She has her own special crew--her captain the carter--and for forecastle men a lad or two, and often a couple of able-bodied seamen in the shape of labourers, to help to load up. When on the more distant voyages to unknown shores, she takes a supercargo--the farmer's son--to check the bills of lading; for on those strange coasts who knows what treachery there may be brewing? There are arms aboard, in the form of forks or prongs; and commonly one or more passengers go out in her--women with vast bundles and children--not to mention the merchandise of sugars and of teas from Cathay, which are shipped for delivery at half the cottages and farmsteads _en route_ homewards. Wherefore, you see, the captain had needs be a sober and godly man, having all these and manifold other responsibilities upon his mind. Besides which he has to make a report upon the state of the crops on every farm he passes, and what everybody is doing, and if they have begun reaping; also to hail every vessel he passes outward or homeward bound, and enter her answers in his log, and to keep his weather-eye open and a sharp watch to windward, lest storms should arise and awake the deep, and if the gale increases to batten down his hatches and make all snug with the tarpaulin. He must bear in mind the longitude of those ports where there are docks, lest his team should cast a shoe or any of the running rigging want splicing, or the hull spring a leak--for the blacksmith's forges are often leagues apart, and he may lose his certificate if he strands his ship or founders on the open ocean of the downs. Sometimes, if the currents run unexpectedly strong, and he is deeply laden, he has to borrow or hire a tug from the nearest farm, getting an extra horse to pull up the hill. When he reaches harbour, and has leave ashore, a jollier seaman never cracked a whip. Perhaps the happiest time with the ploughboys is when they are out with the waggon, having a little change, no harder work than walking, sips at the `pots' handed to the captain by his mates, and nothing to think about. Nor was there ever a more popular song in the country than-- We'll jump into the waggon, And we'll all take a ride! Though in winter, when the horses' shoes have to be roughed for the frost, or, worse, when the wheels sink deep into the spongy turf, and rain and sleet and snow make the decks slippery, it is not quite so jolly. Yet even then, so strong is the love of motion, a run with the waggon is preferred to stationary work.