions of a ship’s business were all he needed to know. A certain sum of money put into a ship would, if she were properly handled, yield certain dividends: a charter at so much the lump sum, would pay so much on the voyage. Thus it always had been; thus, if he ever gave the matter a thought, he supposed it always would be. As the flush years went by, he developed into a typical sea captain of the old school; a man of honour, of ideals, of simple dignity and original thought, careless, buoyant, at times a little reckless, a stern disciplinarian, a wise judge of human nature, a sentimentalist at heart, a believer in the inherent righteousness of things, a man of sincerity and individuality. Dishonesty, laziness, hypocrisy, he hated as he hated crime. Inefficient men found him a hard taskmaster. By nature and training he was arrogant and imperious; the instinct of command ran strongly in his blood. He spoke his mind at all times; he was equally ready to defend his position. His pride in his wife, in his boy, in his ship, in everything he loved, was enormous. In short, he was a man singularly adapted to the high and responsible calling of master mariner—singularly ill-fitted for his coming encounter with the world. *III*