The Young Supercargo: A Story of the Merchant Marine
Date: 2021-11-16T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Christian life -- Juvenile fiction; Sea stories; Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction; Fathers -- Juvenile fiction; Adventure stories; Friendship -- Juvenile fiction; Siblings -- Juvenile fiction; Voyages and travels -- Juvenile fiction; Seafaring life -- Juvenile fiction; Ship captains -- Juvenile fiction; Castaways -- Juvenile fiction; Youth -- Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction; Mothers and sons -- Juvenile fiction; Merchant marine -- Juvenile fiction; Cargo ships -- Juvenile fiction

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Title: The Young Supercargo: A Story of the Merchant Marine

Author: William Drysdale

Illustrator: Charles Copeland

Release date: November 16, 2021 [eBook #66747]
Most recently updated: October 18, 2024

Language: English

Original publication: United States: W. A. Wilde & Company, 1898

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/66747

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOUNG SUPERCARGO: A STORY OF THE MERCHANT MARINE ***

THE YOUNG SUPERCARGO

BRAIN AND BRAWN SERIES.

By William Drysdale.

Illustrations by Charles Copeland.

THE YOUNG REPORTER. A Story of Printing House Square. 300 pages. With five full-page Illustrations. Cloth. 12mo. $1.50.

THE FAST MAIL. The Story of a Train Boy. 330 pages. With five full-page Illustrations. Cloth. 12mo. $1.50.

THE BEACH PATROL. A Story of the Life-Saving Service. 318 pages. With five full-page Illustrations. Cloth. 12mo. $1.50.

THE YOUNG SUPERCARGO. A Story of the Merchant Marine. 352 pages. With five full-page Illustrations. Cloth. 12mo. $1.50.

*** Other volumes in preparation.

“‘WHY, THIS IS NO WHARF-RAT, OFFICER.’”

THE
Young Supercargo

A Story of the Merchant Marine

BY
WILLIAM DRYSDALE

Author of “The Young Reporter,” “The Fast Mail,” “The Beach Patrol,” etc., etc.

ILLUSTRATED BY
CHARLES COPELAND

BOSTON AND CHICAGO
W. A. WILDE & COMPANY

Copyright, 1898,
By W. A. Wilde & Company.

All rights reserved.

THE YOUNG SUPERCARGO.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER | | PAGE
I. | Kit Silburn’s Start in Life | 9
II. | A Voyage to Yucatan | 26
III. | A Norther on the Gulf | 44
IV. | Kit’s Connecticut Home | 61
V. | A Burglar in the Cabin | 78
VI. | The Strange Case of John Doe | 97
VII. | Kit becomes a Supercargo | 109
VIII. | News from the Wrecked Schooner | 129
IX. | Kit inspects London | 149
X. | A Letter from the State Department | 168
XI. | A Voyage to Marseilles | 186
XII. | Imprisoned in the Castle D’If | 203
XIII. | A Visit to Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde | 221
XIV. | The Mysterious Stranger from Rome | 237
XV. | News from New Zealand | 256
XVI. | Kit leaves the “North Cape” | 272
XVII. | Overboard in the Pitch Lake | 287
XVIII. | A Voyage to Bermuda | 306
XIX. | Kit finds his Father | 324
XX. | Love’s Young Dream in Barbadoes | 340

ILLUSTRATIONS.

| PAGE
“‘Why, this is no wharf-rat, officer’” Frontispiece | 14
“‘You are young for a supercargo, Señor’” | 48
“‘Can you take me to No. 32 Fenchurch Street?’” | 136
“‘Here—is the hole he cut through into the priest’s cell’” | 211
“They had a beautiful view of the Mediterranean” | 240

THE YOUNG SUPERCARGO.

CHAPTER I.
KIT SILBURN’S START IN LIFE.

A BIG black steamship lay beside the wharf in front of Martin’s Stores, in Brooklyn. The cold November night was so dark that from the brick warehouse, a hundred feet away, hardly anything could be seen of her but the lantern that swung in her rigging, a faint light that shone through her cabin portholes, and occasionally one of her tall top-masts standing out against the pale moon that tried with little success to show itself between the scudding clouds. It was bitterly cold, for November; and a stiff wind from the northeast was driving the black clouds seaward at the rate of thirty or forty miles an hour.

The steamer was the North Cape, arrived the week before from Sisal, in Yucatan, with a cargo of hemp in bales. Though everything was dark and quiet about her on that wintry night, evidences of hard work in unloading lay all around. The bales had been taken out of her hold faster than the warehousemen could trundle them into the building, and the hundred feet of space between wharf and warehouse was littered with them. Some were piled up in tiers, and others lay scattered about in confusion.

That open space between the warehouse and the harbor was well sheltered from the cutting wind; and patrolman McSweeny, of the Brooklyn police, with ears and fingers tingling found it a warm corner, and made more frequent visits to it than his duty really required. If he had gone into one of the neighboring coffee-houses to warm himself, he might have been caught by the roundsman and fined; but in going through the brick archway under the building and prowling among the goods on the wharf in search of tramps or thieves he was strictly obeying orders. So on the cold November night he paid particular attention to the wharf of Martin’s Stores, and visited it so often that no burglar in the neighborhood would have had the least chance.

Patrolman McSweeny had been a Brooklyn policeman long enough to understand all the favorite police ways of stirring out homeless tramps who are so desperately wicked as to go to sleep in the warmest corner they can find. Among such goods as bales of hemp, for instance, he took his long nightclub and jabbed it into all the dark spaces that were wide enough for a boy or man to squeeze into. That way, he found, was certain to produce results, if anybody was there. Either the soft feeling at the end of the club told him that he had found a victim, or the vigor with which he poked it made the victim cry out with pain.

For a policeman weighing nearly two hundred pounds, and armed with a big club and a revolver, patrolman McSweeny, it must be admitted, made his rounds among the bales with great caution. The ordinary tramp is a mere bag of dirt for the average policeman to prod and cuff and shake as he likes; but about ten days before Mr. McSweeny had stirred up two tramps on that same wharf who had more muscle than most of their clan, and in their anger they had turned upon him and thrown him overboard. So he felt that his dignity needed a little polishing up, and he was ready to polish it up on the next tramp he caught.

And tramps were not his only victims along the wharves. Sometimes he came across a boy,—a frowsy, ragged, shivering, homeless boy; and that always gave him great delight, for a boy, unless he is a big one, is not as troublesome to handle as a hungry and desperate man. Some policemen have big hearts, and would rather buy a cup of coffee and a roll for a hungry boy than take him to the station house and lock him up; but patrolman McSweeny was not of that kind. He was trying to make a record on “the foorce,” and every arrest added to his laurels.

It was about eleven o’clock when the patrolman made his fourth trip that evening among the hemp bales. Never very good-natured, he was particularly cross that night. Something at the station had annoyed him; and with his aching fingers and one or two draughts of a stronger beverage than coffee, he was rather a dangerous person to be trusted at large with a club and a revolver and the authority of law. His next victim on the wharf of Martin’s Stores was pretty sure to have an unpleasant time.

He went from pile to pile of the bales, poking his club viciously into every dark nook and corner, always ready for a sudden attack. And he had not gone far before he poked something soft, lying between two bales, and heard a voice cry out, in startled but still sleepy tones:—

“Hey! who’s there?”

The voice was a relief to him, for it was the voice of a boy.

“Git up here, ye young thafe, till I show ye who it is. Will ye come out or shall I fan yer carcase wid me club?”

In answer to this gentle summons a boy’s head and shoulders appeared above the bales, and the big policeman seized the section of coat collar that was visible and snatched the rest of the boy out with a jerk.

“Stop that! Let go of me!” said the boy.

Such resistance as that almost took the policeman’s breath away. He was accustomed to having boys beg him to let them off, and promise to go home, or go to work, or almost anything else, to get out of his clutches. But here was a boy who demanded his liberty instead of begging for it. In such a case it would have made no difference, probably, even if it had been light enough for him to see that instead of an ordinary vagabond or river thief this boy was clean and well dressed.

“Lit go av ye, then, is it!” he repeated, giving his prisoner another shake; “it’s in the cells I’ll lit go av ye, an’ not before, ye young thafe. Yer caught in de act, an I’ll run yer in.”

“I am no thief,” said the boy, “and you have no business to poke me with your club or shake me. If you want to arrest me, I will go with you peaceably; but I have done nothing to be arrested for.”

“Done nothin’!” the policeman exclaimed, letting go of the boy’s collar and taking him by the sleeve; “didn’t I ketch ye stealin’?”

“What was I stealing?” the boy asked.

“Hemp, av coorse,” said the officer.

Indignant as he was, the boy could hardly help laughing at the idea of his stealing five hundred pound bales of hemp.

“I was sleeping there,” the boy answered, “because I had nowhere else to sleep.”

“Thin I’ll give yer a safe place ter slape!” the policeman declared. “You come wid me;” and he started toward the archway, still holding his prisoner by the sleeve.

They were just about to turn from the outer end of the arch into the almost deserted street when they nearly ran into a man who came along the sidewalk at a swinging gait and turned short about to enter the dark tunnel.

“Hello, officer; what’s this?” said the man, stopping to look at the young prisoner under the gas lamp.

“Good avenin’ to you, Captain Griffith,” the policeman answered, in a very different tone from the one he had used in speaking to the boy. “It’s one of them loafin’ wharf rats I’ve caught among your bales of hemp, sir. But I’ll put him where he won’t be sn’akin’ around the wharves for one while, sure.”

“Why, this is no wharf rat, officer,” the newcomer said, taking the boy by the shoulder and turning him around under the lamp to have a better view of him. “He looks like a respectable boy. What were you doing on the wharf, my boy?”

“I went there to sleep between two of the bales, sir,” the boy replied, “because I had nowhere else to go.”

“Well, that’s no crime,” said the man; “we all have to sleep somewhere, I suppose. I think I wouldn’t lock him up just for that, officer. He’s a decent-looking boy, and I can give him a place to sleep aboard the ship. It’s no wonder a youngster hunts a warm place on such a night as this.”

“Af ye think best, Captain,” the policeman readily answered, releasing his hold on the boy’s arm. “It’s in luck ye are, bye, that Captain Griffith of the North Cape put in a good word for ye, or ye’d a been in a cell by this toime. Then I lave the bye with you, Cap’n.”

“Very good,” said the Captain. “Good night, officer; you’ll have cold work to-night. Come along, my boy.”

The next minute the boy was retracing his steps through the tunnel, no longer a prisoner, but sure of a warm place to pass the night. He had no time to wonder why it was that the captain of a freight steamer had so much influence with the Brooklyn police; and no matter how much he had wondered he could hardly have guessed the truth, that every time the North Cape lay at Martin’s Stores policeman McSweeny received a five-dollar tip for keeping extra watch over her at night. The big patrolman was too shrewd not to oblige his patron whenever he could.

Captain Griffith led the way up an inclined gangway to a lower part of the deck, then up an iron ladder to a higher deck amidships, then down a companionway to the snug little cabin of the North Cape, where he turned up the big cabin lamp that had been burning dimly. That done, he threw off his overcoat, sat down in a revolving-chair at the head of the cabin table, and looked at the boy for several minutes as if he intended to look right through him, clothes and all.

What he saw standing by the cabin table, hat in hand, was a manly-looking boy of about sixteen or seventeen, perhaps a little large for his age, strong of build, with a good honest face and bright bluish-gray eyes, and wavy dark brown hair, and hands and face bronzed by the sun.

“No place to sleep, eh?” the Captain asked, at length.

“No, sir,” said the boy.

“What are you doing in Brooklyn without a place to sleep?” the Captain went on.

“I came to New York to look for work, sir,” the boy replied. “This afternoon I answered an advertisement in Brooklyn, but did not get the place.”

“Where do you live?” the Captain asked.

“In Huntington, Connecticut, sir,” the boy replied.

“What’s your name?”

“Christopher Silburn, sir; they call me Kit.”

“And how did you happen to come to New York to look for work without any money?” the Captain continued.

“I had some money when I came, sir,” Kit answered, “but I have been here for three days, and it is nearly all gone. What little is left I am saving to buy food with.”

“Have you no friends?” the Captain asked, looking at Kit’s clothes, which though evidently not of city make, were clean and whole.

“I have a mother and sister, sir,” he answered, “and it is on their account that I have come to the city, for they need what I can earn. My father is dead—at least, I am afraid he is.”

“Afraid he is!” the Captain repeated; “don’t you know whether he is dead or not?”

“Not for certain, sir,” Kit replied. “He was first mate of the schooner Flower City, which sailed from Bridgeport for New Orleans with machinery nearly a year ago. She was sighted by a steamer off Hatteras, but she has never been heard from since, nor any of her crew. She was given up long ago, and there is hardly any hope.”

“Lost at sea!” the Captain said thoughtfully; and it was evident that from that moment he took a greater interest in the boy he had rescued. “The old story, I suppose. No money; family at home; wife and children left to starve.”

“Not quite as bad as that, sir,” Kit answered, “but very nearly. My father left us a little house in Huntington, nearly all paid for, and my mother earns some money by sewing. It is a hard pull; but if I can find something to do, it will make things a little easier.”

“Well, Mr. Kit Silburn, of Huntington,” the Captain said, after another long look at him, “you tell a very straight story. I thought out in the street that you looked like an honest boy; that’s the reason I got you away from the policeman. But I don’t judge boys by their faces; some of the best faces are owned by the biggest rogues. I have a sure way of my own of finding out whether a boy is likely to steal my spoons and cushions. I judge a bank by what it has in its safes, and a boy by what he has in his pockets. Empty out your pockets here on the table, till I see what you carry.”

Kit was a little surprised at this request, which was delivered more like an order on deck; but he obeyed promptly. He began with the trousers pocket on the right-hand side, and laid out an old knife, a key-ring without any keys on it, and a small foot rule. Then from the left-hand pocket he took a well-worn pocket-book.

“What’s in the purse?” the Captain asked.

Instead of replying in words, Kit opened it and held it upside down over the table, and there rolled out a half-dollar, a bright quarter, a five-cent piece, and two pennies.

“That your whole stock?” the Captain asked.

“Yes, sir, that is all the money I have left,” Kit answered. Then he began on his vest. From the upper pocket on the left-hand side he took a toothbrush, and a pocket comb fastened to the back of a small mirror. In a lower pocket, on one side, he had four collar buttons; and on the other side a card with his name and home address written upon it, prepared by his mother, as he explained, in case anything should happen to him.

Then he began to empty the pockets of his coat. From the breast pocket he took his handkerchief, and two clean handkerchiefs, folded, that were beneath it.

From one of the lower pockets he took a morning newspaper, with several of the advertisements marked with pencil. Then he put his hand up to the inside breast pocket, but paused.

“Well, go on,” said the Captain.

With a little hesitation Kit took from the pocket two clean collars, folded in the middle, and laid them on the table. Then a little pocket testament with gilt edges. Then a letter that had been opened, addressed to “Mr. Christopher Silburn, General Post Office, New York.”

“That’s all, sir,” he said.

“Where do you carry your matches?” the Captain asked.

“I don’t carry any matches, sir,” Kit answered.

“Nor cigarettes?”

“No, sir, I never smoke.”

The Captain picked up the testament and opened it at the fly-leaf and read, written in a neat womanly hand, “Christopher Silburn, from Mother. ‘The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.’”

“Now, my boy,” the Captain continued, “I see you have a letter there. Letters always tell their own story. If you want to tell me more about yourself, you can read that letter to me. But you need not do it unless you choose.”

“I am quite willing to read it, sir,” Kit replied, taking up the letter. “It is from my sister, with a few lines added by my mother.”

He took it from the envelope and stepped up closer to the light. The body of the letter was in a scrawly, girlish hand, and the postscript was written evidently by the same hand that wrote the inscription in the testament.

My dear Kit [he read]: We are so worried about you for fear something will happen to you in that big city. Mamma says it is more than fifty times as big as Bridgeport, and I am always a little afraid when I go there. I cried half the night last night, and I know Mamma was crying for you in the evening, though she didn’t think that I saw her. Dear old Turk was so quiet all day, I know he missed you, too.

I do hope you will find some situation you like, and get a good start. But if you don’t find one, we want you to come home, Kit; Mamma says so.

I bought stamps with one of my dollars to-day and send them to you in this, for fear you may run out of money. If you don’t get anything to do, send me a postal card, and I will send you the other one too, so you can come home in the boat. I do wish you were here this evening.

Your loving sister,

Genevieve.

Then he read the postscript:—

My darling Boy: Sister has written for me, as my eyes ache in the evening. We hope to hear from you by to-morrow. Be sure we both miss you very much. God bless you, my boy, and take care of you. Remember what I told you before you started.

Mother.

“And you have spent your sister’s stamps, I suppose?” the Captain asked, when Kit, having finished, refolded the letter.

“No, sir, I was robbed of them,” he replied. “I took them into a little shop in one of the avenues to have them changed into money, and the man put them in the drawer, but would not pay me for them. He accused me of stealing them. ‘You’re not the first office boy has stolen his boss’s stamps and come here to sell them,’ he said. ‘Go and bring your boss, till I give him back his stamps.’”

“And being a country boy, you did not think of taking the address of the shop, I suppose?” the Captain asked.

“No, sir,” Kit answered. “He threatened to call a policeman if I didn’t go away, so I went.”

“Looks as if the shopkeeper was the thief himself,” said the Captain, smiling at Kit’s innocence. “Well, put your things back in your pockets. How old are you?”

“Sixteen, sir,” Kit answered; “nearly seventeen.”

“Ever been to sea?”

“No, sir. I know very little about the water, for a sailor’s boy. Huntington is ten miles back from the Sound, and a good many of the people there are seafaring men, but the boys don’t see much of salt water.”

“Would you like to go to sea?” the Captain asked, looking up at him suddenly.

“Yes, sir; I should like it very much indeed,” Kit answered promptly.

“Well, I haven’t taken all this trouble with you just for amusement,” the Captain went on. “I am in need of a cabin boy; and when I saw you in the hands of the policeman I rather thought that fate had sent me one without farther trouble. I never take a boy who has run away from home, and for that reason I wanted to find out about you by what you had in your pockets. And I find that you have not run away, and that you have very good references. A boy with a Bible in his pocket and a letter from his mother and sister has as good references as I want. I’m not very much of a church man myself; know more about log books than prayer books, maybe; but I like to see a boy who’s started out right. Would you like to be my cabin boy?”

“Yes, sir; I should like very much to have the place,” Kit replied.

“Then I’ll tell you what the place is, so you’ll know what you’re about,” the Captain continued. “You know what a tramp steamer is, I suppose?”

“Yes, sir,” Kit answered. “It is a steamer that belongs to no regular line, but goes wherever she can get freight to carry.”

“That’s it,” the Captain assented. “And the North Cape is a tramp steamer. She belongs to no regular line, but goes wherever she can get freight to carry. She is chartered for one more voyage to Sisal after hemp, and after that she will go wherever business offers. It may be on one side of the world and it may be on the other. So if you go with me, you are just as likely to be in China six months from now, as to be in New York.”

Such a prospect made Kit’s eyes sparkle.

“I should like that very much, sir,” he answered.

“Very well, then,” the Captain resumed. “Your pay will be six dollars a month, and you are not to go ashore without leave. That is not very much pay, but on the ship you will get your board, so you will have more money at the end of the month than you would have with more pay on shore. Your work will be to do whatever you’re told, and you’ll have to walk a very straight line. Don’t think because I have talked to you so much to-night that I’m going to pet you, for I’m not. When a ship leaves port, there is only one law for everybody on board, and that is the captain’s orders.”

He paused a moment, and then went on:—

“There is another boy on this ship, the engineers’ mess-room boy. You’ve heard the old saying, I suppose, that one boy is half a boy and two boys are no boy at all. But it’s not so on the North Cape. Each boy has to be a whole boy here, from the top of his head to the soles of his boots. I don’t allow any skylarking, or any quarrelling.”

Kit saw that he was expected to make some reply, so he said, “I will try to please you, sir.”

“I think you will,” said the Captain. “Now you have a start,—not a very big one, but as good as most boys have,—and the rest lies with yourself. You can push your way up in the world, or you can make a fool of yourself and go to the dogs. Nobody but yourself can say which it shall be.”

“I am very much obliged to you, sir,” Kit answered. “I found it pretty hard to get the start, but now that I have it I shall try to make the most of it.”

“It’s time to turn in,” said the Captain, glancing at the cabin clock and seeing that it was almost midnight. “To-morrow you must write home for whatever clothes you have. No matter what they are, they will be good enough when we are at sea. And you must ask your mother’s permission to go; I won’t take you without that, but as soon as you get it, I will let you sign the crew list; and you can begin your work to-morrow morning, while you’re waiting for it. We’ll not be away from here for a week yet, and there’s plenty of time. You can sleep on one of the cabin sofas to-night.”

With that the Captain turned the big lamp down low, picked up his overcoat, and disappeared through a door at the end of the cabin, leading, as Kit learned afterward, to his own stateroom.

Kit was a little dazed at first by the rapidity with which things were happening. Late in the afternoon he had concluded to go without any supper, because he was not very hungry and he could not afford to eat just because it was meal time. Then he had looked about for a place to sleep outdoors, having no idea how many thousand homeless people in New York are doing that same thing every night, nor how vigilant the police are to drive them away or arrest them. He had spent two nights in cheap lodging-houses in the Bowery, but everything was so foul and uncomfortable there that he preferred the open air. Then he had gone to sleep between the hemp bales, only to be poked with a club and shaken and put under arrest. And now here he was an hour later with as good a situation as he had hoped to find; and a chance to sleep in as snug and comfortable a cabin as he ever dreamed of; and a prospect of breakfast in the morning that would not have to be paid for out of his poor little eighty-two cents.

He went around the table to the longest of the three sofas in the cabin, and found it covered with soft leather cushions. There was even a leather pillow at the end. He lay down and tried to think things over. He had no doubt that his mother would consent to his going, for it had always been intended that he should go to sea with his father. Then he thought about Genevieve and her stamps, and about Turk, and in five minutes he was fishing in his dreams, in Bonnibrook, the stream that runs through Huntington.

A noise in the cabin awoke him. It was the steward giving the place its morning cleaning; and half asleep as he still was, Kit saw that the sun was streaming through the port-holes.

“Hello, there,” said the steward, “where did you come from?”

Kit sat up and looked around. He had to think a moment before he could tell where he did come from.

“I’m the new cabin boy, sir,” he said.

“Get up, then, and stir yourself,” said the steward.

CHAPTER II.
A VOYAGE TO YUCATAN.

FOR five days after Kit’s arrival on board the North Cape the steam winches were at work ten hours a day with their deafening clatter, first in hoisting the remainder of the hemp bales out of the hold, then in taking in what shipping men call a “general cargo,” consisting in part of barrels of flour, boxes of tea, cases of cloth, hats, shoes, and other things necessary in a country where little but hemp is produced.

On the fifth day there came indications that the ship was about to sail. The last of the piles of merchandise on the wharf disappeared, the winches stopped, and two of the hatches were battened down. Kit was prepared for this, for he was now a legal member of the ship’s family, having signed the crew list. He had written home and had received his mother’s permission to go to sea, coupled with many loving expressions and much good advice; and had received, too, an affectionate letter from Genevieve, and a little bundle containing the clothing he had left at home.

Early in the afternoon the Captain’s bell rang, and it was Kit’s business to answer it.

“Go tell the chief I want steam at eight o’clock,” he ordered.

“Yes, sir,” Kit answered, and ran up to the chief engineer’s room to deliver the order. When he left the chief’s room he was stopped near the engine-room skylights by the boatswain.

“Here, youngster,” said he, “run up for’ard and ask the first officer to send me the load-water-line; I’ve got to take soundings.”

“Yes, sir,” Kit answered again, and was about to start on the errand when he was stopped by Tom Haines, the fourth engineer, a pleasant-faced young Scotchman of about twenty, who was leaning against the skylights.

“Don’t go, young ’un,” Haines said; “he’s trying to make a fool of you. The load-water-line is painted on the side of the ship; besides, we don’t take soundings lying at a wharf.”

Kit laughed good-naturedly at the joke, and Haines added:—

“They’ll soon get tired of playing tricks on you, as you don’t get mad. Just keep your eyes open and your mouth shut, and you’ll soon know as much about the ship as any of them.”

“Oh, I don’t intend to let them make me mad,” Kit answered, “no matter how many tricks they play on me. A new boy has to expect that sort of thing, I suppose.”

Before he reached the cabin companionway he was stopped by “Chocolate” Cheevers, the engineer’s mess-room boy, whose nickname was generally abbreviated to “Chock.” This boy had already played more tricks upon Kit than all the rest of the crew combined, and the new cabin boy felt sure that he would not be a pleasant companion on the voyage. The curious nickname that the sailors had given him came, it was easy to see, from the brown hue of his skin; and this and his tight-curled black hair and velvety brown eyes marked him for a light West Indian mulatto. He was about a year older than Kit, tall and slender.

“Say, farmer,” he said, laying a hand on Kit’s shoulder (disliking his own nickname, he was anxious to attach one to Kit), “don’t you want to go ashore with me and have a look at the town to-night? This will be our last night in port.”

“Why, we’re going to sail at eight o’clock,” Kit answered.

“Well, you are a green one!” Chock laughed. “How can we sail before we get our crew on board? We’ll not leave the wharf before midnight, and then she’ll anchor out in the harbor till morning.”

“But I can’t go on shore without leave,” Kit protested, “nor you either.”

“We can get leave fast enough, on the last night. Come along, and we’ll take in some of the shows on the Bowery. It’s a gay old place, that Bowery.”

“Oh, that’s what you mean by taking a look at the town, is it?” Kit laughed. “I don’t care about that kind of a look, thank you. I saw a little of the Bowery when I was looking for a job, and I’m not fond of it; and I have no money to throw away on such things. We’d better both stay on board and attend to our business.”

“Ah, the cabin boy is a preacher as well as a farmer, is he?” Chock sneered. “Service of song every Sunday morning.”

“No, I am no preacher,” Kit answered pleasantly; “but I am not fool enough to spend my money on Bowery shows, either.”

The Captain’s bell rang again, and he had to hurry away before Chock had a chance to retort. He was wanted this time to help the Captain get ready to go ashore; and after the Captain had gone he took the opportunity to write his last letter home before sailing, as he always had less to do when the Captain was away. There were writing-materials on the big cabin table, and he sat down and wrote:—

Dear Mother and Vieve:—We are getting up steam and will be off to-night or to-morrow morning, so this is the last letter you will get from me till I am back from Yucatan. And won’t I be a regular old sailor by that time!

The Captain has gone ashore, and we expect the rest of the crew this evening. You see only about half the crew stay by the ship all the time; the rest are shipped new for every voyage. The regular ones are the Captain, the first and second mates, the chief engineer and his three assistants, the boatswain, the cabin steward, cabin boy (that’s the undersigned!), cook, galley boy (that boy is about thirty!), and the engineers’ mess-room boy. Then before sailing we ship six men “before the mast,” and four firemen, or stokers. That will make twenty-three of us on board when we sail.

I think I have given the Captain satisfaction so far, and I like it first-rate. Of course we are only in port yet, but I shall like it at sea too. We have a beautiful little cabin, and the Captain’s room is about half as large as the cabin. I have to take care of his room, keep it clean, and keep his clothes in order; clean the cabin every morning, fill and polish the big lamp, run when the Captain’s bell rings, and, as he says, “do whatever I’m told,” which of course I do.

At the other end of the cabin, across a little alley, are three good staterooms. The first and second mates have one together, and the cabin steward and I have another. He sleeps in the lower berth, and I in the upper. It makes fine quarters for us; but we would have to move out if there were passengers on board.

At meal times the Captain and first mate eat together first, then the second mate comes down and eats, and after he is done the steward and I eat together. The engineers have their own mess-room. Of course there is plenty to eat, and our china is all marked N. C., for North Cape. You wouldn’t think things would be so grand on a freight ship. Why, the cabin is all furnished in mahogany, with soft leather cushions. Oh, I forgot to say that I have to help the steward wash the dishes, so it’s well you taught me how.

Don’t think I am off on a pleasure trip. I didn’t leave you both for that. I have lots of work to do; and I hope to do it faithfully, so that before long I may be something better than a cabin boy. But cabin boy isn’t so bad for just now.

The North Cape’s size is 2850 tons, and she is a very strong iron ship; so you need not be worried about me. Shake dear old Turk’s paw good-by for me. You know how much love I send to you both. Good-by for a month or six weeks.

Your loving

Kit.

That was the longest letter he had ever written; and by the time it was finished he had to help set the supper table, for the ship’s meals must go on whether the Captain was on board or not. Then the dishes were hardly washed and put away after supper before the Captain returned, to be followed in a few minutes by a shipping agent who brought the crew—the six sailors and four stokers, most of whom had been supplied with enough liquor to make them willing to sign orders for advances on their pay, for the benefit of the agent and boarding-house keeper. Some of them were quite sober, however, and there was one young man of good appearance whom Kit thought he should like.

It was nine o’clock by the time the sailors were aboard and quartered down in the forecastle, but still there were no further signs of the ship’s moving; on the contrary, the Captain went ashore again, and the usual harbor lights were kept burning in the rigging. About eleven o’clock, having nothing to do, but feeling too much excited over the start to turn in, Kit went up on deck, and was glad to find Tom Haines taking the air while he waited for his watch to begin at midnight.

“I wonder why we don’t get off, sir,” Kit said, going up to the young engineer.

“You mustn’t say ‘sir’ to me, young ’un,” Haines laughed. “It’s only the Captain and the two mates and the chief engineer that you’re to say ‘sir’ to. But we’ll be off in a few minutes now.”

“Then we’ll be out at sea in two or three hours!” Kit exclaimed.

“Not a bit of it,” Haines answered. “We’d hardly go to sea without the Captain, and he is spending the night on shore. We’ll drop down below the Statue of Liberty and anchor there, and some time to-morrow we’ll get off.”

“What delays us so long, when everything is ready?” Kit asked.

“Everything is not ready,” Haines replied. “We have to give the crew a few hours to sober up in, for one thing; they are not fit for duty now. It’s an outrageous shame the way the sailors are brought on board drunk; but that’s always the way, so I suppose there’s no use worrying about it. Then we can’t go till the charterers of the ship tell us to; the minute they say go, we’re off. You may as well turn in, young ’un, for you’ll not see her fairly under way much before noon to-morrow.”

Kit went down to the cabin and did such odd jobs as he could find, for he knew it was useless for him to try to sleep when the ship was about to move. When everything was straightened up, he sat down by the big table under the lamp and took out the little book in which his mother had written his name.

“I wish they’d had steamships in these Bible times,” he said to himself; “I’d like to see what they had to say about them. There’s a good deal here about ships, but they were all such little ones; and I don’t see anything about cabin boys; maybe they didn’t have any cabins.”

He had not been reading long before the blowing of the big whistle and the noise on deck told him that the ship was about to move, and he hurried out. But that first little stage of the journey was a disappointment. She merely crawled over to the Statue of Liberty and dropped her anchor, and there was nothing to be seen but the great blazing torch over the statue, and the twinkling lights on shore.

It was hardly daylight in the morning when Kit felt himself roughly shaken, and heard the voice of the steward saying:—

“Come, hustle out here, boy. We’re away from the wharf now, and you’ve got to stir yourself. Don’t lie there and say ‘yes, sir,’ but jump. I’ll have no lazy boys about my cabin.”

Kit sprang up and dressed as fast as he could, but nothing he did satisfied the steward, who ordered him here and there apparently for the sake of showing his authority, scolded him, and once took him by the shoulders and shook him.

“I’d rather hate to sail with the steward for captain!” Kit said to himself, laughing inwardly at the little man’s feeble attempt at violence. He did not even know the man’s name, for he was always addressed as “steward”; but he was a middle-aged, dried-up little fellow, his yellowish face marked from small-pox, and his body so thin that his coat always hung like a bag. He spoke with a strong foreign accent, and Kit had noticed already that the Captain did not seem to like to have him about him; but he was a capital steward, and understood his business from top to bottom.

“I ought to have brought a note-book along to keep a list of the things I learn,” Kit said to himself after several hours of this nagging; “I’ve learned a fresh thing this morning, anyhow—not to make a show of myself by giving unnecessary orders if I’m ever put in any little position of authority.”

How differently the Captain managed things! About ten o’clock a little tug came alongside, and the Captain and the pilot climbed aboard.

“Put her under way, Mr. Mason,” he said to the first mate as he passed him, as quietly as if he had been saying “It’s a fine day.” The steward would have made more fuss over having the carving-knife cleaned.

It was a grand thing to be steaming out to sea in a fine ship like the North Cape; but now that the moment had come Kit felt a little more serious over it than he expected. He had never been away from home before, and a thousand recollections of the old place crowded into his mind. What were his mother and Vieve doing, and how long would it be before he should see them again? Having little to do in the middle of the morning, he went up on deck and leaned over the rail while the steamer ran down through the Narrows and into the lower bay. Everything was new and beautiful to him; but he would have enjoyed it more if there had not been, somehow, a little bit of a haze before his eyes. Suddenly he felt a friendly clap on the back, and heard the kindly voice of Tom Haines:—

“Brace up, young ’un. You might as well start your first voyage laughing as crying.”

“Oh, I’m not crying,” Kit protested; and he proved it by wiping the back of his hand across his eyes. “You’ll think I’m a big baby, won’t you?”

“Not at all,” Haines answered; “I salted the ocean myself a little when I first left home. You’ll soon get used to being away.”

“It’s not only that,” Kit said thoughtfully. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen the big ocean, and I can’t help thinking that my father is lying at the bottom of it somewhere. He was lost at sea about a year ago.”

“All the more reason for you to keep up a bold front, young ’un,” Haines insisted. “If you have no father, you have to shift for yourself, and for your family too, like enough. Keep at work and don’t stop to think about such things. If you want to send a line home to let them know you’re all right, you can send it ashore by the pilot, you know, when we’re outside the Hook.”

Captain Griffith was not the man to leave his ship in the hands of the pilot, as some captains do. He was up on the bridge, glass in hand, and remained there till he had seen the flags run up that announced to the signal station at Sandy Hook, “North Cape, for Sisal,” so that her departure would be announced to the owners and all interested. Then he went below, and the chief mate took his place on the bridge.

Kit was surprised, perhaps almost disappointed, to find that the sea was as smooth as the bay. It was one of those days that come sometimes even in winter, when there is hardly a ripple on the surface. There was not a sign of the seasickness he expected, and while the Captain was on the bridge he had an opportunity to write another “last line” home.

“Dear Mother,” he wrote with pencil, “I can write you another line to send by the pilot. We are at sea now, just outside Sandy Hook, and it is as smooth as Bonnibrook. I am not the least seasick. A little bit homesick, but I’ll soon work that off. I have to help set the dinner table now. Love to all. Kit.”

In another half-hour the pilot was gone, and they were fairly cut off from the world till they reached the coast of Yucatan. The Atlantic Highlands loomed up, and Seabright, and Long Branch, and so many more places on the New Jersey coast, that it looked to Kit as if it must be one continuous town. When darkness came they could still see the lights on shore.

An hour after supper the Captain went into his stateroom, sat down at his desk that had a bookcase over the top, and called Kit. He had a bundle of very large sheets closely written in columns before him, and more sheets of the same paper, blank.

“Can you read writing, my boy?” he asked. “Oh, yes, I know you can,” he added, “for you read a letter to me. See whether you can read this writing to me while I copy it,” and he handed Kit one of the big sheets.

Kit took it and began with the first line across the broad page:—

“‘Hernandez & Co., Merida,’” he read; “‘1 case dry goods; weight 168 pounds;’ then here’s some sort of a mark—a square with an H inside of it.”

“That’s what we call a diamond H,” the Captain explained; “when it’s in a circle, we call it a circle H. Now go on.”

Kit read several more of the lines without difficulty, till the Captain stopped him.

“You’ve been to school, then, have you?” he asked.

“Oh, yes, sir!” Kit answered. “I always went to school till about six months ago. Since then I’ve been doing whatever work I could get.”

“Study geography?” the Captain asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“What do you know about the place we’re going to—Sisal?”

“It is a small place on the coast of Yucatan, sir,” Kit answered promptly; “a seaport for the city of Merida, which lies about twenty miles inland. But I have learned most of that from your books here since I came aboard, sir,” he added, blushing a little.

“Well, I am glad to see you are honest about it,” the Captain said, with a smile. “I think you can stand there and read some of these manifests to me while I copy them. These things are the plague of my life. I have to make three copies of them before we reach Sisal, and I’d rather navigate a ship around the world than do it. Go ahead, now, and be very careful; for the least mistake will make no end of trouble.”

Kit began and read line by line with great care, while the Captain laboriously copied. After fifteen or twenty minutes of the work the Captain laid down the pen, and began to open and shut his hand and to rub it.

“Ah, my fingers are not as nimble as they once were,” he said. “It gives me cramp in the hand.”

For some time Kit had been revolving something in his mind while he read, but could not quite determine to speak it out. This pause of the Captain’s, however, decided him.

“I write a plain hand, sir,” he said; “if you could trust me, I think I could copy them for you.”

The Captain looked up at him with one of the piercing looks that seemed to go through him, and Kit was a little alarmed. Maybe it was presuming too much for the cabin boy to suggest such a thing. Even then, though, under that sharp gaze he thought it was worth the venture, for if he succeeded, it would show that he was good for something better than scouring the knives.

“Sit down here and let me see your handwriting,” the Captain said at length, laying a bit of plain paper on top of the manifests.

Kit sat down and took up the pen, and had just begun to write when something happened that gave him so much satisfaction that he could hardly keep a straight face. There came a knock at the door, and the engineers’ mess-room boy stepped in with the engineer’s report of the number of tons of coal in the bunkers. For this boy to see him seated in the Captain’s stateroom, writing at the Captain’s desk, with the Captain himself standing by watching him, was the best answer he could give to the assertion that he was a “farmer” and a “preacher.” Chock Cheevers could not have looked more astonished if he had seen one of the stokers on the bridge taking an observation.

The little interruption over, Kit wrote, as neatly and plainly as he could, “Christopher Silburn, cabin boy, steamship North Cape, for Sisal.”

“Yes, that is a good plain hand,” the Captain said, taking the paper. “I will let you try it, at any rate. You can go ahead while I go up on the bridge. Remember that you can’t be too careful.”

He hooked the stateroom door open as he went out; and he had hardly been gone five minutes before Mr. Hanway, the big, powerful second mate, went down to his room for a reefing jacket. Seeing the new boy at the Captain’s desk, and being fond of a little quiet fun, he went up to the open door, touched his cap in mock politeness, and said,

“She’s heading sou-sou-west, sir.”

Kit hardly knew whether he dared joke with the second mate or not; but with an inspiration he looked up from his work without the least change of countenance, and, returning the salute, replied,

“Very good, sir; keep her so, sir.”

More than an hour passed before the Captain returned from the bridge, and in the interval Kit nearly filled one of the large sheets.

“That will do for to-night,” the Captain said, looking over the page. “You have done it very well; but there’s more than one night; you can do a little at it every evening.”

Then the steward had something to say when Kit went into the pantry, which also opened from the cabin. The steward was not pleased to see the new boy taken into the Captain’s favor.

“I want that cabin cleaned before six o’clock in the morning,” he growled. “You needn’t think you’re going to shirk your work because you write for the Captain.”

“Very well, sir,” Kit answered. “I don’t intend to shirk any work.”

It did not seem quite right, on his first voyage, that the sea should be so smooth all the way down the coast. Even when the North Cape passed Hatteras there was no more than a little swell. When she reached the Florida coast, in about four days, she kept so well in shore that the sandy beach could be seen plainly, and the palm trees just as he had seen them in pictures. He learned from Tom Haines that steamers bound for the Gulf always run as close to the Florida coast as they dare, to be inside of the Gulf Stream, which flows northward at the rate of about four miles an hour, and retards a south-bound steamer just that much when she runs against it.

On the seventh day they sighted the eastern cliffs of Yucatan; and after two days of steaming along the coast, but so far out that they could see nothing but the outlines of the low hills, Kit learned that they were approaching Sisal. By that time he had made three copies of the long manifest, working at it a little nearly every evening on the cabin table.

It was early in a hot afternoon that they dropped anchor off Sisal; and nowhere in the world is it more appropriate to say of a ship that she lies “off” a port, for at Sisal a ship of any size must lie at least three miles off. There is no harbor, and the shore slopes off so gradually that no ship can approach the town.

“That must have been as smooth a voyage as ever a ship made,” Kit said to Tom Haines, as they stood by the rail together when the anchor went down. “I didn’t know it ever was so smooth for ten days at a time.”

“The Atlantic is a treacherous old pond,” Tom answered. “To-day it makes you believe it’s only a big lake; to-morrow it knocks you all to pieces. And this is a bad part of the coast we’re on, this south side of the Gulf; when we get any bad weather here, we have to hoist anchor and run to sea. But you want to keep your eyes open now; you’ll see some queer people in a few minutes.”

“What are all those little boats coming out to us?” Kit asked; “lighters to take off the cargo?”

“No indeed!” Tom laughed. “They don’t begin work as fast as that here. Everything is ‘mañana’ here, which means ‘to-morrow’ in Spanish; these people all speak Spanish, you know. That first boat, the one with the flag at the stern and rowed by four men, is the government boat, that brings out the Captain of the port, the health officer, and a lot of custom-house men. After they have examined our papers and found that we’re all well, the other boats will come up. They are what we call ‘bum-boats,’ with things to sell—cigars and tobacco, bead work, canes plated with tortoise-shell, all sorts of nonsense; and they will be on the lookout for passengers who may want to go ashore. But it’s the officers in the first boat I want you to see; they’ll be aboard in a minute.”

The gangway had been lowered, and after a great deal of shouting in Spanish the government boat came up to it and made fast. Then there came up the steps a dozen swarthy men whose appearance gave Kit more surprise than anything else he had seen on the voyage. Each one, as far as he could see, wore nothing but a white shirt and a high black silk hat, with a belt around the waist with a big revolver stuck in each side. They carried themselves with great dignity, which made their costume all the more grotesque; and as they stood on deck shaking hands with Captain Griffith, it was as much as Kit could do to restrain his laughter.

“Don’t they wear trousers in this country?” he whispered to Tom.

“They all have trousers on—white linen ones,” Tom answered; “but they roll them clear up so they won’t get wet in the boat. And it’s the fashion in Yucatan to wear the end of the shirt outside instead of inside the trousers. It wouldn’t be so bad in this hot climate, with their bare feet and legs, if they didn’t wear the high black hats to look stylish.”

The Captain took his visitors down into the cabin; and next minute his bell rang, and Kit had to run.

CHAPTER III.
A NORTHER ON THE GULF.

WHEN the port officers returned to shore they left behind four of the custom-house men, who were to stay on board the North Cape as long as she lay there; and these men deposited their high hats in the cabin and put on dark blue caps that they carried in their pockets, rolled down their trousers, and thus, though still in their bare feet, transformed themselves into respectable-looking citizens.

Kit heard the order given from the bridge, “Lower away the captain’s gig!” and in a few minutes Captain Griffith followed the officers ashore to arrange for lighters to land his cargo. He returned in time for supper, bringing along a package of letters that had been handed him at the custom-house—some for himself, and some for members of the crew.

“I think I have something here for you, Christopher,” he said as he passed through the cabin, where Kit was setting the table. “Yes,” he went on, pausing under the lamp to look over the letters, “‘Mr. Christopher Silburn, S. S. North Cape, Sisal, Yucatan.’ There’s news from home for you. The mail steamer left three days behind us, but she has beaten us down and gone on to Vera Cruz; so you will have a chance to answer your letter when she comes back, in about a week.”

“Thank you, sir,” Kit answered, as the Captain handed him a letter addressed in his mother’s familiar handwriting. He was delighted to hear from home, but still the letter frightened him a little, for he had not expected to hear while he was away, and his first thought was that there must be something the matter. He hastily cut the envelope open and read far enough to see that no one was sick, then put the letter in his pocket till his work was done. It was not till the supper dishes were washed and put away that he had any leisure, and then he sat down under the cabin lamp and read it. The main letter was from his mother, and there was a shorter one from Genevieve.

My dear Boy [his mother wrote]: Though I have no news to tell you, I want to send you a few lines by the first mail steamer, for I don’t want you to feel that you are entirely cut off from home and family. No matter how far away you are, you know we are always thinking about you.

And I don’t want to tire you with a lot of advice, but I do hope, my dear boy, that you will take care of yourself in every way. It may be selfish in me to say so, but I want you to remember that you have not only yourself, but your mother and sister too, to think about and work for. You are all we have. I am sure you will do your best wherever you are, but I want you to take great care of your health. That is an unhealthy country you are in, and you must not expose yourself to the hot sun. I will try to have some new shirts ready for you when you get back to New York; and I think you had better buy a few handkerchiefs, for you have not enough. And don’t forget the little book I gave you, Kit.

Your Loving Mother.

Then he unfolded the note from Genevieve.

Dear Kit [she wrote]: This is the first note I ever wrote without mother’s seeing it, but I do not want her to see this, because I am going to write to you about father, and that always troubles her.

I want you always, when you are travelling about the world, to keep your ears open for news of the Flower City or some of her boats. It may be foolish, but I never can believe that we shall not see him any more. You know how many people have been shipwrecked and then come home again years afterwards. You’ll do this, won’t you?

Dear old Turk is trying to write to you. He heard me say that I was going to write, so he sits here beside me, putting up first one paw and then the other. I am sure he would write if he could. With love,

Vieve.

He was about to read the letters over again, when the Captain’s bell rang. All the doors and port-holes were left open now, for the heat was intense even after dark, and he went into the Captain’s room without knocking.

“Shut the door, my boy,” the Captain said; “I have something to say to you;” and as Kit obeyed, he could not help wondering whether he had done anything that he was to be scolded for. But the Captain’s first words relieved his mind.

“I am going to put you at a job to-morrow that will require all your brains,” he said. “The lighters will be here in the morning after cargo, and I am going to send you ashore to make a list of every package landed. I have to keep a sharp eye on these boatmen, or they rob me. Everything will be checked off as it leaves the ship, and you will keep a list on shore, and the goods go into the hands of our agent in Sisal immediately, and he receipts for them.

“Now I want you to understand,” he continued, “that this is very important work. I have never trusted such work to a cabin boy before. If you miss a package, it may cost me a great many dollars. But I see you have some brains, and I want you to use them, and do the work carefully.”

“Thank you, sir,” Kit answered. “I will certainly do my best.”

Kit returned to the cabin, with a little flush on his face. He had seen for some days that his position on the ship was much better than when he started, but he had not dreamed of such an important commission as this. It would give him a great amount of extra work to do, but what of that? He was not afraid of work. Nearly any one in the crew would jump at the chance to go ashore and do what he was to do. Copying the manifests had given him extra work, but it had paid many times over by giving the Captain a good opinion of him.

Immediately after breakfast next morning the gig was lowered again, and the Captain was rowed ashore by two of the men, with Kit sitting in the stern by his side. Kit knew how some of the crew were wondering to see him going off in this style, but he had no chance to speak to them. On the way they passed three of the lighters going out—open boats about thirty feet long, very strongly built, with a single mast, each with a large crew of half-clad Mexicans ready for work.

The Captain waited till the first of the lighters arrived with its load, and showed Kit where he was to stand on the mole, as the Mexicans call the wharf, and how he was to keep his list. Then he returned to the ship, and the cabin boy was left to his own resources.

“I’m going to be roasted and broiled and frizzled here,” he said to himself, “under this sun. But I can stand it if these fellows can. And when there’s no lighter in sight I can get into the shade there beside the warehouse.”

He soon found that he was to have company in the hot sun; for as the agent had to receipt for the goods, he sent one of his own clerks to check them off on one of the manifests that Kit had copied. The clerk was a slender young man in a broad-brimmed Panama hat; and Kit was greatly amused when he touched his hat to him, and called him “Señor.” But the young man spoke a little English, and they soon became acquainted.

“You are young for a supercargo, Señor,” the clerk said, in a lull in the work.

“‘YOU ARE YOUNG FOR A SUPERCARGO, SEÑOR.’”

Kit had read enough sea stories to know something about supercargoes, though he did not know that he was doing the work of one at that minute.

“I’m not the supercargo, sir,” he replied; “I’m the cabin boy; we have no supercargo.”

“Ah!” said the clerk; and it was still more amusing to see how dignified he immediately became, and what a superior air he assumed. But another trifling incident soon made him friendly again, for the agent himself came down to the mole to inquire about something, and he, too, touched his hat to Kit and called him Señor, whereupon the clerk said something in Spanish that must have explained that Kit was only the cabin boy, for the agent immediately replied, “Oh, cabin boy is he? Well, he must be a good one, or he wouldn’t be put at this work. Bring him up to the house to breakfast.”

Kit was under the impression that he had had his breakfast several hours before, on board ship; but he followed Tom Haines’s advice to “keep his eyes open and his mouth shut,” and before long he learned that the southern custom is to take only a cup of coffee and a roll in the early morning, and to wait till midday for the full breakfast, which is really an early dinner.

About twelve o’clock there were no lighters in sight, for the boatmen were eating their breakfast too, and the clerk took Kit through a narrow street to a big one-story stone warehouse, the agent’s business place, where, on a shady rear verandah, a long table was spread. This was “the house” the agent had referred to; and by keeping both eyes and ears open, Kit learned that it is the custom in Yucatan for the proprietors and all the employees of large business houses to eat together in the warehouses, a cook and waiters being kept on the premises.

He was a little embarrassed to find that he was to be seated at the right hand of Mr. Ysnard, the agent, near the head of the table; for he was bright enough to see that the seats were arranged according to rank in the firm, with the proprietor at the top of the table, the cashier and chief clerks next, then the minor clerks, and the porters and boys near the foot.

“Hadn’t I better go lower down, sir?” he asked. “I don’t think I belong up here.”

“Oh, yes, you do!” Mr. Ysnard laughed; “you are my guest to-day, and my guests always belong in the seat of honor.”

While the many courses were brought on, soup, fish, roasts, dessert, and fruits, Mr. Ysnard asked Kit enough questions to keep him busy answering—how long he had been on the North Cape, how he liked it, where he lived, and all about himself. But when, after the meal was finished, they all sat talking, and most of them smoking, he began to grow uneasy.

“I shall have to ask you to excuse me, sir,” he said to Mr. Ysnard. “I am afraid some of the lighters will be coming in, and I must not miss anything.”

“Very true, my boy, you must attend to business,” Mr. Ysnard answered. “And you can safely follow the example, Michel,” he called down the table to Kit’s fellow-clerk on the wharf, who sat about the middle.

Together they returned to their work, and up to dark they had little chance for conversation, for eight lighters were now busy bringing cargo. When it was too dark to see longer, the gig was sent to take Kit on board.

“Make way for the supercargo!” Chock Cheevers cried, as he stepped on board. “Clear a gangway there. Don’t you see who’s come aboard?”

But the second mate had something more important to say.

“Bring your list into the chart-room,” he ordered, “and compare it with my tally.” The second mate had been keeping the tally of everything that left the ship; and when the comparison was made they corresponded exactly, showing that on his first day, at any rate, Kit had made no mistakes.

It seemed a little odd to go to washing dishes again after being a clerk all day; but they were soon done, and next morning he was out bright and early to clean the cabin and set the table. After breakfast he was rowed ashore as before, but dressed this time in his thinnest clothes. Even at eight o’clock the sun was burning hot, and the cloudless sky seemed to indicate an intensely hot day. He was soon to learn, however, that tropical skies change very rapidly. Five or six of the lighters had come in with loads and returned to the ship, when there came a single puff of wind from off the water that reminded Kit of home. It was the first really cool thing he had felt since his arrival in Yucatan; and this little puff, lasting only a few seconds, was more than cool—it was actually chilly.

“Ah, that’s good!” he said to the clerk; “I wish they’d give us more of that.”

The clerk shivered in his linen clothes, and pointed with one hand toward the sky. There far in the north was a big dark-gray cloud, that seemed to grow larger and darker as they looked at it.

“El Norte!” Michel exclaimed; and shivered again.

“What’s that?” Kit asked.

“A norther, you call it in English,” the clerk replied; “a great cold storm from the north. That puts an end to our work for some days. There’ll be a heavy sea on in a few minutes.”

“Then I ought to get back to the ship,” Kit said half to himself.

“You couldn’t do it,” said the clerk. “Look.”

He pointed seaward, and Kit saw all the lighters scudding toward shore before a wind that they hardly felt yet on the mole. Thick black smoke was pouring from the North Cape’s funnel, and across the water he heard the “click, click, click,” of the steam windlass.

“Why, she’s going off!” Kit cried; “she’s hoisting anchor!”

“Of course she is,” Michel laughed; “she’ll have to put to sea; she can’t lie there in a norther, and you’ll see no more of her till the storm is over. That often happens here.”

“And what becomes of a cabin boy who happens to be left on shore?” Kit asked, half inclined to laugh at the predicament he was in.

“You’re better off here than on the ship,” Michel answered, “and we won’t let you starve.”

By this time the whole sky was overcast, and frequent blasts of the cold wind struck them. The foremost of the lighters arrived, and their men worked like beavers to land what cargo they had. All about were men on the beach drawing their boats far up on shore out of reach of the heavy sea that they knew was coming. As fast as the lighters were unloaded, they too were drawn up. It was as much too cold now as before it had been too hot, but they had to stay on the mole till everything was checked off.

“Now make a run for it to the warehouse!” It was the voice of Mr. Ysnard, who had come down to see that all was left snug, and who saw that both the youngsters were shivering. Already the spray was beginning to fly over the mole, and in one glance seaward Kit saw that the North Cape was standing out into the Gulf. He was left alone in Yucatan; but instead of waiting to worry over it, he took to his heels and beat Michel to the warehouse by several yards.

There he hardly knew the place, it was so dark; for all the shutters on the seaward side had been closed to keep out the wind, as there was no glass in the windows. People were hurrying through the streets, and the sky was growing blacker every minute.

“Now we’ll catch it, my boy,” Mr. Ysnard laughed, as he followed them in, half soaked with spray. “Three days these things last, generally, and then it takes two or three more for the sea to go down so that the lighters can go out. So you are a prisoner in Mexico for five days at least, and you will be my guest longer than you expected.”

“Thank you, sir,” Kit answered; “but I hope the ship will not be in any danger.”

“Oh, no more than from any other storm. There is plenty of sea room, and she will run out fifty or a hundred miles and keep her nose in the wind. No, she will be all right.”

The breakfast table had to be set in the warehouse, as the verandah was too much exposed to the wind; and Kit noticed that the norther interfered with business and upset everything just about as much as an earthquake would at home. The clerks really suffered from cold, though Kit found it warm enough in the shelter of the building. The storm increased every minute, and they soon began to hear the roar of the sea breaking against the mole.

It was a relief to everybody when closing time came, five o’clock. Mr. Ysnard’s open carriage arrived to carry him to his home in the country, and he told Kit that he was to go along.

“But you must have something around you, in this wind,” he said; “I think I can lend you a Mexican overcoat.” And he went into the office and returned in a minute with two large red blankets, one for himself and one for Kit.

“This is what we call a ‘serape,’”[1] he explained. “See, there is a slit cut in the middle for the head to go through,” and he slipped the blanket over Kit’s head and put his own on in the same way; and Kit could not help laughing to see himself so suddenly transformed into a young Mexican.

[1] Pronounced ser-rap-pa.

As they were driven through the streets he saw that Sisal was a desolate little place of few houses, some of them of stone plastered over and some covered with corrugated iron; and the streets were nearly deserted on account of the norther, and most of the shutters closed. The few men to be seen were all wrapped in serapes, which warmed the shoulders, but could not warm the bare feet, nor heads covered with straw hats.

Mr. Ysnard’s house was on the brow of a low hill overlooking the town and the sea, and after the late dinner he took Kit into his “den,” as he called it, and they had a long talk before bedtime.

“As you copied the manifests,” the agent said in the course of the conversation, “you are familiar with all the marks on the cargo. You may see some cases coming ashore without any marks at all. Those are little private ventures by some of the officers or crew; and when you see one of them all you have to do is let it pass without putting it on your list, you know. They escape paying duty by slipping them through that way.”

“No, sir; I have no instructions of that kind,” Kit answered. “My orders are to make a list of everything brought ashore.”

“But if there should be a little profit in it for you?” Mr. Ysnard suggested. “Suppose you were paid a small commission on everything that slipped through without your seeing it?”

“I don’t think you ought to ask it of me, Mr. Ysnard,” Kit replied. “The Captain trusts me, and I should be ashamed to betray him. I couldn’t possibly do it.”

“Ah, my boy, I was just trying you,” Mr. Ysnard laughed, giving Kit a hearty clap on the shoulder. “I am glad to see that you are not to be tempted. That is just what we want to avoid, the landing of such smuggled cases, for they get both the ship and the agent into a lot of trouble. I suppose the Captain sent you ashore because he was sure he could trust you.

“There is always room for bright young fellows who can be trusted,” he added; “in fact, I could make room in my own business for a young American of about your age. How would you like to leave the ship and make more money in Sisal?”

The question came so suddenly that it almost staggered Kit; but he soon made up his mind how to answer.

“I think it is very pleasant here, sir,” he said, “but I don’t believe in changing. I have a good start on the ship, and don’t think I ought to leave it; but I am very much obliged to you, sir, for the offer.”

When he went out in the morning, he saw that the Gulf was almost white; partly with foam, and partly from the white sand that was stirred up from the bottom. Tremendous seas were breaking over the mole, and great sheets of spray were flying over several of the warehouses.

The norther prophets were right in saying that the norther would last for three days. Every night Kit went home with Mr. Ysnard, but without meeting his wife, as she was an invalid and seldom left her room. On the fourth day the dark clouds drifted gradually away, the wind lulled, and the tropical sun shone hot again. About noon he was delighted to see the North Cape steam back to her old place and drop her anchor.

“But you’ll not get out to her for a day or two yet,” Mr. Ysnard told him; “no small boat could go out till this heavy sea subsides. I am going into the country in a few minutes to see how much my plantations have suffered, and if you like, you can go along and learn something about this hemp you are going to be loaded with.”

The carriage came early that day, and they were soon driving between broad fields of cactus plants.

“That’s the stuff,” Mr. Ysnard told him; “it is the leaves of this cactus that yield the hemp. You see some of the leaves are six feet long and four or five inches broad. We cut off the leaves and soak them in water, then run them through a machine that extracts the fibre. That fibre is the hemp. Another machine cleans and straightens it, and we dry it and press it into bales, and it is ready to go north to be made into ropes and matting. Now you know something about the cargo you are to carry.

“But you have no idea,” he continued, “of the condition of the workmen who raise this hemp. We call them peons, and on most of the plantations they are little better than slaves, though I am glad to say that it is not so on mine. In this country a peon cannot leave the land he belongs on while he is in debt to his master; and as they earn only about twelve and one-half cents a day they are always in debt. A son is responsible also for his father’s debts, so they are practically slaves, with no chance of ever freeing themselves. It is a terrible system.”

“Your plants do not seem to have suffered much from the wind, sir,” said Kit; “maybe it is because you treat your men better.”

“Well,” Mr. Ysnard laughed, “there is no great merit in that. They do better work for me because I treat them well, and it pays better in the end. Slave labor is always the poorest.”

The next day the lighters ventured out again, and there was more work for Kit on the mole. Then when the cargo was all landed the loading began, and he was kept on deck to keep tally of the number of bales received. That took six full days, and still there was no sign of the mail steamer returning.

“The storm must have delayed her,” Captain Griffith said. “No use to send letters home now; for she has to touch at Havana, and we go direct, and we’ll beat her up. We’ll be off to-morrow.”

Kit asked and received permission to go ashore to say good-by to the agent who had been so hospitable to him. He had spent so much time in the little town that it almost seemed like leaving home again. Mr. Ysnard shook his hand warmly at parting.

“I have enjoyed having you here,” he said. “I like to see a bright, faithful young chap like you. Our young Mexicans are slow coaches beside you American boys. I was going to send you out a barrel of Mexican fruit that I had put up for you, so I’ll have it put in your boat. Keep pulling, my boy, and some day you may be down here in a better position than cabin boy.”

Kit tried to think it over as he returned to the ship, but he could not explain to himself what he had done to make Mr. Ysnard take such an interest in him. There was something about him, he could not help seeing, that pleased both the Captain and the agent; and he was glad of it, though he did not know what it was.

When the ship passed the Sandy Hook signal station, eight days later, the flags that she set told the brief story of the homeward voyage.

“North Cape,” they said, “eight days from Sisal, with hemp. Smooth passage.”

And when a few hours afterwards she lay at her old place in front of Martin’s Stores, her bow almost rubbed against the stern of a little tug.

“Why, that’s the Triton!” Kit said to himself, when he saw the tug’s name. “That’s Captain Judson’s boat, from Bridgeport, and Captain Judson is our near neighbor in Huntington. If he is going back, maybe he will take my barrel of fruit up to Bridgeport.”

“Yes, going back to-night,” Captain Judson said, when Kit found him. “I towed a yacht down yesterday. Take up a barrel of fruit for you? Aye, that I will, lad—and take you too, if you can get off. I know somebody up there who’d be glad to see you. Eh, my boy?”

Take him too! That was something that Kit had not thought of; but what a surprise it would be for the folks at home to see him come walking in! Within five minutes he had seen Captain Griffith and had readily been granted a week’s leave of absence.

CHAPTER IV.
KIT’S CONNECTICUT HOME.

THE Huntington stage was the same old weather-beaten stage that Kit had left a month before, but its wheels were gone. Fairfield County, all the way from Bridgeport back to Huntington and beyond, was white with snow, and the frozen roads were packed hard. The body of the stage had been lifted from its wheels and put on runners, and the bells on its two gaunt horses jingled merrily through the Bridgeport streets and over the Connecticut hills.

“My folks all well, Silas?” was the first question that Kit asked when he found the stage nearly ready to start.

“They was right peart when I come down this mornin’,” the driver replied, “so I guess they hain’t gone into a decline since. Sakes alive, but won’t they be surprised to see you, though! They was lookin’ for a letter. But what’s this, Kit? No overcoat! Here, wrap this hoss blanket ’round you snug.”

“Oh, you don’t know how good the cold feels, Silas,” Kit laughed, though he was glad enough to accept the blanket. “I’ve just come from a country where the sun burns like a hot iron, and the trees were full of fruit, ten days ago.”

Involuntarily he looked around to see that his barrel was safe.

“Now don’t you give yourself no consarn ’bout that thar bar’l!” the driver exclaimed. “When Silas lashes a bar’l on behind his sleigh, you can just make up your mind it’s thar to stay. While you youngsters goes out an’ sees the world, old Silas he stays to hum an’ ’tends to business, an’ carries your letters back to Hunt’n’ton.”

The only other passenger was Henry Steele, the Huntington shoemaker, who had been down to Bridgeport to buy leather, and had it in a big roll beside his feet; and he and the driver plied Kit with so many questions about his travels that he was kept busy answering.

“What was you aboard this North Cape?” Silas asked.

Kit felt for a moment that considering the work he had been doing he was entitled to lay claim to some higher position than the one he really occupied; but he soon smothered that down.

“Cabin boy,” he answered; and added to himself, “There’s no use of a fellow being ashamed of a good honest job, and one that he likes.”

“And you got good and seasick at the start, I’ll warrant!” Mr. Steele laughed.

“No, sir, I wasn’t sick a single minute on the whole voyage,” Kit answered.

“Well, Kit,” said the shoemaker, “if some boys were to tell me that, I’d think they were drawing the long bow. But I’ve known you since you were knee-high to a grasshopper, and I must say I’ve never known you to speak anything but the truth.”

“Th-th-thank you!” Kit tried to say it with a laugh, but the laugh turned into a shiver. It was all very well to feel at home in the cold, but there were some holes in the horse blanket. And he was growing impatient to see the familiar faces. He had not felt so down in Yucatan, because there he knew it was impossible; but now that every minute took him nearer, the minutes became dreadfully long.

Manly young sailor as he was, his heart beat faster as the stage drew into the outskirts of Huntington—if so small a place can be said to have outskirts. He had had already a glimpse of the white church steeple from a distant hilltop. And now there was the church itself! And he could have told with his eyes shut just how the land lay opposite the church. First there was a little store, with some empty barrels and boxes always in front. Then there was Dr. Thomas’s big white house, with the white fence in front. And then came a small house a story and a half high, with a light piazza across the front, standing about thirty feet back from the street, with a weather-beaten picket fence in front, and some big trees on each side extending their thick limbs over its mossy roof. House and fence had once been brown, but both were sadly in need of paint, and one end of the cornice was coming loose. But in Kit’s eyes, that was the cosiest place of all; for that was home!

There were no tracks in the deep snow between the road and the walk in front of the house, and when Silas guided the horses in toward the sidewalk they sank halfway to their knees. Then Kit unwrapped his blanket and sprang out. Some one in the front room of the house saw the stage stop, and that was a matter to be inquired into. All the neighbors take an interest in it when the Huntington stage stops in front of a house. The door opened, and a rosy-cheeked young girl of about fourteen looked out.

“Hello, Vieve!” Kit cried, waving his hand to her. A tropical hurricane could not have made his heart jump like that.

The girl paused long enough to cry out:—

“Mother! Mother! Quick! Here’s Kit!”

And the next moment she was down the walk, and the sailor boy was smothered with hugs and kisses in a way that made old Silas and the shoemaker feel quite young again, and Turk was barking a noisy welcome. In another minute Mrs. Silburn joined them, and all the hugging was repeated.

“Now don’t trouble yourself about the bar’l,” Silas insisted when Kit at length made his way back to the stage. “’Taint no weight at all;” and he took it by the rims and carried it to the piazza, then rolled it into the house.

“I’ve brought you something better than the letter you was lookin’ for, Mrs. Silburn,” he said, as he returned to the stage.

But Mrs. Silburn hardly heard. She had eyes only for Kit, ears only for what he said.

“You’re not sick, Kit, that you’ve come home?” she asked, when the three were in the sitting-room together. “No,” she added, “I need hardly ask that; I never saw you look better. Why, you’re as brown as an Indian.”

“Never was ‘weller’ in my life,” Kit answered as well as he could, for his mother was holding fast to him while Vieve was trying to drag him up to the stove to warm him. “A week’s leave of absence, that’s all, while the ship discharges cargo.”

“Oh, a whole week!” Vieve cried, jumping around him in her glee. “That’s the reason you’ve brought your baggage!” and she glanced toward the barrel.

“Did he bring that in here?” Kit asked. “That won’t do. It came from a hot place, but it must stay in the cool up here. Have you got a cool room we can put it in?”

“I think you’ll find all the other side of the house cool enough,” Mrs. Silburn laughed. “We don’t keep any fires across the hall now; it saves both wood and trouble.”

Kit rolled the barrel across the hall into the cold parlor, and hurried back to the stove. But he could not stay in one place long—not for the first hour or two. He had to go to the windows to see how the yard looked, and into the kitchen to look at the familiar pans hanging against the wall, and upstairs to the little room with the sloping ceiling where he had slept so many years. When he came down again, Vieve was putting on her hat and coat.

“Say, avast there, now,” he cried; “you’ll have to take another tack. (I suppose you’ll expect me to talk sea talk, now I’m a sailor.) I know what you’re after, Vieve, and it won’t do. No going out to buy more things for supper. I’m not the prodigal calf, you know—the prodigal son, I mean. Whatever you were going to have for your own suppers is just what I want.”

“Just put yourself in that chair, Mr. Silburn,” Vieve laughed, pointing to her father’s armchair, that she had drawn up to the fire for him, “and don’t begin to interfere so soon;” and she was gone before he could stop her. And Mrs. Silburn brought her husband’s slippers, that were carefully laid away, and would have untied Kit’s shoes if he had let her.

“You’ve had a hard time of it, Kit,” she said, “and we must make you comfortable at home.”

“Indeed, I’ve not, mother,” he answered; “you mustn’t spoil me on that account. I’ve had a splendid time, and enjoyed every minute. I’ve made some good friends, too, since I went away.”

“I’m sure you would do that, Kit,” she answered, her face full of motherly pride. “And you’ve grown so, too!”

It was not long before supper was ready, for Vieve was both cook and errand girl while her mother was busy sewing.

“You’ll not mind eating in the kitchen, Kit?” his mother asked. “We eat there now, while we’re alone.”

“Mind it!” Kit exclaimed; “it’s just what I wanted to do. Oh, look here, Vieve!” he went on, as he took his mother by the arm and led her into the kitchen, “have you cooked all these things so quick? Beefsteak, and fried potatoes, and ham and eggs, and coffee? Why, we ought to have you for cook aboard ship.”

“Ah, you don’t know how good it all tastes!” he declared, when they had set to work at the eatables. “We have good fare on the ship, first rate; but it’s not like home. No such coffee as this, I tell you. Coffee is always bad at sea, they say.”

“And do you have to eat out of a little mess pan, like the other sailors?” Vieve asked.

“Do I!” Kit laughed. “I guess you don’t know what a dignified position your big brother holds, my child. Why, I eat in the cabin, with silver forks and spoons, and a monogram on all the dishes. And in the evening I sit at the Captain’s desk and do my writing.”

“Oh, Kit!” Mrs. Silburn expostulated. She was not quite sure whether he was joking with them or not.

“It’s a fact,” he answered, laughing to think how grand he could make everything appear if he felt inclined to boast. “And I wash the dishes afterwards, and clean the spoons; but that part we don’t speak of in polite society.”

They were done eating, but still busy talking, when Vieve suddenly asked:—

“What’s in that barrel, Kit?”

“Ah, Miss Curiosity!” he laughed. “You’re the same old Vieve, ain’t you? I suppose that’s the way your relation Eve prodded poor Adam on to his ruin. But to tell you the truth, Vieve, I don’t exactly know what’s in it myself. Suppose I bring it in and we find out.”

No sooner said than done; the barrel was rolled in, and Vieve had the hammer and chisel ready.

“Now shut all the doors, Vieve,” he said, as he unfastened the head; “if it should be anything alive, it might get away.”

Vieve hastened to obey, but seeing him laughing at her, she threw them open again.

When the head was raised from the barrel, the room was instantly filled with a delightful tropical aroma that was familiar enough to Kit, but that is seldom found in a house in Huntington.

“Just crush these in your hands, and then smell them,” he said to both, taking up a handful of the fragrant lemon leaves with which the top of the barrel was covered; and they thought they had never smelled anything so sweet.

When he brushed the leaves aside, he found more than half a bushel of lemons, limes, and oranges. Then a little partition nailed in, and beneath it a great assortment of southern fruits—sugar apples, loquats, sapadillos, sour sops, jelly cocoanuts, tamarinds, guavas, and bananas. Then another partition, and beneath that a dozen of the largest and finest pineapples he had ever seen. By the time the barrel was emptied, every table and chair in the kitchen was covered with luscious fruit.

“Where in the world did you get all these things, Kit?” his mother asked.

“A present from one of my friends in Yucatan,” he replied; and then he had to tell all about Mr. Ysnard and how kind he had been. While he talked he was busy gathering up the fruit and laying it on the pantry shelves, where it would neither freeze nor be too warm, and Vieve and her mother fell to and washed the dishes.

“We’ll try one of these pineapples in the sitting-room,” he said; and he took a sharp knife and began to pare off the rough outer skin. “I want you to taste a real pine fresh from the orchard. They’re very different from the hard little things we buy here.” When it was peeled he took two forks and tore it apart into small pieces, as he had been taught on the ship; and around the sitting-room stove they were all agreed that no better or sweeter fruit could be grown.

But alas for Kit’s intentions to tell all his adventures that evening! He had had little sleep on the tug, and before the pineapple was finished, he caught himself nodding several times.

“There’s no use talking,” he laughed; “I’ve got to go to bed. The wonderful adventures and hairbreadth escapes of Christopher Silburn, Esq., will keep for another time. I guess I’m in a hurry to feel my old bed.”

And before many minutes he was sound asleep in it, to know no more of ships, or tropics, or home, till he sprang up in the morning, thinking that he must hurry to clean the cabin.

Breakfast was hardly over before Harry Leonard, one of Kit’s old chums, called to see him; for by that time it was known all over Huntington that Kit was home. Harry was a good companion in every respect but one: the boys called him the biggest boaster in Fairfield County.

“I’m thinking of going to sea myself,” he said, after they had talked a few minutes. “I know where I can get a berth as second mate of a bark, after I’ve made a voyage or two. What do you do on the North Cape, Kit?”

“I’m assistant to the Captain,” Kit answered, with a sly wink at Vieve; “I write out the manifests and such things. He and I were the only ones who went ashore, and I spent several days with our agent in Sisal. I want you to try an orange out of the barrel of fruit the agent sent out to the ship for me. Oh, yes, I have to be back in five days more. I don’t know who’d make out all the papers if I didn’t get there.”

With Vieve hiding her face and shaking, it was hard for Kit to keep from laughing, but he did.

“Didn’t I give him a dose?” he roared, after Harry was gone. “He’s such an awful bragger I thought I’d pay him in his own coin. But isn’t it funny how you can change things by telling only one side of a story. Everything I said was true, only I didn’t tell it all.”

That afternoon Kit was out in the snow with a ladder and hammer and nails, fastening the end of the cornice that was loose; and before dark he had mended the shaky front gate, and replaced some missing pickets, and put a new hinge on the kitchen door.

“I’m not going to let you work so when you come home for a little holiday, Kit,” his mother said in the evening when they were sitting around the fire again. “You must rest.”

“Oh, that’s nothing at all,” Kit retorted. “I want the place to look shipshape for a particular reason. Somebody may be coming home one of these days, and he must find everything in good order. I know you don’t like to talk about that, mother, but it has to be talked about sometimes. As long as there is the least chance, we must not lose hope; and both Captain Griffith and Mr. Ysnard think there is still a possibility of father’s being alive. Of course it is a very slight chance, but still it is a chance, and we must not give up.”

“Oh, Kit, I am so glad to hear you say so!” Vieve exclaimed. “You know that’s what I have always said. And your Captain thinks so too!”

“Ah, don’t deceive yourselves, children,” Mrs. Silburn sighed. “How could your father be alive without coming home or even sending us word for nearly a year? And we know that his ship was lost.”

“Yes, there is no doubt his ship was lost, mother,” Kit admitted, “but still there are many things that may have happened through which he may be alive and yet not be able to get home, or even to write to us. Mr. Ysnard has a friend whose ship was lost at sea, but who got home more than two years after he had been given up. They took to the boats, of course, and all the boats were swamped but the one he was in. That one was picked up by a Norwegian brig bound for Honolulu. When they got into the Pacific, after going around Cape Horn, the brig was wrecked also, and the crew got to one of the little desert islands in the Pacific where ships never touch. They were there over a year before they got away. And there was an ending to that that won’t be likely to happen in our case. When the man got home, he found his ‘widow’ just about to be married to some other man.”

“No, I don’t think that will happen in our case!” Mrs. Silburn said, smiling in spite of herself. “Such remarkable escapes happen sometimes at sea, but we have no right to expect them. You may as well make up your mind that you will have to be the head of the family, Kit.”

“A poor head at present, I am afraid,” Kit answered. “But I think the day will come when I shall be able to take care of you both, if father doesn’t come back. That’s what I am planning for, at any rate. It’s not much of a position to be a cabin boy, but I expect to have a better one some day. It sha’n’t be my fault if I don’t. If I can show them that I am fit for a better place, I think I will get it in time. But even now I can do a little bit toward helping things along; I nearly forgot that part of the business.”

He put his hand in his pocket and took out some money, and laid a bright new two-dollar note in Genevieve’s lap.

“You know the dollar’s worth of stamps you sent me, Vieve. I was awfully glad to get them, too, for I felt pretty poor just then. So there’s the dollar, with a little interest added.”

He had not the heart to tell her that he had been robbed of the stamps. In all his accounts of his adventures he had not said a word about the hardships he had gone through. When he told about how nearly he had been arrested, it was only to turn it into a joke.

“No, I don’t want it, Kit,” Vieve protested, trying to hand him back the note. “I sent you that for a present.”

“No back talk to the head of the family, miss!” he laughed, giving his sister’s wavy hair a playful pull. “And here’s a little for you, mother. I can leave you only three dollars this time, as it will cost me a dollar to get back to the ship. But I hope before long to do better than that. If I could only make a little more money, I’d like to have some paint put on the house.”

“I’m not going to touch a cent of it,” Mrs. Silburn declared. “I don’t need it, but you do. I want you to buy a cheap overcoat with that money; you can’t be going about in winter without an overcoat.”

“I don’t need one,” Kit protested. “I tried on my old one up in my room this morning, and it fits first rate. It’s plenty good enough till I get in with the ‘Four Hundred’ in New York, and none of the Vanderbilts or Astors have invited me to dinner so far. But I don’t need an overcoat at all unless we go to some cold country next voyage.”

“And where do you expect to go next time?” Vieve interrupted.

“There’s no telling,” Kit answered; “it just depends upon who charters the ship. We might go to China, or to Australia, or Bombay, or most any seaport in the world. Maybe it will be back to Sisal, for all I know. Even the Captain did not know, when I left.”

Kit had his own way about the money in the end, and made his mother accept the three dollars.

“I’d be a nice head of a family if I couldn’t leave you any money!” he argued. “You know I have no expenses like other fellows; and if I should need money at any time I could draw against my wages. The sailors nearly all do that; indeed, they have generally spent their pay for the voyage before they start, so they have to work to pay the bill.”

He was acting very much like the head of the family when he looked over the old house one morning and announced that he thought it could be made very comfortable for them as soon as he had more money.

“I like the arrangement of it,” he said; “this sitting-room in front with the kitchen behind it is very handy. Then the parlor across the hall and your bedroom behind that is very handy, too. When father comes back, Vieve can take the other room upstairs.”

“Oh, it’s a shame to let you work so hard just to make us comfortable!” Vieve exclaimed. “Other boys have such good times with their skating and swimming and football and such things. I’m going to work myself just as soon as I get a chance.”

“I hope you will,” Kit laughed. “Go to school and work there just as hard as you can. If mother hadn’t made me go to school and attend to my lessons, I’d be just an ordinary cabin boy now. I mean,” he explained, blushing a little at the way he had put it, “I shouldn’t be able to copy manifests for the Captain, or do a supercargo’s work for him on shore. We don’t see at the time how much good study does us, but I tell you we see it afterward, Vieve. And skating and football and such things! Pshaw, don’t you think I got enough of them when I was at home? When a fellow gets to my age” (and he drew himself up a little taller, which made Vieve smile), “he has other things to think of. I want to push myself ahead, Vieve, and earn enough to take care of you both. And swimming, did you say? Who do you think has a better chance for swimming than a sailor when his ship is in port? Oh, you needn’t sympathize with me, my child. I’d rather go off and see foreign countries than play football.”

On Sunday morning he and Vieve went together to the old white church across the broad street, “just like old times,” as they said; and after Sunday school he had to explain to a score of friends where he had been and what he had been doing. His boy friends, he noticed, did not seem to think it any hardship to go to sea in a fine steamship; most of them would have jumped at the chance to go with him.

A whole week seemed so long when he left the North Cape to go home! And it seemed so short when the last day came! But the stage was coming down the hill, and Kit had his old overcoat on, which was a trifle short, but very warm. And under his arm was a little bundle of shirts and things that his mother had made for him.

“I may have a chance to get home after the next voyage,” he said, when they were half smothering him with good-bys in the cold hall, “and I may be gone for six months; there’s no telling. But I’ll write whenever I can, you may be sure, and tell you where to send letters. Turk, you’re pawing me all to pieces, old fellow. Good-by, Vieve; good-by, mother. I’d keep father’s chair and things ready for him, if I were you, for he might walk in most any day. Good-by, Turk. He knows I’m going away, doesn’t he?”

In a minute more he was in the stage, his mother waving to him from the door, Vieve throwing kisses to him from the gate, and Turk jumping in the snow, barking furiously.

“That’s a pretty little sister you’ve got,” said Silas, when a turn in the road hid the old house from sight.

“I’m glad you think so,” Kit laughed, “for everybody says she is the image of me!”

He was not the first boy who has tried to laugh on leaving home, to conceal very different feelings.

CHAPTER V.
A BURGLAR IN THE CABIN.

“OH, this is ahead of being a cabin passenger on one of the big liners!” Kit said to himself, as he hurried through the brick tunnel that led to the wharf of Martin’s Stores. “The passenger knows where he’s going, so he doesn’t have the fun of wondering. But I don’t know. Maybe the ship has been chartered for China while I’ve been away; or it might be for Russia, to carry grain. There’s no seaport in the world that we mightn’t go to. I think one will suit me just about as well as another, though I’d rather like to cross the ocean.”

Tom Haines was one of the first men he met on deck.

“Well, have you made up your mind where you’re going to take the yacht to this voyage?” Kit asked, as they shook hands.

“Don’t call her a yacht!” Tom laughed. “We’d have too many big bills to pay if she was our yacht. It’s better as it is: we get a salary and a sea-voyage at the same time. Yes, we’re chartered for Nassau this trip, to bring back pineapples and sponges; and we’ll be off in four or five days.”

“For Nassau!” Kit repeated; “why, that’s—” but there he stopped.

“That’s right,” Tom said, still laughing. “Stick to your old rule and never say you don’t know a thing, but go and find it out. I know what you’re thinking about. You want to go down in the cabin and look at the map to see where Nassau is. But I’ll save you the trouble. It’s the capital of the Bahama Islands, in the northern West Indies, and about a thousand miles from New York; so that will make a short voyage. But there’s more news for you: you have a new cabin steward.”

“No!” Kit answered, not at all sorry to hear it. “Where’s the old steward?”

“I should think in Bellevue Hospital by this time,” Tom replied, “unless he’s reformed. He got on a terrible spree and fell to breaking the crockery, so the Captain sent him off in a hurry. The new man is a Scotchman named MacNish, and that’s all I can tell you about him. There’s a new galley boy, too; but that doesn’t count for much.”

“Not to you,” Kit declared, “but it does to me, because now I’m not the newest hand on the ship. But I must go down and report myself.”

He did not see the new steward, who was at work in the pantry; but Captain Griffith called him into his stateroom.

“I am glad you are back promptly,” he said, “for to-morrow we begin taking in cargo for Nassau, and I want you to keep tally as it comes on board. It is not exactly cabin boy’s work, but you do it carefully, and it is good experience for you.”

“I am only too glad to do it, sir,” Kit answered. “I want to make myself useful.”

“I thought of raising your pay two or three dollars a month for this extra work,” the Captain went on, “but I have concluded not to do it at present. I don’t want to make a pet of you; it’s better that you should work your way gradually like other people. You can go to the steward now and see whether he has anything for you to do.”

There was nothing to be done at the moment, for the new steward had everything in order. Kit had never seen the pantry so clean, nor the cabin brass-work so well polished. Mr. MacNish was apparently about forty years old, a plump man of medium height, his florid round face smooth except for a little tuft of iron-gray whiskers under each ear.

“Looks more like an Englishman than a Scotchman,” Kit said to himself; and his accent certainly was more English than Scotch; but his manner was much pleasanter than the other steward’s, and he used so many biblical quotations when he talked that Kit thought he must be a very devout man.

For the next four days the cabin boy was busy keeping tally of the general cargo as it came aboard, and after the same performance as before of anchoring by the Liberty statue and the Captain coming out in a tug, the North Cape got under way for Nassau. There was not much to be seen of the New Jersey coast this time, for she stood out to the southeastward all the first night, and in two days and a half crossed the Gulf Stream and ran into warmer weather. And every day Kit thought more and more of the new steward. He was so kind and gentle, so willing to do things himself rather than give Kit trouble, so neat and industrious, and above all so pious in his conversation, that it worried the cabin boy to see that Captain Griffith treated him rather abruptly, as if he did not care much for him.

“Was that a little Bible I saw you have last night, my boy?” Mr. MacNish asked Kit one morning. “Ah, I thought so. I like to see boys read their Bible. And maybe you’d lend it to me sometimes. Mine must have been stolen, I’m afraid, for I always carry it in my satchel. Oh, it’s a great comfort, lad, in times of trouble. My good old father” (his voice grew a little husky) “taught me to read my chapter every day, and I don’t like to miss it. I hope to see the day when we’ll have morning and evening service on every ship afloat.”

On the sixth day after leaving New York they sighted Nassau, and Kit was delighted with the appearance of the place from the water. The big square stone houses, with their upper and lower balconies enclosed with green Venetian blinds; the red tiled roofs, white streets running up a steep hill, palm trees waving gracefully over many of the roofs, old forts, half in ruins, to the right and left of the town, and the warm summer weather in midwinter, made it seem like a little fairy-land. But these things had to be seen from a distance, for the North Cape drew too much water to cross the bar. She anchored outside, half a mile from the town, close under the long narrow strip of rock called Hog Island, where she was exposed to the north wind and would have to hoist anchor and put to sea if a gale came.

By the next day the lighters were ready, for the cargo had to be landed in lighters as it had been in Sisal, though the distance was not as great, and Kit was set ashore early to check off every package as it was put on the wharf. He was no beginner at this work now, and as the people spoke English he found it much easier than at Sisal, though the boatmen and ’longshoremen were all negroes, and spoke a mixed jargon of Congo African and Colonial English that was sometimes almost as hard to understand as the Spanish. The day was intensely hot, and there was no tree or building on the wharf to give him shelter, and the lighters arrived so fast that he not only had no chance to see anything of the city, but had not even time to stop for dinner.

The only break in the long day was when the mail steamer, the Santiago, arrived from New York. She also was too large to cross the bar, and a little tug went out to her and carried her passengers and mails ashore.

When the day’s work was over, Kit was quite ready to return to the ship and eat his supper; but while they were washing dishes the steward proposed that they should get permission and spend the evening on shore.

“I feel so lost without the Holy Scriptures I brought from home,” he said, “and the precious hymn book I used when I was younger than you are. Ah, how many times they have made my heart light when it was sore with trouble. I can buy new ones on shore, but they’ll not be like the ones I used so long. And I want to mail a letter to my dear old father. I think the Captain would let us go if you were to ask him.”

Kit was rapidly gaining experience of the world, but he still had a great deal to learn about the people who live in it. That there are men who try to hide their wickedness under a cloak of deep piety he had no suspicion. It was very nice in the new steward, he thought, to take the first opportunity to replace his lost Bible and mail a letter to his aged father; and though he felt more like going to bed, he went to the Captain and readily got permission for them both to go ashore, without the least suspicion that the steward would much have preferred to go alone, but was using him as a cat’s-paw because the Captain would be more likely to oblige him.

They were taken to the landing-steps in the gig, with the understanding that the boat would return for them at half-past ten, Mr. MacNish carrying along a small leather satchel, strongly mounted with brass, that looked quite luxurious for the steward of a tramp steamship.

“I want to make a few trifling purchases,” he explained, “and this will be handy to carry them aboard in. Perhaps I can’t find what I want, but I’ll not worry over it; ‘sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.’”

As they climbed up the slippery stone steps Kit noticed two men who looked like Americans sitting on a bench in the little park, and imagined that they looked very hard and sharp at him and his companion. And he saw that the steward noticed them too; indeed there was little that Mr. MacNish did not notice, now that they were ashore. He looked around as if there might be highwaymen behind the trees, and clutched his satchel a little tighter, though it was too dark for him to see the men distinctly.

When they crossed the small park they were in Bay Street, the main business street of the place; and they had not gone far before they were in front of a dingy saloon, with doors standing wide open.

“I feel the chill of the night air,” Mr. MacNish said, stopping before the door, “and it is dangerous to be chilled in the tropics. Let us go in and get something to warm us.”

“I am warm enough, thank you,” Kit answered; “I don’t care for anything.”

“You know the apostle advises us to take a little wine for the stomach’s sake,” the steward urged.

“My stomach’s all right!” Kit laughed. “I suppose they didn’t have any quinine in those days; quinine’s much better.”

“Then hold my satchel till I come out,” the steward said, putting it in Kit’s hands; and a minute later he stood in front of the bar, pouring out a tumblerful of something that looked stronger than wine.

While the steward was in the saloon, the two men who had been sitting in the park passed by on the other side of the street, and Kit noticed again that they were looking sharply at him and at Mr. MacNish. He was positive now that they were watched, and it startled him; but he was relieved to see that the two men paused and exchanged a few words with a Nassau policeman a little further up the street. They could hardly be highwaymen, he thought, if they were known to the police. When Mr. MacNish came out of the saloon he spoke about them.

“Two men who look like Americans seem to be taking a great interest in us,” he said. “They watched us pretty closely when we landed, and they just walked past here, looking at us again.”

“What’s that!” MacNish exclaimed; “two men! What did they look like?”

Kit wondered that such a trifling thing should excite him so much, but he described the men as well as he could.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” MacNish said, though his manner belied his words. “You just imagine it. Here, we’ll turn up this way toward the hill; I think the stores are better in the street above. You carry the satchel for me a bit, my lad.”

They turned into a dark side street, and were no sooner around the corner than the steward quickened the pace almost to a run. His manner was so changed that Kit for the first time became suspicious, and thought that he had better have nothing to do with the satchel.

“Here, you take your satchel, Mr. MacNish,” he said; “I can keep up with you better if I have nothing to carry. We don’t need to hurry so much, do we?”

MacNish snatched the satchel from his hands without replying, and before they had taken ten steps more Kit was almost knocked down by two men who sprang out from an alley and seized the steward by both arms as if they were used to such work. By the dim light from a neighboring shop window Kit saw that they were the men who had been in the park.

“Now, then, Slippery Jim, we want you,” one of the men said. “No nonsense, unless you want some lead in you.”

Kit was too much astonished to speak, but the steward was equal to the emergency. With a powerful jerk he wrenched himself free, and the next moment Kit saw the gleam of a revolver in his hand and heard a shot fired. It was done so quickly, however, that the bullet flew wide; and the next minute two policemen in uniform emerged from the alley, and all four men grappled with the desperate steward and bore him down.

His language as he lay struggling on his back on the sidewalk was anything but pious; but he submitted to the inevitable when the officers put handcuffs on his wrists and stood him on his feet.

“I am afraid you have made a mistake, gentlemen,” Kit at length said; “this man is Mr. MacNish, steward of the steamship North Cape.”

“Steward nothing!” one of the men answered, contemptuously. “This man is Slippery Jim, with fifty other names, and one of the slickest bank burglars in the world. He’s the man that tapped the North Western bank for a hundred and forty thousand dollars ten days ago, and I only hope he’s got it in that satchel. Steward, indeed! He’s smart enough to turn his hand to anything, and he took that way to escape from New York with his booty. See here.”

As he spoke the man took hold of the whiskers on both sides of MacNish’s face, and being false ones they came off very easily. Then he rubbed his handkerchief across the steward’s face, and wiped off a big patch of the pink stain that had given him a florid appearance.

“We got on his track just after you sailed,” the man continued, “and followed him in the mail steamer. We are detectives from New York, and you are a lucky boy that we don’t take you in as an accomplice.”

Meanwhile the other stranger had been trying to open the satchel. Finding it securely locked, he impatiently took his knife and cut a long slit in the leather and thrust in his hand.

“Here we have it!” he exclaimed, “or some of it. We’ll count it over at the police station.”

Kit’s eyes bulged when he saw a big handful of greenbacks and bonds taken from the satchel; not covetously, but in awe when he thought of the great amount of stolen money he had been carrying.

The steward, seeing that his game had reached an end, was inclined to laugh over his experiences on the North Cape.

“You’ll be wanting a new steward on the ship, Spooney,” he laughed, “for I’ve accepted a steady situation on shore. I hope you’ll lend your Bible to the next man; I found it awfully comforting. But I guess I’ll not mail that letter to-night to my dear old papa; the old chap was hanged about thirty years ago. I kept your blooming cabin in good shape, anyhow, for a man with a hundred and forty thousand dollars in his satchel.”

It was a relief to Kit when the officers took his former companion away. He had heard of such desperate criminals, but had never been face to face with one before. He had an hour yet before the boat would come, and spent the time walking the streets, feeling sick at heart and a little out of patience with himself.

“I don’t wonder he called me ‘Spooney,’” he reflected. “I ought to have been smart enough to see through the man at once, as I think the Captain did, to some extent. How easily he might have got me into a heap of trouble if it had been worth his while! Even a poor boy with nothing to be robbed of, has to be careful whom he associates with. So remember that in the future, Mr. Kit Silburn!”

The Captain’s only remark, when he returned to the ship and told what had happened, put Kit in a little better spirits.

“So that leaves us without a cabin steward,” the Captain said, “in a small port where we can’t get another. I wish I could cut you right straight in two, Christopher, for I want you in two places at once. As soon as we have the cargo out you must act as steward till we get back to New York; but for the present I must have you on shore.”

“I think I can manage with the steward’s work, sir,” Kit answered; “and the cargo ought to be out in two or three days now.”

“And till then the engineers’ boy must look after the cabin too,” the Captain added.

That night Kit had many things to think of as he lay in his berth. Everybody feels a little sheepish to be so thoroughly deceived, and he was no exception. But there were more important things to consider than that. It was only a wretched burglar who had called him a spooney, and his employer liked him well enough to want him in two places at once. Kit was a good fellow, but he was human, like the rest of us, and that remark of the Captain’s made him feel pretty well satisfied with himself. And here was the steward’s place vacant. If he did good work there for a week or two, he could get the place permanently, he felt almost sure of that. But did he want it? He was not quite sure about that. On the one hand it would bring him better pay, and on the other hand if he became a steward he probably would never get any higher. And after all, maybe the Captain would think him too young; and a dozen more ifs and ands, and in the midst of it all he fell asleep.

For the next week he was the busiest boy in the Bahama Islands. As far as possible he set things right for the day in the cabin before he went ashore, then stood all day in the sun, checking off cargo, and was back to the ship again in time to attend to supper. In the evening he washed the dishes and cleaned up the pantry, and turned in early because he had to turn out early. In those days it was only by good management that he could get ten minutes of his own to write a short letter home.

“Well, you are a softy!” Chock Cheevers said to him one morning in the cabin—for it was Chock who had to wait on the Captain in Kit’s absence. “Here you’re doing the steward’s work, and the cabin boy’s, and the supercargo’s, all for six dollars a month. I’d strike for double pay, anyhow, if I was you. I’m going to strike, myself, pretty soon if this double work keeps on.”

“My child,” Kit laughed (he hardly noticed it himself, but he always spoke to the mess-room boy now as if he were indeed the supercargo, instead of only the cabin boy), “if I had time I would tell you how many millions strikes cost every year without doing any good, for I read it one day in an old newspaper. But I haven’t time; the boat is waiting for me. You do the striking, and I’ll do the working. The fellows who work don’t generally need to strike. Besides, I like to do it.”

That evening Captain Griffith called Kit into his stateroom when his work in the pantry was done.

“I want you to make me out a complete list of everything that has been landed so far,” he said, “so that the agent ashore can receipt for the goods. I suppose you see by this time something of what a supercargo’s work is on board ship.”

“Yes, sir,” Kit answered; “he has to see that the whole cargo is taken out and landed, and receipted for by the agent.”

“Yes, that and much more,” the Captain continued. “He is the agent on board of the parties that charter the ship, and must look after their interests in every way. He is not an employee of the ship, but of the charterers. Suppose the North Cape is chartered by John Smith & Co. to carry a cargo to Rio Janeiro. They deliver their goods on the wharf, and we load them and carry them to Rio, but beyond loading, carrying, and unloading them, we legally have nothing to do with them. It is the supercargo’s business to tally the goods delivered on the wharf and put on board, see them safely landed at their destination, and take the consignee’s receipt for them. But more than that, he must take care of the cargo on the voyage. If there is live stock, he sees that it is fed and cared for. If there are fruits or vegetables, he takes care that they are kept cool in hot climates, and kept from freezing in northern latitudes. In short,” he concluded, “the supercargo must take as great care of the cargo as if it belonged to him, always under the owners’ orders. And he is a passenger on the ship, living in the cabin with the captain, and having nothing to do, of course, with the management of the vessel. There are always two interests on a chartered ship,—the interest of the ship, which the captain takes care of, and the interest of the cargo, which is the supercargo’s work. Unfortunately we have had only small charters lately, that did not warrant the employment of a supercargo, so his work has been left for me to do. When we are chartered for large and valuable cargoes, the charterers always put a supercargo on board.”

Kit’s work on shore did not end when the small general cargo was discharged, as he expected. Nassau business men have an easy way of thinking that things can be done just as well to-morrow as to-day; and when the North Cape was empty her return cargo of sponges and pineapples was not ready. He had to make frequent visits to Mr. Johnson, the pineapple man, and Mr. Sawyer, the sponge man, to hurry them up.

“I am just going out to the pine fields now,” Mr. Johnson said when Kit first visited him; “come along, and see for yourself how things are.”

Kit climbed into the carriage with him, and they drove out about two miles back of the city to the nearest fields, where he saw for the first time how pineapples grow. The field was a large one of twenty or thirty acres, very rocky, but with soil between the protruding rocks that was almost as red as bricks, and covered with plants from three to four feet high, each plant with many long, narrow, stiff “leaves,” and each leaf sharp with spines along its sides and a needle-like point. The score of colored men who were cutting the pines all wore leather leggings, he noticed, to protect them from the sharp points.

“And only one pineapple to a plant!” Kit exclaimed; “I thought they would bear more than that.”

“Only one,” Mr. Johnson laughed. “The pine is a very large fruit to grow on so small a plant, and each plant produces only one. When it is ripe, we cut it, and that plant’s usefulness is over, except that it sends out a great many little shoots, called slips, which we take up and plant for next year’s crop. You see the pine grows on a long stalk in the middle of the plant, and shoots up like a big cabbage head out of a bush.”

With the promise of enough pines to begin loading next day, Kit went to Mr. Sawyer’s sponge yard to hurry matters there, and was told that Mr. Sawyer was at the Sponge Exchange; and through going there to find him he learned enough about sponges to make him open his eyes wide. The Exchange was a large stone building on one of the wharves, with a series of broad open arches on each side, so that it seemed to have no walls; and its concrete floor was covered with separate heaps of sponge.

“This is the most important industry we have in Nassau,” Mr. Sawyer explained, “and this Exchange is the largest sponge market in the world. The merchants fit out small sailboats for sponging, and the colored men who navigate them get the sponges sometimes by diving, sometimes by grasping them with long-handled rakes, like oyster tongs. The sponges are cleaned with lime and sea-water, and then are brought here and sold by auction. The members of the Exchange are so expert at the business that for a pile of sponges worth two hundred dollars, the bids frequently do not vary more than five or six cents. From here they go to the sponge yard of the purchaser, where they are cleaned again and sorted, and pressed into bales. I will go up to my yard with you and see what the prospects are.”

The ground of the sponge yard was covered a foot deep with bits of waste sponge, and a dozen colored men and women were sitting about with scissors in their hands, examining the sponges, feeling them, cutting out rough bits of stone or coral, and sometimes sewing loose ends together to give the sponge a better shape. A rough, ragged, shapeless sponge, after it went through these black hands, came out smooth and shapely.

“Here is where we make the bales,” Mr. Sawyer explained, leading Kit into a shed where a pile of sponge as big as a room was put under a powerful press and squeezed down to the size of a cotton bale. “Sponge is very compressible, of course. Some of these colored men take a sponge as big as a bushel basket, and with crude levers press it into a small cigar box. It is not only my own sponge, of course, that you are to be loaded with; I buy wherever I can, and I think I can promise you five hundred bales by two o’clock to begin on.”

With his mission successfully accomplished, Kit returned to the ship and began his new duties as steward.

“Two more things to stow away in my knowledge box,” he said to himself. “I’ve had precious little time to learn from books, but my work has taught me some things from experience; all about Sisal hemp, to begin with, and now about pineapples and sponges. And maybe a little about people, too, for I’ve seen some queer ones.”

In the two weeks more that the North Cape lay at Nassau, waiting for a cargo that was made ready for her very slowly, Kit managed the steward’s work in such a way that no complaints were made; and that he reasonably considered a sure sign that he gave satisfaction, for the officers of a freight ship are not slow to find fault when anything goes wrong. While the loading was still in progress the mail steamer returned from her visit to the south side of Cuba, and after touching at Nassau went on to New York, carrying northward for trial and punishment the man of many names and crimes, MacNish, the steward, who had been lying in the Nassau prison. And when the North Cape once more lay in front of Martin’s Stores, the newspapers were printing long accounts of his attempted escape as steward of a freight steamer, and his arrest in the West Indies.

CHAPTER VI.
THE STRANGE CASE OF JOHN DOE.

WHILE Kit was picking his way through the pineapple fields and watching the processes in the sponge yards of Nassau, something was happening on the other side of the world that would have made the blood jump in his veins if he could have known of it.

Though it was midwinter in New York, it was then, in January, midsummer in the city of Wellington, New Zealand, which lies south of the equator. Doors and windows stood open, and men and animals alike sheltered themselves as far as possible from the burning rays of the sun. Even the New Zealand boys, who are not little brown savages with feathers in their hair, but white boys who speak English and go to school and wear clothes made after London and Paris fashions—even the boys found it too hot to enjoy their usual Saturday games.

On the very day that Kit was trying to hurry the pineapple men and sponge men of Nassau, there was an unusual stir in the big public hospital of Wellington. Not in the wards where the patients lay; no matter what happened outside, they were always kept quiet and tranquil. But downstairs in the Board room, where the Board of Governors of the hospital meets four times a year to inquire into the management and arrange the financial affairs, the windows were open and the big table and soft armchairs all freshly dusted; and in the banqueting-hall beyond, which the patients never see, but where the governors regale themselves after their quarterly labors, a long table was spread as if for a banquet.

Occasionally a carriage drove through the big gates, and one or two gentlemen stepped out and disappeared in the house surgeon’s private office. It was evident, to every one who knew the hospital routine, that the quarterly meeting day had come, and that the governors were arriving. They were to audit the accounts, to hear complaints, to make any necessary changes in the staff, and last but by no means least to eat the good dinner that almost invariably follows the meeting of any board of charities.

At two o’clock precisely the chairman rapped on the big table and called the Board to order; and the ten other gentlemen, five on each side of the table, listened with more or less patience to the reading of the minutes of the last meeting. Then came a batch of reports; for the reading of reports and the appointment of committees to consider them form a large part of the business of such meetings. The house surgeon’s report gave a favorable account of the hospital’s work in the last quarter. So many patients had been received, so many had been discharged cured, and not so many but so few had died. If any stranger had been allowed to be present, he must have thought it the most remarkable hospital in the world. In the surgical ward, particularly, not a single patient had died while undergoing an operation; every operation had been successful. Some of the medical members of the Board smiled faintly when they heard this, being familiar with the cheerful medical custom of calling every operation successful when the patient does not die on the spot; he may die that night or the next day, but still the operation is called successful. There was a hush of interest about the table when the clerk read:—

“The strange case of John Doe need not be further mentioned here, as the house surgeon will ask the privilege of making a verbal report in his case at the pleasure of the Board.”

Then followed the steward’s report, showing how many barrels of flour and sugar and other eatables had been consumed and what they had cost; and the apothecary’s report of the medicines used, and a dozen more; and, after a half-hour’s discussion of these matters, that part of the business was finished, and the chairman announced that he was “now ready to hear the house surgeon’s report on what has appropriately been called the strange case of John Doe.”

At this the house surgeon stepped forward with a small memorandum-book open in his hand. He was a tall, slender man with iron-gray hair and an extremely professional appearance, slow and accurate in his speech.

“Although this case has already been brought to the attention of the Board, Mr. Chairman,” he began, “I will briefly rehearse the principal facts for your further information. This man to whom we have given the name of John Doe, because his real name is totally unknown to us, was brought to this port six months ago by the British ship Prince Albert; and being both physically and mentally incapacitated, he was immediately brought to the hospital. The log of the Prince Albert showed that on the 27th of last June their lookout saw a signal of distress flying from a pole on a small unnamed and uninhabited island in the Pacific Ocean, the latitude and longitude of which I have a minute of, but do not at the moment remember. The ship was immediately put about and a boat lowered, and sent ashore under command of the second mate. The mate found what he at first supposed to be the dead bodies of four men, all scantily clothed; but on examining the bodies faint signs of life were found in one, the man whom we now know as John Doe, who wore nothing whatever but a pair of trousers, and, like the others, was much emaciated. The only property found on the island was the small spar which had been set up for a signal pole; and the plain inference was that the four men had escaped from some wreck on the spar, without an opportunity to save any of their property.

“The three men who were certainly dead were decently buried, and John Doe, who was unable to speak or even to open his eyes, was taken on board the Prince Albert, where under kind and judicious treatment he improved so far physically that by the time she reached this port he was able to walk a few steps, though still extremely weak. But there was no corresponding improvement in his mental condition. He was not able to speak, and apparently understood nothing that was said to him. Such was his state when he was received in the hospital.

“It was my opinion, and that of the entire staff, that he was broken down by the terrible hardships and privations that had caused the death of his companions, starvation and exposure doubtless chief among them. Under our treatment he has gained greatly in strength, so that he is able to move about slowly; and if he were mentally sound I should feel warranted in discharging him as convalescent. But mentally he is still incapacitated. His memory is so utterly gone that he does not even know his own name or country. We have tried every means to arouse him from his stupor, but he has been able to articulate only six words, and those indistinctly. They are: ‘I don’t know. I cannot remember.’

“Those few words are sufficient, however, to show that he belongs to some English-speaking nation, probably either to our own country or to America, or perhaps to some of the British colonies. And my object in laying the case before you at this length is to enable the Board to determine whether under the circumstances he is a fit subject for further treatment in the hospital. Some question has been raised on that point on account of the doubt whether the man is even a British subject.”

“This is indeed an interesting case—a most interesting case!” the chairman said, when the house surgeon sat down. “I do not remember that such a problem has ever been presented to us before. Whether this man, being no longer bodily ill, is entitled to our further treatment and support, is what we are called upon to decide. I understand from our worthy chief of staff that he is now strong enough to walk about without assistance. Would it not be well to bring him into the room, that we may see for ourselves?”

“Yes, yes; bring him in!” was echoed by several voices. “Let us see whether we can make him out.”

“And if we find that he is an American,” one of the governors said, “he should be taken in charge by the consul of his own country.”

“One word more, Mr. Chairman,” said the house surgeon, taking the floor again. “I must explain that there is some slight ground for believing that the man is an American rather than a British subject. The orderly on duty in the exercise yard reported to me several weeks ago that a ship had that day come into the harbor, flying the American flag; and that this John Doe, seeing it over the top of the wall, showed more interest in it than in anything else since his arrival. He extended his arm toward it, and tried to mutter some words that the orderly could not make out. With this hint I have had it in mind to try upon him the effect of the flags of other nations; but anticipating your desire to see the result for yourselves, I have postponed the trial until to-day, and have also asked the American consul to be present—subject, of course, to your wishes. The consul is now waiting in my office.”

“Let us see John Doe first,” said the chairman; and the house surgeon pressed a bell button and gave some instructions to the orderly who answered.

In a few minutes the door opened again, and the orderly escorted into the room what seemed at first to be a bent and stiffened old man, leaning heavily on a cane and making his way along with difficulty. His hair and beard were almost white, and he shuffled in without raising his eyes from the floor, as if he took no interest whatever in the proceedings. Led to a chair, he sat down heavily, and half-closed his eyes. But the professional eyes present saw that it was not age, but suffering and illness, that had reduced him to this condition. The aged look in his face was caused rather by pain than by years, for there were few of the wrinkles in the forehead or about the eyes or mouth that come with advanced age; and his hands were those of a man in the prime of life, “sixty-five or seventy,” an unprofessional person would have pronounced him; but the physicians present knew that he was very little, if at all, past forty.

“Well, my good man, how are you feeling to-day?” the chairman asked.

“I don’t know,” John Doe answered, without raising his eyes, and with a dazed look on his countenance.

“When did you leave London?” one of the governors asked; but the man merely shook his head.

“Or did you come from New York?” another said; but still there was no answer but a feeble shake of the head. It was too evident that he understood very little of what was said, and could not answer even that little intelligently.

Several of the medical members of the Board went up to him and felt his pulse, examined the hue of his skin, raised the lids and looked searchingly into his eyes, and felt his scalp carefully for traces of an old injury, but could find none.

“Suppose that we see whether any of our flags will have an effect upon him to-day,” the chairman suggested; and turning to the house surgeon he added, “and invite the American consul to come in and see the result.”

The surgeon went after the consul, and when they entered the room, they were followed by an orderly, bearing an armful of folded flags. The consul was invited to take a chair, after replying to the chairman’s question that he was acquainted with the circumstances of the case; and the orderly was directed to unfold one of the flags and show it to the mysterious patient.

“Try the British flag first,” the chairman said; and the room was as quiet as death while the orderly shook out the flag, and held it close to John Doe’s face. But the feeble man paid no more attention to it than he had paid to the questions.

“Now the French flag,” the chairman ordered; and still John Doe did not raise his eyes from the floor.

“The American flag,” said the chairman. This was the test; and as the orderly held out his arm with the beautiful stars and stripes hanging over it, the members of the Board leaned forward eagerly to watch the result.

For a moment John Doe did not seem to see the flag. But presently his sunken eyes caught the brilliant red and white stripes, and instantly a change was noticed in his face. A look of semi-intelligence came over it that none present had seen there before. Leaning the cane between his knees, he stretched out one hand and drew the orderly closer to him, and with the other hand stroked the stripes as lovingly and gently as he might have stroked a kitten or the head of a pet child. His lips moved, and it was plain that he was trying to utter words that would not come. And the hush in the room became still deeper when after a few moments of this the feeble man drew the back of his hand across his eyes to wipe away the moisture.

“That will do, Mr. Orderly; you can take the flags away,” the chairman said; and every man in the room noticed that John Doe kept his eyes fixed upon the flag until it was folded and carried away.

“If this remarkable experiment has had the same effect upon you as upon me, gentlemen,” the chairman continued, “you have seen that the sight of an old friend has for a moment roused the slumbering faculties of this poor man’s brain. I have no longer any doubt that he is an American; and I should like to hear the American consul’s opinion of this strange case.”

“This is one of the most touching things that I have ever seen, Mr. Chairman,” the consul said, stepping forward. “That this stricken and unfortunate man, a stranger in a strange land, sick, destitute, almost bereft of reason, should show this emotion at the sight of my flag, an emotion that nothing else excites in him, leaves me no room to doubt that he is my countryman. And yet I am compelled to say that this is not legal proof of his nationality, and to explain, what most of you doubtless know, that a consul is only permitted to give substantial aid to distressed seamen who are beyond doubt citizens of his country. Still I should be glad to strain a point and send this man home, if I only knew where to send him; but that is yet one of the mysteries.

“What we have just seen, however, convinces me that his reason is not dead, only sleeping. Any familiar sight, the face of a member of his family, even the mention of a familiar name, might restore his lost memory in an instant. I think you medical gentlemen will agree with me in this, for you have seen such cases. We shall have within a few weeks reports from our respective governments giving the names of all the British and American vessels that were lost last year. It is highly probable that the mention of the name of this man’s ship may awaken his memory sufficiently to give us a clue to his identity; and I shall of course lay the facts before the State Department at once. But meanwhile I am so firmly convinced that this unfortunate man is my countryman that I will willingly take upon myself personally the responsibility of his support.”

The consul had hardly resumed his chair before one of the members of the Board sprang to his feet.

“Mr. Chairman,” he almost shouted, “it is about two months, as you know, since I returned from America. While there my interest in hospital work naturally led me to visit the great hospitals in many of the large cities. In New York, in Boston, in Chicago, in San Francisco, in New Orleans, I found that at least ten per cent of all the patients were British subjects, receiving every possible care and kindness without question of their nationality. In that land they do not ask whether a man is an American or a Briton or a Hottentot; the only question is whether he is sick and in need of help, and if he needs it they give it to him. I do not wonder that this unfortunate man shed tears at the sight of his flag. And if we turn him out into the streets to starve because he is a foreigner, we ought to shed tears at the sight of ours, though for a widely different reason.”

As the speaker took his seat there was such a furious clapping of hands that the chairman had to rap on the table for order.

“The Board seems to be so much of one mind,” he said, “that it is not necessary to put a motion. John Doe will remain an inmate of the hospital until the Board’s further orders. And now, gentlemen, the orderly informs me that dinner is waiting. We hope, Mr. Consul, that you will do us the honor to dine with us.”

At the precise moment when the Board went in to dinner, and the tottering John Doe was led back to his favorite seat in the sunny yard, Kit, in happy ignorance of his father’s condition, was learning that a sponge as big as a bushel basket could be pressed into a small cigar box.

CHAPTER VII.
KIT BECOMES A SUPERCARGO.

TO have another run out to Huntington when the North Cape returned from Nassau, was something that Kit had been looking forward to. Not for a week this time, for he could not expect to have a week’s holiday at the end of every voyage; but for two nights and a day, perhaps; long enough to see the familiar faces and the old place.

But three days, four days, passed, and he was still acting as steward; and he could not ask for leave of absence while he had that work to do. And whether he ought to ask for the place permanently or not, he could hardly make up his mind. He felt the need, more than ever before, of some one to go to for advice and counsel. Tom Haines was a good friend, but Tom could hardly advise him in such a matter; and to apply to the Captain was out of the question. So he did not know whether to feel glad or sorry when on the fourth day Captain Griffith brought a stranger into the cabin and introduced him as the new steward.

“You know the lay of the land in the pantry, Christopher,” he said, “so you can show him where things are kept.”

And that was the end of his dream of becoming steward of the North Cape!

“I think I am rather glad than sorry,” he soon said to himself; “but if I had really wanted the place, this would really serve me just right for not making up my mind about it. Chances don’t wait for a fellow if he does not seize them when they offer. So I am still the cabin boy, and will still have a chance to copy the manifests and go ashore to check off cargo. And maybe this will give me a chance for my visit home.”

That evening he walked the deck a little in the cold moonlight, deliberating whether he should ask for a furlough or not; and he had no sooner made up his mind to do it than he started for the Captain’s room, having seen enough of the dangers of delay. But before he reached the head of the companionway the Captain’s bell rang for him.

“Come in and shut the door, Christopher,” Captain Griffith said. “I have something to say to you.” Then when the door was closed, he continued, “How old did you tell me you are?”

“I am past seventeen now, sir,” Kit answered.

“You have done very good work for me, Christopher,” the Captain went on, “but still I am going to take your name off the crew list. I shall have to have a new cabin boy.”

“I hope not, sir!” Kit answered; “I have tried to give you satisfaction.”

“You have done very well, I must admit,” the Captain said; “but you are not exactly fitted to the place. You are too bright for a cabin boy, and there is no better berth in the crew that I can give you.”

So saying, he took out the book in which he kept the crew list and the wages account, ran his finger down to Kit’s name, and took up his pen.

“I see there is seven dollars and a half due you,” he went on, “but we will call it ten dollars on account of the extra work you have been doing. So now I erase your name, and you are no longer a member of the crew;” and he ran his pen through Kit’s name with a big, broad mark.

For a moment Kit felt as if a flash of lightning had come into the stateroom and struck him.

“I hope you will tell me what I have done, to be sent away, Captain,” he said, in a voice that was not altogether steady.

“Well, sit down, Christopher, and I will tell you,” the Captain said, swinging his chair around as Kit took a seat. “I could not well invite my cabin boy to sit down here for a talk, but as you are my cabin boy no longer, I can invite you now. I see you take it very much to heart, so I will tell you in few words.”

It seemed to Kit at first as if a judge were about to pronounce sentence upon him; but something in the Captain’s face gave him a little hope.

“The North Cape has been chartered by the big firm of Hunter & Hitchley for a long voyage. She is to go first to Barbadoes with a general cargo, there take on a cargo of sugar for London, and return from London to New York with another general cargo. Such a voyage requires a supercargo; and when the firm asked me to recommend one I recommended Christopher Silburn. So it means that instead of being the cabin boy you will be the supercargo as soon as you go over to Hunter & Hitchley’s office and sign the contract.”

“Oh, Captain!” Kit exclaimed; he did not see how he could say anything more at the moment.

“Your pay will be only eighteen dollars a month for the present, on account of your youth; and that is small pay for supercargo; but it is better than six dollars as a cabin boy.”

“I should think so, sir!” Kit declared; “and I don’t know how I can ever thank you for such a kindness.”

“Never mind about that,” the Captain laughed. “And now, Mr. Supercargo, you must leave me to my work, for I have a great deal to do to-night. Do you think you could find me a good cabin boy to take your place?”

“Yes, sir, I think I could,” Kit answered; and he thought immediately of Harry Leonard, of Huntington.

“Then I will leave that matter with you,” the Captain said, turning again to his work.

Kit had to go on deck again for a little fresh air after this sudden change in his fortunes, and in his rapid march to and fro he met Tom Haines, and was on the point of telling him the news, but stopped himself. “I must tell the folks at home first of all,” he thought; and after a little chat with Tom about other matters, in which Kit hardly knew what he was talking about, he went down to the cabin to write a letter.

“I hoped to be with you in Huntington by this time,” he began, “but you will have to put up with a ten-dollar note and a bit of good news.”

Then he told the story of his promotion as plainly as his excited mind would permit, and added, “Don’t mind taking the money, for I have a little more, and of course I will get an advance for a long voyage like that. I shall need some new clothes; for what is good enough for a cabin boy would hardly be decent for a supercargo.”

And at the end he sent a message for Vieve to take to Harry Leonard. “If he’s not second mate of that bark yet, maybe he would like to be cabin boy of the North Cape at six dollars a month. I can get him the place if he wants it, but he must come or let me know the very day you get this, or it will be too late. And now for Barbadoes, folks, and London! across the big ocean and back again! I was hoping for that, you know. I’ll write again, of course, before we sail.”

Kit’s interview with Hunter & Hitchley next day was something of an ordeal, for after the contract was signed they had endless instructions to give him. A hundred things he must attend to with the greatest care; and another hundred things he must avoid; and such and such firms must be seen in New York, and so and so in Barbadoes, and in London.

“You are very young for this work,” Mr. Hitchley told him, “but Captain Griffith has recommended you highly. We take you altogether on his recommendation.”

“I will do my best to give satisfaction, sir,” Kit answered. He had made the same promise on becoming a cabin boy, and kept it, and was determined to keep it again.

His new position brought many minor changes that he had not had time to think of yet. When the cabin dinner bell rang that day he did not quite know what to do, so he wisely waited and did nothing, and in a few minutes the Captain sent for him to come down to dinner.

“The supercargo eats with the Captain, Silburn,” Captain Griffith said. “I neglected to tell you that. And he is always ‘Mister’ to the crew; but for my part I shall call you Silburn, because you are so young.”

It was odd enough to be eating there with the Captain and first officer at the table he had helped to wait on before, but he soon grew accustomed to it, just as he did to being called Mr. Silburn by everybody but the Captain. In a few days he appeared in a new suit of dark blue cloth and a cap to match, with a single gilt button on each side; a costume in which he looked as nautical and business-like as any young supercargo could desire.

Doing the clerical work in getting together and loading the cargo was mere routine business for him now, thanks to the experience he had had in former voyages; and by the time the North Cape was ready for sea again he felt considerable confidence in himself in his new position. The non-arrival of Harry Leonard made him a little uneasy, for it would not do to fail to have a cabin boy ready on sailing day. Harry had written that he would be on at once, but nearly a week had passed. He arrived, however, just as Kit was thinking of looking for another boy.

“Oh, say, what a swell you are, Kit!” he exclaimed, “in that uniform. I must have one like that some day. But I’ll take a shy at your old place first, for a voyage or two. That’s good enough to begin on, I suppose. Say, what does a fellow get promoted to from there? Does supercargo come next?”

“Not always,” Kit answered. He could not help seeing that Harry’s ideas were up too near the top-masts, and would have to come down nearer the keel before long. “But it’s very pleasant work in the cabin of the North Cape, as long as you don’t give the Captain any occasion to use his rope’s-end on you.” Kit did not believe much in teasing the new boys on board, but Harry was so full of his own importance that he could not resist the temptation to frighten him a little.

“No! say, does he though?” Harry asked, in alarm. “Does he whack you very hard?”

“Oh, not so very!” Kit laughed; “anyhow, you don’t mind it much after you get used to it. Come down to the cabin; he told me to bring you down to him when you came.”

“This is the boy I spoke to you about, sir,” Kit said to the Captain. “His name is Harry Leonard.”

“I tried to come as soon as I got Kit’s letter,” Harry broke in, “but I had to have some clothes made.”

“What’s that!” Captain Griffith exclaimed, looking at the new boy sharply. “If you mean the supercargo, his name is Mr. Silburn. Don’t forget that. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Harry answered quite meekly; and Kit thought that a good time for him to withdraw, when the interesting process of training a willing but conceited boy was beginning.

There was a large streak of good nature in Harry, however, as well as a stock of humor; and he felt that he had wiped out this rebuff when he went up to Kit on deck on the third day out, and, touching his hat very formally, said:—

“Mr. Silburn, the Captain wishes to see you below, sir, if you please;” then drew his left eye down into a wink that was big enough for a dozen winks, stuffed his hands into his pockets, and strutted off whistling “Yankee Doodle.”

Every day Kit was busy for some hours with his manifests, which he worked at in the afternoons now instead of the evenings. And it was fortunate for him that he wasted no time at the start; for on the eighth day, when they were expecting every moment to sight Sombrero Key, the first land since leaving New York, they ran into a little tropical hurricane that tossed up a tremendous sea, and kept Captain Griffith on the bridge for nearly ten hours without rest. He did not stop his writing when the confusion on deck told him that they were preparing the ship for rough weather; but in a few minutes his head began to ache, and he closed his eyes to rest them. Then a chilly feeling ran down the back of his neck; he felt as if he must have taken a mixture of chicken salad, mince pie, ice cream, and soda water for dinner, and began to wonder whether a siege of illness was coming on. A minute later, however, Harry Leonard ran out of the pantry, holding both hands against his stomach.

“Oh, Kit!” he cried, “or Mr. Silburn, or Supercargo, or whatever your blessed name is, I’m so sick! oh, I wish you’d let me stay at home!” and he threw himself on one of the sofas and lay moaning.

That told Kit what was the matter with him; it was no tropical fever coming on, but a plain case of sea-sickness! On his third voyage, when he had risen to be a supercargo, he was desperately seasick for the first time, simply because it was the first really rough weather he had encountered.

The heavy rolling and pitching of the ship in that howling wind and tremendous sea, the incessant rattling and breaking of dishes in the pantry, the creaking of joiner work, the shouting of orders on deck, the men running to and fro to execute them, the whir and jar of the screw when a lunge of the bow raised it out of the water, combined to give Kit his first real idea of bad weather at sea. He went on deck, and the fresh air made him feel better; and he exercised his privilege as supercargo and went up on the bridge, where he instantly saw by the anxious faces of the Captain and first officer that they were worried. He knew that the storm alone was not sufficient to put the ship in danger; but they were in the neighborhood of Sombrero and other small islands of that group, night was coming on, and as there was no sun that day for an observation they were not sure of their position, and the outlook was not encouraging.

No supper was prepared in the cabin that evening, for neither the Captain nor his mate had time to eat; but sandwiches and hot coffee were put on the table; and when the Captain came down to swallow a cup of coffee in haste he merely shook his head in reply to Kit’s questions.

Late in the evening Harry still lay groaning on the sofa, and Kit was in and out, for neither of the boys felt inclined to turn in. About eleven o’clock a terrible pounding began on deck. It sounded almost as if one of the iron masts had fallen and was rolling about the deck. First there was a thumping from port to starboard that seemed enough to crush in the deck, followed by a moment of quiet, and then, as the ship rolled again, the rolling went from starboard to port. Harry sprang up in alarm.

“Kit, we’re goners!” he exclaimed; “the ship’s going down!”

“I don’t believe it,” Kit answered, “but something has carried away.”

They both ran for the companionway and scrambled on deck, where the terrific wind almost tore them off their feet. Everything was dark as pitch except for the light of a solitary lantern, and by that faint light they saw that in the heavy rolling one of the winches had broken loose and was rolling from side to side of the deck, to the imminent danger of both deck and rail; and men were trying to lasso it with heavy ropes, for no one could approach it without risking his life. While they watched, the winch was caught and secured, and they returned to the cabin.

About two o’clock Captain Griffith came down with the relieved look of a man who had just rid himself of an aching tooth. “We’re all right,” he said, as the steward brought him another cup of coffee. “We’ve just sighted Sombrero light, so we’ll not visit Davy Jones’s locker just yet. It’s time for you to turn in, Henry.”

Harry started off for his berth, and Kit and the Captain had a little chat over their coffee.

“I don’t like being off a rocky coast on a bad night,” the Captain said. “The North Cape is good for any kind of weather, but the ship has not been built yet that will stand a night’s pounding on the rocks. Now by afternoon we should be off St. Kitts, and from that all the way down to Barbadoes you will see some of the finest sights you ever saw in your life. I have seen the Alps and most of the best scenery in Europe, but never anything to equal these beautiful islands we will soon pass—St. Kitts, Nevis, Montserrat, Martinique, Dominica, and several more. Most of them are mountain peaks rising from the sea and touching the clouds. Barbadoes itself is flat and uninteresting, except for being the most thickly populated bit of land on the globe. It contains only about forty square miles, and has forty thousand inhabitants, or a thousand to a square mile, mostly negroes. But you will soon see for yourself. I feel quite ready for a sleep. Good-night, Silburn.”

“Good-night, sir,” Kit answered; and he made his way across the unsteady cabin by holding on to the backs of seats, and was soon in his own berth.

By the middle of the afternoon the young supercargo learned another of the advantages of being in his new position. They were then skirting the coast of the British island of St. Kitts, having left the storm and the worst of the rough sea in their wake. Instead of taking a hurried look at the shore over the rail, with both ears open for the Captain’s bell, as the cabin boy must generally do, he could go up on the bridge and take a good look through the Captain’s glasses; and he was soon convinced that Captain Griffith had not at all exaggerated the beauty of the scenery. He was used to high hills, for Huntington is surrounded by them, but not hills like these.

“To think of a mountain coming right up out of the water,” he said to himself, “and going on up and up till the peak is in the clouds, and looking as green and smooth as the grass in a park—though I know it’s not grass, for the Captain says it is fields of sugarcane below, and trees toward the top. And the way those clouds gather around the peak! It seems to catch them as they float by, and they grow thicker and blacker every minute till there is more water than they can hold, and it comes down without warning in a deluge of rain, and then the sun shines again! I never saw anything like it.”

Then the next day he was equally enthusiastic over the French island of Martinique, which is much larger and has many peaks instead of a single one; and soon afterward the British Dominica, with scarcely any inhabitants in its high mountains but the fragments of the once-powerful race of Caribs, who live now by making baskets so tight that they will hold water and are used for trunks. As they passed the little port of Roseau, the capital of Dominica, they saw a large steamer lying at anchor, which Kit learned was the New York mail steamer the Trinidad, bound like themselves for Barbadoes; and within the next hour she was under way and following in their wake.

In a longer race the North Cape would have had little chance against the speedier Trinidad; but the distance from Dominica to the roadstead off Bridgetown, Barbadoes, is so small that the two vessels dropped anchor there almost at the same moment, the North Cape as near to the breakwater as safety allowed, and the Trinidad farther out. As the day was about closing, Captain Griffith was in no hurry to enter his ship at the Custom House, for in any case he could not begin unloading until the next day; but it was different with the other steamer, which had passengers on board who were anxious to land. So it happened that the boat in which Kit was set ashore to pay an early visit to his agent, reached the landing-steps almost at the same moment as the boat that carried the Trinidad’s purser.

Kit was first up the steps, followed by the well-fed purser, who, although not a tall man, weighed something over two hundred pounds.

“Just my luck!” the fat purser panted, as he looked about the large open square. “If I—huh, ahuh, huh—if I didn’t want a—huh, huh—want a carriage, the square would be full of them; but when I want one in a—ah!—in a hurry, there’s none here. Here it’s four minutes to six; and how’s a man of my—huh, huh—of my size going to get to the Custom House before they close at six o’clock, I’d like to know!”

“Maybe I can be of use to you, sir,” Kit said, stepping up to him. “I am supercargo of the North Cape, and I’m a pretty good runner. I’ll take your papers up to the Custom House for you if you like.”

“Oh, thank you,” the purser panted, looking very much relieved. “I’ll be a thousand times obliged to you. Here they are, then, all ready; all you have to do is to shove them under the clerk’s nose.”

Kit made a hurried inquiry about the direction of the Custom House and started on a run, and had the satisfaction of delivering the papers just half a minute before business closed for the day. He next visited his agent and arranged for lighters in the morning; and an hour later he met the Trinidad’s purser again, not quite so short-breathed and red in the face this time.

“Here we are again, supercargo!” he exclaimed, seizing Kit’s hand. He had a very jolly manner, and seemed as free with Kit as if they had been acquainted for years. “You can’t miss anybody in this hole of a place. They call it a town, but I call it a hole. I’m just going in here to get something to cool me off, and I want you to come along.”

“I’m just as much obliged,” Kit answered; “but I suppose you mean something to drink, and I never drink anything.”

“I suppose you’ve made a mistake, for the first time in your life,” the purser rejoined, with a laugh that shook him all over. “I mean something to eat; a big heaped-up plate of the coldest ice cream this side of New York. We’re right in front of the ice-house, where I always eat a lot of ice cream for the fun of hearing it sizzle as it goes down. By the way, my name’s Clark; what’s yours?”

“Silburn,” Kit replied. “But the ice-house? This looks like a store.”

“So it is,” said the purser, as they climbed the stairs to a big restaurant where scores of people were eating. “It’s store, restaurant, ice-house, furniture-shop, a dozen things combined. I thought everybody knew the Bridgetown ice-house. Ice is a government monopoly here, you know, and these fellows buy the privilege of selling all that is used on the island. Hello here, Snowflake” (to one of the black waiters; he seemed to know every one in the place), “bring us two platters of your best ice cream; platters, do you hear? Not saucers, or plates, but the biggest platters you have.”

Kit found the ice cream excellent, and the purser a very entertaining companion. He was full of good sea-stories, and knew how to tell them in an interesting way. And he wanted to know all about the young supercargo.

“You’re very young for such a place,” he said; “at your age I was sweeping the cabin and brushing the Captain’s clothes.”

“So was I,” Kit laughed, “until this voyage;” and he had to tell how he became a supercargo, after describing his rescue by Captain Griffith from a Brooklyn policeman.

“Well, you’ll make your way, if you take care of yourself,” Mr. Clark said, after Kit had finished his story and his ice cream together. “Just you let drink alone and don’t get anything into your pockets that belongs to some other fellow. It’s rum that spoils a good many young fellows at sea, and you can’t keep too far away from it. I know appearances are rather against me” (and his fat sides shook again); “they tell me a man with my red face has no business to give temperance lectures; but to tell the truth, I never drink any liquor, though I’ll own up to being fond of good eating. Here, Snowflake, two more platters of ice cream; and don’t stop to warm it.”

Kit soon found that notwithstanding his free-and easy manner and his almost continual laughter, his new companion was a man of great sense and good judgment, thoroughly acquainted with the work of both purser and supercargo.

“I’m glad we ran across each other,” Mr. Clark said, as he shook the young supercargo’s hand. “We’ll meet again sometime, certain sure. Don’t forget me; and remember that when you need a friend you’ll always find one in the purser of the Trinidad.”

That was another of the advantages of being a supercargo; he could make friends and associate with people who would not have paid much attention to a cabin boy. But he had more things to learn before the day was over; for when he returned to the ship he found Captain Griffith preparing to go ashore, and the Captain invited him to go along and meet some of the merchants with whom he would have to do business. They went to the Mercantile Club, where he found the latest English and American newspapers, and news telegrams posted from London and New York, and met some of the principal business men of Bridgetown, and several large sugar planters who went “in to town” in the evenings to hear what was going on in the big outside world. The conversation was all about business and the price of sugar and the state of the crops and the price of freights; and it did not take him long to realize that with his new associations he was no longer a boy, but a young man of affairs who must keep his eyes and ears open and inform himself about a great many things that he had paid no attention to before.

For nearly a week the young supercargo was so busy with getting his cargo ashore and delivered that he had no further chance of seeing the city or the island; but when it came to loading he had more time to himself. The sugar came in slowly, and there were days when there was not enough on the wharf to keep the lighters busy. On such days he had several times to drive out to large plantations to hurry the work, and the planters always treated him with the greatest hospitality. Every night he had some new entry to make in the journal that he began to keep when he became a supercargo—a journal that he refused to call a diary, because he had no intention of writing in it regularly, but only when he had something worth writing. Captain Griffith found the little book lying on his desk one day and wrote on the fly-leaf, “Kit Silburn, His Log”; and after that it was always known as “The Supercargo’s Log.” Some of his entries tell in very few words the story of part of his first long voyage.

“Feb. 12.—Still at Bridgetown, Barbadoes. Took in 146 hogsheads of sugar to-day, with 12 lighters. The sugar is all done up in hogsheads, weighing something over a ton each. It is black-looking stuff as it comes from the mills, and has a sweet, sickish smell. The colored people like to lie on the wharf in the sun and lick up the molasses that leaks out of the casks. We have now 821 hogsheads on board.

“Feb. 13.—Still at Bridgetown. No lighters at work to-day, as there was no sugar ready. Went out to three plantations to hurry things. At the Sea View plantation Mr. Outerbridge took me all over the place, and made me stay to dinner. (P.S. He has a beautiful young daughter, Miss Blanche, and after dinner we had a pony race. She beat me.) They say this sun would kill a white man in three months if he worked in the cane-fields, but it does not hurt the negroes. Saw how they squeeze out the cane-juice between big rollers, and then boil it down into sugar. The planters promised me 150 hogsheads by to-morrow.

“Feb. 14.—Got 122 hogsheads sugar on board, and plenty promised for to-morrow. Very curious thing happened to me to-day. When I came aboard ship to supper, found a letter for me, though no mail steamer in. Opened it, and found a handsome valentine. Can’t imagine who could have sent it.

“Feb. 15.—Only 30 hogsheads loaded to-day, on account of heavy rain.

“Feb. 20.—Loaded 82 hogsheads. Have now 1455 on board. We hope to sail for London on Saturday. Miss Blanche Outerbridge has invited me to a lawn party at their plantation to-morrow. Half afraid to go, for never was at a lawn party in my life.

“Feb. 21.—No sugar to-day. Went to the lawn party, and had splendid time. The Governor was there, and Mr. Outerbridge introduced me to him.

“Feb. 23.—Loaded 160 hogsheads to-day. Sugar coming with a rush now.

“Feb. 25.—Sailed for London at two o’clock this afternoon, with 2415 hogsheads of sugar, making about $120,000 worth of cargo that I have to look after. Must keep my eyes open. Will see no more land now till we sight the Scilly Islands, off the English coast.

“March 15.—Expect to sight the Scillys to-morrow morning. Have had a fairly good voyage so far, with some bad weather, but no hard gales. A long stretch of water, this, from Barbadoes to England; but the seas are no higher in the middle than along the coast. Cargo in good order.”

CHAPTER VIII.
NEWS FROM THE WRECKED SCHOONER.

SOON after daylight on a raw and chilly March morning the masthead lookout cried “Land-ho!” And the officers and crew of the North Cape knew that their voyage across the Atlantic had reached its last stage. Captain Griffith was on the bridge, as most careful commanders are on entering the busy English Channel; and Kit was there too, eager for a first sight of the Old World. An hour later the Scilly Islands could be seen plainly without a glass, though at that distance they looked like a single island with ships’ masts growing upon it like trees. Kit had read as much as possible in the Captain’s books about the places he was to see, so he knew that the group is composed of about fifty small islands, and that what looked like ships’ masts were the signal poles upon which are announced the arrival and departure of more vessels than are signalled at any other place in the world.

The second officer was busy on deck making fast a series of six or eight signal flags to a line, and at a word from the Captain they were hoisted. A moment later a large black ball was run up on one of the poles on shore, and the flags were lowered, folded, and returned to the flag locker. It was done so quickly that Kit could hardly believe that those few stripes of bunting had accomplished so much in so short a time; but he knew that the flags said to the signalman on shore, “North Cape, from Barbadoes for London, eighteen days, with sugar”; and that when the signalman hoisted his black ball it said, “All right; I understand you.” And he knew, too, that almost before the flags were lowered a telegraphic message had gone to London, announcing the ship’s arrival, to be posted in the Maritime Exchange, where her agents would see it as soon as the Exchange opened for the day; and that long before that the news would have gone under the ocean by cable to be posted in the Exchange in New York, where it would appear a few hours later in the afternoon newspapers. So by the hoisting of those few flags the whole world was informed that the North Cape had made her voyage safely, and was approaching her destination.

“What’s the matter, Silburn?” the Captain asked, bringing his hand down on Kit’s shoulder. “You look sorry to have the voyage nearly ended. Would you rather turn round and go back?”

“No, sir!” Kit replied; “I’m anything but sorry. But I was just thinking what a tremendous lot there is to learn in this world. Here we have seen nothing but sky and water for eighteen days, and with only the sun and stars to guide you, you knew almost the exact minute when we should be here beside the Scilly Islands. Then you hoist a flag, and in ten minutes they know in New York and in Barbadoes that we have arrived. It is the most wonderful thing I ever saw.”

“Oh, no, Christopher,” the Captain answered; “you have seen stranger things than that. Do you see the sun coming up out of the water there to eastward? That is rather more wonderful, isn’t it? Every leaf on every tree is more wonderful than anything that man has done. If we knew half as much as we think we do, there would be no more sickness in the world, because we would have a cure for every disease; no more poverty, for the earth is full of wealth and we should know how to get it out; and instead of merely sending a few dots and dashes by a wire across the ocean, we should be able to see what they are doing over in New York, and talk to them. We may come to that some day.”

“I wish we had come to that now, sir!” Kit exclaimed. “If we could see all over the world, I should know where my father is, if he is alive.”

“It’s better as it is, my boy,” the Captain went on. “To see over the world would gratify your curiosity, but it would give you a great deal of worry. No, there are some mysteries of nature that we are better off not to understand, at least until we have advanced enough in all directions to understand that everything that happens is for the best. Still, we must always make the best of what we do know. Some people, for instance, know enough to go below when the breakfast bell rings. Come along.

“This is a great coast to learn history from,” the Captain continued, while they were eating breakfast. “A large share of the modern history of the world has been made in this channel. We don’t want to see a storm to-day, but if it had not been for a storm in this channel, you would most likely be a Catholic, and we should have an image of the Virgin Mary in the cabin.”

“Oh, yes, sir, I know about that,” Kit interrupted. “You mean the storm that broke up the great Spanish Armada. But the British say they had the Armada whipped before the storm came.”

“Trust the British for that!” the Captain laughed; “they won’t let even nature have any of the credit. But that is only one thing in a hundred. Here is Land’s End just off our port bow, on the coast of Cornwall. A few years ago they were all singing a song beginning:—

“‘And must Trelawny bleed? And must Trelawny die?

Then twenty thousand Cornishmen will know the reason why.’

Now who was Trelawny, and why must he die? No, I’m not going to tell you; you can hunt it up in some of my books. Then in a few hours we will be passing a little town called Lyme Regis—a town that never amounted to much, but some years ago the whole world was anxious about what was happening there. Who was the prince who landed there with an army, and tried to make himself King of England? You can hardly name a spot along this whole coast, but has some important events connected with it.”

Within the next twenty-four hours Kit saw a great many places that before had existed for him only on paper. His father had often brought home some of Clark Russell’s sea-stories, and Kit had read them without stopping to think that the places mentioned in them were real places. But here was “The Lizard,” a high point surmounted by a light-house that looked like an old castle; and Bolt Head, and Portland Bill, then St. Alban’s Head, and St. Catherine’s Point. He had read of all of those. Then by the next morning they were well up the Channel; and although the French coast was near enough to be seen indistinctly, they were so close to the British shore that they had a good view of Brighton, Eastbourne, Hastings, and Dungeness, all of which Kit had heard of. Then they ran into the narrow straits of Dover, past Folkestone, South Foreland, Deal, Ramsgate, Broadstairs, North Foreland, and Margate, and headed straight for the mouth of the Thames.

“Now, then, Silburn,” Captain Griffith said, when they were fairly in the river, “your work will soon begin. I don’t know where this cargo is to be landed, and it’s your place to find out. I shall run up as far as Gravesend and wait there for orders from the agents. They ought to have a tug there to meet us; but if they don’t, you will have to go on to London and find out where we are to discharge. They may order us up to the docks, or keep us below here.”

“Yes, sir,” Kit answered, as if “running up to London” were an everyday affair with him.

“They have a saying over here,” the Captain went on, “that it’s not worth while to do your own barking when you keep a dog; so as you are the supercargo, you’d better do the barking, which, in this case, is to find out where we are to unload. I’ll lower the gig and set you ashore at Tilbury, just across the river from Gravesend, and you can get a train from there up to London, and go to the agents’ office; that is, of course, if they do not send some one to Gravesend to meet us.”

Kit went down to his room to make his papers ready, feeling anything but comfortable over this prospect. How was he to go to London alone, knowing nothing of the city, and make his way through strange streets to the office of a strange agent? Going to make the acquaintance of strangers was hard work for him at first, but he had grown used to that now; but to make his way about London was another matter. However, he did not let this worry him long.

“If I am going to be a child, afraid to go into a new city,” he said to himself, “I’d better be a cabin boy again. When a fellow undertakes to do man’s work, he must go at it like a man. Other youngsters have gone to London, I suppose, without being eaten.”

Notwithstanding his brave ideas, he looked with some anxiety for the agent when the North Cape came to a stop in the Thames opposite Gravesend and near the Tilbury shore. But no tug appeared, and it was plain that he was destined to make the trip to London.

“Now listen sharp to what I tell you,” Captain Griffith said, “and you will come through all right. We will set you ashore at Tilbury, and the railway station is right at the wharf. Buy a second-class ticket, and the train will carry you about twenty-five miles and set you down in Fenchurch Street station, in London. The agents, as you know, are Topping, Forwood & Hauts, at 32 Fenchurch Street, and that is only three or four blocks from the station. But that part of the city is greatly crowded, and rather than waste time by your losing yourself, I want you to go up in a hansom. You will find scores of them in front of the station, and the fare will be one shilling. Here is a pound in English silver change, which I will charge to you. And before doing your own business with the agents, have them send me a telegram saying where we are to discharge cargo. Is that all plain?”

“Yes, sir,” Kit answered; “I think I can carry that through without making any slips.”

The gig landed him at Tilbury wharf, and he immediately found himself in a different world. His ticket he bought at the “booking-office,” and when he went through to the train its antiquated appearance made him smile. The cars were like little square boxes, not much bigger than a street car, but divided into compartments holding eight persons each, with the doors on the sides; and the engine looked like the small locomotives of the elevated railroads in New York.

The hour’s ride took him first through open fields that looked strangely green for the time of year, then past a settlement of immense gas tanks, through several small towns, and then among such a maze of houses that he knew he must be in London. When the train stopped in Fenchurch Street station, he had no need to inquire his way to the street, for he had only to follow the crowd. Down the long steps he went through the lower part of the station, and found himself for the first time in a crowded London street.

The Captain was right about the hansoms; there stood a row of them reaching almost out of sight, and he went up to one of the nearest and asked the driver:—

“Can you take me to No. 32 Fenchurch Street?”

“‘CAN YOU TAKE ME TO NO. 32 FENCHURCH STREET?’”

The driver looked at him a moment, and shook his head doubtfully.

“I s’pose it kin be done, sir,” he answered, “but it’s a-goin’ to be consid’able of a job, h’account of this ’ere crowd. It’s all a-owin’ to the funeral. You see the Prince o’ Wiles’s mother-in-law she’s gone an’ died, sir, an’ they’re a-buryin’ of ’er hin the Temple this harternoon, an’ the streets is blocked. But Hi kin tike you ’round cirkewetous-like, sir.”

“Well, get me there as soon as you can,” Kit said; and he stepped in, and the driver shut the two little half-doors, and they set off. Certainly he had never before seen streets so crowded. The driver turned off at the first corner, but even in the side streets he could barely make his way through the crush. On and on they went, turning here and turning there, but everywhere the crowd was the same; and in every street Kit kept his eyes open for a look at the procession, but saw nothing of it. A quarter of an hour passed, a half hour, and still they were dodging through the throng.

Suddenly Kit gave one of his knees a tremendous slap and began to laugh.

“Didn’t they come near doing me for a countryman!” he said to himself. “The Prince of Wales’s mother-in-law, indeed! Why, she was the Queen of Denmark, and must have died before I was born. Anyhow, she wouldn’t be buried in London; and this is no funeral crowd in the streets; it’s all hansoms and ’busses and trucks—the usual London crowd, no doubt. The cabby sees I am a stranger and will get as much out of me as he can.”

At length the hansom drew up in front of No. 32 Fenchurch Street, and Kit stepped out, and handed the driver a shilling.

“Wot’s this for?” cabby asked, pretending to be very much surprised “It’s six shillin’, sir, by the wiy we ’ad to come. Hi ought to say ten, but Hi’m willin’ to make it six.”

“Oh, I guess not,” Kit laughed. “A shilling’s a good big fare for the distance. It’s too bad about the poor Prince of Wales, isn’t it?”

Although cabby had climbed down from his high seat and was assuming a very belligerent look, Kit felt bold to make this mention of the funeral because he saw a big policeman walking slowly toward them on the sidewalk, and he felt sure that the driver would not care to have the question referred to the authorities. And he was right about this; cabby growled a moment about a poor man having to live, but accepted the shilling, and drove away before the officer reached them.

It was surprising how easily and quickly the business was done with the agents. They sent a telegram at once to Captain Griffith, informing him that he was to unload at Gravesend; and in a few minutes Kit was talking with them as freely as if he had been taking cargoes to London for years. He could not help noticing how much easier it was for him now to become acquainted with people than it had been at first. The rough edges were wearing off, and instead of a ship’s boy he was becoming a man of business. It was easier, he found, to manage a cargo in London than in the West Indian ports, because everything was done in a more business-like way; and a cargo of sugar, being all in large parcels, was much easier to handle than a miscellaneous cargo. When he had received all the instructions the agents had to give him about the sugar, he found that a young clerk from the office was to accompany him back to Gravesend to arrange for storing the sugar in a bonded warehouse.

“This is Mr. Watkins, one of our junior clerks,” the head of the firm said. “Mr. Silburn, supercargo of the North Cape, Watkins. You can travel to Gravesend together, as Mr. Watkins has to see the warehousemen.”

Kit was a little surprised at the appearance of his new companion. Mr. Watkins was about his own age, perhaps a trifle older and taller, with rosy cheeks, and a voice that seemed, whenever he spoke, to come up from the very soles of his shoes. He wore a long black frock coat, rubbed a little shiny on the shoulders and elbows, and a shiny high silk hat; and as they went down the stairs together, he drew on a pair of leather-colored kid gloves.

“You’re—ah—aren’t you very young, you know, to be a supercargo, Mr. Silburn?” the young clerk asked.

“Well, I’m growing a little older every day,” Kit answered.

“You must have paid—aw—aw—a heavy premium to get into such a place at your age,” Watkins went on.

“Premium?” Kit repeated; he did not understand the English system of paying a premium to have a boy apprenticed to any business.

“Y-a-a-s,” Watkins continued. “My father had to pay a hundred pounds to get me into this office, and I’ll not earn enough to pay my board for the next two or three years.”

“We don’t pay any premiums in our country,” Kit exclaimed. “A boy or young man gets a salary there for working, and the more he’s worth the more he gets.”

“Aw, really!” Mr. Watkins exclaimed. “No wonder America is such a good country for young men. I’ve often thought of going over there, don’t you know, if I could only get the chance.”

At first Kit felt something of a dislike for the young Englishman, perhaps on account of his peculiar style of dress and strange manner of talking. But when he came to know him better, the dislike melted away, for he found Watkins to be a very clever fellow.

Instead of going to the railway station they went in the other direction, down to the end of London Bridge, and there took one of the little river steamers for Gravesend.

“I want to show you some of the sights of London,” Watkins said, “and when I go over to America, you can show me around New York.”

“Oh, I’ll do that,” Kit readily promised, “if I am at home. So this is London Bridge, is it? I’ve often heard of it, and the great crowds continually crossing it.”

“Have you any bridges as large as that in America?” Watkins asked.

Kit was on the point of replying that there were a great many very much larger; but he caught himself in time, remembering that it is not well to boast of one’s own country in a foreign land.

“Oh, yes,” he said, “we have some as large as that; and some of our rivers are quite as large as the Thames, I think.”

“Really!” Mr. Watkins exclaimed; “I should hardly have thought it. But here comes the boat.” And they stepped aboard a steamer that Kit thought a very small one, compared with the American boats; and his companion soon began to point out places of interest.

“There is the Tower of London,” he said. “I will take you in there some day, if you like. And there is St. Catherine’s dock, and next are the London docks, and then the East India docks—you must have heard of them. Here on the other side is the great Greenwich observatory. That ought to interest you, for more than half the ships afloat take their time from the big Greenwich clock. You see the river is very crooked. These straight places between the bends we call ‘reaches.’ We have come through Greenwich Reach and Woolwich Reach, and now we get to Barking Reach, Halfway Reach, and Long Reach.”

By the time they got to Gravesend Kit felt that he had seen a great deal of London for a first visit of two or three hours. And he had made one acquaintance at least, and had done his supercargo’s business with the agents as far as it could be done on the first day. There was hardly any spot he had seen that he had not heard of before; for his father had made many voyages to the great European city, and had often told them stories about London.

When they landed, Mr. Watkins went in search of the warehousemen, and Kit found that he had not far to go, for on receipt of the telegram the North Cape had moved up to one of the Gravesend wharves. He went into the cabin and exchanged a few words with the Captain, and soon afterward he met Tom Haines on deck.

“Say, Silburn,” Tom asked, “what did you say was the name of the schooner your father was on when he was wrecked?”

“The Flower City,” Kit answered, much surprised at the question.

“I thought so,” Tom went on. “Then I have some news for you.”

“Don’t keep me in suspense over it, Tom,” Kit begged. “You know how you would feel about it if it was your own father.” In spite of his efforts to remain cool he felt his hand shaking a little.

“Oh, don’t be excited about it,” Tom continued. “I haven’t found your father, you know, or anything of that kind. But there’s a man aboard the ship who was before the mast on the Flower City when she was lost.”

“No!” Tom exclaimed. “Then he’s the first one of the crew who has ever been heard of! Now don’t keep me waiting, Tom; where is the man?”

“He’s on deck, up forward,” Tom answered. “It’s an old sailor they call Blinkey, because he has such a squint. He has a friend in our crew and came aboard to see him, and I happened to overhear him telling about his shipwreck in the Flower City. I thought that was your father’s vessel, so I got into a talk with him and told him about you, and made him promise to wait till you came back. He knew your father very well.”

“Blinkey!” Kit repeated. “Why, the very last time father was home he told us some funny stories about an old Irish sailor called Blinkey. It must be the same man.”

He hurried forward, and soon found the old man talking to a group of the sailors, still telling of his adventures in the Western World.

“And you’re Mr. Silburn’s lad!” Blinkey exclaimed, when Kit went up to him. “A fine, well-growed lad, too, with the look of your daddy in your eyes. And you’re a-learnin’ this bad trade, are you?”

One of the men nudged the old man and whispered that he was talking to the supercargo, whereupon he scraped the deck with one foot in lieu of a nod, pulled the peak of his cap, and gave the band of his trousers a nautical hitch.

“It’s beggin’ yer pardon I am,” he went on, “me not knowin’ as how I was speakin’ to a officer. But it’s the fine man yer father is, lad—I mean Mr. Silburn. I never shipped with a better mate.”

“Is!” Kit exclaimed. “Then do you know whether he is alive?”

“It’s not me that’s knowin’, sir,” Blinkey replied. “He was in a good tight boat the last I set eyes on ’im, but there’s no sayin’. I was drownded mesilf in that wreck, an’ that was the third time. But a sailor havin’ nine lives, like a cat, I’ve six yet to dispose of.”

Kit was kept in agony by the slowness of the old man in coming to the point and the frequent interruptions of the sailors, so he took Blinkey up to his stateroom, where they could talk in peace.

“Now tell me about the voyage, Mr.—Mr.—”

“Blinkey,” the old man interrupted. “It’s so long since I’ve had any other I’ve forgot what it was. Well, sir, as I was a-sayin’, I shipped for Ameriky in the bark Margate, and she took fire an’ burnt in New York bay, so there was Blinkey out of a job. But I wasn’t a man in them days to stay long on shore, sir, so I looks about—”

“Yes!” Kit interrupted, fearing that another long yarn was coming. “But the Flower City.”

“I was a-gettin’ to that, sir,” the old man went on, without hastening in the least. “So I looks about, as I was a-sayin’, an’ a berth offers on the Flower City, an’ I ships on her. Well, sir, we made two v’yages down the coast, an’ then we loaded with machinery for New Orleans. Ah, it was that there machinery as done us up, sir. All went well till we run into a gale off Hatteras; an’ we’d ’a’ pulled through that if the cargo’d been better stowed. But we had a heavy load on deck, an’ some of the big machines carried loose. Ah, it oughtn’t to be allowed, sir, that it oughtn’t, to carry heavy cargo on deck.”

“And then?” Kit asked. It was to him the most interesting thing he had ever listened to; and the old man was so slow in coming to the point!

“Then we give a lurch, sir, and over we went. Both our starboard boats was under water, but we’d two on the port side, an’ we took to them. Your father steered one, and the Captain the other, an’ I was in the Captain’s boat. Night was a-comin’ on, an’ the last I see of Mr. Silburn he was a-headin’ his boat about sou-sou-east, an us a-followin’. That was the last, sir.”

“And you?” Kit asked.

“Me, is it? I was drownded. Nex’ mornin’ we was all dead. The sea was too heavy for a small boat well loaded, an’ that night a wave struck her an’ she went to pieces. I don’t know what I laid hold of when everything went from under us, but it must ’a’ been some of the wreckage; for some time next day I found myself on board a Spanish brig, with a hole stove in the side of my head, an’ no notion of what had happened to me arter the boat went to pieces. The brig took me across the ocean to Barcelona, an’ after a while in hospital there I worked my way back to London. Since that crack on the head I haven’t been no use on a wessel, so I’ve got a job here in the big warehouses. An’ that’s the whole story, sir. What became o’ that there other boat is more nor I can say. But if it was my father as was in her, sir, I’d be a-lookin’ any day fer him to come home. She was a better boat than I was in, an’ you see I’m safe on shore, though I was drownded as dead as ever anybody was. Leastways, I hope Christopher Silburn didn’t come to no harm, for he was always werry kind to me, lad—always werry kind to me.”

“Thank you,” Kit said, in a husky voice, seeing that the old man seemed to feel badly over the probable loss of his former mate. “But I have very little hope left, after what you tell me. Your being saved was almost a miracle, and we can hardly look for two miracles in the same shipwreck. You saw the Flower City go down, did you?”

“Went down right before our eyes, sir,” Blinkey answered, “less than five minutes after we left her. She couldn’t do nothin’ else, sir, with them iron castin’s in her.”

“Was there water in either boat?” Kit asked; “or provisions, or a compass?”

“Nothin’ in neither boat but the seats an’ oars, sir,” Blinkey replied; “there wasn’t no time. Why, we couldn’t even lower the boats; had to just cut ’em away, sir. An’ that reminds me. Did you ever see that before, sir?”

As he spoke the old sailor put one hand into his trousers pocket and drew forth a large iron-handled pocket knife, such as sailors often carry. The handle was polished bright by long rubbing against the pocket and its other contents.

“See it before!” Kit exclaimed; and his eyes moistened as he took the knife in his hand. “I should think I had seen it before! My father carried that knife as long as I can remember, and I often used to whittle with it when he was at home. Here’s a scar on the palm of my left hand now where I once cut myself with it.”

“Yes, sir, that was your father’s knife,” the old sailor answered. “He handed it to me that last night to cut the boat’s lashings with. But he couldn’t wait to get it back, and I put it in my pocket. The knife belongs to you, my boy—Mr. Silburn, I mean. You must take it, sir.”

“Thank you,” Kit murmured, very willing to accept the gift. “I am glad to have even that much from the wreck of the Flower City, though I hope for more. And I want to take down your address, so that I can find you in the future if necessary. Where will a letter reach you?”

“I don’t exactly know, sir,” the sailor replied, “for I haven’t had such a thing for many a day. I think if you was to direct it to Blinkey, an’ send it to the ‘Star an’ Garter’ public house in Gravesend, though, sir, they’d know who it was for an’ git it to me.”

While the old man was bowing and scraping himself out, Kit slipped into his hand all the change he had left from the pound the Captain had given him, and then hurried through his supper. He had devoted that evening to a long letter home, giving an account of the voyage and what he had seen in London. But now he had even a longer letter to write, and on a very different subject.

CHAPTER IX.
KIT INSPECTS LONDON.

THE unloading of a steamer in England, the young supercargo soon found, is not the rapid process that it is in America, though much cheaper. The workmen receive smaller pay and move more slowly, the machinery is not so modern, none of the facilities as good.

“This is about halfway between New York and the West Indies,” Kit was forced to conclude, “in the way they do work. It must be true, as I have often heard, that ‘New York is the quickest unloading port in the world, and the most expensive.’”

He tried at first to hurry the men up and so save money for his employers; but it was uphill work for one young American to change the customs of centuries, and he had to let things take their course. Even the agents, he noticed, were in no hurry. When the sugar was all unloaded, there was no new cargo ready to take its place, and the four or five days that might have sufficed to make the North Cape ready for sea again, expanded into several weeks. So in spite of himself Kit had a good deal of idle time while the ship lay at Gravesend—idle, that is, as far as his work was concerned; there were too many new things to be seen all around him, too many facts about London to be learned from the Captain’s books, for much of his time to be really unemployed. Frequently he had to go to the agents’ office in Fenchurch Street, and on those occasions whenever he had an hour or two to spare he took a “’bus” to some other part of the city, taking care to remain in the same one till it reached its destination and then return in it, for fear of losing himself.

One morning when there was no cargo to load and no prospect of any arriving, Captain Griffith suggested that they should go up together and have a look at the city.

“I speak of ‘the city’ in the same way as I should speak of it at home,” he added, “meaning the whole town. I suppose you have learned that in London the part they call ‘the city’ is a very small section where most of the financial business is done; so when a Londoner says he is going into the city, he means into that small and crowded part of the town. But I mean it in the larger sense, including the whole place, or as much of it as we have time to see.”

“Why, that will be fine, sir,” Kit replied. “I have an appointment for this morning with young Mr. Watkins, one of our agents’ clerks. He is going to show me something of London, and we will both enjoy it if you will go along.”

“Well, if you youngsters won’t think an old man in the road,” the Captain laughed, “I will go with you. I once knew London pretty well; but it is fifteen or eighteen years since I have seen much of it, and perhaps I will need a guide as much as you do.”

On the way up in the train (it is always “up” when you go to London; no matter if you start from the top of the highest mountain in Scotland, you speak of going “up to London”) Kit told the Captain about the old sailor from the Flower City, and showed his father’s knife.

“Do not set your hopes too high,” the Captain said after he had heard the story; “but I should look upon that as a very encouraging piece of news. It shows that their boats were sound and that the crew were still afloat after the schooner went down. As one man was saved, another may have been. There is still great doubt, of course; but I should continue to hope.”

When they reached the Fenchurch Street office, they found Mr. Watkins waiting for Kit, still arrayed in a long black coat and high silk hat, but much newer and brighter ones than he wore while at work, and looking so stiff and starched that Kit had to laugh to himself to think what a figure he would cut in any American city at that hour of the morning.

“Now where shall we go first?” the clerk asked, when they reached the street.

“I don’t want to interfere with any plans you may have made,” Captain Griffith answered, “but if you have not settled upon any place, I suggest that we go first to see the Temple. That I consider one of the greatest curiosities of London—like a quiet country village set down in the very heart of the largest city in the world.”

“Is it a church, sir?” Kit asked.

“No, indeed!” the Captain laughed; “quite the opposite; it is one of the headquarters of the London lawyers, though there is a fine old church in the grounds. But it is so different from anything we have in America that I can hardly explain it to you. You will soon see for yourself, if we go there.”

“We can easily walk as far as the Temple,” Mr. Watkins said, “and you can always see more in walking than in riding. This way, right up Fenchurch Street. The way we give the same street different names in London is puzzling to strangers, but you soon grow used to it. Now this is one of the chief thoroughfares running east and west; and when you learn the principal ones, you can easily find your way about. I believe in your country each street bears the same name through its entire length, but it is not so here. For instance, this is Fenchurch Street. We keep right along in this street for miles, if we choose, but it has a great many different names. In a short distance the name changes to Lombard Street, then Cheapside, then Newgate Street, then Holborn Viaduct, then New Oxford Street, then Oxford Street, then away out in the West End it becomes Bayswater Road, though it is really the same street all the way through. But we do not go as far as that. We will have a look at the Bank of England as we pass King William Street, then when we get to the end of Cheapside we will see the Post Office and St. Paul’s Cathedral, and cut through St. Paul’s Churchyard to Ludgate Hill, which will take us to Fleet Street, and there is the Temple.”

“I believe I have heard of every one of those places before,” Kit exclaimed, as they made their way along the crowded street; “and I am glad we are going through St. Paul’s Churchyard. I have heard so much about the old London graveyards, and that must be one of the best of them.”

Why did the Captain and Mr. Watkins look at each other and smile when he said this, Kit wondered.

“You will find that nearly every London name is familiar,” said the Captain, “if you have heard or read much about the place. But I am afraid you will be disappointed in St. Paul’s Churchyard, for it is not a burying-ground. It is only the name of a street; all the graves were emptied long ago and the ground sold for business purposes.”

“Why, there are no windows in the Bank of England!” Kit cried, when they reached that great, low, square building occupying a whole block.

“Plenty of them,” Mr. Watkins answered, “but not on the outside. These outer walls that you see are not really part of the building. The real building is inside these walls, and separate. It has to be very strong and well guarded, you see, because so much money is kept there.”

“And that crowd in front of the big doors!” Kit went on. “Why, it looks as if the bank had failed, and the depositors were trying to get their money.”

“Ah, that crowd ought to remind you of home,” said Mr. Watkins, laughing. “We often see such a crowd in front of the bank. The people are generally American tourists, ‘Cook’s personally Conducted,’ we call them, and they are visiting the banks among the other sights. They are led about from one place to another like flocks of sheep.”

“You are seeing something of the world without being a ‘personally conducted tourist,’ Silburn,” the Captain said. “We sailors have some advantages, after all.”

“I don’t think I should like to be led about like a sheep,” Kit laughed, “though I suppose it is cheaper and saves a lot of time. You must see a great many Americans in London, Mr. Watkins; though of course you do not always know them when you see them.”

“Oh, don’t we!” the clerk exclaimed. “They say there are always about forty thousand Americans here, and we can tell one the minute we lay eyes on him. They dress a little differently, you know; and then when they speak they have such a different accent. I hope you’ll not mind my saying so.”

“Not a bit of it!” the Captain answered; “give it to us. Turn about is only fair play, and we always poke a little fun at the Englishmen in America; when we see a stranger arrive with three or four big leather satchels, a leather hat-box, a tin bath-tub, and two or three steamer rugs, we know he is an Englishman before we hear him speak. We have a great many of them, too, and generally disappointed because they can’t shoot Indians in Broadway, or go buffalo hunting on Boston Common. You English, somehow, are never happy unless you are shooting something. But if I am not mistaken that group of large buildings is the Post Office.”

“Yes, sir, that is the Post Office,” Mr. Watkins answered. “And I think you will have to admit that it is the best-managed Post Office you ever saw.”

“Yes, I admit that cheerfully,” said the Captain. “It is the very best in the world. I can send a letter from Gravesend in the morning to the further end of London, and have an answer the same afternoon. I could not do that in any city in America.”

“What, better than the New York Post Office, sir!” Kit exclaimed, in surprise.

“Much better managed,” the Captain replied; “very much better. And the police force here is much better than in any American city. Here, wait on this corner a minute, and see the ‘bobby,’ as they call him, manage the great crush of vehicles and people. There, see that! He just raises a finger, and every vehicle stops to let the people who have been waiting get across. And now that they have crossed he gives the slightest wave of the hand, and the vehicles start again. We have nothing like that at home. But wait a minute longer. There! You see by raising a finger again he stops the whole line of vehicles going north and south, to let those pass that are going east or west; and by another slight motion he stops the east and west ones, and opens the north and south street. Oh, it is beautifully done. Without such control there would be an endless block in the streets. By the way, Silburn, I want you to watch this great ‘traffic,’ as they call it, in the streets, and tell me to-night what you think are the peculiarities of it; and at the same time keep an eye on the public buildings, and tell me what you think of them.”

“Very well, sir,” Kit answered. “But I can tell you now what I think of St. Paul’s. Oh, what a tremendous pile of stone! Why, I never saw anything like it! What a handsome cathedral it would be if they would scrub it! But it looks as dirty as if there had been a shower of ink.”

The others laughed at this odd description, but had to admit that it was quite accurate—for St. Paul’s looks as if it needed a good scouring. Contenting themselves for the time with admiring the outside of the great building, they went on as far as Ludgate Circus, and turned southward into New Bridge Street instead of going on into Fleet Street.

“They have a circus here sometimes in this open space, I suppose?” Kit asked as they were crossing Ludgate Circus.

“Oh, no,” Mr. Watkins replied. “There are a number of these ‘circuses’ in London—Regent’s Circus, Finsbury Circus, and so on. That does not mean that there is ever a circus in them. It is simply the old Roman way of designating a circle.”

A short distance down New Bridge Street, which leads to Blackfriars Bridge, they turned to the right into Tudor Street, and in a few minutes went through one of the big gateways into the grounds of the Temple. It was indeed, as the Captain had said, like going into a country village, in the green grass, the noble trees, the delicious quiet, though separated only by a wall from the busiest part of the world’s busiest city.

“This is historical ground we are on,” Mr. Watkins said as they walked in. “Though given up to the lawyers now, this was originally the quarters of the Knights Templars of Jerusalem—the order established for the defence of the Holy Sepulchre, you know. That was nearly nine hundred years ago, and of course there were not as many buildings here in those days. Then it was taken from them and fell into the hands of the Knights of St. John, and later on it became the property of the lawyers of the higher courts, who still hold it. They have their offices in these buildings, and many of them live here with their families. Some of the buildings are nearly a thousand years old, and some are quite modern. A beautiful place to live, isn’t it, almost in a park, but with the city just outside the gate?”

“Why, there must be fifteen or twenty of these big buildings!” Kit exclaimed; “and are they all full of lawyers?”

“All full of lawyers,” the clerk answered, smiling. “And there goes one of the lawyers. He is on his way to court, as you can tell by his wearing his wig. You know the barristers always wear a big wig in court. Do you see that little shop over there by the arches? That is the shop of a wig-maker who does business here and makes most of the wigs. He has to pay well for the privilege of doing business here, too.”

“But wigs!” Kit asked. “What do they wear wigs for? They’re not all bald, are they?”

“Oh, no!” Watkins laughed. “They wear them because that has been the custom for hundreds of years—wigs and long black gowns, whenever they appear in court. We never change old custom here, you know. If our great-grandfathers did a thing, we think that sufficient reason for our doing it too. But turn up this way; I want to show you the Temple Church. I think it will interest you, for it is the Church the old Templars used to worship in; it was built in 1185.”

They went through the big Gothic doorway of the Temple Church, where a guide took them in hand and pointed out all the curiosities. Under the dome at the front was a large open space, where there lay stretched full length on the floor a dozen or more life-size figures of men clad in armor, and all black like tarnished bronze.

“Some have their legs crossed, you will notice,” the guide explained, “and others lie out straight. Those with crossed legs were the Knights of the Cross, the others their squires and followers. The legs are crossed so as to make the sign of the cross, you know. You would hardly believe that the figures are made of white marble, would you? Yes, sir, all white marble; they are so old that they have turned black.”

In the other part of the church, nearer the pulpit, he showed them the handsomely carved pews that the lawyers sit in, and explained that after attending service on Sunday mornings the occupants go into the great hall to dine together in state. “It is always a fine banquet,” he added, “so they are pretty regular in their attendance at church. Do you see that little tower on the side, with just a slit for a window? That was once the Temple prison where unruly knights were confined; sometimes they were left there to starve.”

After inspecting the church they turned to the right into a narrow court between the church and some other large buildings, where a number of tombstones marked the graves of eminent persons. Most of the stones were carved with armorial bearings, showing that the persons beneath had been lords or dukes or other noblemen; but one tomb without any such pompous tracing attracted Kit’s attention.

“Why, look here!” he cried. “This says, ‘Here lies Oliver Goldsmith!’ One of the best books I ever read (it was called the ‘Vicar of Wakefield’) was by a man named Oliver Goldsmith. I don’t suppose it can be the same one, though.”

“It is the very one,” the Captain told him. “There may have been a thousand Oliver Goldsmiths in the world, but still there was only one. See what a beautiful inscription it is. All the coronets and coats-of-arms in the world could not make a tomb as interesting at those simple words, ‘Here lies Oliver Goldsmith.’ A man could hardly pass that tomb without stopping to look at it.”

“Well!” Kit exclaimed, “I never thought I should see his grave.”

“Oh, a great many celebrated men have been associated with these Temples,” Mr. Watkins explained. “Dr. Johnson once lived here, you know, and one of the newer buildings is called Dr. Johnson’s building.”

“By the way,” the Captain interrupted, “that reminds me. It is time we had something to eat, and I want you both to take lunch with me after we go down and have a look at the gardens.”

While they walked through the beautiful Temple gardens, with their fountains, flower-beds, and gigantic trees, with the Thames flowing in front and the great series of Temple buildings in the rear, Kit wondered how speaking of Dr. Johnson reminded the Captain of eating lunch. He could not at the time see any connection between them, but he saw it a few minutes later.

“Let us go out this way,” the Captain said, “into the Strand. I have not been here for many years, but these old places do not change much. I know of a very good restaurant not far from here.”

In the Strand they turned to the right, and a few steps took them into Fleet Street, where the Captain soon stopped and guided them into a narrow alley bearing the sign, “Wine Office Court.” A few feet up the court, on the right-hand side, they went through a doorway that looked nearly as old as anything about the Temple, and so into a restaurant with old-fashioned high-backed benches, stiff old chairs, heavy oak tables, and a fireplace that looked as if it might have been used by the Crusaders.

“You take that seat at the end of the table, in the corner, Silburn,” the Captain said, “and Mr. Watkins and I will take the sides. We don’t have to consider here about what we will eat, because the great dish is a chop and a baked potato, with some of the baked Cheshire cheese to finish up on. You know the name of this place is ‘The Olde Cheshire Cheese.’ I was reminded of it as soon as Mr. Watkins spoke of Dr. Johnson.”

“This is one of the famous old eating-houses of London, Silburn,” the Captain continued. “I wanted to bring you here because I saw you reading my ‘Boswell’s Life of Johnson’ the other day, so I thought it would interest you.”

“Oh, he must have been a great man, sir,” Kit answered. “I am very much interested in that book.”

“Well, look at that brass plate on the wall just over your head,” the Captain laughed.

Kit turned his head and read the words, cut in a small brass plate that was screwed to the wall, “The seat of Dr. Samuel Johnson.”

“Why, what does that mean, sir!” Kit exclaimed. “That can’t be the man I have been reading about!”

“It is the very man,” the Captain declared. “This restaurant is so old that it was here in his day, and it was his favorite eating-place. And that exact seat where you are sitting was his favorite place, where he sat every day to eat his dinner while he talked with many of the famous men you read of in the book. You see you are on the track of famous people to-day.”

“I feel as if I were a sort of character in a book,” Kit replied, “instead of a real American eating chops and baked potatoes; such chops, too! this is a great country for chops, but I don’t think much of their oysters. I tried some a few days ago, and they tasted soapy, as if they had been raised in a wash-tub. Then when I went into a drug store to look at a directory they charged me a penny for the privilege. Think of paying two cents to look at a directory! But those are small matters. It is an event in a fellow’s life to be sitting where the great Dr. Johnson used to sit, and to see the grave of such a man as Oliver Goldsmith. I can hardly realize it.”

“Oh, we will associate with some more noted people before we stop,” the Captain replied. “If you both feel like it, we will take a hansom down to Westminster Abbey when we finish here, where you can see the tombs of more celebrated Englishmen than you have ever heard of. It is a good place for a young man to go, for he naturally begins to inquire about the great people who are buried there, and to read about them.”

When the lunch was concluded and they were about to go, Mr. Watkins made a remark. It was something that he had been thinking about half through the meal; for it was intended to be a joke, and an Englishman approaches a joke as cautiously as a good driver nearing a railway crossing.

“I suppose there will be a new plate on the wall next time you come here, Mr. Silburn,” he said.

“Why so?” Kit asked.

“Well,” said Watkins, “you see that plate says, ‘The seat of Dr. Samuel Johnson.’ Now they will have another one under it, I have no doubt, adding, ‘Also of Mr. Supercargo Silburn.’”

“Oh, I’ve no doubt of it,” Kit replied. “I ought to laugh at the joke, but I really cawn’t, don’t you know, after that big chop and potato.” He tried to imitate the English manner of speaking; but if that was another joke, it was all lost on Mr. Watkins.

The three crowded into a hansom and were soon set down in front of Westminster Abbey, and for the next hour Kit had eyes for nothing but the long rows of tombs. The architecture might have surprised him under other circumstances, but no architecture was as interesting to him as the burial-place of so many famous people he had heard of. The tomb of David Livingstone was one of the first that caught his eye. Then he found Sir Isaac Newton’s, and those of Browning and Tennyson side by side, and Shakespeare, Dr. Johnson, Lord Macaulay, a bust of Longfellow, and scores, hundreds of others whose names he had at least heard.

“Shall we go in among the tombs of the kings?” Captain Griffith asked at length.

“Not on my account, sir,” Kit replied; “I don’t want to spoil the effect of these great people by looking at a lot of mere kings.”

“You mustn’t mind my young friend’s disparagement of your kings, Mr. Watkins,” the Captain laughed; “he is a thorough young American, and we don’t raise kings over there to any great extent. But it will suit me not to spend any more time here. What do you say to having a look at the town from the top of Primrose Hill, with just a glance into the British Museum as we pass it?”

Both “the boys,” as the Captain called them, were pleased with this proposition, and he called another hansom to take them first to the British Museum. There Mr. Watkins took pains to show them the interesting parts, and Kit was particularly interested in the mummies and their curious casings. What he wanted most to see, however, was the great library, one of the largest in the world; and he was disappointed when told that it was impossible to get into the reading-room without a ticket, which could be had only with a deal of red tape.

“I don’t believe they would let the Prince of Wales in without a ticket,” the young clerk said, “so I am sure we have no chance.”

There was no disappointment, however, about the view from the summit of Primrose Hill. They drove around through Hampstead to reach the hill from the rear, and when they stood on its very top the whole of London seemed to lie at their feet.

“Ah, it is a grand sight!” Mr. Watkins exclaimed. “We Londoners never tire of looking at it, though it is an old story with us. You see what a deep valley the city lies in, with the Thames running through the middle of it. The hills on the other side of the valley are in Surrey and Kent, two of our English counties. And do you see that blazing fire near the top of the Surrey Hills? It looks like fire, but that is the Crystal Palace with the sun shining upon it.”

“Yes, it is a grand sight,” the Captain said. “And you must not forget, Silburn, that you are looking at this moment at the homes of more people than you can see from any other spot on earth. Here are six millions of people living between us and those opposite hills—more people than there are in the kingdom of Belgium, and nearly as many as there are in the whole of Canada. You never saw such a view as this before.”

“No, sir, I never did,” Kit admitted; “it is a great sight; but I can’t help wondering why they built such a big city down in such a hollow. No wonder they have such thick fogs here. I suppose you’ll laugh at me for it, but I think our hills out in Fairfield County are much handsomer. I should rather live in Huntington than in London.”

“Well, I like to hear you tell the truth about it,” the Captain laughed. “Some Americans who come over here think they must praise everything because it is the fashion to do so. These Europeans like to boast of their own countries, but they seem to immigrate to America pretty fast. Eh, how is that, Mr. Watkins?”

“Yes, sir, they do,” the young clerk answered. “And I am one of them. If I had half a chance, I should go to America myself.”

The setting sun gave warning to the sight-seers that it was time to bring their excursion to an end. Both Kit and the Captain urged Watkins to return to Gravesend and eat supper with them on the North Cape; but he still had work to do in the office, and the party separated in Trafalgar Square, Captain Griffith and Kit taking a ’bus to the Fenchurch Street station, whence a train soon carried them to Tilbury, opposite Gravesend.

“Now, Silburn,” the Captain said that evening while they sat in the cabin, “I want you to answer those questions I asked you to-day. What have you to say about the traffic in the London streets?”

“They are the most crowded streets I ever saw, sir,” Kit answered; “but it does not seem to me that there is any more business done in them than in a great many other streets I have seen. I looked out for big trucks, express wagons, baggage vans, and such things, but did not see a great many. The crowding seemed to me to be done by the great number of ’buses and hansoms. If the ’buses were taken away, there would be no great crowd in the London streets. So if they had the same modern means of transit that we have in our American cities, fast cable and electric cars and such things, there would be plenty of room.”

“And the public buildings?” the Captain asked.

“Some of them must have been very fine when they were new, sir,” Kit replied; “but they are so dark with smoke and dirt and age that they make a fellow feel gloomy. I should think the Londoners would have the blues most all the time, with their dark buildings and those terrible fogs. It is a great place, of course; but somehow it doesn’t seem to me exactly like a city. It seems more like a lot of big villages that have grown together.”

“Ah, they’re not going to make an Englishman of you, that’s certain!” the Captain laughed. “But you are right in both the opinions you have given. It is the lack of quick transit that crowds the streets; and modern London is not exactly a city, but a collection of large towns that have grown together. You will be quite an expert in cities some day, if you study their points so carefully.”

CHAPTER X.
A LETTER FROM THE STATE DEPARTMENT.

“I THINK it’s a mean way to treat a fellow, Kit,” Harry Leonard complained when they were alone together. “Oh, you needn’t think I’m going to be calling you Mr. Silburn when nobody else can hear. I want a chance to see something of London, and you know very well it’s only fair I should have. I haven’t been allowed ashore since we came into the Thames. You always used to go ashore when you were cabin boy, for you’ve told me so.”

“That was a little different,” Kit exclaimed. “I was doing a supercargo’s work when I was cabin boy, and I had to go ashore on business. But I think the Captain will let you go up to town if you ask him. I know he likes you, from the way he speaks of you. You’re a very different boy, Harry, if you don’t mind my saying so, from what you were when you came on board. We all have to learn, I suppose, that we don’t get things for favors, but by working for them, and you are doing your work well.”

“Thawnk you very much, Mr. Supercargo!” Harry retorted, taking off his cap in mock humility. “I like to be appreciated by my superiors.”

“Well, it’s a fact,” Kit laughed. “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. All this stuff on the wharf will be aboard by two or three o’clock, and if you like I will ask the Captain to let you go up to London with me after that. You know it is daylight here till eight or nine o’clock in the evening.”

“Hooray for you!” Harry shouted. “If you ask, it’s a sure thing, for you get whatever you want. I wish I had such a pull with the Captain as you have.”

“I have no ‘pull’ at all—” Kit started to say; but he was interrupted by footsteps on the companionway, and a moment later Captain Griffith entered the cabin with a handful of letters.

“There seems to be something for most everybody in this lot,” he said, laying the letters upon the big table and looking them over. “Captain Griffith, Captain Griffith, Mr. Mason, Mr. Christopher Silburn, Mr. Hanway, Mr. Christopher Silburn—here are two for you, Silburn, so your folks have not forgotten you.”

Kit saw at a glance that one of the letters was from his mother and the other from Vieve; and the one from his mother was so large and thick that it rather alarmed him. He went to the corner of the long sofa and hurriedly opened it, and found two enclosures, besides a page or two in his mother’s handwriting.

“We are so flustered by these letters that we don’t know what to do,” Mrs. Silburn wrote. “But your sister and I both think that the best thing will be to send them right over to you, so that you will be sure to get them before you leave London. We have kept copies, in case they should be lost. Oh, Kit, do you think there is any chance that this man may be your dear father? I am afraid it is only exciting our hopes in vain, but we ought to do something about it, though we don’t know what. How could we ever get along without a great, big man like our Kit to advise us?”

After reading this mysterious introduction Kit turned hurriedly to the enclosures. The first was on a sheet headed “Bryant & Williams, Bridgeport, Conn.,” whom he immediately recognized as the owners of his father’s schooner, the Flower City.

Mrs. Christopher Silburn, Huntington, Conn. [the letter began]:

Please find enclosed a copy of a letter we have just received from the State Department at Washington, which explains itself. We have sent similar copies to the families of all the members of the crew of the schooner Flower City, as far as they are known. While we have slight hopes that the person referred to in the letter may have been a member of that unfortunate crew, we deem it only right to lay the information before you, that you may take whatever measures seem to you proper.

Very respectfully yours,

Bryant & Williams.

Kit was beginning by this time to chafe over the delay in getting at the mysterious information. But the other enclosure must give it, and he quickly unfolded the sheet.

State Department, Washington, D. C. [it began].

Office of the Fourth Assistant Secretary.

Folio G x R. No. 2814 F.

Messrs. Bryant & Williams, Bridgeport, Conn.

Dear Sirs: The department is informed by the Consulate at Wellington, New Zealand, that a patient who has been in the public hospital there for some months is supposed to be a shipwrecked American sailor. This man was landed in Wellington from the British ship, Prince Albert, having been picked up by that ship on the 27th of June last on a small unnamed island in the Pacific Ocean, where his three companions had died of hardship and starvation, and where he was reduced to such a mental and physical condition that he was unable to move or give any account of himself.

Since his reception in the hospital he has been restored to physical health, but he is still unable to give his name or place of residence, though from certain tests that have been applied it is believed that he is a native-born American citizen. He is of medium height with gray hair and beard, and looks sixty years old, though he is probably much younger.

The Life Saving Service has supplied this department with a list of all the American vessels that have been lost within the last two years; and a copy of this letter is sent to the owners of each of such lost vessels, as far as they can be traced, to enable them to communicate with the families of the lost crews.

Requests for information on the subject should be addressed to the Chairman of the Board of Governors, Public Hospital, Wellington, New Zealand; or to the American Consulate at that port.

Yours, etc.,

H. R. Battaway,

Chief Clerk to Fourth Assistant Secretary.

On opening the letter from Vieve he found that it was full of questions and surmises about the mysterious man in New Zealand, so he put that in his pocket to be read later on. The State Department letter was too important to let anything interfere with it. He read it again and again, and tried to estimate what the chances were that this man might be his missing father. Suppose there were twenty lost vessels, each with a crew of twenty men? That would give only one chance in four hundred. But one chance in forty thousand, he thought, would be a great thing. Sixty years old? His father was not nearly as old as that; and there was not a gray hair in his head. But who could say what suffering he might have gone through, or what changes it might have made in his appearance?

It was hard work to put those letters into his pocket and go on quietly checking his lists as the cargo came aboard; but it was necessary, and Kit did it. The engagement he had just made with Harry Leonard must be postponed, for he must have time to think, and then time to write some letters. But what was he to write?

All through the morning and until the last case of cargo on the wharf was put in the hold and duly checked off, the young supercargo stuck manfully to his work. Harry Leonard was disappointed when told that his trip to London would have to be put off, but when Kit explained the reason Harry was more than willing to wait.

“Why, they’d give him a big reception in Huntington,” he exclaimed, “if your father should come home alive.”

With all his thinking Kit could not decide upon a better course than to show the letters to Captain Griffith and ask his advice. “He knows more in five minutes than I know in a week,” he said to himself, “and his advice is sure to be good. It’s a valuable thing to have good friends to go to when you need advice.”

Captain Griffith, as he expected, was very much interested when he heard the contents of Kit’s letter. First he listened while Kit read the letter from the State Department, and then took it and read it carefully over himself. Then he got out a map to look at the position of Wellington, New Zealand.

For some minutes he leaned back in his revolving-chair, looking hard at the ceiling, deep in thought.

“It’s a strange case, Silburn,” he said at length. “I’ve been trying to figure out what happened to your father when his schooner went down. They took to the boats, and in the heavy sea your father’s boat went to pieces. He kept afloat on some piece of wreckage, and in the morning he was seen and picked up by a passing ship. She was an American ship, I should say, bound ’round the Horn for San Francisco or the northwest coast. But when they got into the Pacific that second ship was wrecked, and your father and three others made their way to a little island, where he was afterwards picked up by the British vessel and carried to New Zealand. Yes, it is all plain enough.”

“Why, Captain!” Kit cried; “do you really think so, sir?”

“I don’t say that I think so, or that I don’t think so,” the Captain answered. “I wanted to see whether there was any reasonable theory by which I could account for your father’s being found on a desolate little island in the Pacific. I see that there is; it might easily have happened just as I have described it. So we begin by knowing that it is possible that this man may be your father. And having reached that point we came to a sudden stop through somebody’s remarkable stupidity. Do you see how badly this inquiry has been managed?”

“Yes, sir,” Kit answered, “I think I do. They ought to have sent a photograph of the man and a full description.”

“Of course they ought!” the Captain declared, thumping his fist down on the desk. “The fullest description possible—his height, weight, color of his eyes, condition of his teeth, marks on his body, every possible particular. I suppose we must be satisfied that the State Department has taken the trouble to give even this much information about the case; but it would have been easy to give a little more. However, this oversight does not put an end to the business; it only entails a great waste of time. Now you have been thinking about this thing all day; what has it occurred to you ought to be done?”

“Well, sir,” Kit answered, “it seemed to me that the best way would be to write to the American consul at Wellington, and ask him to send a description of the man. If it is my father, he is nothing like sixty years old, but what he has gone through may make him look much older than he really is.”

“That’s it,” the Captain agreed. “That is exactly the proper thing for you to do. And write from here, at once; but have the answer sent to your home in America, for there is no telling where you may be. Now tell me something about your father. How tall a man was he?”

“He was just five feet ten and a half inches, sir,” Kit replied. “I remember that very well, because he used to measure me when I was little and say, ‘I wonder whether you will ever be as tall as your father, youngster?’ It hardly looked likely then, but I am within about an inch of that now, and still growing.”

“Very well; put that down on this slip of paper; height, five feet ten and a half inches. Was he stout, or slender?”

“Just about medium, sir,” Kit went on; “I think he weighed about one hundred and sixty pounds. And he was dark in the hands and face, from the sun, and had dark brown eyes and hair to match, the hair just a little bit curly, like mine.”

“Put it all down,” the Captain said. “Were his teeth good or bad?”

“Oh, he had beautiful teeth, sir,” Kit declared. “He never had to go to the dentist’s, and they were as white and regular—well, I used to tell him they were almost as handsome as a set of false ones.”

“Put it down,” the Captain repeated. “And do you know whether there were any marks on his body that he could be identified by?”

“The only mark I know of was a long scar on his left temple, sir,” Kit answered, “running down like this;” and he drew a finger across his own temple to show the direction. “He got that when he had such a narrow escape from being killed. A block fell from aloft and came just near enough to make a gash in his skin. A quarter of an inch more would have killed him on the spot, of course; but he only laughed at it when he told us about it.”

“Ah, that is a good point; put it down. A man may lose his teeth, or grow fat or thin, or his hair turn gray, but he never can get rid of a scar. That cut on the temple will go further than anything else to tell us whether this is your father or not. Now when you write to the consul tell him all these things that you have told me, and as much more as you can think of. And there is another thing. To make such an inquiry as this, and get your father home, if it proves to be your father, will cost some money. You are willing to spend whatever you can afford, I suppose?”

“Why, Captain,” Kit exclaimed, “what would I care for money in exchange for my father! I would sell the last shirt off my back just to hear that he is alive. And we could raise a little money in Huntington, if it came to the worst. I know mother would spend her last cent to find him. But I think I can manage it myself, if it does not cost too much.”

“Well, Silburn,” the Captain said, laying his hand on Kit’s shoulder, “you have a good name, and that is always something to fall back on. I have a little money that I have saved year after year, and if you need more than you think, I will lend you a few hundred, and you can pay me interest on it and pay it off gradually. I should consider it quite as safe in your hands as if it remained in the bank.”

“Thank you, Captain,” Kit answered. “I am more grateful to you than I can tell you. But it will be months before we can hear from the consul, and by that time I shall have a little more money of my own. I want to send him a little money in the letter and ask him to have a photograph taken of the man in the hospital. If it is my father, I think we should recognize him, no matter how much he is changed.”

“That is a capital idea,” the Captain assented; “and by writing from here your letter will get to New Zealand much sooner than if you sent it from America.”

That evening Kit had his hands full with letter-writing. There was one to be written to his mother, and one to Vieve, and a note to Bryant & Williams, thanking them for their letter, and last of all, a long one to the consul at Wellington, in which he gave the fullest possible description of his father.

“The mention of some familiar names,” he wrote, “might cause him to remember things that he has forgotten, if, as I hope, it proves to be my father. He lives in Huntington, Connecticut, opposite the church, and my mother’s name is Emily Silburn. His two children are Genevieve and Christopher Silburn; he always called us Vieve and Kit. Our dog’s name is Turk. The Flower City was the schooner he was wrecked on. The scar I have mentioned looks whiter than the rest of his face. If he seems to recognize any of these names, that will be pretty good evidence that he is Christopher Silburn.”

“Ah, my!” Kit said to himself, rubbing his eyes after finishing the long letter, “this not knowing whether you have a father or not is bad business. But just suppose we should see him sitting again in his old chair in Huntington! I mustn’t think of that, though, for it may be only preparing for a disappointment.”

Captain Griffith approved of the letter to the consul when he read it; and when Kit asked permission for Harry Leonard to go up to London with him next day, it was given immediately.

“I don’t like to have my boys going into these big towns alone, getting into mischief,” he said; “but if Harry goes with you, that is a different matter. You know you are not a boy any more, but a supercargo; and you must keep Harry straight. By the way, Silburn, stand out there in the light a minute till I look at you. There; that is just the way I stood you out the night I rescued you from the policeman in Brooklyn. Do you know it occurred to me while you were describing your father this afternoon that you were giving almost an exact description of yourself? You must be very much like him.”

“I am glad to hear it, sir,” Kit laughed, “for he was always called a fine-looking man.”

When the Captain’s two “boys” took the ferryboat over to Tilbury in the morning, Harry was like a young colt in a spring pasture. No wonder, either, for he had not set foot off the North Cape’s deck before since she left New York. He was full of fun now that he was away from the restraint of the ship, and, like Kit, he was not disposed to admire everything simply because it was in a foreign country; on the contrary, most things he saw he regarded as fair game for ridicule.

“And they call these things cars, do they?” he asked, when they were seated alone in one of the compartments of the train. “Well, they look to me very much like our coal cars in America, with roofs put on them. I suppose they have such little windows because larger ones would be of no use; you never can see more than fifty yards in this country, on account of the fog. Did you ever see such a foggy hole? I know now why the sun never sets on the Queen’s dominions: it’s because it never rises, ‘don-cher-know?’ What do they want with an old Queen here, anyhow? I guess if a President’s good enough for us, it’s good enough for them.”

“I always thought you were an Irishman, Harry,” Kit laughed; “now I’m sure of it, from the way you find fault with the English. Wait till you see London; you may change your mind then.”

“Oh, London!” Harry sneered. “You’d think the sun rose out of the Thames and set in Buckingham Palace, to hear these Britishers talk. I’ll bet it’s not as fine a city as Bridgeport. Look at the big factories they have there, and the new court-house, and the—”

“We may as well get out here,” Kit interrupted, “as this is Fenchurch Street station and the end of the line. I don’t believe they’ll carry us any further.” He found it very entertaining and novel to act as a guide to London, particularly with a companion who looked upon everything from such original standpoints as Harry, and who was so determined to see nothing equal to America in the British capital.

Harry was so much interested in Kit’s accounts of the mummies and other curiosities in the British Museum, that they took a hansom and drove to the Museum first.

“This sort of thing will do occasionally in London,” Kit said, “where a cab costs a shilling. But we’ll have to come down to street cars again, or walking, when we get back to America.”

“Where are the high buildings, Kit?” Harry asked, after they had gone a few blocks. “These are all small affairs, so far. Can’t we have him drive past some of the tall buildings?”

“I’m afraid we should have hard work to find any,” Kit answered. “I have seen no buildings here more than six or eight stories high.”

“Six or eight stories!” Harry cried; “and they call this a great city! Why, there are some buildings in New York twenty-six stories high, and lots of them from twenty to twenty-five stories. Yes, it’s just as I expected: they brag so much about London, but I don’t believe it’s ‘in it’ at all beside America. They can’t fool me with their mummies, either, for I saw some in a museum in New York when I was there. I know a thing or two about dried Egyptians.”

As he was prepared to find fault with the mummies, it was not hard to be disappointed in them. “They’re a very ordinary lot,” he declared when he saw them. “Those in New York were all kings and emperors and such things, but these are just common people. They don’t look as life-like, either. Why, those fellows in New York seemed just ready to sit up and eat their dinner.”

Some mention being made of Buckingham Palace, Harry immediately became anxious to see it. “Not that I suppose it amounts to much,” he explained, “but we may as well see what sort of tenement houses they lodge their royal family in. Royal family, indeed! Why, in our country we’d elect a new queen every year or two if we had to have one at all.”

“Very well,” Kit assented; “I should rather like to see Buckingham Palace, too, and we can have a look at the Thames Embankment at the same time. We can walk over to Gower Street station and take the underground road to St. James Park station, and that is near the Palace. We both want to see the great underground railway, of course.”

Feeling surer of making his way in the main streets, Kit led Harry to Tottenham Court Road, and turned up Euston Road to the Gower Street station. In Euston Road they found a great many openings in the street and in the yards on each side, through which poured clouds of sulphurous smoke.

“Bah!” Harry cried, as one of the dirty clouds enveloped and half choked them; “there must be a sulphur mine underneath here, and it’s caught fire. Or do you suppose it’s a match factory?”

“I suppose these must be airholes for the underground road,” Kit replied; “for it runs under this street. But I don’t see how the people can stand such rank smoke, that’s a fact. And it’s cheerful to think that that’s the air we will have to breathe in the underground train.”

They bought their tickets for St. James Park station and went down two long and dirty stairways into the bowels of the earth, where they found a long cave arched with smoky bricks, dimly lighted with a half-dozen gas-jets, with a very dirty platform on each side and two tracks between them. Twenty or thirty other persons were waiting for the train, all breathing the thick smoky atmosphere, that coated their throats and made them cough.

In two or three minutes a faint rumbling began in one of the dark tunnels leading out of each end of the cave; and the rumbling grew louder and louder till it became a roar, and the train drew up. There was a great banging of doors, people got out and others got in, Kit and Harry scrambled into an empty compartment, and in a few seconds the lights of the platform faded away and they were in darkness save for a very dim gas-jet in the roof of the car.

“Now this is real luxury!” Harry laughed. “Everything you touch is black as a chimney, and the air you breathe is thick enough to cut. These tunnels would make good sewers, Kit. But do you think our folks would believe the Londoners really ride through such holes in the ground? Ain’t it simply frightful?”

“I shall have to agree with you this time,” Kit answered. “I had no idea the underground roads were as bad as this. It would be a terrible place for an accident, wouldn’t it, in these dark caves?”

They went on and on past station after station, and after half an hour of jolting and half suffocating Kit began to suspect that he must have made some mistake, for it was less than a mile from Gower Street to St. James Park. He took out his map and examined it as well as he could under the feeble light.

“See here, I’ll tell you what we’ve done,” he explained, “we’ve taken an outer circle train. You know this underground road runs in a small inner circle and a big outer circle. And we’re in the wrong train, that is carrying us away round the city. But no matter, it will bring us to St. James after a while. That’s rather a good joke on us, Harry, for a hansom would have taken us across in half the time and for half the money.”

“Oh, well,” Harry answered, “no matter. It’s just as well to get a good dose of the underground this time, for I never want to see the thing again. One dose is enough, well shaken and taken.”

It took them fifty minutes to reach the St. James Park station; and after they had climbed the long stairs to the surface they stood awhile on the edge of the park to get some fresh air into their lungs.

“It’s just as I expected,” Harry declared, “only a good deal worse. They don’t half know how to do things over here. And that’s Buckingham Palace, is it, where the Queen lives? Why, it’s only two stories high, and a basement! Now, Kit, you know as well as I do that this palace ain’t a patch to Mr. Barnum’s house out in Seaside Park, in Bridgeport. No, sir, it doesn’t compare with it.”

“Oh, Harry, you can’t please a fellow who’s determined not to be pleased,” Kit laughed. “When you come to London, you must make up your mind that things are better than anywhere else, and tell the people so. Then they’ll pat you on the back and say the Americans are their cousins.”

“How could I tell them?” Harry asked; “they don’t understand me when I speak to them, and I never half know what they say. I should think they might know how to speak their own language.”

By the time night came they had seen the new Thames Embankment, and Madame Tussaud’s waxworks show, Trafalgar Square, and Pall Mall, St. Paul’s Cathedral, and several of the curious old churches, and had walked through the Strand and Fleet Street, and many more of the busy parts of the city. And within forty-eight hours the Scilly signals were set in motion again, and over the wires flashed the brief announcement, “Passed, steamer North Cape, for New York.”

CHAPTER XI.
A VOYAGE TO MARSEILLES.

BETWEEN being a cabin boy with no responsibility beyond setting the table straight and keeping the cabin clean, and being a supercargo with a large and valuable cargo to look after, there is a wide step, as Kit realized when the North Cape lay once more at the wharf in front of Martin’s Stores. Harry Leonard set off gayly for home before the ship was fairly moored in her berth; but for his own part, with nominally far more liberty, he could not think of going further away than his employers’ office till all the cargo was out; and he could not tell whether even then he should be able to take a long enough holiday for a run out to Huntington.

“You see these things work both ways, Harry,” he said to the cabin boy before the latter set off. “You complained in London about not being able to go ashore, but I am just as badly off here, where I have so much to do that I cannot leave the wharf for a week at any rate.”

“But you don’t complain about it, Kit,” Harry answered. “I don’t believe you ever complain about anything.”

“Why should I complain about this,” Kit asked, “when it is my work that keeps me and I am glad to have the work to do? What would the owners think of the Captain if he said he could not sail on the day they ordered, because he had some business of his own to attend to? No, I am not complaining about it, but just telling you the fact. And I spoke of it because I want you to take a little bundle up to Huntington for me, and tell my folks that nothing but my work keeps me from going home at once. I shall know in a few days whether I can get home this trip, and of course I have written.”

There was no reason why the supercargo should explain to the cabin boy that the “little bundle” he sent home was the result of many visits to Peter Robinson’s, in Regent Street, and to another London place known as “Louise’s,” in the same street; and that it contained some things whose buying required as much care on his part as the stowing of a cargo. It was not such a little bundle, either, nor so light; but Harry took it cheerfully, and promised to deliver all of Kit’s messages.

Instead of Kit applying to the Captain now for information about the ship’s movements, it was rather the other way. As supercargo it was his business to know what the next cargo was to be, and where it was to be taken. But for some days neither of them knew, and it was impossible to learn, because the charterers did not yet know, themselves.

“I imagine from what I heard in the office to-day,” Kit said to the Captain one evening, “that they are thinking of sending us next to Marseilles.”

“Yes,” the Captain answered, “they are talking of it, I know. But nothing is settled yet.”

“I hope they will,” Kit went on; “that would give us a fine voyage into the Mediterranean and past Gibraltar. Marseilles must be a little further than London, of course.”

“Yes, it is just about four thousand miles,” the Captain answered. “It would be a good thing for you, for several reasons. The North Cape ought to go into dry-dock to be scraped and painted before crossing the ocean again, for one thing, and that would give you time to go home. For another thing, Marseilles is one of the most interesting places in the world. But our firm won’t take those things into consideration in making up their minds,” he added, laughing.

“What cargo should we probably take if we went to Marseilles, sir?” Kit asked.

“Oil,” the Captain replied; “and as Marseilles is one of the great olive-oil shipping ports, that would be carrying coals to Newcastle with a vengeance, wouldn’t it?”

“I don’t quite understand, sir,” Kit answered.

“Well, you will soon see into it,” the Captain said, “if we go to Marseilles. You see they make a great deal of olive-oil all along that part of the Mediterranean coast. And it is shipped from Marseilles. Olive-oil, you understand, is a very expensive product. We make a great deal of cotton-seed oil in this country, and that is a very cheap product. So they buy our cotton-seed oil, and we take it over to them.”

“But you don’t mean that they mix our cotton-seed oil with their olive-oil, and sell it for pure oil, do you, sir?”

“I never saw them mix it,” the Captain said, laughing quietly to himself. “But when you put this and that together, and considering that they have no other use for cotton-seed oil over there, it certainly looks very much like it, doesn’t it?

“However, I don’t think you need worry your mind about our share in the transaction,” the Captain went on, seeing that Kit looked very thoughtful over it. “If they pay us for carrying the oil, we have nothing to do with the use they make of it. We might carry a cargo of cotton to Manchester; and if some dishonest cloth-maker there mixes a lot of it with his wool, that dishonesty cannot be laid on our shoulders.”

“Captain, do you think there is a really honest man in the world?” Kit asked.

“Yes, two,” the Captain laughed; “Christopher Silburn and Captain Griffith.”

The uncertainty about their next destination could not last long, for the cargo was nearly out; and on the same day that Kit was told definitely that he was to go to Marseilles, the Captain induced his charterers to let him have a week in dry-dock first for overhauling the ship. The supercargo, however, could not arrange for more than four days’ leave of absence, there being many things to see to; and that would give him only two full days at home.

Going out by train this time, for greater speed, Kit reached Bridgeport too late for the stage; but without hesitation he set off over the hills on foot, glad of the chance to see so much of the country just as the trees and grass were putting on their new spring suits; and when he stepped without warning into the little house opposite the church, his mother and Vieve were at the supper table.

“You gave me a great start when you came in, Kit,” Mrs. Silburn declared after the first greetings were over. “You walk exactly as your father did; my first thought was that he had come home. And upon my word you are just his size. My, my, what a man you have grown! I have no little Kit any more, but a big grown man.”

“Don’t speak of growing!” Kit retorted. “Where’s the little sister I left at home? What have you done with her? This great big girl can’t be Vieve, can she? And you are looking so much better, too, mother. I’m afraid those little things I got you in London are about four sizes too small.

“I wanted to get you some really good things in England,” he went on, “but those letters you sent me from Bridgeport and Washington made me more careful of my money. If that mysterious man in New Zealand should really prove to be father, we would need all the money we could possibly raise to bring him home comfortably. I don’t feel as if my wages belonged to myself, exactly, till that thing is settled.”

“Oh, it was such a comfort, Kit, the way you managed those letters,” his mother declared. “We did not know what to do at all. I don’t feel so much now as if I had no one to depend upon.”

“Well, the Captain advised me,” Kit modestly answered. “He always knows what ought to be done. You must not set your heart too much upon it, but still there is a chance. Since one man escaped from the wreck of the Flower City, why not another? It will take weeks and weeks, perhaps months, to get an answer from the consul at Wellington; and until it comes, we can do nothing but wait patiently.”

The next morning Kit settled himself in his father’s armchair by the window, with a big volume in his hands.

“It’s a good thing father bought this set of cyclopædias,” he said, “for I think it will give me just the information I want. Our next voyage is to be to Marseilles (did I tell you last evening?), and I want to find out something about the place. You’ve no idea what a help it is in going to a new city to read everything you can find about it beforehand. All the way over to London, when I had any spare time, I read the Captain’s books about it and studied the maps, and by the time I got there I knew a great deal about it.”

“Harry Leonard must have been a great help to you there,” Vieve suggested slyly; “he says he showed you around so much.”

“Does he?” Kit laughed. “That’s just like Harry! He makes a very good cabin boy, but he hasn’t quite got over his boasting habit yet. The only visit he made to London was when I got leave for him one day and took him for a trip on the underground railway. We took the wrong train, too, by the way, and went about fifteen miles round to get a mile across town. But let’s see about this place in France. M-a-r; here we are—‘Marseilles, the third city of France, population about four hundred and fifty thousand. Well situated in a valley on the shore of the Mediterranean. Chief city of the Department of Bouches-du-Rhone. Marseilles is one of the oldest cities in Europe, having been founded about 600 B.C.’

“Think of that, mother! This place I am going to was founded six hundred years before the time of our Saviour!

“‘The first settlement,’” he continued to read, “‘is usually ascribed to the Phœnicians. Lazarus is said to have been one of the early bishops of Marseilles, and a skull purporting to be his is still preserved in a portion of the original church in which Lazarus preached. Aside from this, the most remarkable building in Marseilles is the church of Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde, which, standing on the summit of a high hill, is church and fort combined, and is reached by hydraulic elevators. Marseilles is the scene of the principal part of Alexander Dumas’ remarkable story of the “Count of Monte Cristo.” The Castle d’If, in which Monte Cristo was confined in a dungeon for fourteen years, stands on a rocky islet in the harbor, and is still in a good state of preservation. The chief articles of commerce are olive-oil, figs, dates, almonds, and wine. Marseilles is one of the principal ports of the Mediterranean, from thirty to fifty vessels entering or leaving daily. The Peninsular and Oriental steamers call here on their way to and from India and Australia.’

“I tell you there’s going to be something to see, in a place like that!” Kit exclaimed, as he closed the book. “Six hundred years before those things happened that we read about in the New Testament! A fellow can hardly get that into his head. I hope I’ll have a chance to see that church on the hill, that’s both church and fort. And Lazarus! That’s going it a little strong, it seems to me; I don’t remember reading anything in the Bible about Lazarus being a bishop. But I should like to see that old church.”

“Oh, I wish they had ‘cabin girls’ on ships!” Vieve declared; “I’d like to go and see these queer places the way you do. Girls never have a chance to see anything.”

“They’re a very lucky lot,” Kit answered. “They only have to stay at home and be comfortable, while their fathers and brothers go away to work for them.”

“Now, children, I’ll have to punish you both if you begin to quarrel,” Mrs. Silburn laughed. “The most important thing is when you will be back from this next voyage, Kit; and that you haven’t told us yet.”

“We can safely say in about two months,” Kit replied, “if all goes well. And by that time I think we ought to have an answer from New Zealand.”

Those two days at home were many hours too short, but there was no help for it. Kit had nearly two months’ wages to hand over to his mother, and after taking a good look at the outside of the house he suggested that she should get some one to mend the two or three broken places and then have it painted.

“That will not cost very much,” he said, “for it is a small house. And if—if that should—well, you know what I mean. We want everything looking nice if he comes home.”

Silas did not go down to Bridgeport with his stage in time to catch the 9.15 train, the one that Kit wanted to take; so he walked down as he had walked up, glad to have another two or three hours among the green fields after so much blue water.

From the time of his reaching New York again the young supercargo had very little time to himself until the North Cape cleared for Marseilles, for the cargo began to arrive next day, and he had to give his attention to it.

“It hardly seems to me as if we had been home,” he said to Captain Griffith as they stood on the bridge, watching the gradual fading away of the Navesink Highlands. “They keep us going so fast; to-day in Barbadoes, to-morrow in London, next day in Marseilles. I see you have the ‘Count of Monte Cristo’ among your books, Captain. I will get you to let me read it when I am through with my work. I have been reading everything I could find about Marseilles.”

“Oh, yes, you can take it,” the Captain answered. “You will find it a very interesting story, particularly when you are bound for Marseilles. But there is something about it that to me is of more interest than the story itself. I won’t tell you what it is; you can find that out for yourself.”

For four or five days Kit was busy with his manifests, but after that his time was his own, except for an occasional visit to the hold to see that his cargo was in good order—his “magic oil,” he called it; for as far as he could make out it was to go into Marseilles nothing but plain cotton-seed oil, and return to New York “pure olive-oil,” worth two dollars a gallon.

The ocean seemed a vast desert of water on this voyage. They were far out of the usual track of vessels crossing the Atlantic, except those bound for the far East by way of the Suez Canal; and in the eighteen days before Gibraltar was sighted they passed only three sails. But in those days Kit put all his papers in order and read the “Count of Monte Cristo” with great care.

“I should not have spent so much time on an ordinary story,” he said when it was finished, “but this tells so much about Marseilles. And I wanted to find out what you considered of more interest about it than the story itself.”

“And did you find it out?” the Captain asked.

“I think so, sir,” Kit replied. “The story was evidently written about the middle of this century, or less than fifty years ago. I think the author wanted to show what wonderful things could be accomplished by a man with fabulous wealth. So after the hero had been imprisoned in that Castle d’If a great many years, he made his way through the walls to the dungeon of a very wise priest who was confined there. The priest became so attached to him that before he died he told him of the secret hiding-place of an immense treasure; and after the hero escaped he went to the island and got the treasure. As nearly as I can make out, the treasure amounted to about three million dollars, and he did all his wonderful things with that money. The interesting thing is, as I understand it, that less than fifty years ago, a great author, living in Paris, when he wanted to write about a man with as much money as anybody could imagine, much less really have, gave him only three million dollars, which in those days seemed beyond belief; whereas now within a single lifetime, some of our American millionaires are so much richer that three million dollars would seem like a small sum to them.”

“That’s it, exactly,” the Captain replied; “I am glad you caught the idea. It just shows how the wealth of the world has increased in the last fifty years—or perhaps how it has fallen into comparatively few hands. Half a century ago three millions was as great a fortune as could be imagined; now when a man gets three he is not satisfied till he turns it into thirty.”

“It has made me anxious to see that Castle d’If and its dungeons,” Kit said.

“I hope to have another look at it myself,” the Captain answered. “I was there once, but it was many years ago—long before you were born. We will go out together some day.”

When Gibraltar was reached, the hoisting of two or three flags caused a telegraphic message to be sent by cable to London and thence to New York, “Passed, steamer North Cape, New York for Marseilles. All well,” so that the ship’s owners and the crew’s friends knew within a few hours that she had once more crossed the Atlantic in safety.

“I should hardly like to be sailing past here in a ship that that tremendous fort was trying to keep out,” Kit declared. “It looks as if nothing could get past, with those great tiers of guns commanding this narrow passage. This is the strangest thing I have seen yet—Africa just across the channel, Spain on this side, and that great tall rock at the end of the peninsula belonging to England. I have read how the rock is full of underground passages and hidden batteries. They call it the impregnable fortress; don’t they, sir?”

“Impregnable is a very good word, Silburn,” the Captain answered, “but no place is impregnable in these days. That rock has been taken and retaken a number of times, so it cannot be impregnable. The English have fortified it very strongly, because it is an important point; but in case of attack they would have to depend largely upon their navy to defend it. A few dynamite cartridges thrown against the rock would soon reduce it.”

“Well, it doesn’t really look as if the English had any business with a big fort right on the best corner of Spain,” Kit went on.

“You will soon find yourself in deep water if you go into such questions as that, young man,” Captain Griffith laughed. “What business have the English in India, or Egypt, or Africa? What business have the Spaniards in Cuba? What business have we in America, for that matter, which belonged to the Indians? You will save yourself trouble by taking things as you find them. You’ll be saying next that the Phœnicians ought to own Marseilles, instead of the French, because they founded it.”

After two days of skirting the Spanish coast the North Cape sighted the Balearic Isles; and two days more took her into the Gulf of Lyons, within a few hours of Marseilles. The last half of her journey in the Mediterranean, however, was not as pleasant as the first; for a heavy wind from the northwest made the air raw and chilly, even in that warm climate, and stirred up a heavy sea.

“It is the Mistral,” the Captain explained. “That is the name they give the cold north wind all along this coast. It comes up very suddenly once every six or eight weeks, and makes the natives shiver. I am just as well satisfied to have it now, for it only lasts a day or two, and we will be pretty sure of fine weather in port.”

As they approached Marseilles, Kit recognized many of the points from what he had read. There was the semicircle of mountains at the rear, forming a vast amphitheatre in which the city lay—desolate, barren-looking mountains of grayish-white rock, with hardly any traces of vegetation. And there was the church on the summit of a high hill rising from the valley, with a great gilded statue of the Virgin Mary on top; he knew that must be Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde, from the descriptions of it, and imagined that the long straight lines running up the side of the hill must be the track of the elevators. Then when they drew nearer he saw the long breakwater, extending a mile or more along the shore, which makes Marseilles one of the best ports in Europe. And to the right lay a group of three rocky islands, some distance apart, one of which he was sure must be the island of the Castle d’If.

“I suppose we run in behind the breakwater, Captain?” he asked. “I see there is quite a forest of masts in there.”

“No,” the Captain answered, “we go into the Old Port—the Vieux Port, as they call it here, vieux being the French word for old. That was the original port, of course, that was the making of Marseilles; and a very curious place it is; a natural basin running right up into the heart of the city, with a narrow entrance. However, you will soon see it all for yourself.”

It was before ten o’clock in the morning that the ship ran between the two old-fashioned forts, one on each side of the narrow entrance, and ploughed her way slowly up the Old Port. It did not look to Kit as if there could possibly be room for another steamer on any of the three sides, so thickly were the vessels crowded in—big steamers and little, sailing-ships, tugs, beautiful yachts, fishing-boats, excursion boats, every sort of craft he could think of. All around, except at the entrance, were broad streets full of people, lined with tall buildings of light stone, many of them looking as if they might have stood since the old Phœnician days. But room was found on the east side for the North Cape, and as soon as she was made fast, both the Captain and Kit went ashore—the former to attend to his custom-house business, and Kit to find his agents.

Within ten minutes they were both back at the ship, each with a disgusted look in his face.

“Well, did you find your agents, Silburn?” the Captain asked. “Just about as much as I got into the Custom House, I suppose. Every business place is shut up tight as a drum. This is some saint’s day or other, and all business is stopped; the only places open are the cafés and tobacco shops. They don’t care very much for Sundays in these Catholic countries, except as a time for bull-fights and the opera; but just give them a saint’s day, and you couldn’t induce one of them to work. This is a wasted day for us, and I don’t like it.”

“Nor I,” Kit answered; “but I suppose we must put up with it. It wouldn’t be so bad if we had some work to do on board.”

“No, there is nothing to do,” the Captain growled. It was not hard to see that he was very much annoyed at the delay. “We might as well go out and see some of the sights, I suppose. How would you like to go up to that church on the hill? or would you rather go out to Castle d’If?”

“Why, I should much rather go out to Monte Cristo’s castle, sir,” Kit answered, wondering that circumstances had made the trip possible on his very first day in port.

“Then Monte Cristo it is!” the Captain exclaimed. “I’ll be getting angry at these saintly Frenchmen pretty soon if I don’t do something to work it off. Then you step ashore, Silburn, and find out how we can get there. There used to be a little steamboat or two going out, and I suppose they still run. Just find out what time they start.”

Kit returned in a few minutes with a longer face than before.

“No boats to-day, Captain,” he reported. “They are all afraid of the rough water outside.”

“Right enough for them,” the Captain answered, “since they are small excursion boats and made for smooth water. But there’s nothing outside to-day to hurt a good sea-boat. Step over there to the head of the port where you see those sail-boats to hire, and see whether you can get a boatman to take us over.”

Kit was gone longer this time, but once more he returned with bad news.

“I’m afraid we’ll have to give it up, Captain,” he said. “Not one of the boatmen will venture outside the port. I made them understand by saying ‘Castle d’If,’ and pointing out; but they only shook their heads and answered ‘Le Mistral! le Mistral!’”

“Well,” the Captain exclaimed, with an expressive shrug of the shoulders, “this town is pretty well closed to-day, isn’t it? But I think I can find a way to get to that island. Lower away the longboat, Mr. Mason.”

CHAPTER XII.
IMPRISONED IN THE CASTLE D’IF.

THERE was a great deal of the boy left in Captain Griffith, as Kit had long suspected; though he attended so thoroughly to his business that it did not often have a chance to show itself. But having made up his mind to enjoy a little holiday at the Castle d’If, he entered fully into the spirit of it. His ordering the longboat lowered was sufficient indication that he intended to sail out to the island, for it would have taken six or eight men to row it against the heavy sea, and it was the only one of the ship’s boats that was fitted with a mast and sail.

“We can hardly be back in time for dinner,” the Captain said, looking at his watch. “Put us up a good big basket of lunch, steward—enough for five or six men, for I must have some passengers along for ballast, in this breeze. Suppose you step up and ask the chief engineer whether he would like to go out to the castle, Silburn; and you can bring your friend Haines too, if he likes to come. I will take you along, Henry, to look after the lunch.”

The little trip to the castle was developing into a regular picnic, much to Kit’s delight. With the Captain and Tom Haines and Harry along, they were sure to have a lively time. Both the chief engineer and Tom Haines were glad to go, and in a few minutes they were all ready for the start.

“Now let me see,” said the Captain, before he went down the ladder to the little boat, in which the mast had been stepped. “We must have everything we are likely to need, for there’s no telling how we may find things out there. The island belongs to the government, and they used to keep a man there to show the castle to visitors, but I don’t know how it is now. Plenty of lunch in the basket, steward?”

“Enough for twice as many, sir,” the steward answered, “and dishes too. You’ll not go hungry, sir.”

“Then I don’t know of anything else we want.”

“Water, sir?” Kit suggested; “hadn’t we better take some water along?”

“There’s always a keg of water in the boat,” the Captain answered. “See that it’s full, Henry. Besides, there is a big well or tank in the castle, enough to supply a whole garrison. But we may need some candles, for some of those dungeons are so dark you can hardly see your hand before your face. Put a good package of candles in the basket, steward.”

The steward ran back to the cabin for the candles, and in another minute they were off, the five men making just about a proper ballast for the boat when the sail began to draw. The Captain took the helm and the main sheet, Harry and Tom Haines were sent up forward to keep her a little down by the head, and Kit and the chief engineer seated themselves amidships.

“This is Fort St. John on the right,” the Captain said, as they sped through the harbor entrance, “and on the left is Fort St. Nicholas. Now look at this big building on the high point to the left—the one that stands in the handsome park. They call that the Château de Pharo. It belonged to the Emperor Napoleon III., and he presented it to the city. In the great cholera epidemic of 1885 they used it for a hospital, and it has since been turned into a medical school with a hospital attached. That is the handsomest site in Marseilles; trust an emperor for picking out the choice spots. Now look out for a little tossing when we round the point.”

It was more than “a little tossing” that they got when they were once out in the big bay. Great waves chased their stern, and occasionally the boat tumbled down from the crest of a billow with a violent slap. But there was no fear in any of the party to mar the pleasure of the sail. They not only felt perfectly safe with the Captain at the helm, but knew, too, that he would not have taken them out if there had been any danger in so stanch a boat.

“Now you have a fine view of Marseilles,” he said, when they were well out. “Off to the left there the breakwater runs so far that you can barely see the end of it. And to the right of the point is what they call ‘the Corniche.’ That is a long, smooth, winding drive along the shore, and one of the handsomest places to be found anywhere. When you go out there two or three miles you come to the end of the Prado; and by turning into that you come to the heart of the city again.”

“See how old Notre-Dame stands out on the hilltop,” he went on. “You would hardly think that statue of the Virgin, on the summit, was thirty feet high, would you? But it is. They have to gild it every few years to keep it bright, and it costs twelve thousand dollars to cover it with gold-leaf. It is so windy up there that they have to build a little house around it for the painters to work in. That is the favorite church with the Marseilles sailors. Many of them go up there to say their prayers before setting out on a voyage. Then when they are in danger at sea they promise an offering to the Virgin if their lives are saved, and when they get back to port they present a little toy ship to the church, or a tablet to be put on the walls. It is full of such things.”

“Don’t you think, sir, it would be better for them to give their attention to navigating their ship, when they are in danger?” Haines asked.

“Well, that is their form of religion,” the Captain answered; “we must not ridicule them for living up to their faith. But what do you think of this boat for a sailer, boys? It is two miles from the port out to the castle, and we shall be there in five minutes more. Why, she deserves to be taken up to Nice and entered in the spring regattas.”

At this mention of the castle they all looked toward it and saw that it was a large and very old building of stone, with battlements on the top, and a high tower rising far above the rest, the whole standing upon a great rock that rose from the water’s edge to a height of thirty or forty feet.

“That must have been a very strong place before the days of heavy guns,” Kit suggested.

“It was one of the strongest forts in France,” the Captain replied. “For centuries the most important political prisoners were confined here. There was not the least chance for them to escape or for their friends to rescue them. Do you see that high battlement that runs up almost straight from the water? That is where Monte Cristo, according to the story, was thrown into the sea when he pretended to be dead and was sewn up in a sack. And if I’m not mistaken he was no wetter then than we are going to be before we get ashore, for there is a heavy sea running against this rock.

“There is the landing-place, just at the foot of that rocky path,” he continued, standing up in the stern to look about. “It is a wharf of natural rock, with three or four fathoms of water. But there’s no landing there to-day, with this sea breaking over it. We must get around to leeward and try to find a bit of beach.”

The island offers very little in the way of beach, but on the sheltered side they found a smooth slope that answered their purpose, and in a few minutes they were safely on shore and had dragged the boat well up out of harm.

“Now this way,” the Captain directed. “One of you youngsters help Henry carry the basket. We’ve got to get around to that path we saw, for the gate at the top of it is the only entrance.”

By scrambling over the rocks they soon reached the path, and followed it over rough and slippery rocks, up a steep incline, to the heavy gate, which was closed, but not locked. Once through the gate, the path showed more evidences of care, though it was still rough and difficult, rising in a sort of rude stairway, with a step followed by four or five feet of steep incline, then another step and another incline. On the right was a thick stone wall, with long narrow slanting slits for firing muskets through.

Up and up the path led, growing rougher the nearer it approached the castle, till it ran across a large open yard and ended at the moat, over which a heavy wooden drawbridge was lowered.

“There’s a sample of old times for you,” the Captain said, when they reached the drawbridge and paused for breath. “Two or three days’ work would make a good path of that; but in two or three centuries not one commander of the place had ambition enough to repair it.”

Crossing the bridge over the dry and rocky and weedy moat, they reached the entrance to the castle proper, where the massive doors stood hospitably open, and they walked in without challenge or hindrance. It was soon evident that there was no other person on the island, for they hallooed and shouted, but received no reply.

“Strange that they leave such a historical place without any one to take care of it,” said the chief engineer. And it did look odd, but the fact was that the man in charge had gone ashore on some errand, and the heavy sea had prevented his return.

Having passed through the main portal, they were in a large stone-paved courtyard, nearly in the centre of which stood an old-fashioned well-curb. A heavy stone stairway on the opposite side led to a solid gallery of iron and stone running completely around the court, both stairs and gallery having a strong rail of wrought iron. Numerous doors opened from both the ground floor and the gallery, some closed and some standing open, and over several of the doors were small signs bearing the names of their former occupants.

“Put your lunch basket here in the corner,” the Captain directed Harry. “There doesn’t seem to be any one here to disturb it. But get out some candles, and we’ll have a look at these lower dungeons first. Nearly every one of these solid doors leads to a dungeon, I suppose you understood, and some of them to a series of dungeons. Silburn is anxious to see Monte Cristo’s late residence, I am sure. Do you see his name on the sign there under the stairway, Silburn?”

“Yes, sir, I saw that the first thing,” Kit answered. “But there is so much to see here a fellow hardly knows where to look. It is like going back two or three hundred years at a single step. Even in the old buildings of London I saw nothing like this. It is a regular feudal castle, such as we see sometimes in pictures.”

“It adds a little to the romance of the thing to have the place entirely to ourselves,” said the Captain. “We are as safe from intrusion as if we raised the drawbridge and bolted the big doors, for you may be sure none of the French boatmen will come out in this sea. Now, then, if you are all ready, we will visit Monte Cristo first. Give me a candle, and I will lead the way.”

With a lighted candle in his hand the Captain went through a broad but low arched doorway, followed by all the others, into a small dark cell, paved with stone, to which a few faint rays of light were admitted by a slit a foot long and about two inches wide in the upper part of one wall.

“And did Monte Cristo spend fourteen years in such a dark hole as this!” Kit exclaimed, with a shudder.

“No, indeed,” the Captain answered; “he was in a far worse place than this. Now look out for your footing on this slant and for your heads in the low doorway.”

He led the way to another and smaller doorway in the darkest corner, not high enough to stand erect under, and reached by going down a dark and dangerous incline of a few feet.

“This,” said he, “is Monte Cristo’s dungeon. You see it is lower than the other, and even darker. Here on the side is the hole that he cut through into the priest’s cell. Do you see where a large stone has been removed? We could crawl through there into the other cell, but it is not worth while, as they are much the same. Well, Mr. Supercargo, how do you like this sort of a residence?”

“Terrible!” Kit answered. “The only good thing I see about it is that it is entirely dry. There does not seem to be any of the dampness that we expect in a dungeon.”

“That is because these dungeons are all above ground, and founded on rock,” the Captain explained. “And this Monte Cristo cell is the worst of all. It is not more than ten or twelve feet square, you see, and the ceiling is low. In fact, it is no better than a dark cellar. But in the upper tier there are some fine cells. Occasionally they caught a king or prince and caged him here, you know, and they had better quarters.”

“Then let us go and see them!” the chief engineer exclaimed. “It’s enough to give a man the shivers to look at such holes as these.”

Cautiously they crawled out of the lower dungeons and went to the stairway. As they passed the well-curb, Harry stopped and raised the lid and looked down.

“Water!” he cried; “I should say so. Here’s a big square tank with water enough to float a ship.”

“‘HERE—IS THE HOLE HE CUT THROUGH INTO THE PRIEST’S CELL.’”

They went up the broad, heavy stairs to the gallery, and the Captain paused before a door that was marked “Louis-Philippe, 1792.”

“Hello!” Kit cried; “did they have Louis-Philippe in here? Why, he was one of the kings of France!”

“This was not the king, if I remember rightly,” the Captain replied, “but the Duke of Orleans, and father of the king of the same name. You will see a very different cell here from Monte Cristo’s, if the door is not locked.”

The huge door opened readily, and they stepped into a large and lofty room, moderately well lighted by a window that overlooked the court, but that was not quite wide enough to offer a chance of escape. The stone floor and heavy stone walls gave the apartment, to be sure, something of the air of a prison; but it was eighteen or twenty feet square, and on one side was a handsome fireplace, with a broad stone seat on each side, and a carved mantel of stone that evidently had once been a work of art, but that was badly chipped and broken by time, perhaps with the assistance of some of the royal prisoners. When they looked up the chimney, through which they had a glimpse of the scudding clouds, they saw that although the opening was nearly four feet across, it was not more than five or six inches wide, so that a prisoner could not escape through it.

“You see they had better quarters for their distinguished prisoners than they gave to poor sailors like Monte Cristo,” the Captain said. “Just imagine this room fitted up with rugs and hangings and handsome furniture, as no doubt it was when Louis-Philippe occupied it. A man could hardly want a better place. There are more such rooms on this tier, that you can look at later on. Some of them were occupied by Albert del Campo, Bernardot, a rich armorer of Marseilles who was mixed up with the Duc de Richelieu. The Man in the Iron Mask, the Count de Mirabeau, the Abbé Peretti, and a great many more famous men of their times. Now if you want a good view of the bay, come up to the top of the tower.”

The Captain led the way up the iron stairs of the tower, all the others following. But before Kit and Harry Leonard, who brought up the rear, reached the top, they heard an exclamation of surprise from the Captain, who hurriedly began to descend the steps.

“Make for the boat, boys, as fast as you can!” he cried. “The wind has shifted, and the sea is tumbling in on that side hard enough to break her to pieces. We must get her further up in a hurry, or we’ll lose a good boat.”

The party made a scramble down the stairs, across the court, and down the rough steps outside, then along the jagged rocks, till they reached the boat, which, by their united strength, was soon dragged out of reach of the waves. But the spot where they had landed in comparatively smooth water was now beaten by heavy seas that wet them with their spray.

“That was a narrow escape!” Kit exclaimed. “It wouldn’t have taken many minutes to break her up, where she lay. But she’s all right now.”

“Yes, the boat is all right now,” Captain Griffith answered; “but that’s about all we can say. There’s no such thing as launching her from these rocks while the wind holds in this quarter. We’re as safely imprisoned in Castle d’If as ever Monte Cristo was. We are in for a night of it here, at any rate; you can make up your minds to that.”

“Hurrah!” Harry Leonard cried, waving his arms. “Ain’t that a jolly lark! We have plenty of provisions and lights and a big tank of water, and I wish the Mistral would last a week.”

But the Captain gave him such a look that Harry suddenly made his face as serious as if the voice had come from the blackened rocks.

“It would make bad work for us if this wind should hold too long,” the Captain said. “But I think we can look for a change in the night; and for the present we have no great cause to complain. We may consider it settled, at any rate, that we must spend the night in the castle. Chief, you and Haines bring along the sail and hang it somewhere to dry; we may need it to-night to lie on. And we will all go back to the court till I organize you into a proper garrison and set the watches.

“Now I am going to establish a headquarters,” he went on, when they were in the court again. “Shall we be romantic and take Monte Cristo’s cell, or be comfortable and camp in Louis-Philippe’s big room?”

“Let us be kings while we can,” the chief engineer answered, as the Captain looked at him for a reply. “It looks a little rheumatic in Monte Cristo’s place, and the other is a fine large room.”

“Very well, then,” the Captain decided; “headquarters established in room No. 14, formerly the residence of the Duke of Orleans. Henry, you are appointed quartermaster; you and Silburn bring up the provisions.”

He led the way again to Louis-Philippe’s cell, and looked about to see what they most needed.

“Chief,” he soon said, “I am going to put you in charge of a foraging expedition. If you will take Haines and Henry with you down to the big yard across the moat, you will find the remains of an old shed or something that has collapsed there. I noticed it as we came in. Let them bring up a good stock of the old boards. It will be cold to-night, and we shall need a fire, and some of them can be made into seats.”

The departure of the other three left Kit and the Captain alone in the cell.

“This is more of an adventure than we bargained for, sir,” Kit said. “I didn’t think when I was reading that story, that I should be a prisoner myself in Castle d’If. None of us will forget it in a hurry, and I think I am rather glad it has happened.”

“So am I, to tell the truth,” said the Captain. “It won’t do us any harm if the weather lets us away in the morning. I don’t go in for this sort of thing very often; but now that we are in for it, we may as well enjoy it.”

Within the next hour the big cell bore a more homelike look than it had had for many a day. With two of the boards a rough table was made between the chimney-place and the inner wall. More boards were converted into two rough benches; still others were arranged slantingly against a wall to make a springy bed; and by resting one end of the remainder on the stone seats and jumping upon them they were soon converted into a formidable heap of firewood.

“How many candles, Mr. Quartermaster?” the Captain asked.

“Eleven, sir,” Harry answered, “besides one that was partly burned when we were in Monte Cristo’s cell.”

“Very good. The fire will give us light enough most of the time. And the provisions?”

“I’ll see, sir,” Harry replied; and taking the napkin from the top of the basket he spread it upon the improvised table and began to lay the food out upon it.

“Here’s more than half of a boiled ham, sir,” he began, “and a roast chicken, and three loaves of bread and some rolls, butter, pickles, some cold roast beef, a big pot of cold coffee, pepper and salt, and a lot of dishes and knives and forks. That’s all, sir.”

“All!” the Captain laughed. “The castle is provisioned for a siege. It’s a good thing the North Cape has such a liberal-minded steward. I was afraid we might only have enough for one meal; but if we take a good sandwich apiece now, we will have plenty for supper and breakfast. Make us five big ham sandwiches, Mr. Quartermaster.”

“Aye, aye, sir!” Harry replied. He was so excited over being at once a shipwrecked mariner and a prisoner in a celebrated old castle, that it was well for him to have something to do.

With the sandwiches in their hands they strolled among the dismal cells, finding something on every hand to interest them. Afterward they went out to explore the island outside the castle walls, and found caves made by the angry water, and in several places steps cut in the rock, where small boats could land passengers. When the first signs of dusk appeared they returned to the castle; and Kit in wandering about found two things that excited his curiosity.

“There are some locked doors down on the ground tier,” he said to the Captain, “that may lead to places of interest. And I have found a very small narrow cell, hardly high enough for a man to stand up in, without any window at all. I wonder what that can have been for.”

“I don’t know about the locked doors,” the Captain answered, “but most likely they lead to the rooms occupied by the people who take care of the place. There must be somebody in charge of it, and they may have gone ashore and been kept there by the storm. It is very natural that they should lock the doors of their rooms on going away. The small dark cell that you have discovered, however, was the death chamber. When a prisoner was condemned to death he was taken there without any warning, generally in the night or early morning. A guillotine was set up there, and the man never came out alive. I suppose this castle could tell some terrible tales if it could talk. But we must be thinking of supper. Haines, you and Henry bring up a few more loads of boards first; that light wood burns up very rapidly, and it is growing chilly.”

The bare old cell soon looked quite cheerful, with a rousing blaze in the fireplace, and its five occupants seated on the benches, eating a good supper and drinking coffee that they had heated over the fire. The Captain announced during the meal that Silburn was to stand watch from six to ten, Haines from ten to two, and Harry Leonard from two till six.

“And the watchman must take care of the fire,” he added, “and keep an eye on the weather. If the wind shifts, I am to be called immediately.”

Kit’s watch carried them through one of the most enjoyable evenings he had ever spent. With the benches drawn up in front of the fire the Captain began to spin sea-yarns, and told them tales of adventure and hairbreadth escape in many seas in various parts of the world. The chief engineer, too, had a good stock of such stories; and Haines spun two or three yarns that kept them in roars of laughter.

“I can’t do my share at this business,” Kit lamented. “I’ve hardly seen a real gale yet, much less had any adventures.”

“That would be no drawback, if you were a real Jack Tar instead of a supercargo,” the Captain said, laughing. “When Jack is short of adventures he invents a few. Some of the imaginary yarns are better than the true ones, too. But you can spin a real yarn some time about the night you were imprisoned in the Castle d’If.”

By ten o’clock the stories were pretty much all told, the sail, now thoroughly dry, was spread over the bed of boards, and all but Haines, the next watch, prepared for sleep. There was no covering, to be sure; but the blazing fire promised to give them a warm and comfortable night. Before turning in, the Captain went to the top of the tower, and found the night intensely dark, but no change in the weather.

When two o’clock came, and Haines aroused Harry Leonard to relieve him on watch, the others were all fast asleep; but the slight noise woke the Captain, and he went out quietly to look at the sky, without finding any change in the wind.

Harry began his watch by putting on more wood, and making a blaze that illuminated the stone cell beautifully. But about four o’clock the watchful Captain stirred, turned over, raised his head, and asked:

“Any change yet in the weather, Henry?”

The cell was dark and chilly, the fire burned down, and no answer came from the watch.

Thoroughly awake in an instant, the Captain sprang up and found Harry sitting sound asleep on one of the stone seats in the chimney-place.

Surprised and angered at this disobedience of orders, he stepped to the door to look at the sky again before awaking the watchman in the emphatic way that he contemplated. He put his thumb on the heavy wrought-iron latch and pushed against the door, but it would not open.

He pushed harder and shook the door, but instead of its opening, the shaking only gave him a still greater surprise. He could tell by the feel and the rattling that the door was held fast by the heavy bolt on the outside. Somebody or something had shot the bolt!

He went to the window and looked out, but all was black as ink. Then, hardly able to believe his senses, he returned to the door and shook it again.

It was so plain that he had to believe it. The bolt was shot, and they were all securely imprisoned in the cell of Louis-Philippe, in the Castle d’If.

CHAPTER XIII.
A VISIT TO NOTRE-DAME-DE-LA-GARDE.

THE noise made by the Captain in shaking the door aroused Harry, and he sprang up, looking very much frightened.

“It’s not six o’clock yet, is it, sir?” he asked; “I must have fallen asleep just a minute ago.”

“Yes, you are a very valuable man on watch,” the Captain answered. “The fire burned out in that minute while you were asleep, I suppose? And it must have been in the same minute that some one came along and fastened the door and locked us all in here, no doubt.”

“Locked us in, sir!” Harry exclaimed. “Why, there is no one on the island to lock us in. I shut the door some time ago because it was growing colder. But no one could have locked it.”

He went up to the door and shook it, but of course could not open it.

“The bolt must have slipped when I shut it, sir,” he said. “The wind was blowing in so hard.”

“No matter what fastened it,” the Captain replied; “it is enough for us to know that it is fastened. It is much more important to know why you were asleep when I put you on watch. Don’t you know that that is one of the most serious offences you could commit? But I shall have something to say to you about that later on. Start up the fire, and put the remainder of the coffee on to warm.”

It was in no very pleasant frame of mind that Harry set to work at building the fire. There was something in the Captain’s manner that looked ominous. Though it was plain that he was greatly displeased at such a breach of discipline, and the results that had followed it, he was cool and quiet, and that promised worse things for the offender than if he had stormed and blustered. And even in his own mind, Harry could not excuse himself. He had been left on watch and had gone to sleep, and while he slept they had been locked in. He could not help thinking of the death chamber below, and the prisoners called from sleep to be guillotined. He felt, he imagined, very much as they must have felt while walking down the stone steps, chained and guarded, to enter the gloomy chamber.

The noise soon awakened Kit and the chief and Haines, and they could not believe at first that they were really prisoners. But very little experimenting with the door convinced each in turn that it was only too true.

“The bolt must have slipped when the door slammed,” the chief engineer decided, bringing his mechanical mind to bear on the problem. “Maybe we can shove it back with a thin strip of board.”

He found a bit that he thought might answer the purpose and went to the window with it, but one or two trials convinced him that the bolt could not be reached in that way.

“Don’t waste your strength on that idea,” the Captain said. “These heavy bolts cannot slip so easily. Indeed, I should be very sorry to think that it had slipped of itself, for in that case we might possibly be kept here for days, without sufficient provisions. Evidently some one has fastened the bolt. Either there was some one else on the island from the beginning, or the guardian of the castle has returned and shut us in. I hope that is the case, for whoever shut us in will let us out. At any rate, we will eat some breakfast before doing anything else. By that time it will be daylight.”

Somehow it did not seem quite so romantic to be encamped in Louis-Philippe’s cell when they were actually prisoners. Kit could not help making a mental picture of some visitor opening the door after weeks had passed, and finding them all lying starved to death. The coffee was comforting in the raw morning, but the breakfast was not as jolly a meal as the supper had been.

“Now,” said the Captain, when they were done eating, “we will see what we can do toward getting out. It is growing light outside. You reach a piece of board through the window, Haines, and pound it against the wall, and halloo at the same time. If there is any one in the castle, he will be pretty sure to hear it.”

Haines followed these directions, and made such a racket that it seemed as if it must have been heard across the water in Marseilles.

“Somebody’s coming!” he exclaimed, after a minute or two of pounding. “I hear a footstep on the stones below.”

“Halloo!” he shouted. “Halloo there! Come and unfasten the door! We want to get out!”

“Here he comes!” Haines cried, a moment later. “It’s a soldier. He’s coming up the stairs.”

“Then let me take your place,” the Captain said; “I will do the talking.”

The footsteps came nearer and nearer around the gallery, and in another moment a young soldier in the French uniform stood before the window.

“Good morning,” said the Captain. “Just slide that bolt back, please; we are fastened in here.”

The soldier gave a military salute, but did not stir.

“Oh, he speaks French, of course,” the Captain exclaimed; “and I don’t know enough of the language to talk to him. Do any of you speak French?”

“I can struggle with it a little,” the chief engineer answered, “though I know very little about it.” He took the Captain’s place at the window, and bowed to the soldier.

“Bon jour, monsieur,” he said. “Nous avons une grand desir to—to—(oh, what a dreadful language!) to sortie. Ouvrir la porte, s’il vous plait.”

The soldier shook his head and made some reply in French.

“What does he say?” the Captain asked.

“He says why don’t we keep quiet,” the chief answered. “Oh, no; hold on; I got mixed with that. He says why did we come in?”

“Tell him we came to see the castle,” the Captain said, “and could not get away on account of the storm.”

The chief put this into French as well as he could, and the soldier immediately began a long and very rapid tirade, in which they caught the words “deux cent kilos de bois,” “hier soir,” and “batteau des gendarmes.” But he showed no inclination to open the door.

“What’s all that?” the Captain asked.

“As well as I can make it out,” the chief replied, “he says that he is the keeper of the castle, and he was detained on shore by the storm. When the wind abated early this morning he got a boatman to bring him out, and seeing a light in this cell he came up and found us here. That we came without permission, and burned up two hundred kilos of his wood (that’s nearly four hundred pounds), and that he is going to signal for the police boat and have us taken in charge.”

“Oh, that’s what he is after, is it?” the Captain laughed. “Then I know a language he will understand. Let me get there a moment.”

Again at the window, the Captain put his hand in his pocket and drew out a ten-franc gold piece which he held between his thumb and forefinger where the soldier could see it, and pointed toward the door.

Evidently that was the language he understood best. He immediately began to smile and reached for the gold, which the Captain handed him; and in thirty seconds more the big door was unbolted, and they all slipped out. The gold piece changed the aspect of affairs entirely. Instead of being their jailer the soldier tried to show them every attention; and while the chief exchanged a few polite words with him, Captain Griffith climbed the tower again, and found that the worst of the wind had died out, what was left coming from another quarter, so that there was no longer any difficulty about launching the boat.

It took some time to prepare to start, replacing the sail, packing the dishes, and getting the boat into the water; but the sun was just nicely up over the Corniche when they sailed into the Old Port again.

After reaching the North Cape, Kit soon went ashore to find the agents; but it was still much too early for the Captain to do any business at the Custom House, and he remained on board. Harry set about cleaning the cabin, making a great show of industry, but wondering all the time what the Captain would say or do to him. He had not forgotten the remark that Kit had made to him, long before, about the rope’s-end in the Captain’s room. To be sure, Captain Griffith had always treated him very kindly; but he had never before done anything quite as bad as to go to sleep on watch. The thought of the rope’s-end troubled him; and it was still troubling him when the Captain’s bell rang.

“Now I’m in for it!” he said to himself. “I’m glad there’s nobody else down here but the steward, anyhow.”

“Come in here and shut the door, Henry,” the Captain said, when he answered the call.

“Oh, yes, I’m in for it now,” he thought. “This is the death chamber, sure.”

“Come up here where I can look at you,” the Captain said. He was seated in front of his desk. “I want to see whether you realize what it means for a man to go to sleep on watch. If we had been left locked in that cell, and had all starved there, who would have been responsible for it?”

“It would have been my fault, sir,” Harry answered.

“It would have been your fault,” the Captain repeated. “If a sailor goes to sleep on watch, and a collision results, and lives are lost, he is responsible for it, and the law would punish him. The man on watch often holds the lives of his comrades in his hand, and he should always feel the responsibility.”

The Captain stood up as he spoke and stepped toward Harry, but the cabin boy did not shrink. He had made up his mind to take whatever came, without flinching.

“I think you understand what a grave fault you committed,” the Captain went on, laying his hand on Harry’s shoulder, “and feel sorry for it. That is not all the punishment you deserve, but it is all you will get this time, as we were on shore and on a pleasure trip. But never let me catch you asleep on watch again. Now get out about your business.”

Harry was not the first cabin boy who had gone into Captain Griffith’s room expecting something unpleasant, and had come out feeling that he would swim through stormy seas to serve such a captain as that. Perhaps that was the reason that nearly every one of the Captain’s cabin boys had turned out well.

It was almost noon when Kit returned to the ship, feeling rather dissatisfied with the way his affairs had gone on shore.

“What’s the matter, Silburn?” the Captain asked him while they sat at dinner. “Have they been doing you up? You have to look out for them here, or they’ll get the strings right out of your shoes. This place is famous for that. They have a large population in Marseilles from Italy, Spain, Turkey, Greece, Syria, all over creation, all in a hurry to make money without caring much how it is made. They tell me that when Marseilles people buy anything in a store they very often won’t let the shopkeeper wrap it up, for fear he will change it.”

“No, sir,” Kit answered, “they haven’t been robbing me; they have had no chance. But our agents here are curious sort of people, and I am afraid they will give me as much trouble as they can. Indeed, they have given me a great deal more trouble already than there was any need of. One of the first things they said was that they would smooth the way for me to get my stuff through, and I could do the same for what they would send over to New York.”

“Did they, though?” the Captain asked, laughing. “And what did you say to that?”

“Why, I was green enough not to know what they meant, sir. I supposed they referred to the cargo, so I said it had been properly entered and there would be no trouble about getting it through, and it would be the same thing in New York. I can see now, from the way they looked at me, that they could not quite make out whether I was really so innocent, or only pretending to be. At any rate, I soon found that they supposed I had brought some goods on my own account, which I would want to smuggle ashore, and that they wanted to send some in the same way when we go back.”

“That was what they meant, and no mistake,” the Captain said. “There is a great deal of that kind of business done.”

“Not by me, sir,” Kit went on. “I told them very plainly that I had brought nothing but what was on my manifests, and that if they wanted to smuggle anything into New York they would have to try some other ship. That offended them, I am afraid, for they became very cool, and left me to find my way about and make my own arrangements. If they can find any fault here with my work, and give a bad account of me to my employers, I think they will be pretty sure to do it.”

“Well, you have the satisfaction of being in the right,” the Captain answered, “and they are very clearly in the wrong. They will hardly be likely to expose their dishonest intentions by making any complaints in New York. At any rate, your work will show for itself when you get back, if you carry it through well.”

“I have got along all right so far without their assistance,” Kit continued; “but it is a new experience to deal with agents who are disposed to hinder rather than help.”

“Y-e-s,” said the Captain, dryly. “You will find that you have still one or two things to learn in the world. Well?”

“I have picked up more information than I should have got if I had been depending upon them. If they think I can’t land a cargo of oil without their help, they are very much mistaken.”

“Oh, ho!” the Captain laughed; “my young supercargo is beginning to feel his oats! Quite right, lad. And if they don’t have the homeward cargo ready for you promptly, their principals will have something to say to them. You may be sure of that.”

“This wharf that we are at,” Kit went on, “they call the ‘Quai de la Fratérnité.’ The oil is to go into that warehouse just across the street. They talked about keeping us a week before their stevedore could take out our cargo, so I found one myself and made a contract with him, and his men are to begin work to-morrow morning.”

“Good for the young American!” the Captain cried. “If these people get too high, just remember that there is such a thing as a cable under the ocean, and that in a few hours you can get orders from New York that they are bound to obey as well as you.”

“Yes, sir; but I hope it will not come to that. That square stone building across the port,” Kit went on, “is the Hôtel de Ville, or City Hall. You see I am getting to be quite a Frenchman. And this wide street that runs down to the end of the port is the Cannebiere, the main street of Marseilles, that is mentioned so often in ‘Monte Cristo.’ And when you follow it up a little ways, it changes into the Allée Meilhan, where Monte Cristo’s father died, you know. Then over at that corner of the port there begins a wide street called the Rue de la République, which runs diagonally down to the breakwater.

“Well, you have made good use of your morning,” the Captain declared.

“Oh, that is only a beginning, sir,” Kit laughed. “I hear that this is considered the unhealthiest city in Europe, because it is so dirty. Why, only three or four years ago all the sewers emptied into this basin, and they say the smell of it was something frightful.”

“I can testify to that,” the Captain interrupted. “Last time I was here it was a standing joke that no ship need take in ballast in Marseilles—the smell of the harbor was strong enough for ballast. It is none too sweet yet, for that matter.”

“And still it is a very fine city,” Kit said; “the most interesting place I have ever seen. There are so many strange things here. That church of Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde keeps staring at me from its hilltop wherever I go. I have a strong notion to go to see it this afternoon, for I shall be very busy after we begin work.”

“You will have plenty of time after dinner,” the Captain replied. “And I can promise you that you will not be disappointed. We don’t hear much about it in America, because Marseilles is very little known there; but to my mind that church is one of the greatest sights in Europe. I won’t go with you this time, for I lost too much sleep last night and want a nap. But this will be a capital day to go. The Mistral is rising again, and on the top of that hill you will learn something about the force of the wind. You can take Henry with you if you want him, for sight-seeing alone is stupid work.”

Kit was very glad for this permission, both on Harry’s account and his own; and toward the middle of the afternoon they went ashore and took an omnibus to the “Garden of the Ascenseurs,” as the starting-point for the church is called.

“Well, if this is an omnibus, then I never saw a street car,” Harry declared. “It’s exactly like a street car. Why do they call it an omnibus, I wonder?”

“Because it does not run on tracks,” Kit explained. “You see there are no rails; it goes right over the paving-stones. It does look like a street car, that’s a fact, and has the same small wheels.”

“Everything is different here from anywhere else,” Harry went on. “Just look at the names of the streets! First we came up the Cannebiere, then up Rue Paradis. Then we turned up the Cours Pierre Puget into Rue Breteuil, and now we are going up the Rue Dragon. What would they think of such names in Huntington, Kit? But the ascenseurs! That’s what takes me. What are they, Kit? some kind of animals?”

“Why, the word is almost English,” Kit laughed. “We call them elevators, in London they call them lifts, and in France they are called ascenseurs. They are elevators, that’s all, to take us up the hill.”

“Say, old man, I don’t see where you learn so many things!” Harry exclaimed. “We only got here yesterday, and you travel about this town like a native.”

“What do you think my eyes are for?” Kit asked. “But here we are. This seems to be the end of navigation.”

The omnibus had run through a big gateway into a small garden, and could go no further because at the end of the garden an immense hill of rock rose almost straight into the air. As they stepped out, an old man held a tin box in front of them, with a hole in the top to drop coins through.

“No, thank you,” said Harry, “I don’t care for any to-day. They have a good stock of beggars in this town,” he added to Kit, “but that’s the first one I ever saw in uniform.”

“He begs for the sailors’ hospital, so the guidebook says,” Kit answered, as he dropped a ten-centime piece into the box. “There, what do you think of going up the hill in that thing?”

He pointed, as he spoke, to a great pile of masonry that rose almost straight up the side of the hill, with two tracks, one on each side, and near the top a series of dark and forbidding arches. The whole thing had an uncanny look; and they heard the rapid flow of a stream of water, but could not see it.

“Phew!” Harry exclaimed. “I don’t like the looks of it very much. I’ve never made a practice of going to church in an elevator, you know. But I suppose it must be safe enough, as other people use it.”

At the foot of the masonry was a small open pavilion where a man sold tickets for the elevators; and after paying their fares, eighty centimes, or sixteen cents, each, which entitled them to go up and come down, they passed through a turnstile and stepped into a car nearly as large as a small room, with a seat across the back, large windows in the front, and before the windows a narrow platform, on which stood the brakeman.

The only other occupant of the car was a priest dressed in the garb of his order—a low black hat, with broad brim turned up at the sides, long black robe with a cape, and the usual black bow trimmed with a narrow edge of white at the throat—the common costume of a Continental priest. He was a pleasant-looking old man with nearly white hair; and it was plain that he was accustomed to making the ascent, for he paid no attention to the strange surroundings, but sat quietly reading a small book.

“If you tell me what it is, you can have it,” Harry said, nudging Kit with his elbow and directing his eyes toward the priest. “I suppose it’s a man, though it’s dressed like a woman. What in the world do they put black petticoats on their priests for in this part of the world? But take a look at the hat, will you? Nobody could invent an uglier hat than that, not if he sat up nights thinking about it.”

Before Kit could reply a bell tapped, the brakeman turned the little iron wheel by his side, and the car began to ascend—not quietly and smoothly, like most elevators, but with an oscillating motion and the noise of a great rush of water.

In half a minute, as they went up, they were far above the roof of the pavilion, above everything about them but the hill, and Marseilles seemed to lie at their feet. It was a grand sight from the very beginning, and grew grander every moment.

“Yes, it’s a big thing, Kit,” Harry cried. “It’s the greatest sight we’ve seen yet. London hadn’t anything like this to offer.”

At this minute the priest closed his little book and leaned over toward the boys.

“Is this your first visit to the Church of Our Lady, my young friends?” he asked, very pleasantly and in excellent English. “You seem to be strangers. You must let me be your guide when we get to the top, for I am quite familiar with the place.”

It was such a surprise to the boys that they barely had presence of mind to answer politely. And Harry could hardly look at the wonderful view for thinking of the remarks he had made about the obliging priest’s clothes.

CHAPTER XIV.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER FROM ROME.

WHEN the car reached the summit, the priest stepped out, and the boys followed.

“Here,” he said, stepping up to the parapet and making a sweep around the horizon with one arm, “you have one of the grandest views in Europe. It is not as extensive as the view from the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and of course there is not such a wilderness of buildings around us. But here you have what is lacking there, a great body of water for a background. You do not see much of the Mediterranean from this terrace, because the remainder of the hill is in the way; we still have a considerable part of the hill to climb, you know. But from the level of the church there is a grand view of the sea.”

“There could hardly be a better view of the city, sir, than there is from here,” Kit answered. “The entire place seems to be just below us, and the hills by which it is enclosed. The Old Port looks from here like a little pond. But I can make out our ship very plainly, though she looks like a toy boat from this distance. It is the third steamer from the end, on this side, sir.”

“Ah, then you are sailors, are you?” the priest asked. “And I know from your manner of speech that you are Americans.”

“Not exactly sailors, sir,” Harry said, thinking it time for him to take a little part in the conversation. “Mr. Silburn is supercargo of that steamer he showed you, the North Cape, and I am the cabin boy.”

“Then you have a great opportunity to see many parts of the world,” the priest answered. “But in all your travels you will hardly see anything more unusual than the church we are about to visit. There are other churches on hilltops, but none with as many curious phases as this. I have remained for several weeks in Marseilles solely for the sake of becoming well acquainted with it.”

“Then you do not live in Marseilles, sir?” Kit asked. “I suppose that according to the custom of the country we ought to call you ‘father’; but we are Americans and Protestants, and not accustomed to such things.”

“It is not of the least consequence,” the priest answered, with a smile. “I would not have you depart from what you believe to be right. It is not a good plan to be Protestant in America and a Catholic in Europe and a Mohammedan in Turkey, and a Confucian in China. Whatever you are, stick to it wherever you go. No,” he went on, “I do not live in Marseilles. My home overlooks this same beautiful blue sea, but it is many leagues from here. I live in Rome.”

“We need not linger here,” the priest continued, “for the view is much broader from the church. Come this way, and we will ascend to the summit.”

He led the way under a heavy stone arch to a long, broad stone viaduct, like a bridge, extending from the column of masonry to the hill beyond. Then the wide stone walk went up, up, with occasional flights of five or six steps. At the further end of this was a longer flight of stone steps, then a turn and another flight, and they were in front of the entrance to a solid stone fort, with a soldier on guard at the gate. At this level the gale was so strong that they could hardly keep their feet. But still they kept on, up more stone steps, till they came to the portico of the church.

“We seem to be the only visitors this afternoon,” the priest said, “though generally there are a number of persons here. I suppose they do not like the high wind.”

Instead of ascending the last flight of steps, leading to the interior of the church, they turned to the left on a broad stone promenade extending around the building. On one side of this was a low stone house with several doors, and over one of the doors a sign bearing the words, “Café, chocolat, vins fins et ordinaire, spiriteaux, tabac.”

“Look at the gin-mill!” Harry exclaimed. “Who ever heard of a—” But he recollected himself before he went any further, and stopped suddenly.

“Do not stop on my account,” the priest said, with a low, pleasant little laugh. “It looks odd to you, I know, to see a liquor shop attached to a church. But every country has its own customs, you know. And here the conditions are very unusual. This is not only a church, but a fort too, as well as a signal station. All the ships that enter the harbor are signalled from the poles on the other side of the building.”

When they turned the corner, they had a beautiful view of the Mediterranean for many miles, and the harbor with its forts and breakwater, and the long range of minor hills and valleys lying between the city and its encircling mountains.

“This little house, I believe,” the priest said as they turned again, pointing to a small stone building that stood on the edge of the promenade, almost overhanging the precipice, “is for the use of the clergy attached to the church. But I have not made the acquaintance of any of them, so I cannot take you in. Perhaps we had better go up now into the church.”

They stopped, however, in front of the church door while the priest pointed out the moat, crossed by a heavy drawbridge, which they had come over without noticing.

“On account of the fort it was necessary to make the church capable of defence also,” he explained. “In case of need the church could make a very strong defence, with the bridge drawn up. I think you have no fortified churches in your country?”

“THEY HAD A BEAUTIFUL VIEW OF THE MEDITERRANEAN.”

“No, sir,” Kit replied; “I never saw one before. There are a great many things in Europe that we do not have in America.”

“Ah, but you are modest about it!” the priest laughed. “You have also a great many things there that we do not have here.”

As they ascended the inner steps they found a little shop on each side of the entrance, kept by elderly women who were evidently sisters of some order, as they were clad from head to foot in white nuns’-cloth. The goods they sold were crosses, medallions, strings of beads, pictures of the church, and other sacred emblems. And just outside, in full view, was the office where masses for the repose of the souls of the dead could be arranged for and the bills paid, and where large and small candles for church use were also sold.

A big doorway on the first landing opened into a crypt or lower chapel; but the iron gate across was locked, and they went up another flight of steps to the church proper—a church of no unusual size, but one of the handsomest and most artistic in France, with walls and pillars of marble, red jasper, and other costly materials. Near the doors were two large stands with innumerable holders for candles, in which many were burning, some as tall as a man, others not much larger than the ordinary household candles.

The priest had pointed out the curious toy ships hanging from the ceiling, all offerings from mariners who had been delivered from peril; the hundreds of tablets on the walls, “like peppermint lozenges with blue borders,” as Harry whispered to Kit; and the costly altar decorations, when he suddenly stopped and looked at his watch.

“I think we had better go out a moment,” he said, “and learn how late the ascenseurs run. It would be awkward to be left up here after they had made their last trip for the night.”

When they reached the stone promenade they saw several men running at great speed toward the ascenseurs; but whether something had happened or whether the men were trying to catch the car, was more than they could tell. The priest, however, asked the attendant who sat near the church door, and so learned the truth.

“There is some trouble with the ascenseurs,” he explained, after a short conversation in French with the attendant. “Not exactly an accident, but some part of the engine was broken down, and they cannot run till it is repaired. They think all will be in order again in half an hour, so we need give ourselves no uneasiness about it.”

“That is a capital illustration of the fallibility of all things human,” he continued, as they stepped back out of the wind. “Those ascenseurs are supposed to be as nearly perfect as such mechanism can be made. It was thought that nothing could possibly happen to them. They operate on what is known as the ‘water balance’ system. As one car goes down the other goes up; and there is a water tank under each car. Before a car starts from the top, its tank is filled with water by an engine that forces the water up through a pipe, and the added weight of the water makes it so much heavier that it easily draws the other car up. Then there are four large wire cables attached to each car, besides the usual devices for bringing the cars to a stop in case the cables should break. That looks as if every possible danger had been guarded against, doesn’t it? Yet some trifling thing about the engine gives way, and the whole beautiful mechanism is for the time made useless. You will find all through life, my boys, that no matter how carefully you lay your plans, they will sometimes miscarry. It is only those things that the great Creator arranges for us that always go right. This solid church may crumble, but the skies above it will still be as blue, the wind still sweep as furiously across the summit of this hill. Remember that, my children. Whether you follow the faith that I love, or the newer forms that I hope you love equally well, you must find in the end that all rests upon the one foundation, the great Creator who makes no mistakes, whose love is eternal, who doeth all things well.”

Kit looked up in surprise to hear a priest speak in this way. There were few Catholics in his part of Fairfield County, and he had never given the subject much attention; but from what he had heard of them he rather imagined that they—well, not that they would eat him exactly, or insist upon burning candles in front of his face, but that at any rate they would not be likely to see good in any religion except their own. But this man was very different from the hazy ideas he had had of Catholic priests. He did not look or speak like a bigot. As Kit examined his face more closely he thought it one of the most kindly and most intellectual faces he had ever seen. And certainly he was a man of great knowledge. Whatever subject came up in the conversation, he was familiar with. He had even talked about the management of a steamship as knowingly as if he had been a sailor. He spoke English and French with equal ease; as a priest he must also speak Latin; and as a resident of Rome he must speak Italian. Kit noticed, too, that although his outer clothing was shaped in the usual priestly fashion, it was made of very fine materials. His boots were delicate and highly polished.

The greater part of the half-hour they spent in examining the curious objects in the church, and what the boys did not understand the priest explained to them. He was an invaluable guide and a pleasant companion, and they were sorry when he said that they had better go out again to see whether the ascenseurs were yet running.

They were surprised to find that it was pitch dark when they went out into the air, for the church was lighted with gas. And the wind had increased and was blowing even a worse gale than before. They groped their way down the steps as far as the entrance to the fort, and the priest held a short conversation with the guard.

“He says the break has proved more serious than was thought,” their guide said, “and the ascenseurs will not be able to move for several hours. But workmen are busy making repairs, and they will be in running order again some time during the evening. So under the circumstances I think it will be safer for us to wait. Of course there is a path down the hill, as I know to my cost, for I walked down it a few days ago, lost my way, and had to do more climbing than I have done since I was about your age. But it would be extremely difficult and dangerous in this darkness, and on such a night. We cannot well wait so long in the church; but if you will come with me, I will see whether I cannot induce the authorities to give us more comfortable quarters.”

“You must not put yourself to any trouble on our account, sir,” Kit answered, though he was rather pleased at the idea of spending a few hours more with so agreeable a companion, as well as with having another little adventure on his second night in Marseilles. “We can get along very well in any sheltered place; and as you are a stranger here it might put you to some inconvenience.”

“I am not a stranger in any church dedicated to the Holy Mother of God,” the priest answered; and from the movement of his hands the boys imagined that he was crossing himself, though it was too dark for them to see. And he spoke as if he felt as sure of finding a welcome there as though he were about to open the door of his own house.

The priest led the way up the steps again to the church door, and said a few words in French to the attendant, which of course the boys did not understand. But as he drew a silver card-case from an inner pocket and handed a card to the man, they rightly judged that he was inquiring for the clergyman in charge, and sending his card to him.

“I did not intend to introduce myself in Marseilles,” he said, after the man had disappeared with the card; “but my poor old throat is too weak to risk long exposure on such a night, and I must find shelter. And you shall share it with me, for I am your guide, philosopher, and friend on this occasion. You need not be surprised at anything you may see. You are in the house of God, and in company of one of the humblest of his servants.”

Kit would have given a great deal for a chance to exchange a few words with Harry. But as that was impossible he had to do his own thinking unassisted. He began to feel somehow as if he was on the brink of another adventure, perhaps stranger even than the night in Louis-Philippe’s cell. This was no ordinary priest, he was sure. Instead of acting like a man asking for shelter, he seemed rather to be waiting for something that he was entitled to.

And what could he mean by telling them not to be surprised at anything they might see? Surprised! the boys were surprised enough already. Their weird surroundings thrilled them. The hill of Notre-Dame, with all its strange accessories, is thrilling under the broad noonday sun; but on this night of inky darkness, with the lights of Marseilles twinkling far beneath them, and the church walls, though solid as the fort itself, trembling under the thundering blasts of the gale, it was enough to stir the blood of older men than Kit or Harry, without the addition of a mysterious priest warning them against surprise.

In a few minutes they heard footsteps coming down one of the long, gloomy aisles, and the attendant returned, accompanied by a priest dressed precisely like their companion, except that he carried no hat. He looked around for a moment in the semi-darkness, this second priest, approached the little group, and immediately dropped upon his knees before the stranger. As he did so, the latter put out both hands as if to help him rise, and the boys noticed that their companion had removed his gloves, that his hands were beautifully small and white, and that upon one of his fingers was a large and sparkling seal ring. The kneeling priest took the hands in his and either kissed one of them or kissed the ring, it was impossible to tell which.

The boys disobeyed instructions at once. They were both surprised already.

Before rising the priest received the benediction from the newcomer, and in another moment they were conversing in Latin; not, it seemed to Kit, like equals talking together, but more like an inferior speaking to a superior. The conversation lasted for some minutes; and at its conclusion the priest of the church, with a profound bow, led the way down the steps, across the stone promenade, and into the small house in which, as their guide had told them, the clergy made their headquarters. It was not, as the boys soon saw, a place where the priests lived, but simply where they could sit and read and make themselves comfortable while waiting for the numerous services during the day and evening; and an adjoining room, the door of which stood open when they entered, was evidently devoted to the uses of the sisters in white.

The room was in darkness at first, but the priest began to light the wax candles that seemed to be kept more for ornament than use, and it was soon bright as day. He drew up chairs for the visitor and his companions, and then, with many low bows, excused himself and went out. The apartment looked somewhat bare, but its scant furniture was heavy and solid.

“This will answer our purpose while we are detained here,” their friend said when they were alone. “I have asked them to let us have a fire, for the wind makes the air chilly.”

In an incredibly short time, the priest returned with a number of attendants, each bearing a load of some kind—attendants, who were evidently young men in training for the priesthood, for they all wore semi-priestly costumes. Two of them carried a large and handsomely carved armchair from the church. Another had a large purple cloth over his arm. Another bore a footstool, and still another brought an armful of wood.

Surprising as all this was, the boys were still more surprised to see that each person as he entered the room immediately dropped upon his knees, and rose only when their guide motioned them to do so, which he did immediately. The two with the big chair had to set it down before they could kneel; but the young man with the armful of wood had the hardest time getting down and up again.

The big chair was placed by the side of the hearth, and with the heavy purple cloth thrown over it, and the footstool in front, it began to look, the boys thought, very much like a throne. But their guide seated himself in it as readily as if a throne was his customary seat, and talked in Latin again with the priest, while one of the young men started a blazing fire. When the priest withdrew again, as he did in a few minutes, accompanied by the young men, it was with many low bows, and walking backward toward the door.

“Some of them are going to break their necks if this thing keeps on,” Harry said to himself. He was fairly tingling for a chance to talk to Kit, but that was still impossible. “But I’d like to know what sort of a Grand High Panjandrum this is we’re travelling with. It must be an awful nuisance to be such a big gun that people have to get down on their knees to you. Why, I don’t believe you have to kneel when you go to see the Governor of Connecticut; no, nor the President.”

“They are going to bring us some trifling refreshment,” their guide said, “as we shall lose our dinners through this accident to the ascenseurs.” Then seeing that the boys hardly knew how to conduct themselves in what was for them a very awkward situation, he skilfully led them into conversation. How long had they been in Marseilles, and what had they seen?

Kit was soon started with the story of their visit to the Castle d’If and what befell them there, in which their friend was very much interested. Then he was led on and on, almost without knowing it, to tell something of his own history; and that took him naturally to the disappearance of his father, and the possibility that he might be the strange man in the New Zealand hospital.

“It is a great trial to be kept in such suspense,” their guide said; “but whatever comes of it you must always feel that it is for the best. I am glad to know that I may perhaps be of a little assistance to you in such a matter. We may never meet again, but I shall be happy if I can give you cause to remember your visit to Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde with the stranger from Rome. I have a very dear friend in New Zealand who may be of the greatest assistance to you in identifying the man in the hospital, or in providing suitably for him if he proves to be your father—as indeed I hope he may. I will give you a line to my friend, and you must not hesitate to use it if occasion arises.”

He took from an inner pocket, as he spoke, a small letter-case with silver clasp and corners, opened it, and with the fountain pen it contained wrote a brief letter, resting the case upon his knee, enclosed it in an envelope which he addressed, and handed it to Kit.

“If you should go to New Zealand to make inquiries for yourself,” he said, “do not fail to present it, or if you send it by mail, write a letter of your own to accompany it, explaining the case. You will find it of use to you.”

“Thank you very much, sir,” Kit answered, as he took the letter. “I cannot tell what will be best to do till we hear from the consul there.”

The letter-case was hardly restored to its place before the priest returned, bringing again several attendants who carried a large tray loaded with silver eating and drinking utensils, a silver urn of steaming tea, bread, meats, cakes, fruit, nuts, and cheese. Again they all went through the kneeling process; and they were shortly followed by several more priests, who were duly introduced to the distinguished visitor.

While they were eating, all the priests and attendants withdrew; and the “they” included the boys as well as the stranger, for he had thoughtfully asked for food for his friends as well as for himself. After a suitable interval the priests returned, kneeling as before, the tray was removed, and the priests, at the stranger’s bidding, drew up chairs, and a conversation followed, sometimes in Latin, sometimes in French.

The boys could easily see that they were as much of a mystery to the priests as the whole thing was to them. Here were two young men, whose dress showed that they were not in holy orders, who did not even speak the language of the country, but who sat and talked and ate with the distinguished stranger as if with an equal; who did not kneel to him, did not even bow when they stood before him, but spoke to him and asked him questions as freely as if he had been their father. If the boys could have understood a few words of the conversation, their situation would have been much less awkward; but it was all as bad as Greek to them, and they could do nothing but sit and listen.

For the next hour or two the priests were in and out, bowing themselves out backwards always as they retired, kneeling always as they entered; and in the intervals the boys enjoyed the conversation of their guide, who had been in many countries and had seen many strange things. He had been in America, much to their delight, and could tell them more than they knew about New York and Boston. He had been in Bridgeport, too; but when they asked whether he had been in Huntington he smiled and shook his head.

There was no need now to make inquiries about the repairs to the ascenseurs, for every priest who entered the room had something to say about the progress of the work, and the visitor kept the boys informed in English. They would be running again in an hour; in half an hour; in ten minutes. Then came the news that they were running, but would make a few trips first to be sure of their safety. It was between eleven and twelve o’clock when they were told that all was in readiness for them to descend.

Outside the door of the little house were two young attendants with lanterns; and the priests themselves were there to take their visitor by the arms and help him down through the stormy darkness to the ascenseurs. And four priests went down with them in the car; and in the pavilion at the bottom the whole four fell upon their knees around the stranger to receive his benediction before he left them. And a handsome carriage was waiting (the priests had taken care of that), in which the stranger insisted that the boys should drive with him into the city.

“I am staying at the Hôtel de Louvre et de la Paix,” he said, “so it will be directly in my way to set you down at the Old Port where your ship lies.”

He bade them a fatherly good-by when they got out, and they climbed aboard the North Cape in the darkness.

“Just pinch me, will you, Kit,” Harry said, when they were safely on deck. “I don’t know whether I’m a cabin boy or a sort of graven image on that big altar.”

Captain Griffith was still up and reading, and he called the boys into his room.

“You made a long visit to that church,” he said. “I was getting a little alarmed about you.”

“We have been in good company, sir,” Kit answered. And he briefly told the story of their adventure. “I really don’t feel quite sure yet that we have not been dreaming,” he concluded. “Yes, it must have been real, though, for here is the letter the gentleman gave me.”

He held the dainty envelope down under the light, and read the address:—

“THE MOST REVEREND
THE BISHOP OF NEW ZEALAND
Wellington, N.Z.”

“Well,” the Captain exclaimed, “the letter is not sealed. You can easily tell by the signature who your distinguished friend was.”

Kit took the letter out and tried to read it, but soon gave it up.

“It is all written in Latin, and I can’t make out a word of it,” he said, handing it to the Captain.

“Don’t you see that little scarlet emblem up in the corner?” the Captain asked, as soon as he glanced at it. “That is the emblem of a cardinal, as I thought everybody knew. Yes, certainly. It is signed ‘Galotti.’ You youngsters have been hobnobbing with Cardinal Galotti. Get off to bed, Henry; I can’t have my cabin boy fooling around with Princes of the Church.”

CHAPTER XV.
NEWS FROM NEW ZEALAND.

THE little cottage in Huntington took on a new coat of white while Kit was seeing the world and earning money beyond the sea. All the weak spots were mended, the yard was put in order, the trees trimmed, and in the rear a neat garden was made, where, toward the end of the afternoons, Mrs. Silburn and Vieve went out in sunbonnets and pulled weeds and did such other work as women’s hands were able to perform. It was a very different looking place from the dingy spot it had become a year before under the shock of its owner’s disappearance. And better than all, the last cent of indebtedness upon it had been paid off.

“I am glad you are able to do this, Mrs. Silburn; glad on your own account,” the lawyer said when she made the last payment. “I hardly expected it, with the trouble you have had. I was prepared to give you as much time as you wanted in paying this up.”

“Oh, you have been very good, Mr. Clarkson,” Mrs. Silburn answered. “For a time I thought I should have to ask you for an extension. But I did not know then what a good boy I had. Yes, I knew it of course; but I did not know that he would be able to do so much for me so soon.”

“Yes, you have a good boy, and no mistake,” the lawyer assented. “But you can hardly call him a boy any more. When do you expect him home again?”

“In three or four weeks, now, I hope. And you know we have a little hope of seeing some one else, too. It is a faint chance; but if the man I told you of in the New Zealand hospital should prove to be my husband, we want to have everything in order for him when he returns. That is the reason Kit was so anxious to have the house painted; and that is why I have struggled to have all the debts paid. We are looking every day for a letter from the consul in New Zealand.”

It was putting it very mildly to say that they were “looking” for a letter from the consul. They were so eager for it that they did not let a single mail arrive without going to the little post-office on the hill. Not only that, but they had matters arranged so that as Vieve came down the hill from the office, she could let her mother know in advance of her arrival whether she had got any letters. Their front windows looked across to the diagonal road that went up past the post-office; and Vieve was to wave the letter, if she got one, as she came down the hill, so that her mother, sitting sewing by the window, would see it.

Vieve was cook and housekeeper, now that her mother was busy all day sewing, and she took pride in leaving everything in good order when she started for school. Not that the cooking was very hard work. They often said, laughingly, that Kit would give them both a good scolding if he should come home unexpectedly and see what they had for breakfast. A cup of coffee, a few slices of bread and butter, occasionally some eggs, or a handful of radishes from the garden, made their usual fare; and the other meals were equally light, though Mrs. Silburn insisted that every few days they should have a steak or some chops for health’s sake.

“It’s a sinful waste of money!” Vieve always declared. “We don’t need them half as much as we need the money. Remember you can’t bring a man home from New Zealand for nothing. Anyhow, it’s a shame for us to eat up the money that Kit works so hard for—and you sewing, sewing all the time. I’m going to find a way to earn a little money myself, as soon as I can. I don’t want to be the only one to make nothing.”

“Then who will take care of me?” Mrs. Silburn’s invariable answer was.

One morning she knew there was a letter by the way Vieve came running down the hill, even before it was waved in the air for her. And Vieve burst in flushed and breathless.

“I’m almost afraid to open it,” Mrs. Silburn said. “So much depends upon this letter, and it may crush all our hopes.”

“Not this letter!” Vieve laughed. “This is not from that consul man, this is from Kit; and his letters never crush anybody’s hopes.”

It was a letter telling of his safe arrival in Marseilles, and his night in Louis-Philippe’s cell in the Castle d’If, and his visit to Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde with Harry and their meeting with the distinguished stranger who proved to be a cardinal.

“A cardinal!” Vieve exclaimed; “just think of our Kit travelling about with a cardinal. He’ll be so proud when he gets home we won’t know what to say to him.”

“Indeed, I think any cardinal or anybody else ought to be proud to associate with a young man like Kit,” Mrs. Silburn hastened to answer. “I don’t know that I want him running about with cardinals, either. They’re papists, and the papists are all tricky. It would be just like them to try to make a Catholic of such a young man. That Louise Phillips, or whatever her name was, can consider herself very much honored, too, that Kit visited her cell.”

“Why, mother,” Vieve laughed, “Louis-Philippe was a man; a king, a prince, or something.”

“I don’t care,” Mrs. Silburn went on, “Kit’s just as good as any of them. Don’t bother, now, till I finish the letter. What do I care for their kings or cardinals when I have a letter from Kit?

“‘The cardinal gave me a letter to the Bishop of New Zealand,’ she continued to read from the letter, ‘and it may be of service to us there. But I hope you have heard from the consul before this. I almost wish I had asked you to send me a cable despatch telling me when you got a letter and what it said. But cabling is so expensive—about forty cents a word to Marseilles—that I shall have to wait in patience till I get home. That will be in about three weeks after you get this letter, I think; and I will be out to see you just as soon as I get my cargo disposed of.’

“I do hope we will hear from that consul before Kit gets back,” Mrs. Silburn said, after finishing the letter; and for the twentieth time she figured out, as well as she could, how long it ought to take a letter to go from London to New Zealand, and how long for the reply to come to America.

“Well,” she continued, “Kit will find things very much improved here when he comes home. I never saw the old place look so well. If only he could stay here longer to enjoy it! He works and works to keep a comfortable home for us, and then never can stay in it more than a few days at a time. But you must be off to school, Vieve; and don’t forget to put on your overshoes, the streets are so muddy. I don’t know how many times I have told you to go and buy a new pair, but you go on wearing those old things, full of holes. You’ll catch your death of cold.”

“I don’t need new ones, mother,” Vieve replied. “They don’t grow on the trees, you know, and all these things cost money. I’m not going to be spending all of Kit’s money for my clothes.”

“You foolish child, don’t you know that he always likes to buy things for you? He’d rather get new clothes for you than for himself.”

“I know it, mother,” Vieve answered. “He slipped some money into my hand last time he was home, you know, and told me to buy something for myself. But I’m not going to do it; I’d rather save it; you know what for.”

“You don’t want your father to come home and find that you’ve died of diphtheria, do you?” Mrs. Silburn asked. “Well, you must have your own way about it, I suppose. Stop at the butcher’s when you come home at noon, Vieve, and get a slice of ham—not a very thick slice. There are two or three eggs left, and that will do for our dinner.”

It was as well that Kit could not see the pinching little ways at home, or he would have worried over it. It was something new for the Silburn family to live in this way, for Kit’s father had always made good pay, and insisted upon the wife and children having plenty of everything. But when he disappeared there came a change, and there were grave doubts for a time whether Mrs. Silburn could make both ends meet, even with the most rigid economy. Then Kit began to earn a little; but although nearly every cent of his went to his mother, she was determined that every cent of his little savings should be set aside for his future use. It was only when there seemed a slight possibility of her husband’s being alive that she consented to use some of his money to repair and paint the house and pay the last of the indebtedness upon it. Her own small income barely sufficed to buy the plainest food. There was always, now, some of Kit’s money in the house; but of their own, as they called it, money that they were willing to spend, they were often reduced to two or three dollars.

Not long after the receipt of Kit’s letter, Vieve once more waved a white envelope as she descended the hill from the post-office, and this proved to be the long-expected answer from the consul in New Zealand. Mrs. Silburn turned it over and over many times, and examined the address and the postmarks and the strange stamp on the corner, before she could raise courage to open it. It was addressed to “Christopher Silburn, Esq.,” as it was in answer to his letter; and her agitation was so great that she was half inclined to make this a pretext for letting it stand unopened until Kit returned.

“Why, mother,” Vieve urged, “you know that was all arranged. He said the answer would be addressed to him, but that we should open it just the same. He would think we took no interest in it if we didn’t open it.”

“No, Kit couldn’t think that!” Mrs. Silburn declared; “he knows us too well for that.”

With trembling hand she cut off the end of the envelope with her scissors; but that was as far as she could go. That letter was destined, probably, either to overwhelm them with joy or fill them with grief; and she could not bring herself to look at it.

“Here, you read it,” she said, handing it, still in its envelope, to Vieve. “My hands shake so I can hardly hold it.”

Vieve quickly took out the letter and unfolded it.

U. S. Consulate, Wellington, N. Z. [she read].

Christopher Silburn, Esq., Huntington, Conn.

Dear Sir:—Your letter in regard to the supposed American sailor in the hospital in this place was duly received, and I have made such investigations as the data you supplied made possible. I also secured the services of a physician to compare the unfortunate man with your description, thinking that his larger experience in such matters would give his opinion greater value than my own.

But I regret that with all these inquiries my answer must still leave you in doubt whether this man is your father or not. We imagine that there is a slight scar upon the left temple, but it is so indistinct, if there really is one, that we think it hardly corresponds with the one you describe. Still we are not prepared to say definitely that it does not.

This man’s height is about five feet nine and a half inches, and you say your father was 5, 10½. But he stoops so much that it is difficult to get his height correctly, and he may in better days have been 5, 10½. We are not prepared to either say that his eyes are brown; they are a sort of brownish gray; and his weight is about 140 pounds, though it was only 127 when he was received in the hospital.

The teeth almost answer the description you give, being perfect except that one incisor on the left side is partly broken off. That is an accident, however, that might have happened since you last saw him.

On the whole, as I said before, I am unable from your description to decide whether this man is your father or not. I have mentioned to him all the names and incidents given in your letter, without the least result. He improves in physical health daily, but there is no corresponding improvement in his mental condition. His memory seems entirely dormant.

I had him photographed some time ago, but before the prints were made the negative was destroyed in a fire that burned a large share of the business portion of this city; and as soon as the photographers are able to resume business I will have a new negative made and send you a photograph.

I suggest that you send me as many further particulars as you can; and meanwhile you may rest assured that this unfortunate man, whether he prove to be your father or not, is comfortably situated and receiving all necessary attention.

Yours very truly,

Hy. W. W. Wilkins,

Vice-Consul of the U. S., Wellington, N. Z.

“Well, if that ain’t a disappointing letter!” Mrs. Silburn exclaimed, when Vieve had finished reading. “I should think a man right there on the spot could tell something about it. Won’t poor Kit be disappointed when he comes home, after all these weeks of waiting!”

“And still he has taken a great deal of pains about it,” Vieve suggested; “even to getting a doctor, and having a photograph taken. We can’t blame him because he is not able to say yes or no to a certainty. He knows how awkward it would be if he should say ‘Yes, this is the man,’ and then after we got him home he should prove to be another man entirely. I am glad he is so careful about it, at any rate. And it seems to me there is a great deal in the letter that is encouraging. Let’s read it over again, and pick out the good points.”

“But you will be late for school, Vieve,” her mother objected.

“School!” Vieve cried; “if I hurry, I may learn that Rio Janeiro is on the east coast of South America; and I don’t care a fig if it’s on the west coast of Asia, when there may be news about father.”

Mrs. Silburn looked up in surprise at hearing Vieve speak in this way, for school was a pleasure to her, not a labor. She saw that the light-hearted girl was in a great state of excitement, though she tried hard to suppress it, and the look was the last straw that brought on the storm.

“Oh, mamma!” she sobbed, with one arm across her eyes. “I believe that man—that man—in New Zealand—is my father!”

With another burst of tears she threw her arms around her mother’s neck and sobbed till the chair shook. And as such things are always contagious, Mrs. Silburn was soon crying too; and if tears are a relief, they must have felt much better, for it was ten or fifteen minutes before they were able to look at the letter again.

“Suppose it is your father,” Mrs. Silburn said at length, in a mildly chiding tone; “that’s nothing to cry about, is it? This unsatisfactory letter only makes another delay, that’s all. Kit will know what to do when he comes. He always knows. What is it the man says about your father’s teeth?”

“Well, he don’t say they’re father’s teeth,” she answered, trying to laugh off the remnants of her tears. “But he says that that man’s teeth—let me see what he does say—” and she turned to the letter again.

“‘The teeth almost answer the description you give,’” she read, “‘being perfect except that one incisor—’ what’s an incisor? oh, yes, I know; ‘that one incisor on the left side is partly broken off.’”

“Now isn’t that a good point?” she asked. “There ain’t many people have teeth like father’s, I tell you. And it’s nothing that one of them should be broken. I guess if we went through such a shipwreck we’d have more broken than one tooth. It’s easy to see how a mast, or a keel, or a—a—a breakwater or something might have struck him while he was in the water.

“Then there’s that scar,” she went on. “Let me see—” and she found that part of the letter again. “‘We imagine that there is a slight scar upon the left temple,’” she read. “Now why should they imagine it if it wasn’t there? You don’t imagine a scar; you see it. Oh, we couldn’t ask for anything better than that.”

There was no school for Vieve that morning; she was too much excited over the letter. But after it had been read again and well studied she drew her father’s armchair to his favorite place by the fireside, got out his slippers and stood them in order in front of the chair, just ready to be stepped into, and laid in the chair his pocket knife, that had been one of their treasures ever since Kit brought it home from London. Then she called in Turk and made him sit down beside the chair.

“There!” she said; “there’s a beginning. We have the chair, the slippers, the knife, and Turk waiting to be petted. And in New Zealand we have got as far as father’s beautiful teeth and the scar on the temple. Before long we’ll have a whole father sitting here with us, or I’m very much mistaken. I don’t feel so much as if he was missing now. We know where he is (at least I think we do), and we have only to get him home.”

“Ah, you are very hopeful, Vieve,” her mother sighed. “I only wish I felt as sure of it as you do.”

It was only two or three mornings after the receipt of the consul’s letter that Vieve once more waved an envelope as she hurried down the post-office hill.

“It’s another from Kit, mother,” she cried, as she burst into the room; “and it was registered and I had to sign a receipt for it, so there must be something important in it.”

There was no hesitation ever about opening Kit’s letters; they were always so hopeful and cheery.

“We are going to get our cargo in a little sooner than we expected,” he wrote, “and in about two weeks or two and a half after you receive this you may hear of our arrival in New York.

“I intended to send you the cardinal’s letter last time I wrote, but I was interrupted and had to mail it in a hurry, so I waited to send it in this. And I will register this letter to guard against it’s being lost in the mails, as a note from so powerful a person might be of great use to us in New Zealand, and I must not lose it. It is written in Latin, as you will see; and I am sorry to say that not one of us on the ship knows enough about Latin to read it. But maybe you can get our minister in Huntington or Vieve’s teacher to translate it for you. I should like to know myself what is in it. I shall not be very long, I tell you, about learning some languages besides English. I did not know how much use they could be to a man till I came to travel. I am picking up a little French in dealing with these French people, but have not had much time for it—for you must not think I have had nothing to do in Marseilles but look at the sights. I heard a funny little story the other day about an Englishman who was learning French. You know the ‘sea’ in French is mer, pronounced mare, and ‘horse’ is cheval. ‘Well,’ said he, after taking a few lessons, I never can learn such a foolish language as this, where the sea is a mare and a horse is a shovel.’”

“Did you ever see such a boy!” Mrs. Silburn exclaimed, handling Kit’s letter as if it were more precious than gold. “He always finds something funny wherever he goes.”

But Vieve was very much interested in the cardinal’s note, and the little scarlet emblem in the corner.

“I might take it to school and ask the teacher to translate it,” she said; “but I think Mr. Wright would be more interested in it. He always takes such an interest in Kit; and then although he is a minister, maybe he has never seen a letter from a cardinal.”

That same afternoon she took the letter to Mr. Wright, the clergyman who preached in the church across the road, and he readily consented to translate it.

“That is, if I can,” he added, smiling. “It is one good thing about the Catholics that they teach their young men Latin much more thoroughly than we learn it in our schools. The priests cannot only read and write it, but they can always converse in it fluently. But I think I can translate this for you; at any rate, I will write it out for you in English, for you probably could not remember it all.”

He read it over first carefully, and then wrote the following translation:—

Most Reverend and Well Beloved Brother: This will be presented to you by Mr. Christopher Silburn, a young American in whom I take an interest.

His father has been shipwrecked and has disappeared, and it is hoped that a sailor now in one of your New Zealand hospitals may prove to be the missing man.

I bespeak for my young friend your good offices in whatever manner may be fitting.

Accept, brother, the assurance of my continued love and esteem.

Galotti.

“Galotti—Galotti,” Mr. Wright said, musingly, as he copied the signature; “why, there is a celebrated cardinal of that name. This can hardly be from Cardinal Galotti, I suppose?”

“Yes, sir,” Vieve answered, swelling a little with pride in her brother; “that is the man. He is one of Kit’s friends in Marseilles.”

Such an astonishing statement had to be explained; and in answer to her pastor’s questions she repeated the story of their meeting in the strange church as Kit had told it in his letter.

“I am remarkably glad to hear it,” Mr. Wright said, when she finished. “Kit is a good boy, and sure to make good friends wherever he goes. But I imagine you have no idea what a powerful friend he has made this time. The cardinals hold the very highest position in the Catholic Church, next to the Pope himself. Such a letter as this from a cardinal to a bishop is almost equal to a royal command, and may be of the greatest use to you. Wait a minute; I think I can tell you something about Cardinal Galotti.”

He turned to a bookcase and took down a volume, and in a few minutes continued:—

“Yes, Galotti is one of the most eminent of the cardinals, and may eventually be the Pope himself. All the cardinals are called ecclesiastical princes, you know; but Galotti is a temporal prince as well, being a prince of Italy. No wonder he seemed so much at ease in the little throne they arranged for him in that curious church. I don’t believe in such things myself; but I am truly glad that Kit has made so powerful a friend.”

Whether Vieve had anything to say to the girls at school about “Kit’s friend the cardinal,” would be hard to tell; but in a little over two weeks more she ran down the post-office hill so fast one morning that her mother knew she had some news, though there was no letter in her hand.

What she had was a little slip that one of the neighbors she met in the office had torn out of his New York newspaper for her. It was only one line of fine type, under the heading “Arrived Yesterday”:

“North Cape, Griffith, from Marseilles.”

CHAPTER XVI.
KIT LEAVES THE “NORTH CAPE.”

THOUGH the voyage to and from Marseilles had been a pleasant one, and the business had been transacted in a way that he knew must be satisfactory to his employers, Kit was remarkably glad when the North Cape was inside of Sandy Hook again. It was time, more than time, for an answer to his letter to New Zealand; and although at his last news from home no answer had arrived, he felt sure that he must find one when he reached Huntington.

“I shall be busy for five or six days getting out my cargo,” he wrote home when his first rush on arrival was over; “but you can expect to see me by the beginning of next week. I have so many things to tell you; and I hope you will have news for me from Wellington.”

He was to have more things to tell them when he got to Huntington than he then had any idea of; but he sent some messages and packages home by Harry Leonard, as before, and worked away at his cargo till the greater part of it was in the warehouse.

He had eight hundred boxes of soap among his other cases, for Marseilles is a great point for the manufacture of soaps; “and it’s a pity they send so much of it away,” he often said to himself, “when they’re in such need of it over there.” But his soap needed particular attention; and he had to make several trips to his employers’ office to get directions concerning it. On his return from one of these trips he went into the cabin and found that there was a visitor in the Captain’s room.

“Come in, Silburn,” the Captain called through the open door. “Here’s a friend of yours come to see you.”

Kit went in, wondering whether his mother could have received important news and hastened to the city to tell him of it; but his hand was instantly seized by the rotund purser Clark, of the Trinidad, as fat and bluntly good-natured and short-breathed as ever.

“Glad to see you again, Silburn,” the purser puffed. “It’s not so long since we cooled ourselves with ice cream in the ice-house down in Barbadoes; but I hear you’ve been seeing a good deal of the world since then.”

“Oh, a few corners of it,” Kit answered. “It’s hard to find a better part of it than our own country, though.”

“You’re right there!” Mr. Clark acquiesced, bringing his hand down on his fat knee with a bang. “You’re just right there, young man. But it’s a good plan to see how the other fellows live, to make us appreciate our own advantages. I’ve not been seeing much of it lately, for my part; just going up and down, up and down, among those black rascals in the West Indies. I’ve had a great deal too much work to do; it’s wearing me down to skin and bone.”

Kit and the Captain were inclined to laugh at this, considering the purser’s hearty appearance; but his face was as solemn as a judge’s.

“The work seems to agree with you pretty well, sir,” Kit suggested.

“No, it don’t!” the purser declared, giving his knee another sounding slap. “That’s a mistake; work don’t agree with anybody, in spite of all the twaddle about it. I don’t believe in work. My theory is that nobody should have to work at all. Every man should have an income of at least five thousand dollars a year, and live on his money. The trouble is things are not arranged right, and some of us get left. No, work is all humbug.”

It was impossible to tell from the purser’s round face whether he was joking or not. He certainly was a hard worker himself.

“The only concession I will make,” he went on, “is, that being compelled to work at all, it is better to do it well. I believe you go on that theory too, Silburn; that’s the reason I’ve come to see you. Although, as I say, I don’t believe in work, still when it has to be done I like to see it done well. I believe you have been defrauded by society, like myself, of the five thousand a year that every man is entitled to, and have to work a little for a living? And that being the case, how would you like to leave the North Cape and come and work for me?”

“For you, sir?” Kit exclaimed, naturally taken by surprise by the suddenness of the question. “On the Trinidad, do you mean?”

“Well, I mean for my company, of course,” Mr. Clark replied; “but with me, on the Trinidad. You see the situation is this. Our business has increased so much down among those islands, both in passengers and freight, that there is more work for the purser on the Trinidad than any one man ought to be asked to do. I am away behind in my work all the time, and that don’t do. So the company has consented to let me have an assistant. And as my assistant will be with me all the time, and I will be responsible for his work, it is only fair that I should have the privilege of selecting him. They see the force of that too; and the matter being left with me, I said to myself, young Silburn’s the sort of man I want with me, if I can get him. He attends to his business without any nonsense, and I’m going to hunt him up.

“So I have had a talk with the Captain here about you,” the purser went on; “and if you want to be my assistant purser on the Trinidad at one hundred dollars a month, you have only to say the word.”

For a few moments Kit hardly knew how to reply. Mr. Clark had been jesting, he was sure, in talking about his dislike of work; and he was still jesting. Kit thought, when he first spoke of Kit’s working for him. But there was no joke about such an offer as he had just made. That was sober earnest, and required an answer.

“Why, I should like to have one hundred dollars a month, sir,” he replied, “very much indeed. And I should like to be with you. But on the other hand I should dislike to leave Captain Griffith and the old North Cape. And there is one thing that would interfere with my going into a new place just now. I don’t know whether I told you about my father, how he was shipwrecked and has been missing for a long time. There is a man in New Zealand, in a hospital, who may prove to be my father; and if he should, it might be necessary for me to go over there to bring him home.”

“Yes, Captain Griffith has told me all about that,” Mr. Clark answered, “and that need not be any objection. It is quite right that you should do everything possible for your father. But it is not such a long voyage to New Zealand in these days of steam, and I could put some one in your place while you were gone. Besides, it takes money for such a trip, and you would get the money much faster as my assistant than you can make it as a supercargo.”

“Yes, sir, that is true,” Kit said; “I thought of that at once. And it is very kind in you to make me such a liberal offer. But can you let me have a little time to think of it in, Mr. Clark? Say a week or ten days? I have always had a sort of horror of changing about from one place to another, and should not like to do it without consulting Captain Griffith and my mother.”

“Take a week and welcome to think it over in, my lad,” the purser answered. “I can’t say more than a week, because I must have some one before I start on the next voyage. But you can do a heap of thinking in a week, if you set about it. And I hope you will make up your mind to go with me. I think it will be to your advantage and mine too.”

After the purser was gone Kit had to look after his soap-boxes; but as soon as they were attended to he returned to the cabin and had a serious talk with Captain Griffith.

“I don’t like the idea of your leaving us, Silburn,” the Captain said; “don’t like it at all. But it would be selfish in me to stand in the way of your bettering yourself. The Quebec company is a good company, the Trinidad is a fine ship, and Mr. Clark is a good man to be with. I have known him slightly for a long time. To be sure, he has some odd ways, but then most of us have. He is always talking about not believing in work, yet he works as hard as any man I know.

“And the one hundred dollars a month is a great object,” he continued. “It is really large pay, considering that you would live on the ship and would have hardly any expenses. You would have to wear the company’s uniform, of course, and keep well dressed on account of the passengers; but that does not amount to much. And you would likely become one of their pursers in time, if you gave satisfaction. Much as I should dislike to lose you, it is only fair for me to say that I think it is a very fine offer. I don’t see how you can do anything but accept it.”

To add to the unsettled state of Kit’s mind, the next day brought him a letter from Vieve saying that they had heard from the consul at Wellington. But she did not say whether the man in the hospital had proved to be their father or not. This he looked upon as a bad sign, for if there had been good news, she would have been in a hurry to tell it. So with this matter to be discussed, and his Marseilles experiences to be related, and his new offer to be considered and decided upon, he felt as if a week at home would hardly be half long enough.

“I never had any regret at going ashore before, Captain,” he said, as he shook the Captain’s hand in bidding him good-by. “But this time it seems almost like leaving home. It has been so pleasant on the North Cape, and you have always been so kind, I should feel strange to belong anywhere else. If I accept Mr. Clark’s offer, I’ll not belong on the old ship any longer, and it makes me feel bad in advance.”

“I don’t like to think of your going, Kit,” the Captain answered, returning to the first name as a mark of affection; “but the manner of your going makes a great difference, you know. If you were going under compulsion, I should feel downright bad about it. Going to something better is a different matter entirely. I suppose when a United States senator is elected President he doesn’t have any great regrets about leaving his old seat in the Senate Chamber. And it is the same thing with you, in a smaller way. But we know each other, Kit, and though you may leave the ship, we will still be friends. Anyhow, when you are in need of a friend you need not go further than the cabin of the North Cape.”

There was so much to be done at home that Kit laid out a programme on his way to Bridgeport. The letter from New Zealand he thought the most important matter, and that should be considered first. Then the offer from Mr. Clark. He had pretty much made up his mind that that ought to be accepted; but if his mother opposed it he was ready to give it up. Then after all the business was done he could tell about his second voyage to Europe. This time he caught the stage to Huntington, and so saved himself a long walk.

“Why, you folks have grown so grand here I’m almost afraid to go in,” he laughed, looking up at the freshly painted house as his mother and Vieve ran out to the gate to meet him.

“Oh, I’m glad you think so!” Vieve answered, taking possession of the side opposite her mother. “I thought maybe we would seem too poor and common for you, since you’ve taken to travelling about with cardinals. But I know more about your cardinal now than you do, Mr. Supercargo, for Mr. Wright has translated his letter for me, and told me all about him.”

They were all too full of the New Zealand letter to let that stand long; and before Kit had been in the house many minutes he asked for it. When they gave it to him he read it carefully, then read it again, and thought over it for a few minutes without speaking.

“Well, it is not as bad as I feared,” he said, at length. “When Vieve wrote that you had received the letter, without saying what was in it, I thought there must be such bad news that you did not want to tell me. But this is only more delay. What little news there is in it is good news, for they seem to have found the scar, though they are not sure about it, and the teeth correspond with father’s. It looks more hopeful than ever, only we must wait till we can hear again. And the photograph ought to settle the question, when that comes. I will write to the consul again, and give him all the particulars we can all think of.”

“And that letter from the cardinal,” Mrs. Silburn suggested. “It seems he is a very great man, and the letter is to the Bishop of New Zealand—a Catholic of course, but I wouldn’t mind what he was if he could help us. This is a nice time of life for a God-fearing Protestant woman to begin talking about cardinals and bishops; but wouldn’t it be as well to send that letter on and ask the bishop to help us?”

Kit asked to see the translation before he gave any opinion about it, for he did not yet know what was in the letter.

“I am inclined to think it would be better to save this for another purpose,” he said, after he had read it. “I have never said so before, but I have often thought, and the same thing must have occurred to you, that I may have to go on to New Zealand. It is a long journey, but any of us would go further than that, further than the end of the world, to have father with us again. If I should go there, this letter would be a very valuable thing to take with me, and I think it ought to be kept for that. The only thing is to have some reasonable certainty that the man in the hospital is really father. With any good evidence of that, even very slight evidence, I should go over there at once.”

“Yes,” Mrs. Silburn answered, with tears in her eyes; “I have often thought of that, Kit. And I knew of course that you would think of it. If we can get any reasonable evidence that that may be your father, I think you ought to go. It will take all the money we can borrow on this little place, and leave us badly in debt again, but we must not stop for that. All the money in the world is nothing compared with having your father back again.”

“Oh, we are not as badly off as all that!” Kit said. Never in his life before had he felt so proud of being able to earn money. “You don’t know how easily we sea-faring fellows can get about the world. I think maybe I can get a job for one round voyage on some vessel bound for Australia or New Zealand, even if I have to work only for my passage. Then the only expense will be paying father’s fare home. Captain Griffith would help me to get such a job, I know; and I have another friend now who would help me to it, I am sure. You see I have some more news for you, though I didn’t intend to tell you till to-morrow.”

Then he told of his offer of one hundred dollars a month from the Quebec Steamship Company, and how he had consulted Captain Griffith, and how the Captain had advised him to accept it; and explained that he thought very favorably of it himself, but waited to hear what his mother thought.

“A hundred dollars a month!” Vieve cried, throwing her arms about her brother’s neck and nearly choking him. “You? Just for writing out those paper things on a ship? That’s twelve hundred dollars a year! why, Mr. Wright don’t get more than a thousand, I’m sure, and the parsonage; but then you’ll have a sort of parsonage too—at least the ship to live in.”

“Ah! but Mr. Wright don’t travel about with cardinals!” Kit laughed. “That makes all the difference in the world. What do you think of it, mother? It is an important matter, and you are the one to decide it.”

“No, we have got beyond that, Kit,” Mrs. Silburn answered, as well as her demonstrations of pleasure would allow. “You are the one to decide questions for us, not we for you. As far as I can see I should think you would not hesitate at all about it. But you know all the circumstances better than I do. You must decide for yourself.”

“Then it is already decided, mother,” he said. “I had made up my mind to accept it, provided you did not object. You don’t know how much I love Captain Griffith and the North Cape. The Captain is one man in a thousand; he has been like a father to me. But one hundred dollars a month is a splendid offer, and the Captain himself advises me to take it.”

There was a little feast in the Silburn cottage that evening to celebrate Kit’s improved prospects. That was what it meant when he beckoned Vieve into the hall and slipped some money into her hand, and told her, after making her purchases, to go to Harry Leonard’s and invite him to come over. Not very much of a feast; if she had had a purseful of gold to spend she could not have bought the materials for a banquet in the little shops of Huntington, at such short notice; but what she found in her hurried trip answered every purpose.

“Now don’t you be making eyes at Harry Leonard, miss!” Kit warned her, when she returned with the provisions, and began by unloading a fat chicken and some bunches of Malaga grapes. “I know you used to be very fond of him.”

“At Harry Leonard!” Vieve retorted, assuming her grandest air. “Humph! I guess when I have a beau (which I won’t have), he’ll be nothing short of a cardinal.”

“Then you’ll die an old maid,” Kit laughed; “don’t you know that cardinals are Catholic priests, and never marry?”

They were a merry party at supper, though Harry was disconsolate for a while at hearing that Kit was going to leave the North Cape.

“Why, I don’t know what we’ll do without him on board, Mrs. Silburn!” he exclaimed. “It will be like a different ship. It will make a great change for me, I tell you. No more good times on shore now for the cabin boy, I suppose. The Captain thinks I’m too young and giddy to go ashore alone in strange ports, though I’m not; but he was always satisfied when I was with Kit.”

The whole story of their visit to Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde had to be told while they were eating, and their meeting with the mysterious stranger; and Harry kept them in roars of laughter when he described how the old and young priests always entered the room “on their marrow bones,” as he called it. Somewhere in Marseilles he had heard the French pronunciation of Vieve’s name, and he added to the merriment by insisting upon giving it the French twang whenever he addressed her: “Miss Zhou-vay-ve; Miss Zhou-vay-ve.”

The spectre at the feast did not show itself till all was over and Harry had gone home, for Kit guarded it carefully as long as he could. But at last he had to let it out.

“My change of work will cut short my visit home,” he announced. “I can’t go off suddenly and leave my employers in the lurch, you know. They must have time to get some one else in my place; and if they ask it, I may have to wait another voyage before going on the Trinidad. But if they let me off, I will still have a great deal to do. My accounts must all be straightened out, and I will have some business with the tailors. I will have to wear the company’s uniform on the Trinidad, you know.”

“Ah! that’s it!” Vieve declared, pretending to be hurt at Kit’s leaving them sooner than he expected, though it was not all pretence. “He wants to get his new clothes! Won’t he be grand, though, when he comes out in a new uniform with gold braid!”

“Yes, you know I always think so much about my clothes,” he answered. “But I’ll be with you all day to-morrow; and busy enough, too, writing letters. To-morrow I must write to that New Zealand consul again, and there are several more to be written. Then the next morning I must go back to New York. But then this won’t be like those long trips to Europe. Why, I’ll be back again in no time at all. The Trinidad only runs to the island of Trinidad and back, stopping at St. Kitts, Antigua, St. Lucia, Martinique, Dominica, and Barbadoes. She makes the round trip in twenty-eight days. Being a mail and passenger boat, you know, she has to make time.”

It was hard work for Kit to go back to the North Cape to say good-by, after his employers had generously released him at once, with many expressions of satisfaction and good will. It was on her that he had changed from a waif on the docks to a cabin boy, and from cabin boy to supercargo. In her cabin he had made his start in life, and every man on board was his friend. He could not bid good-by to Captain Griffith in the cabin and then go away. The crew crowded around him to wish him happiness and prosperity. Men who had never shown any particular interest in him before, seemed grieved to have him go. He had to shake hands with Mr. Mason and Mr. Hanway, with Tom Haines and his chief, with the steward, even with Chock Cheevers.

In four days more, when in all the glory of bright new uniform he stood on the deck of a faster and handsomer ship, watching once more the hoisting of the flags as she sped by the Sandy Hook signal station, it gave him a start when he saw that the uppermost flag did not bear the familiar number of the North Cape.

“The Trinidad,” the signals said this time; “for Trinidad and intermediate ports.”

CHAPTER XVII.
OVERBOARD IN THE PITCH LAKE.

THE difference between a modern mail and passenger steamer and a vessel built solely for carrying freight is so great that Kit could hardly help liking his new surroundings, much as he regretted leaving his old friend the North Cape. On the Trinidad there was a beautiful little office for the purser, in which Mr. Clark had one desk and his assistant another; and although the work was ten times as great as on the freighter, the facilities for doing it were ten times better. It was vastly more labor to make up the manifest where there were thousands of miscellaneous packages for different consignees at different ports; but it had to be written only once, for there was the copying-press ready to make as many duplicates as might be needed. Kit had never seen so many facilities before for doing good and rapid work.

And there was not more change in the office work than there was in everything else. No more “sea clothes” to be worn now, with forty or fifty passengers in the cabin, and the necessity of going into the grand saloon for every meal. It was a finer saloon than Kit had seen anywhere before, fitted up in marbles and hard woods and shining glass; and certainly the meals were far beyond anything he had dreamed of. Mr. Clark’s seat was at the head of one of the tables, and Kit’s at the foot; and he soon found that being agreeable to the passengers is an important part of the purser’s work on a large steamer. That part of the work Mr. Clark was quite willing to do himself, leaving his assistant to attend to the clerical-business; and Kit was more than willing to have it so, for he did not feel quite at home yet with so many passengers on board ship.

The voyage was no novelty to him, as he had been over precisely the same route before as far as Barbadoes. But this trip bade fair to give him a much better knowledge of the intermediate islands, for the purser told him that he was to do all the “shore work.”

“There’s no use of my roasting myself on those islands,” Mr. Clark said, “when I have a young fellow to do it for me. You are accustomed to that kind of work; you will find this almost the same as the work you have been doing. You must never let a package get away from you till somebody else becomes responsible for it and you have his receipt for it. These fellows down here would steal the tan off your face, if they didn’t have so much of their own. I have read in books that there’s a great deal of honesty in the world, but somehow it doesn’t seem to thrive around the seaports. Maybe you had a little experience of that in Marseilles.”

“I rather think I did!” Kit laughed. “But I have learned pretty well how to hold on to my goods. I don’t think they’re going to rob me much down here.”

One of the pleasures of the evening was to have Captain Fraser come into the office for a chat. In the long run between New York and St. Kitts, the first island, with fair weather and no land for hundreds of miles, the Captain had very little to do, and hardly an evening passed without a visit from him. He was a big, jolly, hearty Nova Scotian, in manner very much like Mr. Clark, Kit thought, at least in his habit of saying things with a sober face that he neither believed himself nor expected others to believe. The speed of the Trinidad was one of the things that Captain Fraser never tired of joking about. One evening Kit made some remark about the good day’s run.

“Oh, I have to hold her back,” the Captain answered. “She’s a very fast ship when we let her out, but the owners won’t stand it. Coming up about three months ago we left St. Kitts a day late, and as we had fine weather the chief engineer kept bothering me to let him make it up. So at last I got tired hearing about it and told him to let her go. Go! Well, sir, you never saw anything like it. You’ve been in a fast train on shore and seen the telegraph poles fly past? That was exactly the way the light-houses flew past all the way up the coast. We got into port two days ahead of time; but when the port captain came aboard, the first thing he said was:—

“‘Hello, here! what you been changing her color for? Don’t you know black’s the color of this line?’

“‘Haven’t changed her color,’ said I.

“‘Look at her,’ said he.

“Well, sir, I looked over the side, and bless my weather binnacles if the ship wasn’t a bright lead color. That was strange, you know, considering that we’d left port black. I jumped ashore and rubbed my hand over her, and she was smooth as—well, smooth as Clark’s bald head there. There wasn’t a particle of paint on her; she’d come so fast it was all stripped off, and the water had polished her steel plates till they shone like a new quarter.

“That made her very handsome, but the owners didn’t like it because they had to dock her to be painted.”

“She must have made a record that voyage, sir,” Kit suggested.

“Oh, that was only the beginning of it,” the Captain went on, with a wink at the purser. “When we started out again and got down off Hatteras we met a Dutch bark towing the biggest sea-serpent you ever saw. Whether it was a sea-serpent or a whale they couldn’t quite make out; but it was about 375 feet long and 35 or 40 feet through. They’d had it two or three days, and they declared it bellowed all night long, though that part I wouldn’t ask anybody to believe.

“I suspected something the minute I saw it, so I went aboard the bark and said, said I:—

“‘I think that’s my property you’ve got there.’

“‘Guess not,’ said the skipper.

“‘I guess yes,’ said I, for I was sure of it now. ‘If you cut into the beast somewhere abaft the mainmast I think you’ll find my trademark in him.’

“Well, sir, they lowered a boat and sent a man to chop into the critter with an axe, and with the first blow the whole thing flummixed—just collapsed, for there was nothing in it but wind. But the man gave two or three more cuts and laid over the flap, and right across it, in big gold letters, was, ‘The Trinidad, New York.’ It was nothing in the world but the paint off our ship, stripped off just like you’d skin an eel. We sold it to the darkies in Dominica afterwards for waterproof coats and galoshes; but I’m not going to put her at that speed again.”

The Captain never repeated his stories, because he always made them up as he went along; and he was so companionable and full of fun that in a short time Kit felt well enough acquainted with him to give him an account of his father’s disappearance and tell him about the man in the New Zealand hospital. The Captain listened with great interest; but even in a matter of such importance he could not quite resist the temptation to crack a joke.

“Didn’t he have a mark on his arm?” he asked. “In all such stories that I’ve read, the missing man had a mark on his arm that he could be identified by. I’ve often thought what an advantage one-legged or one-armed or one-eyed men have. If one of them goes off missing, it’s the easiest matter in the world to identify him.

“But seriously, Silburn,” he went on, “it does look a little as if that man might be your father. It’s nothing against it that he was picked up on an island in the Pacific Ocean. When a man is floating about on a spar, say, or an oar, or anything else that keeps him up, and a ship comes along, he don’t stop to ask whether she’s bound for China or New York. Any port in a storm, and a ship’s as likely to be going one way as another. Then the second ship may be lost, and there you are. If he was the kind of father you want to bring back, I think you can find out whether this is the right man or not. I’ve known some fathers who’d be just as well left at a safe distance of twelve or fifteen thousand miles.”

“Oh, mine isn’t that kind of a father, sir,” Kit answered, not quite knowing whether to laugh or not. “We would do anything in the world to get him back.”

“Then why don’t you go out to New Zealand and see for yourself?” the Captain asked. “You could identify him better than any stranger; and you can’t get anything done for you as well as you can do it yourself.”

This was precisely the point that Kit was trying to get the Captain’s opinion upon.

“But don’t you think, sir,” he asked, “that it is as well to wait till we hear something more definite from the consul out there, and till he sends the photograph?”

“Yes, I think it is,” the Captain replied. “But let me tell you something about consuls, young man. I suppose I’ve seen more of them than you have, for I’ve had business with them nearly all my life. There are some good men in the business—very good—who will put themselves out of their way to do you a service. I don’t mean to deny that. But in general a consul is a man who draws his salary for putting his heels on the mantel and smoking cigars. They get their appointments generally not because they are good men for the place, but on account of some trifling political service. Under that beautiful system we get consuls in important places who ought to be raising turnips out in the southwest corner of New Mexico. I don’t know anything about the consul in Wellington; but as a general rule, don’t you put your trust in consuls, my boy. When you have important business to be done, go and do it yourself. It’s the only safe way. If that was my case out in New Zealand, I’d wait a reasonable time for the photograph, and if it looked anything like my father, I’d be out there so quick I’d strip all the paint off myself.”

“Do you think I would have any chance of getting something to do on a steamer going to New Zealand and back, sir?” Kit asked. “Say as supercargo, or purser, or something of that kind?”

“Not the least in the world!” the Captain answered emphatically; “not from New York. All of our American trade with New Zealand you might put in your vest pocket, and you wouldn’t find a steamer going there in six months. But if you were to say Australia, now, that would be easy enough. There are plenty of steamers going from New York to Australia, and when you get there you are not far from New Zealand; you know you could do that part of the journey on your own hook. Indeed, I know two or three masters myself engaged in that trade; and if you make up your mind to go, you let me know and I’ll help you along. Clark here tells me he’s got the best young assistant in the country, though I suppose he’s mistaken about that, for all the good pursers die very young. But this is a case that would be easy to manage, because your father was a sea-faring man and you’re a sea-faring man yourself going after him, and most any good-hearted master would lend a hand. It’s all in the family, you know; we help one another.”

This conversation seemed to Kit to make things look a little brighter. If he could get to New Zealand and back without the great expense of paying his passage, half the difficulties would be removed—yes, nine-tenths of them.

“What are you doing so much with that sailor I see you talking to on deck when you’re off duty, Silburn?” Mr. Clark asked him one day before the first land was sighted. “You and he are not hatching a plot to wreck the ship, are you?”

“No, sir,” Kit laughed; “though we say some very mysterious things. The last thing I said to him yesterday was ‘my aunt has two apples, and my uncle has two pears.’ It does sound a little like a plot, doesn’t it? But the fact is the man is a Frenchman, Mr. Clark, and I have employed him to teach me a little French in my spare moments. I made up my mind in Marseilles that a sea-going man ought to know some languages beside his own, so I bought two primary French books in New York; and this man, who is quite an intelligent fellow, teaches me the pronunciation. It may come of use in Martinique when I am able to speak a little, for I have heard you say they speak nothing but French there.”

“It’s a capital idea,” the purser agreed. “I’ve always had hard sailing in Martinique because I couldn’t jabber their miserable language. I’m glad you’ve taken it up. And you’ll be remarkably glad yourself, some day, if you stick to it.”

Kit was not destined to use any of his newly acquired French in Martinique on that first outward voyage, however; for when they reached the roadstead in front of St. Pierre, the chief city, where they were to land both passengers and freight, they found danger signals flying from the top of the light-house, and all the lighters and smaller boats drawn far up on the beach. There had been enough of a storm in those waters to stir up a heavy sea, and more wind was threatened, so the cautious Frenchmen would allow no boats to go out. The passengers for Martinique could look right up the hilly streets of their chief city, almost into some of the windows, but there was no possible way for them to get ashore.

“It is all small freight we have for here, Mr. Clark. Couldn’t we land it and the passengers in our own boats?” Kit asked.

“Ah, my boy, the authorities on shore would fine us if we tried it while they have the danger signals set,” the purser answered. “Besides, we should lose the insurance if anything happened to the cargo. There’s nothing for it but to wait till the signals come down.”

Captain Fraser evidently thought differently, however. After trying for five or six hours in the roadstead he gave the order to go ahead.

“Why, we are going on!” Kit exclaimed. “What will become of our passengers and freight for St. Pierre?”

“Well, they’ll have to go on to Trinidad and come back with us,” the purser answered. “You know we touch here on the way back. That happens sometimes, and people who live in this part of the world have to get used to it. If they will build their cities where there is no harbor, only an open roadstead, they must take the consequences. We can’t keep a mail steamer waiting for a storm that is supposed to be coming.”

When they reached Barbadoes, Kit felt quite at home again. It was not worth while, he knew, for him to have any hopes of getting out to the Sea View plantation to see his friends the Outerbridges, for nearly half of all their freight was for Barbadoes, and in the few hours that they lay in the roadstead he was busy every minute, even at night. He found time, however, to write a hurried note to Mr. Outerbridge, saying that he was now assistant purser of the Trinidad, that they were on their way to Port of Spain, and that when they returned in a few days it would be a great pleasure to him if any of them happened to be in the town.

Leaving Barbadoes late in the evening, the Trinidad steamed very slowly across toward the island of Trinidad, as Captain Fraser did not care to go through the narrow passage before daylight.

“You’ll have to be out early in the morning if you want to see the ship run into the muddy water of the Orinoco,” Mr. Clark told Kit that evening while they were preparing their papers for the last port. “It’s a curious sight, that you can’t see anywhere else, that I know of. You know the numerous mouths of the river Orinoco all empty about here—some into the Gulf of Paria, where we are going, and some below it. The immense body of muddy water runs along shore with a rush, and makes—well, I’m not going to tell you what it makes. If you turn out by daylight you will see for yourself.”

With this hint Kit was sure to be out early; and he found that he was not the only watcher, for some of the crew who had seen the curious thing scores of times were out to see it again. When they were a short distance above the very narrow entrance to the Gulf of Paria, a dangerous channel that is called the Dragon’s Mouth, he saw ahead a distinct line drawn across the water—a wall of water, it looked like—a wall of muddy water two or three feet higher than the clear water of the ocean.

“That’s just what it is, sir,” one of the sailors told him when he asked a question. “You see that big body of fresh muddy water runs down out of the Orinoco. When you see the line, that’s where the river water running north meets the sea water running south. But the ocean’s the stronger, sir, and it backs the river water up into that ridge you see. Oh, yes, sir; we’ll run through that and you’ll never know it.”

So they did, the ship being too large and heavy to be visibly affected by the slight difference in water levels; and in a few moments more they were in the Dragon’s Mouth, with the high rocks of Trinidad on one side and the equally high hills of Venezuela on the other, and both so close that Kit could easily have thrown a stone against Trinidad or against the coast of South America. Then in a short time they were through the dangerous channel and in the broad Gulf of Paria; and by eleven o’clock they were at anchor in smooth and shallow water about a mile away from the wharves of the city of Port of Spain, the capital of Trinidad.

Kit thought himself pretty well accustomed to the heat of the tropics after his experiences at Sisal and Barbadoes; but he had never found anything before that was quite equal to the stifling heat of Port of Spain.

“We are on the line of greatest heat here,” Mr. Clark explained when he went into the city with him to introduce him to the agents. “It is hotter here than right on the equator. You understand about the isothermal lines, I suppose! This place is ten degrees north of the equator, but the ‘line of greatest heat,’ as they call it, runs directly through here.”

For two days the assistant purser was continually bathed in perspiration from his necessary walks into the city and looking after his goods on the wharf. But by that time the cargo was out and his work in the port was practically over, for there is very little freight to carry from Trinidad to New York.

“I have to go out to La Brea this afternoon to see the superintendent of the pitch lake,” Mr. Clark said on the third day. “It’s a nuisance, in this heat, and I wish I could leave it to you. But I have had some dealings with him, and the company charged me particularly to close a contract with him this trip if I can. So I suppose I must go myself.”

“The superintendent of the pitch lake!” Kit exclaimed. “I have read something about the great pitch lake in Trinidad; but what does it have a superintendent for?”

“Because it is a very valuable piece of property,” the purser answered. “It belongs to the government, you know, and they keep a superintendent to look after it and sell the pitch. It goes all over the world; a great many of the streets in New York and other American cities are paved with it. They call it pitch here, but when it is boiled down and ready for use we call it asphalt. We are negotiating with the superintendent to send a freight ship down to carry away two or three cargoes, and it will be a profitable job if I can close the contract with him.”

“It must be a very curious sight—a lake of pitch,” Kit suggested.

“I believe it is hard enough on the surface to walk over,” the purser replied; “but I have never seen it. You can go along with me if you like. It is only twenty or thirty miles down the coast. The train leaves at three o’clock, and we can be back by a little after dark.”

Kit was glad to avail himself of this permission, and at three o’clock they took the train for La Brea. The railway ran through a country that was given up largely to the cultivation of sugarcane; and at the stations they passed they saw a great many men who were neither whites nor negroes, in a curious costume of white stuff so arranged that it covered one leg to below the knee, but left the other leg almost bare.

“They are coolies,” Mr. Clark said, seeing that Kit was interested in these brown, slender people. “They bring a great many of them here from India to work on the plantations. They have to work so many years to pay for their passage, and after that they are free. But they’re a queer lot. When a man is badly treated by his master he doesn’t complain, but goes out and sticks a knife into himself, and they find his body lying in the cane-fields.”

In a little over an hour the train set them down at La Brea, and they found the pitch works not far from the station, on the edge of the wonderful black lake. But the superintendent’s house, they learned, was across one corner of the lake, about half a mile away; and they immediately set out for it.

They were both a little cautious about walking over the pitch at first, particularly where the path led over breaks between the beds of pitch, and they had to feel their way across narrow planks for bridges. The moving of the pitch beneath their feet did not tend, either, to give them confidence.

“This is a very queer sort of a lake!” Kit declared, stopping at the edge of one of the round beds to examine it. “I think I can see how it is made. First there is a lake of water here, with a great bed of molten pitch somewhere beneath. A column of the pitch shoots up, like a waterspout, and when it reaches the surface, the top of it flattens out, like an immense mushroom, held up by the narrow column that reaches down dear knows how far. This water between the black mushrooms looks very deep and black; bah! I shouldn’t care to fall in there.”

“That’s about the way the thing grows,” Mr. Clark agreed. “Some of the ‘mushrooms,’ as you call them, are only a yard or so in diameter, and some are twelve or fifteen feet. Gradually enough of them have come up to cover the entire surface of the lake, which must be two or three thousand acres. What a desolate-looking place, isn’t it? And they tell me that no matter how much is cut out, a fresh column of pitch shoots up and fills the hole. I shouldn’t care to wander around here much after dark.”

It was not a very safe path even by daylight. In some places the “mushrooms” not only touched, but crowded and indented each other; but in other places there were gaps two, three, sometimes even six feet wide, that had to be crossed on the planks. When they stood in the middle of one of the big “mushrooms,” it was firm enough; but when they stood upon its edge, their weight bent it down until the water ran over its surface.

They made the passage in safety, however, and Mr. Clark had a long talk with the superintendent while Kit remained on the lake. It was a very satisfactory talk, the purser said when he came out, for everything had been arranged and the contract signed. But Kit had been watching the sky for some time with uneasiness. Engrossed with his business, Mr. Clark had given no attention to the passing of time, and it was with some alarm that Kit had seen the sun set behind the mountains and darkness begin to gather.

Mr. Clark was a little uneasy about it, too, when he saw how long he had stayed. He was not particularly fond of walking, even on a good pavement; and the prospect of crossing the end of the lake in the dusk, sometimes on narrow planks across the openings, sometimes on the yielding pitch beds, did not please him.

“We’ll have to hurry up, Silburn,” he called to Kit when he reached the edge of the lake. “You know there’s precious little twilight in this part of the world; it’s either daylight or it’s dark. One of those old rattletrap cabs in Bridgetown would be better than walking over these tarry islands. But come on, youngster! You may think I’m no walker, but I’ll show you!”

He started out at a great pace, with Kit following. But Mr. Clark’s physique was not adapted to severe exercise. After the first hundred yards he began to breathe hard, and soon he stopped entirely.

“I’ve got to—to—(hech!) to stop and get my (hech! hech!)—my second wind!” he panted. “Hang their old (phew! phew!) old pitch lakes! If they make—make (hech!) streets out of ’em, I wish they’d (phew! phew!) make some here. It’s getting darker every—every minute, too!”

“We started out too fast, sir,” Kit answered; “if we take it slower, I think we’ll get along all right. It’s going to be dark before we get across, anyhow, so we may as well take our time to it.”

Mr. Clark was compelled to take his time to it, for he had no more wind for fast walking. It was not fairly dark yet, but “pretty thick dusk,” as Kit called it, and they had to feel their way along. The purser remained in the lead when they set out again, for Kit hesitated to go ahead, for fear of going too fast for him.

They were about to cross one of the widest crevices, and Mr. Clark was half way over on the plank, when Kit heard a startled cry.

“Silburn!”

And plank and purser went down together, Mr. Clark disappearing beneath the black water.

Kit saw in an instant what had happened. The end of the plank had slipped from the edge of the opposite bed of pitch.

Mr. Clark, he knew, could not swim; and besides he might come up beneath one of those horrible “mushrooms,” and so almost inevitably be drowned. But Kit was not long in making up his mind what to do. He instantly threw off his coat and knelt on the edge of the “mushroom” he was on, with his head close to the water, ready to dive for his companion as soon as he could get a glimpse of him.

He had no chance to dive, however. As soon as the impetus of his fall was over, the purser shot to the surface again like a cork; and catching a momentary glance at Kit’s head he grabbed at it with all the energy of a drowning man, and got his arm around the neck before Kit had time to draw back.

As he started to go down again, which he did at almost the same instant, only one result was possible. Kit was overbalanced and dragged into the water, and they went down together into the black depths, both in deadly peril from drowning, and Kit with the additional danger of the arm wound around his throat like a vise.

CHAPTER XVIII.
A VOYAGE TO BERMUDA.

IF Kit had been less at home in the water, there is little doubt that they would both have found their long rest down among the black columns of pitch. But besides being a strong swimmer he was well versed in all the arts of managing a drowning companion. He knew that without his assistance the purser at least must drown, so he quickly brought his right hand around, and seizing the struggling man’s nose with a grip of iron, he bent the purser’s head back till it seemed as if his thick neck must break. But this had the desired effect, as Kit knew from experience that it would. Mr. Clark let go his hold to save his neck, and in an instant Kit had him firmly by the waist.

This was done almost in a second; and when they came to the surface again, Kit grabbed at the slippery edge of the “mushroom.” His hand slipped off, but struck against the floating plank, which he had not seen in the darkness; and that was better still. He guided one of Mr. Clark’s hands to the plank, and then let go his own hold.

“Now hold fast for a minute, sir,” he said, “and we’ll be all right.”

“I’m g-gone, Silburn!” the purser gasped; “I c-can’t (ah!) swim!”

“You’ll be on shore in a moment, sir, if you hold tight,” Kit answered; and he scrambled up on the nearest “mushroom” and laid one end of the plank upon it. But he could not risk the leap to the opposite shore in the darkness, so he plunged into the water again and swam across and soon had the other end of the plank in place.

But getting Mr. Clark out was no easy matter, even with the plank made firm again. Kit climbed out, and walking the plank till he could reach the purser’s nearest arm, he grasped it firmly and helped him toward the shore.

“Now get one knee on the plank,” he said, when he had him in the corner between the plank and the edge of the “mushroom”; and stooping down he seized the knee that his companion was trying in vain to raise high enough, and pulled it up.

“Now one grand pull, and we’re all right.” Kit was on the pitch bed again by this time, with a firm hold under the purser’s arms. He pulled with all his strength. Mr. Clark got the other knee on the “mushroom,” and in an instant more he was safe on land, but exhausted with his efforts, and unable to rise.

Kit quickly turned the purser over on his face and raised his feet to let any water run out of his mouth that he might have swallowed; and that was no light undertaking with so heavy a man. Then he turned him over again, and finding that he was breathing regularly, though heavily, he began to urge him to rise.

“We must get ashore to dry our clothes,” he said. “It won’t do for you to lie here in the wet.”

“Oh, I never can walk ashore!” the purser gasped; and putting up his hand, he added, “I must have struck my face against something down in that hole; my nose is so sore.”

In spite of the unpleasant surroundings, it was all that Kit could do to keep from laughing; for he knew what was the matter with that nose.

“No, sir,” he answered; “you had me by the throat, and we were both drowning, and I had to take you by the nose to make you let go.”

The purser laughed himself at this; and thinking that a good sign, Kit took hold of him again and half dragged him to his feet. Then he ran across the plank to get his coat, the only dry garment they had between them, and with a little more urging Mr. Clark consented to make an effort to reach the station.

It was almost totally dark now, and they had to feel their way along, moving very slowly.

“I don’t know what put it into my head to bring you with me to-day, Silburn,” the purser said when they were near enough to shore to feel safe. “But it was the best thing I ever did in my life. If it hadn’t been for you, the catfish would be making a supper of me by this time in this miserable lake.”

“Oh, you might have taken a different route entirely, if I had not been with you, sir,” Kit answered. “What we want now is a fire to dry our clothes by. If we have a little time at the station, we must find one somewhere, or build one.”

Finding at the station that they had more than an hour to wait for the return train, and indoor fires being almost unknown in that part of the world, they went out to the edge of the road and built a little camp fire with such stray sticks as they could find, and piece by piece dried their outer clothing, much to the amazement of a crowd of coolies that soon gathered and stood watching them. And the station agent, learning what had happened, brought them each a steaming cup of coffee.

By the time they reached the ship and put on dry clothes Mr. Clark was quite ready to crack jokes over his mishap, though he insisted that but for Kit he should have been drowned. And Captain Fraser refused to see any but the funny side of it, and declared that such a roll of fat as the purser could not possibly have been in danger of drowning.

“I think I shall have to stop going ashore at any of the ports, except on business,” Kit said, after the accident had been well discussed; “particularly toward night. In all my voyages I have not had a sign of an adventure on the water; but as soon as I go ashore, something is sure to happen. The first night in Marseilles we were imprisoned in Louis-Philippe’s cell in Monte Cristo’s castle; the second night we were up in Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde when the elevators broke, and had a cardinal to entertain us; now here I go ashore for a little ride in the country, and tumble into the pitch lake.”

“Don’t you worry about adventures on the water, young man,” Captain Fraser said, almost precisely as Captain Griffith had once answered him. “All you have to do is to stick to the sea long enough, and your adventures are sure to come. I shouldn’t be in any hurry for them, either, if I were you. Sometimes a man comes out on the top side of an adventure; but more times he’s on the under side, and don’t come out at all.”

On the homeward voyage, whenever he had a few spare moments, Kit tried to think out what he ought to do. As soon as his cargo was out he would make a hurried trip home; that was the first thing. There could not possibly be a second letter from the New Zealand consul yet, but there might be a photograph. And if—ah! if the photograph proved to be what he hoped, he would fly back to New York and take his promised leave of absence, get Captain Fraser’s and Mr. Clark’s help to find a berth on some steamer going to Australia, and be off for New Zealand as fast as possible. And Captain Griffith would help him, too, if the North Cape had not sailed again. What a lucky fellow he was, he thought, to have three such friends to help him!

These were all reasonable and natural things for him to think of; perfectly proper plans for him to make. But when shall we see the happy time when the best laid plans may not sometimes go wrong?

When the Trinidad neared her pier on the North River, Mr. Clark was quite excited and very much annoyed to find that one of her sister ships, the Orinoco, was lying on the other side of the slip.

“Now that’s going to upset everything,” he exclaimed.

“Why, what difference does it make, sir,” Kit asked, “whether the Orinoco is here or not?”

“Difference!” the purser repeated. “A heap of difference to us all, as you may find. The Orinoco is running on the Bermuda line, and she ought to be out there now. Something has broken down about her, or she wouldn’t be lying here. And if that is the case, we will be put in her place for Bermuda. That means that we shall have to hustle this cargo out as fast as steam and men can move it, and get another in equally fast, and be off to sea again before we have time to say Jack Robinson.”

That was precisely what happened. As soon as the Trinidad was docked they received orders to prepare for a voyage to Bermuda; and as they must leave port within three days, Kit saw that he should be busy every minute, without the slightest chance of going home.

In the hurry of emptying the ship and reloading her in so short a time he barely had opportunity to write a brief note to Vieve, telling her of the circumstances and asking her to send him, the moment she received the letter, a telegram saying whether the photograph or another letter had arrived from New Zealand. All his plans were of course upset, but there was nothing for him to do but give himself up to work and forget, as far as possible, his own affairs.

The way the old cargo was taken out and the new one put in was very different from the manner of work he had become accustomed to in European and West Indian ports. The gangs of ’longshoremen, working by night under electric lights, were relieved every eight or ten hours; but only the purser and his assistant could attend to the clerical labor, and there was no relief for them.

The Trinidad was almost ready for sea again, and some of the Bermuda passengers were already on board, when a blue-coated telegraph messenger inquired his way to the purser’s office and handed Kit a telegram. He could not hesitate about opening it, for he had no time now to hesitate about anything; but he understood perfectly well that its contents might make a great change in his movements.

Christopher Silburn [the message read], Assistant Purser, S. S. Trinidad, New York.

No letter. No photograph. All well.

Genevieve.

Under other circumstances that would have been a disappointment; but now it was what he hoped for, for with so much extra work he felt that it would be unfair for him to leave everything to Mr. Clark until the ship returned from Bermuda.

On the second day out, while sitting at his desk working at the manifest, Kit leaned his head on one hand and took serious counsel with himself.

“I have made a good many voyages,” he reflected; “to Sisal, to Barbadoes, twice across the Atlantic and back, and again to the West Indies. But I have never—”

He suddenly resolved to finish his reflections in the open air; and for greater convenience he leaned heavily against the rail.

“What’s the matter, Silburn?” Mr. Clark asked through the open door, catching a glimpse of his assistant’s white face. “You don’t mean to say that you’re—”

“Yes, I do, sir!” Kit answered, leaning over the rail again for fresh thought. “After all my voyages, this little choppy sea has made me just as sick as a dog!”

“Ah, you’re not the first victim of the Bermuda voyage!” the purser laughed. “I get sick myself out here sometimes. It’s the Gulf Stream that does it, my boy. We cross the stream diagonally, and the current catches us under the starboard quarter and gives us a nasty little motion, half pitch and half roll, that sends the oldest sailors to the rail sometimes. Lie down a few minutes, and you’ll feel better.”

“No, sir, I’m not going to give in to it,” Kit replied. “I’ll walk the deck a little in the air. I don’t see a single passenger on deck.”

“So much the better!” said the purser, with another of his jolly laughs. “When they’re all sick they can’t be haunting our office to ask questions. We can do very well without them.”

Kit’s nausea soon wore off under his open-air treatment; and before many hours he was too much interested in his first look at Bermuda to think of being sick. Though he had seen many places, this was entirely different from any of the others. Here were three hundred and sixty-five little islands (so report said; and that estimate looked about right) grouped together in mid-ocean, forming a tiny kingdom far removed from the rest of the world.

After taking a pilot, the Trinidad bore down toward one of the points of the largest island, which was shaped like a horseshoe, with a large smooth bay in the hollow. There was a town on the point, which the ship seemed to be heading for; but when near it she coyly circled away to follow the shoreline in the opposite direction, almost turning on her course, entered the horseshoe bay, and steamed for several hours, still skirting the shore, among tiny islets, nearly grazing half-hidden rocks, turning and twisting in here, out there, till she reached a smaller bay making in from the large one, on whose shore was another and larger town.

“How do you like that for a channel?” Mr. Clark asked. “It is called the most intricate channel in the world, and I suppose it is. That first town was St. George’s. We had to go so close to it because the channel runs that way. This place is Hamilton, the capital. Have you noticed that most of the people live in white marble houses?”

“Yes, I have been wondering at that,” Kit answered. “They must have marble quarries here.”

“Most strangers wonder at it when they first see the islands,” the purser went on. “But they are not all millionaires here, as you might think. Those walls are made of rough stone, plastered over and whitewashed; and from the sea they look exactly like marble. There are more queer things here than you could put in a sea-chest, and it’s a pity we’ll not have more time. They don’t quarry their stone out, you know, like other people, but cut it out with saws. It’s soft stuff, like that building-stone you must have seen in Marseilles, but hardens when exposed to the air. Now if you want to see a novel way of docking a ship, just watch.”

On shore was a broad street, with no buildings on the water-side except a long, low iron shed that was nothing but pillars and roof, with no walls. A great many colored people waited on the wharf, and a few whites, and Kit noticed two big round timbers lying near the edge, with a little pile of planks. The Trinidad was carefully brought to a stop about thirty feet from the wharf, her further progress being prevented by a hidden ledge of rocks; and a gang of colored laborers immediately began to shove out the heavy timbers, with a little help from the ship’s donkey engine and winches. In a few minutes one end of each timber rested on the wharf and the other end upon the ship’s deck, making the skeleton of a substantial bridge. To these large timbers the men lashed smaller cross-pieces, then laid on the planks for a flooring, and in about twenty minutes the steamer was connected with shore by a bridge strong enough for much heavier work than would be required of it.

There was part of one afternoon, while the Trinidad lay at Bermuda, that both the purser and his assistant were at liberty; but that was not long enough for the favorite drive to St. George’s.

“There’s one place that we could go, five or six miles from town,” Mr. Clark said, “and that’s the Walsingham caves and Tom Moore’s house.”

“Moore’s house!” Kit repeated; “you don’t mean the poet, Thomas Moore, I suppose.”

“That’s the man,” the purser answered. “He lived here for some time. It is just a nice drive out to his house, and the caves are very near it. But as to going out there with you, no I thank you! The caves are very spooky-looking places, dark and slippery; and you admit yourself that you are a hoodoo on shore. When you go to Monte Cristo’s castle, you are locked in a cell. When you go to that church on the hill, the elevators break down. When you go with me to the pitch lake, I am all but drowned. If I should go to the caves with you, I’d no doubt be buried alive. I beg to be excused.”

“If that is the only objection,” Kit laughed, “maybe we can make a compromise. I never cared anything about caves, but I should like to see the house that Mr. Moore lived in. My collection of foreign curiosities includes a count and a cardinal so far, you know. I should like to add a poet.”

After a little bantering, Mr. Clark agreed to go as far as Walsingham, Mr. Moore’s house, but declared that he would on no account go near the caves. And it was as well that there were two to divide the expense of the carriage between, for Bermuda cab fares are “on the American plan,” not on the cheaper European scale.

They found the poet’s house to be a plain double two-story edifice of stone, so blackened by time and weather that it looked gloomy in the extreme; and the yard in front grown up with bushes, a large lake in the rear studded with black rocks and bordered with dismal drooping mangrove trees, and the general dilapidation of the place, added to the sombreness.

Kit was much amused at Mr. Clark’s positive refusal to get out of the carriage, for fear of something happening. But he got out himself and went all over the place, and was satisfied that nothing but the most solemn poetry could ever have been written in so gloomy a place.

“You don’t really mean that you’re afraid of something happening when you go ashore with me, Mr. Clark, do you?” Kit asked his companion on the way back to the ship. “You must be joking about that.”

“Not exactly in the way you mean,” the purser answered. “But some people are always having adventures of one kind or another; it comes natural to them; and I think you’re one of that sort. It’s all very well for youngsters like you. But when you come to be my age, or especially my weight, you’ll find that a trifling adventure may mean something serious. To slip into a lake means a bad cold, as I know to my cost; a fall may mean some broken bones. No; adventures are for the young and spry, not for the old and fat.”

“Well, we have certainly had a safe and quiet trip ashore this time, sir,” Kit said, with a laugh, as, once more on deck, they reached the door of their office. “This whole voyage is about as quiet a trip as any one could ask for.”

At that moment his eye caught sight of a small bluish envelope lying sealed upon his desk. It was addressed simply to “Silburn, str. Trinidad, Bermuda,” and the printing across the top indicated that it was a cable message. He hastily tore it open and read:

“Silburn str Trinidad Bermuda Photograph received very encouraging Genevieve”

There was no punctuation, hardly any divisions between the words; but its meaning was plain enough.

“Now isn’t that a thoughtful sister of mine!” he exclaimed, handing the message to Mr. Clark. “She knows that I’ll be in a hurry to set off if we identify the picture. So she sends me this cable to give me time to make any arrangements on the way up to New York.”

“This is important news for you, Silburn,” the purser said, after reading the few words. “It looks very much as if you would find your father.”

“It is the best news I ever got in my life, sir,” Kit answered. “I don’t quite understand what my sister means by ‘very encouraging,’ but I imagine they are still in a little doubt after seeing the picture, though they think it looks like my father.”

“That is exactly what I anticipated after hearing your story,” the purser agreed. “You have no idea how hardships and sickness can alter a man’s appearance in a few months; and from what you tell me, your father, if this is your father, must have gone through a great deal. Now what do you propose to do about it?”

“I think I ought to get out there just as soon as possible, sir,” Kit answered, “if we are all agreed at home that the picture bears a reasonable resemblance to my father.”

“I can’t advise you against it, Silburn; I can’t advise you against it,” Mr. Clark said, more seriously than was his custom. “If I were out there in that fix, I should expect one of my boys to come after me just as fast as a ship would bring him. I don’t want to lose you for a few months, but it is your duty to go. You must remember, though, that you are to come back to me. I will get some one to take your place while you are gone, but I want you back again when you return.”

On the homeward voyage there were some serious talks in the purser’s office about how Kit was to be got to New Zealand.

“It just amounts to this,” Captain Fraser said, after the matter had been well discussed. “If there is any ship going that way that I know the master of, or the owners of, I can almost certainly arrange it for you; and if there isn’t, I can’t. You will have to go without pay, you understand; just for your passage there and back.”

“I will willingly do that, sir,” Kit answered.

“Then I’ll tell you how I think it can be done,” the Captain continued. “Here’s a steamer, we’ll say, loading for Australia, with a supercargo at so many dollars a month. Now after seeing the owners or agents and convincing them that you are a supercargo of experience and understand your business, and getting their consent, we go to the supercargo and say, ‘Here’s a seafaring man got a sick father in New Zealand; wants to go out there and bring him home; willing to make the round voyage and do your work for the sake of the passage. We have seen your agents and they are willing. You stay ashore this voyage and draw your pay and enjoy yourself, and he’ll do your work.’”

“Well, I wonder that I never thought of that before!” Kit exclaimed. “It’s the very best plan that could be made.”

“I think it can be done, if we can strike the right ship,” the Captain continued. “You couldn’t very well do it for yourself, you understand; but what’s the use of having friends if they can’t help you along a little? It’s a different matter if an old shipmaster like myself goes to the firm and says, ‘I know this young man. I recommend him.’ And I take Captain Griffith along, if he is in port, and he says, ‘This man was trained on my ship; he is a good supercargo; I recommend him.’ And Clark goes along and says, ‘This man is my assistant purser on the Trinidad; he understands his business and will take care of your interests; I recommend him.’ You see that makes a pretty strong backing; and if that isn’t enough, I’ll get the Quebec Steamship Company to put in a word too. Just you go home after you get your cargo out and leave me your address, and we’ll attend to the rest for you.”

Kit began to try to thank them both for their good opinion of him; but seeing what was coming they quickly changed the subject.

The photograph had caused many a tear to be shed in the Silburn cottage in Huntington, and there was a fresh flood when Kit reached home. So old the man looked; so wan and worried; so bent and gray! What sufferings must he not have endured if that was indeed a picture of Christopher Silburn!

“Take off the beard,” Kit declared, “trim the long hair, straighten the back, smooth out the wrinkles, and there is father! Of course it is not a certainty, but I feel reasonably sure of it.”

“So do I!” Vieve echoed.

“I pray you may both be right!” was all that Mrs. Silburn could say.

Two days later a neighbor’s boy ran in to say that Kit was wanted at the telephone office in a hurry. He ran up the hill to the post-office, in which was a station of the New York and New England telephone line.

“That you, Silburn?” a familiar voice asked. “Yes, I’m Captain Fraser, in New York. It’s all arranged for you. You’re to take the supercargo’s place on the steamer Brindisi, sailing for Melbourne next Thursday. Come in and report to Hayes, Ward, & Burt’s, 82 South Street, as soon as possible. Got that down? Good luck to you, my boy. Here’s somebody else wants to speak to you.”

“That you, Kit?” It was the familiar and beloved voice of Captain Griffith. “It’s all fixed for you. You’ll be over to the North Cape to say good-by, of course. Remember what I told you long ago about money.”

Before Kit could answer, a third voice came over the wire.

“Look out for pitch lakes over there!” There was no mistaking the cheery voice of Mr. Clark. “We’ll be gone before you see us, but never mind. We’ve done a good day’s work for you to-day, Silburn. A good voyage to you, and—success!”

There were so many hundred things to be done at home in so few hours! And that ever-present, ever-troublesome question of money! The hard saving of the whole family for months had not been for nothing. Kit was surprised to find how much his mother had saved for this occasion; and she was equally surprised to learn that he had nearly two hundred dollars in his pocket. With the joy of the errand and the sorrow of parting he hardly remembered just what happened when he said good-by.

“Be careful of my little parcel!” Vieve called after him as Silas cracked his whip and the stage rattled down the road.

CHAPTER XIX.
KIT FINDS HIS FATHER.

IT was a beautiful spring-like day in the latter part of September when Kit stepped ashore on the quay in the city of Wellington, New Zealand. Fresh new leaves were upon the trees, fresh green grass in the lawns, bright fresh flowers in the beds. Nature had recently awakened from her winter sleep, and the young city of the Antipodes was at its brightest and best.

During the long voyage he had had ample time to determine just what he must do on arrival. First, of course, he would go to the American consul’s and introduce himself; and how often he had hoped that the consul would not detain him long, for he would be so anxious to get to the hospital! And then he would hurry to the hospital, and in five minutes the great question would be decided.

But now that he was actually on the spot, things did not look, somehow, exactly as he had expected. No place ever does look just as we expect when we have long been thinking about it and then go to see it for the first time. He looked with curiosity at the big buildings, wondering which was the hospital, which the consulate. He could hardly grasp the idea that in all probability his father was in one of those buildings before him. But suppose that, after all, the man in the hospital should not prove to be his father; suppose he had made this long journey for nothing? He quickened his steps up the street to walk these useless fancies away.

“Will you be kind enough to tell me the way to the American consulate, sir?” he asked a gentleman whom he met.

“It is in that red brick building on the other side,” the gentleman answered. “You cannot very well miss it.”

In two minutes more he had made himself known to Mr. Wilkins, the vice-consul and acting consul.

“I rather thought we should see you here,” Mr. Wilkins said, “but hardly so soon. My second letter must have made good time over to America.”

“Your second letter!” Kit exclaimed; “we had not received a second letter from you, sir, when I left home. I started as soon as we got the photograph you sent.”

“Oh, yes; I see,” said Mr. Wilkins. “Then you recognized your father in the photograph, did you?”

“Not with certainty,” Kit replied; “but there was a resemblance. But was there any further news in your second letter, sir?”

“Well, I can hardly say any further news, except that there has been a great improvement in your father—at least in the man in the hospital. Even since the photograph was taken he has improved very much. Physically, I mean; he is a great deal stronger, and looks and acts much younger. And mentally he has improved somewhat, too. He is not able to give the least account of himself, to be sure; the past seems to be a perfect blank to him; but in affairs of the present he takes some intelligent interest. I am glad that you will see him in his improved condition rather than as he was some months ago. It was a hard matter for the consulate to deal with. A distressed American sailor we are allowed to send home at the public expense; but there was no evidence that this man is an American sailor—or indeed an American at all.”

“I think I can soon settle that question when I see him, sir,” Kit answered. “If he is my father, I shall know him, no matter how much he is changed. And naturally I am anxious to see him as soon as possible. If you will be kind enough to give me a line of introduction to the hospital authorities, I will go there at once.”

“Of course you are anxious!” the consul assented. “You have been kept in suspense a terribly long time; but you shall know the best or the worst without delay. I will go over to the hospital with you at once. It is only a few steps from here.”

In the hospital they were shown into the house surgeon’s office; and when the surgeon entered he was greatly interested to find that some one had come from the other side of the world in the hope of identifying the mysterious John Doe.

“It is a case that we have all taken much interest in,” he said. “If you could have seen him when he arrived here, you would be assured by his present appearance that we have taken good care of him. But you have made a long journey to find a father, and I will not keep you waiting. For some weeks this patient has been going in and out at his own pleasure, under the necessary restrictions; but his favorite place is the sunny courtyard. To avoid exciting him unduly, I think the best plan will be to induce him to walk in the courtyard; and we three will then walk quietly through. That will give the best opportunity to see whether you can identify him, or whether he will recognize you.”

“You know best about that, sir,” Kit answered.

The surgeon tapped his bell, and in a moment an attendant entered—the same one who had held the flags in front of the patient long before.

“I want you to get John Doe into the courtyard for a walk,” the surgeon said. “This gentleman hopes to identify him, and in a few minutes we will walk through the yard. But give the patient no hint that anything unusual is happening. Just ask him out for a walk; he is always ready for a walk in the sun.”

“I must caution you,” the surgeon said to Kit after the attendant had gone to execute his order, “that in these cases of suspended memory we have to be prepared for almost anything. Nothing is surprising. If the patient proves to be your father, he may recognize you at once, and the shock may restore his lost memory in an instant. On the other hand, he may not recognize you at all. Or if he does, he may treat you as if you had left him only a few minutes before—as if your being here was a perfectly natural thing. If he knows you at all, it is an extremely favorable indication. With one little beginning, his whole past will almost certainly come back to him.”

As they walked through the long corridor toward the door that was to admit them to the courtyard, Kit felt his heart beating against his ribs as though trying to break them. The consul said something, but it made no impression upon him. He heard footsteps on the stone pavement outside, and tried to recognize them, but could not. The surgeon threw open the door, and they stepped out.

At the farther end of the yard, where the sun shone brightest, “John Doe” was walking slowly up and down, with his hands clasped behind him.

“That is my father!” Kit said very quietly.

It surprised him that he could speak so coolly, for he felt anything but cool. The moisture in his eyes was beyond his control; but he had firmly made up his mind that he would make no scene, whatever happened. He had too often been disgusted at seeing bearded Frenchmen hug and kiss each other like school-girls; he would have none of that—at least not in public.

For a moment neither of his companions spoke. They appreciated his feelings and gave him time to collect himself. But the consul’s hand stole into his and gave him a warm grip. Then another hand; that was the surgeon’s.

After a short delay the surgeon put his arm through Kit’s, and the three walked across the yard toward the patient. It was a terribly trying moment for Kit. The impulse to rush forward and clasp his father’s hands was almost irresistible, but he restrained himself.

Before they were half way across the yard, “John Doe,” now John Doe no longer, but Christopher Silburn, hearing footsteps, turned and looked around. Recognizing the surgeon, he nodded to him, and was about to resume his walk, when something about their party attracted his attention. He looked again, and turned his steps toward them—not in his former aimless way, but as if he had an object in view. In a moment more Kit and his father were face to face.

“Now what’s kept you all this time, Kit?” Mr. Silburn asked, in an annoyed tone. “When I send you on an errand, I want you to do it and come straight home. I will not have this sort of thing.”

It was so utterly different from anything he had anticipated that Kit was completely taken off his guard. But as soon as he recovered himself he was filled with joy at being recognized at all. He must, he knew, humor his father’s mood, and lead him gradually along.

“I got here as soon as I could, father,” he answered, in a tone as tender as a girl’s. “There were some things I had to do for mother first.”

“Where is mother?” Mr. Silburn asked, looking around as if he expected to find her behind him.

“She’s in the house—at home,” Kit answered.

“And Vieve?” he asked.

“She’s at home, too.”

“Well, you must do your mother’s errands, of course,” Mr. Silburn went on. “But I don’t like to have you away so long, Kit. I’ve been wanting you to bring me my other clothes. I can’t find them anywhere, but they must be some place around the house. I’m tired of these gray ones.”

He held out one arm and looked at the sleeve, then down at the legs of the trousers, as if they were something new to him.

“Hadn’t we better go down to the tailor’s and get your new ones?” Kit asked. “They must be done by this time, and you will have to try them on.”

He looked at the surgeon as he spoke, and the surgeon gave him an approving nod, as if to say, “Yes, humor him as much as you can.”

“Yes, we will go and get the new ones,” Mr. Silburn answered. “I don’t like these gray ones at all.”

“In just a minute, father,” Kit said. “I want to run into the house a minute first.”

The surgeon took the hint and followed him in, for he saw that Kit desired to speak to him.

“Perhaps it will make him feel more like himself to have the kind of clothes he is accustomed to—a dark blue suit,” he suggested. “If you think best I will take him out to a tailor’s to buy some. And he would like to have his hair and beard trimmed in the old way, I am sure.”

“Yes, the more you can make him look like his old self, the better,” the surgeon assented. “He is doing famously. Don’t contradict him in anything. Just let him take his own way as he has been doing, and it will not be long before he will discover that there has been some change in his surroundings. Then he will begin to ask questions, and you can tell him what has happened.

“I advise you to bring him back here,” the surgeon continued, “at least for a few days. It would not be well to make everything too strange for him at first. We will give you a room here with two beds, so that you can stay with him. By the time you get back from your walk you may find a great improvement in him; I can see that having you with him makes him feel happier.”

When the two Christopher Silburns started down the street for the tailor’s, the consul went with them, for he was very much interested in the strange case; and it was not long before the patient was arrayed in a dark blue suit, with a new derby hat; and after his hair and beard had been trimmed to the way he was accustomed to wear them, he looked so much like the old Christopher Silburn that Kit could hardly help dancing around him for joy. But he held himself in, and made no demonstrations. It was evident that his father was very much pleased, too, with the change in his appearance; he admired himself in the mirror, drew himself up till the stoop was gone from his shoulders, and was very particular to have the new hat on straight. It was nothing but the truth when the consul said that he looked like a new man.

“I should like to go to the cable office for a minute or two,” Kit said, when they were done with the barber. “I don’t want to keep all this pleasure to myself.”

But writing a cable message home, when every word cost more than a day’s salary, was no easy matter. The first one he wrote contained sixteen words, and that was far too long. After many trials he got it reduced to nine, in this fashion:—

Silburn, Huntington, Conn.

Father much improved. Knows me.

Kit.

“That tells them that I have found him, and that we are both all right,” he reflected. It was just like Kit that the first real extravagance he ever committed was for his mother and Vieve, not for his own pleasure. The message cost him nearly thirty dollars.

“Who is that to?” his father asked, as he handed the telegram to the clerk.

“To mother,” Kit replied. “It’s just to let her know that we are all right.”

“And where is mother?” was the next question.

“Why, at home, in Huntington,” Kit answered, thinking that now were coming the questions that the doctor had said were sure to come sooner or later. But he was mistaken. His father looked perplexed, as though trying hard to think about something, but walked out of the office with them without saying more, stroking what the barber had left of his beard.

On the way up the street to the consul’s office, however, he stopped and seized Kit by the arm.

“Kit,” he said, “what place is this?”

“This is Wellington, New Zealand, father,” Kit replied.

His father merely nodded his head and went on stroking his beard, but asked no more. It worried Kit to see how very hard he was trying to remember something, without succeeding. But it was not till they were seated in the consul’s office that he spoke again.

“There is something I don’t understand,” he said then to Kit. “And I see you don’t want to tell me; but tell me this, is anything wrong at home?”

“Not a thing, father,” Kit answered.

“Nobody dead?”

“No, indeed; nor sick, either; and in an hour or two they’ll be the happiest couple in the world, when they get my message.”

“Well, then I can wait,” Mr. Silburn answered. “I don’t know what it all means, but it’s all right, since you’re here. You’re such a big fellow, Kit; I had no idea you were such a big boy. And you’re going home with me?”

“In the very first ship,” Kit answered.

“Then it’s all right,” he said; “you can tell me when you get ready. Things are all in a muddle, somehow.”

The consul had a great many questions to ask about Kit’s voyage, and his business, and how long he was going to stay; and after a little conversation, of which Mr. Silburn took no notice, he asked one in which the former patient took a sudden interest.

“Don’t you both feel as if you could eat something? There is an excellent restaurant across the street, and I should be glad to have you eat dinner with me.”

“Yes, I’m hungry,” Mr. Silburn answered. “I haven’t eaten anything since—no, I’m getting mixed again. The last thing I ate was a bit of raw lobster, but I can’t remember where it was.”

When they were seated at the table, the patient gave ample proof that his loss of memory did not affect his appetite.

“That lobster you spoke of,” the consul said, hoping to revive the subject, “was that on the island?”

“It seems to me it was on an island somewhere,” Mr. Silburn answered. “Not much of an island, as far as I can remember; just a little place, with only a few people on it. I’m glad you spoke of it; though it seems to put me in mind of something, though I can’t think what it is. Give me some more of the roast beef, please.”

When Kit and his father retired to their room in the hospital early that evening, a room evidently kept for some of the staff rather than for patients, Kit drew one of the big chairs up to the table, and seating his father in it, proceeded to open the small package that Vieve had entrusted to him.

“You see Vieve hasn’t forgotten you, father,” he said. “She thought you must miss your slippers, so she made me bring them over to you. And here’s something else. Do you remember this?”

He reached into one of the slippers and took out his father’s pocket knife that the sailor from the Flower City had given him.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for that knife,” Mr. Silburn said, taking it as coolly as if he had mislaid it somewhere the day before. “Where did you find it, Kit?”

“I got it from the man you handed it to, to cut away one of the Flower City’s boats with, sir,” Kit answered. “Do you remember that?”

“Why shouldn’t I remember it?” Mr. Silburn asked, a little petulantly. “I handed it to Blinkey, and they got away from the schooner all right. Has anything been heard from them yet?”

“Blinkey is safe in England,” Kit replied, as he took off his father’s shoes and put on his slippers. “But you and he are the only ones who have been heard of.”

“Oh, well, they’ll be all right,” Mr. Silburn exclaimed; “they were good tight boats, and—no, our boat went to pieces, though. I get these things so mixed. My head’s all in a muddle with trying to remember, and it tires me. I think you’d better help me get to bed, Kit. I’ll be rested by morning.”

“Kit!” he called, as Kit was tucking the bedclothes snugly about him; “you still here, Kit?”

“Yes; here I am, father.”

“And you’ve come all the way to New Zealand to take me home?”

“Yes; we’re going home just as fast as we can.”

“And you won’t go without me, Kit?”

“Do you think I’d be likely to do such a thing, father?” Kit asked.

“No, you wouldn’t, Kit; you always were a good boy. And I’ll be rested by morning.” And with Kit’s hand firmly clutched in his he closed his eyes and gave up trying to remember.

Kit stood by the bedside for some minutes, till he was sure that his father was asleep; then he sat down at the table and wrote a long letter home, knowing that the mails would reach America weeks earlier than the slow Brindisi could arrive. And a letter to Mr. Clark too, and another to Captain Griffith. It was nearly midnight before he got to bed, but the fatigue and excitement of the day insured a good night’s sleep.

“Kit, my boy, wake up. I want you to tell me something.”

When Kit opened his eyes, the sun was streaming in the windows, and his father, already dressed, was standing by his bed. He sprang up and began to put on his clothes.

“I want you to tell me, Kit,” he repeated, seating himself in one of the big chairs, “how long I have been away from home.”

“Nearly two years, sir,” Kit answered.

“Two years!” Mr. Silburn exclaimed, springing from his chair. “You’re not making game of me, Kit? You wouldn’t do that, my boy!”

“No, sir,” Kit answered; “it is true. After the wreck of the Flower City you disappeared, and we almost gave you up. Then after a long time we heard of an American sailor in the hospital here in New Zealand, and got them to send us a photograph. We were not sure even then; but I came on, and found you. So that trouble is all over, and you mustn’t worry yourself about it.”

“No, I’ll not worry about it,” his father replied. “But I want to know; it makes a man feel so foolish not to know where he has been. How did you get here, my boy?”

That made a long story; for Kit had to tell how he had been a cabin boy and a supercargo; how he had become an assistant purser; and how his good friends on the two ships had paved the way for him to New Zealand. As he got on with the recital, his father seized his hand and fondled it; and before he finished, great tears of love and gratitude were rolling down the old sailor’s cheeks.

While he was still in this position, the house surgeon called to learn how his former patient had passed the night.

“That’s what I want to see,” he said, as he took in the situation. “You shed no tears while you remembered nothing, Mr. Silburn. This is one of the best symptoms, to have your emotions aroused. Don’t try to push your memory now; it will all come back to you; give it time.”

In the four days that Kit could spend in New Zealand, he saw improvement every day. Gradually it came back to his father that after the Flower City’s boat went to pieces, he was a long time in the water. That when he was about to give up, he was rescued by some ship, he could not remember her name, that carried him around Cape Horn. That that ship was also wrecked and abandoned. Then there was a hazy picture in his mind of a desert island, and terrible suffering from hunger and thirst. All beyond that was still a blank.

Kit was so jealous of anything that took him away from his father, that it was a relief to hear that the Bishop of New Zealand had gone to Australia on business; so it would be useless for him to present his letter from the cardinal. That would have been valuable in case of trouble, but all had been smooth sailing.

Throughout the long voyage home, in which Mr. Silburn was a passenger on the Brindisi, he continued to improve. There was hardly anything now about his adventures that he could not remember, except his long stay in the Wellington Hospital. Every little incident had been discussed over and over. But it was not till the vessel had passed Sandy Hook, and was steaming slowly up New York Bay, that he let Kit know of something that had been worrying him.

“There was a payment due on the house about the time I ought to have been home,” he said. “I’m afraid we are going to have trouble about that.”

It was worth all the hard work to Kit, all the hard saving, to be able to tell his father that the indebtedness had been paid to the last penny.

CHAPTER XX.
LOVE’S YOUNG DREAM IN BARBADOES.

OLD Silas beamed all over as he and Kit tucked the robes around Mr. Silburn in the Huntington stage, once more on runners. It seemed to the young supercargo that the very horses had a pleased look.

“Well, sir, I didn’t expect to see this again!” Silas declared. “Many a time I’ve took Kit up to Hunt’n’ton, this last year or two. Why, Mr. Silburn, the first time he went up with me he didn’t have no overcoat to put on, an’ I had to wrap him in the hoss blanket. But next time he come home, bless you, his clo’es was good as anybody’s. I says to myself, says I, ‘That there boy’s a makin’ his way, he is.’ An’ then he comes with gold braid on his cap; an’ look at him now, will you! But I swan to goodness, I didn’t expect to see him ridin’ up alongside of his father any more. We’d all give you up, Mr. Silburn.”

“No, not quite all!” Mr. Silburn laughed. “Here’s one fellow didn’t give me up, or I wouldn’t be taking a ride with you to-day, Silas. If he hadn’t stuck to me through thick and thin” (and he gave Kit a clap on the shoulder), “I’d still be out in New Zealand eating stewed mutton in that hospital.”

“I wasn’t the only one who didn’t give him up,” Kit protested. “We always kept his chair and slippers ready for him.”

“And you ain’t brought no baggage, Mr. Silburn?” Silas asked.

“Baggage?” Mr. Silburn repeated; “this little satchel here, that Kit got me. The rest of my baggage is pretty well scattered, Silas. Let me see; I have a chest of clothes somewhere off Hatteras, but they’ve been on the bottom of the ocean for two years, so I’m afraid they must be damp. Then there’s a quarter interest in a flag pole on some island in the Pacific, but I had to leave that behind. And there’s a suit of gray clothes in the Wellington hospital. I never want to see them again, whatever happens, though they were very kind to me out there.

“That’s a pretty good team you have there, Silas,” he went on; “look as if they could take these Fairfield County hills without losing their wind. Suppose you let them out once, and show us what they can do.”

“Ah, you’re in a hurry to see the folks!” Silas declared. “An’ no wonder, Mr. Silburn. I’ll git you out to Hunt’n’ton jist as quick as ever the trip was made, if nothin’ don’t give ’way.”

Kit had a nice little plan arranged to introduce his father as “Mr. John Doe, of New Zealand,” when they reached the gate; but it fell through most ingloriously. The truth is there was very little said at first when they reached the house. Mrs. Silburn and Vieve had hold of the wanderer before he was out of the sleigh, and in the excitement his satchel would have been carried away if Silas had not come running in with it.

There was not only the joy of seeing him sitting in his own chair again by the fire, but of seeing him almost as well as ever, only a little older and grayer. Kit had had no chance to write them from the steamer of his father’s steady improvement, so it was a fresh pleasure to find that his memory was fully restored, except that he never could quite realize that he had been months, instead of days, in the Wellington hospital.

They wanted him all to themselves that day, but that was impossible. The news soon flew through Huntington that Mr. Silburn had returned, and the neighbors began to pour in at such a rate that Vieve and Kit had to fly around and start a fire in the parlor stove, to give their mother a chance to set her grandest dinner table in the sitting-room. And every visitor had so much to say about Kit that he began to wish himself a cabin boy on the North Cape again.

“I’ll have to look out for myself here,” Mr. Silburn laughed, “or I’ll be of no account in my own house. Everything’s ‘Kit,’ ‘Kit,’ ‘Kit.’ Well, I must say there ain’t many boys—”

“Oh, look here, father!” Kit cried; “are you going to begin on that too! Look at Vieve; nobody stuck to you tighter than Vieve. You don’t know how she used to encourage us when we were inclined to give you up.” And he told for the first time how Vieve had sent him one of her two dollars when he went to New York, and how he had been robbed of the stamps.

“Genevieve, come here to your father!” Mr. Silburn said, in a tone of mock severity. And he put his arm around her to lift her to his knee as he used to do, but found that was a task that required both hands. Fathers are so slow to see it when their daughters grow into young women; it takes the sons of other fathers to make that discovery.

“Why!” he exclaimed, “you’re as heavy as a kedge anchor, and bigger than your mother. And you sent one of your dollars to Kit, did you? Now if I was half a father, I’d have handfuls of gold to shower over you on coming back from the sea, wouldn’t I? And the fact is I haven’t a cent but a little money that Kit made me put in my clothes—the clothes that he bought me, too. He—”

“Oh, Vieve has turned miser since you went away,” Kit interrupted, fearing that his father might go back to the old subject. “She wouldn’t spend a cent for fear we might not have enough money to get you home. She wants a rich husband, too. She has her eye on a cardinal that I met over in—”

Of course Vieve would not let him finish the sentence; and in the midst of the playful quarrel she was called to help her mother with dinner; and if any one should ask just how the reunited family spent that first day, not one of them could give anything like an exact account.

After a few days Vieve declared that the family reminded her of three kittens, so pleased with everything that they sat around the fire purring.

“You’d better enjoy it while you can,” her father answered. “Kit will soon have to be going back to his ship; and for my part, I’m not going to sit here the rest of my life doing nothing. You needn’t think it. It’s just the time for a man to go to sea again, after being shipwrecked; lightning don’t strike twice in the same place, you know.”

“Oh, Christopher!” Mrs. Silburn exclaimed. “You wouldn’t think of going to sea again, would you?”

“I’ve got to do something,” he answered, “and navigation don’t go very well on shore. But no more long voyages, likely. Maybe you’ve forgotten what I told you before I went away about a firm in Bridgeport that wanted me to take charge of a schooner line between there and New York? You see my memory works all smooth now, don’t it? Well, if they’re still of the same mind, I may do some business with them. You’re not going to lay me away on the shelf yet awhile, anyhow.”

“Oh, then I’d have a chance to go to New York with you some time!” Vieve cried. “You know I’ve never been there yet.”

“That’s just where I shall have to go to-morrow,” Kit announced. “I see by the paper that the Trinidad is due this afternoon, and it’s not fair to stay away too long. I’ll be back again for a few days, you know, but I must be on hand for the next voyage.”

It was purely by accident that he mentioned it just as Vieve showed how anxious she was to see the metropolis; but the coincidence set him to thinking. Here he had been half over the world, and Vieve had never been further than Bridgeport. Why shouldn’t he give her a trip to New York?

“How would you like to go along with me, Vieve?” he asked. “I’ll show you my ship, and bring you back in two or three days.”

“Oh, Kit!” his mother exclaimed; “that’s just like a boy. How can the child go to New York without any clothes fit to wear?”

“Bother the clothes,” Kit retorted, still just like a boy. “She’s not going to set the fashions, is she? I’ll lend her one of my blue suits.”

It was so quickly settled that Vieve was to go, that Mr. Silburn was led to exclaim:—

“There’s no parental discipline at all in this family, is there?”

“Well, there’s none needed, that’s one thing,” Mrs. Silburn answered; and she sat up half the night getting Vieve ready. She was relieved to find that they would not have to go to a hotel, for there would be any number of vacant staterooms on the Trinidad.

That trip to New York with Vieve was one of the greatest pleasures that Kit had ever enjoyed, next to finding his father. Everything was so new to her. She had never even been in a railway train before. And Mr. Clark was so kind to her, and took her all over the ship, and she was so delighted with everything. And in the evening he had a talk with the purser in their office that must have been very satisfactory, for next morning he said to Vieve:—

“Vieve, do they have tailor shops for girls? I mean places where a girl can buy things all ready to put on, the way a man can?”

“Oh, do they!” Vieve answered. “To think that anybody shouldn’t know that! Why, dozens of them.”

“Well,” he went on, “I heard a great piece of news last night, and feel like celebrating a little to-day. We’ll get the stewardess directly and go out and see whether you can find anything to fit you. You can buy the whole business, can you? Hat, coat, dress, shoes, and all?”

“Yes, when you have money enough,” Vieve laughed. “But what is it, Kit? What is this great piece of news? Ah, now, Kit, you ought to tell me; I always tell you everything.”

“Not till we get home, Miss Curiosity,” he answered. “When we get home I’ll tell you all about it.”

Kit wisely declined to go further than the door of any of the big bazaars that the stewardess led them to. But Vieve’s first experiment in “shopping” must have been successful, for when Kit took her over the Brooklyn Bridge toward evening to see Captain Griffith and the North Cape, her appearance was so changed that her mother would hardly have known her.

And to tell the good news about his father to Captain Griffith was almost equal to telling it at home, the Captain took such an interest. He had to go over the whole story of his voyage to Melbourne and then across to Wellington, and describe his first meeting with his father, and everything that happened afterwards.

“Well, Miss Silburn,” the Captain said, when Kit concluded—“or I think I’ll have to call you Miss Vieve,—I’m almost one of the family, you know, and one of the first things I did when I got hold of Christopher was to read a letter you wrote him—”

“Oh, yes, sir, I hope you’ll call me Vieve,” Vieve interrupted; “I shouldn’t know who you meant if you called me Miss Silburn.”

“Well, I was going to say,” the Captain went on, “that I took an interest in you all from the time Christopher read me those letters from home on the first evening I knew him. And when I heard about the dollar’s worth of stamps you sent him, and the way he was robbed of them, I came very near handing him a greenback to send in his letter to you. But I was afraid it might spoil him. Boys are very easily spoiled; specially cabin boys. I don’t suppose he’s ever told you about how I had to train him in, in the first voyage or two.”

“Don’t you believe it, Vieve!” Kit laughed; “the Captain wouldn’t hurt a cat.”

“I gave him plenty of work to do, at any rate,” the Captain went on. “I don’t want to make him conceited by saying he did it well; but he seems to have turned out pretty well, like most of my boys. The great point about your brother was that he made up his mind to do his work well, and push his way ahead. Boys who start with that idea generally succeed, even when they have no great brains to begin with.”

“Ahem!” Kit interrupted. “Can’t we find something more interesting to talk about than me? Where do you go next time, Captain?”

“To Barbadoes again,” the Captain answered. “We went there last voyage. You fellows in the big mail steamers mustn’t think you are the only ones to go to the West Indies. And I saw a friend of yours there, too. Do you remember any one named Outerbridge, in Barbadoes?”

Kit began to blush so hard that the Captain immediately added:—

“Oh, not the young lady. It was her father that I saw. He wanted to be remembered to you, and hoped to see you next time you visited the island.”

“Ah!” Vieve exclaimed, “he never told us anything about a young lady in Barbadoes, Captain. You’re getting so you don’t tell me anything, any more, Kit. Do you know, Captain, he heard some great piece of news last night, and he won’t tell me what it was.”

“No, I won’t tell even Captain Griffith what it was, not at present,” Kit retorted. “And he will say that I’m right not to tell the business affairs of the company I work for.”

“It would be very unlike you to do it, I’ll say that,” the Captain assented; “and very improper besides. But you are going right back to the Trinidad, of course? and I may expect to see you while we are lying at Barbadoes?”

“I’m off in her next Saturday, sir,” Kit answered. “That’s the reason I have to start for home to-morrow morning, and can’t make you a longer visit. But my sister was anxious to come over and see Harry Leonard, and—”

“Why, Kit!” Vieve cried, with a blush that made her look prettier than ever; “I never mentioned his name, or thought of him.”

“Of course you both want to see Henry,” the Captain laughed; and in answer to his bell Harry soon appeared, and Kit had to retell his latest adventures in brief. But it was growing late, and they could not prolong their stay, and they crossed the East River on a Fulton ferryboat to give Vieve a view of the big bridge by night.

Such a trip was like delving into an Arabian Nights palace for the young Huntington girl, and for weeks afterward she could talk of little but the wonderful things she had seen. And from what Kit heard while he was home, he imagined that the most wonderful things of all, the most beautiful, most lovely and enchanting, were not the busy streets or tall buildings, not the big ships, the great bridge, or the crowds, but the fascinating things she saw in the big bazaars, which she described with more technical terms than he thought she had ever heard of.

But Kit’s great news had to be told before they could let him go. He intended to tell it in the home circle, but he would have been more than human if he had not let Vieve tease him a little for it just after seeing how anxious she was.

“It is not to be mentioned outside of the family,” he said, “because I mustn’t be telling office secrets; but Mr. Clark told me I could tell it at home. You must know, then, that—ahem—ahem—”

“Oh, Kit, do go on!” Vieve burst out. “I’ll tell all about that Barbadoes girl if you don’t.”

“You can’t,” Kit retorted; “you don’t know anything about her. But to come back to business, the company is building a fine new steamer, larger and better than any of the others, to be called the Maida. She is under way now, and when she is finished, Captain Fraser is to command her, because he is the senior captain of the line; and Mr. Clark is to be her purser, because he is the senior purser. That, as you can see, will leave the Trinidad without a purser; or would, rather. But if the present arrangements are carried out, the new purser of the Trinidad will be—”

“Oh, Kit!” Mrs. Silburn cried.

“I see you’ve guessed it, mother,” he went on. “His name is Kit Silburn. But I only said if present arrangements are carried out, mind you. There’s many a slip ’twixt the cup and the lip. The company may change its mind, or—or lots of other things may happen meanwhile. A purser gets exactly fifty per cent more pay than an assistant purser, and that part I should be very well satisfied with. But the Trinidad would seem strange without Captain Fraser or Mr. Clark.”

“Lots of other things,” as Kit predicted, did happen in the ten or eleven months that passed before the new Maida was ready for sea. The Silburn residence, for one thing, grew from a little story and a half cottage into a pretty two-story house, one of the best in Huntington. The new line of schooners between Bridgeport and New York, of which Mr. Silburn was manager and one of the stockholders, proved a profitable venture. Harry Leonard became a supercargo himself, and felt six inches taller from that minute. And it happened in the strangest way that the dinner-parties given at Sea View plantation, in Barbadoes, always fell upon the days when the Trinidad was in port.

Kit did not hesitate to speak at home about Miss Blanche Outerbridge, and for a time Vieve was inclined to be jealous of “that Barbadoes girl,” as she insisted upon calling her. But after a while Mr. Outerbridge brought his family to America for a visit, and upon becoming well acquainted with her, she had to say that Barbadoes produced some very pretty and companionable young ladies.

It was not till long after Kit became purser of the Trinidad, however,—not till the day came when there was neither need nor excuse for his spending any more of his earnings in Huntington,—that in one of his confidential talks with Vieve he told her how good the prospect was that she might in course of time be suitably provided with a sister-in-law.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Publishers.

War of the Revolution Series.

By Everett T. Tomlinson.

THREE COLONIAL BOYS. A Story of the Times of ’76. 368 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

It is a story of three boys who were drawn into the events of the times, is patriotic, exciting, clean, and healthful, and instructs without appearing to. The heroes are manly boys, and no objectionable language or character is introduced. The lessons of courage and patriotism especially will be appreciated in this day.—Boston Transcript.

THREE YOUNG CONTINENTALS. A Story of the American Revolution. 364 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

This story is historically true. It is the best kind of a story either for boys or girls, and is an attractive method of teaching history.—Journal of Education, Boston.

WASHINGTON’S YOUNG AIDS. A Story of the New Jersey Campaign, 1776–1777. 391 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

The book has enough history and description to give value to the story which ought to captivate enterprising boys.—Quarterly Book Review.

The historical details of the story are taken from old records. These include accounts of the life on the prison ships and prison houses of New York, the raids of the pine robbers, the tempting of the Hessians, the end of Fagan and his band, etc.—Publisher’s Weekly.

Few boys’ stories of this class show so close a study of history combined with such genial story-telling power.—The Outlook.

TWO YOUNG PATRIOTS. A Story of Burgoyne’s Invasion. 366 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

The crucial campaign in the American struggle for independence came in the summer of 1777, when Gen. John Burgoyne marched from Canada to cut the rebellious colonies asunder and join another British army which was to proceed up the valley of the Hudson. The American forces were brave, hard fighters, and they worried and harassed the British and finally defeated them. The history of this campaign is one of great interest and is well brought out in the part which the “two young patriots” took in the events which led up to the surrender of General Burgoyne and his army.

The set of four volumes in a box, $6.00.

SUCCESS. By Orison Swett Marden. Author of “Pushing to the Front,” “Architects of Fate,” etc. 317 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

It is doubtful whether any success books for the young have appeared in modern times which are so thoroughly packed from lid to lid with stimulating, uplifting, and inspiring material as the self-help books written by Orison Swett Marden. There is not a dry paragraph nor a single line of useless moralizing in any of his books.

To stimulate, inspire, and guide is the mission of his latest book, “Success,” and helpfulness is its keynote. Its object is to spur the perplexed youth to act the Columbus to his own undiscovered possibilities; to urge him not to wait for great opportunities, but to seize common occasions and make them great, for he cannot tell when fate may take his measure for a higher place.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Boston and Chicago.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Publishers.

Brain and Brawn Series.

By William Drysdale.

THE YOUNG REPORTER. A Story of Printing House Square. 300 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

I commend the book unreservedly.—Golden Rule.

“The Young Reporter” is a rattling book for boys.—New York Recorder.

The best boys’ book I ever read.—Mr. Phillips, Critic for New York Times.

THE FAST MAIL. A Story of a Train Boy. 328 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

“The Fast Mail” is one of the very best American books for boys brought out this season. Perhaps there could be no better confirmation of this assertion than the fact that the little sons of the present writer have greedily devoured the contents of the volume, and are anxious to know how soon they are to get a sequel.—The Art Amateur, New York.

THE BEACH PATROL. A Story of the Life-Saving Service. 318 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

The style of narrative is excellent, the lesson inculcated of the best, and, above all, the boys and girls are real.—New York Times.

A book of adventure and daring, which should delight as well as stimulate to higher ideals of life every boy who is so happy as to possess it.—Examiner.

It is a strong book for boys and young men.—Buffalo Commercial.

THE YOUNG SUPERCARGO. A Story of the Merchant Marine. 352 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

Kit Silburn is a real “Brain and Brawn” boy, full of sense and grit and sound good qualities. Determined to make his way in life, and with no influential friends to give him a start, he does a deal of hard work between the evening when he first meets the stanch Captain Griffith, and the proud day when he becomes purser of a great ocean steamship. His sea adventures are mostly on shore; but whether he is cleaning the cabin of the North Cape, or landing cargo in Yucatan, or hurrying the spongers and fruitmen of Nassau, or exploring London, or sight seeing with a disguised prince in Marseilles, he is always the same busy, thoroughgoing, manly Kit. Whether or not he has a father alive is a question of deep interest throughout the story; but that he has a loving and loyal sister is plain from the start.

The set of four volumes in a box, $6.00.

SERAPH, THE LITTLE VIOLINISTE. By Mrs. C. V. Jamieson. 300 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

The scene of the story is the French quarter of New Orleans, and charming bits of local color add to its attractiveness.—The Boston Journal.

Perhaps the most charming story she has ever written is that which describes Seraph, the little violiniste.—Transcript, Boston.

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Travel-Adventure Series.

IN WILD AFRICA. Adventures of Two Boys in the Sahara Desert, etc. By Thos. W. Knox. 325 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

A story of absorbing interest.—Boston Journal.

Our young people will pronounce it unusually good.—Albany Argus.

Col. Knox has struck a popular note in his latest volume.—Springfield Republican.

THE LAND OF THE KANGAROO. By Thos. W. Knox. Adventures of Two Boys in the Great Island Continent. 318 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

His descriptions of the natural history and botany of the country are very interesting.—Detroit Free Press.

The actual truthfulness of the book needs no gloss to add to its absorbing interest.—The Book Buyer, New York.

OVER THE ANDES; or, Our Boys in New South America. By Hezekiah Butterworth. 368 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

No writer of the present century has done more and better service than Hezekiah Butterworth in the production of helpful literature for the young. In this volume he writes, in his own fascinating way, of a country too little known by American readers.—Christian Work.

Mr. Butterworth is careful of his historic facts, and then he charmingly interweaves his quaint stories, legends, and patriotic adventures as few writers can.—Chicago Inter-Ocean.

The subject is an inspiring one, and Mr. Butterworth has done full justice to the high ideals which have inspired the men of South America.—Religious Telescope.

LOST IN NICARAGUA; or, The Lands of the Great Canal. By Hezekiah Butterworth. 295 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

The book pictures the wonderful land of Nicaragua and continues the story of the travelers whose adventures in South America are related in “Over the Andes.” In this companion book to “Over the Andes,” one of the boy travelers who goes into the Nicaraguan forests in search of a quetzal, or the royal bird of the Aztecs, falls into an ancient idol cave, and is rescued in a remarkable way by an old Mosquito Indian. The narrative is told in such a way as to give the ancient legends of Guatemala, the story of the chieftain, Nicaragua, the history of the Central American Republics, and the natural history of the wonderlands of the ocelot, the conger, parrots, and monkeys.

Since the voyage of the Oregon, of 13,000 miles to reach Key West the American people have seen what would be the value of the Nicaragua Canal. The book gives the history of the projects for the canal, and facts about Central America, and a part of it was written in Costa Rica. It enters a new field.

The set of four volumes in a box, $6.00.

QUARTERDECK AND FOK’SLE. By Molly Elliott Seawell. 272 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

Miss Seawell has done a notable work for the young people of our country in her excellent stories of naval exploits. They are of the kind that causes the reader, no matter whether young or old, to thrill with pride and patriotism at the deeds of daring of the heroes of our navy.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Boston and Chicago.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Publishers.

Fighting for the Flag Series.

By Chas. Ledyard Norton.

JACK BENSON’S LOG; or, Afloat with the Flag in ’61. 281 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

An unusually interesting historical story, and one that will arouse the loyal impulses of every American boy and girl. The story is distinctly superior to anything ever attempted along this line before.—The Independent.

A story that will arouse the loyal impulses of every American boy and girl.—The Press.

A MEDAL OF HONOR MAN; or, Cruising Among Blockade Runners. 280 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

A bright, breezy sequel to “Jack Benson’s Log.” The book has unusual literary excellence.—The Book Buyer, New York.

A stirring story for boys.—The Journal, Indianapolis.

MIDSHIPMAN JACK. 290 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

Jack is a delightful hero, and the author has made his experiences and adventures seem very real.—Congregationalist.

It is true historically and full of exciting war scenes and adventures.—Outlook.

A stirring story of naval service in the Confederate waters during the late war.—Presbyterian.

The set of three volumes in a box, $3.75.

A GIRL OF ’76. By Amy E. Blanchard. 331 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

“A Girl of ’76” lays its scene in and around Boston where the principal events of the early period of the Revolution were enacted. Elizabeth Hall, the heroine, is the daughter of a patriot who is active in the defense of his country. The story opens with a scene in Charlestown, where Elizabeth Hall and her parents live. The emptying of the tea in Boston Harbor is the means of giving the little girl her first strong impression as to the seriousness of her father’s opinions, and causes a quarrel between herself and her schoolmate and playfellow, Amos Dwight.

A SOLDIER OF THE LEGION. By Chas. Ledyard Norton. 300 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

Two boys, a Carolinian and a Virginian, born a few years apart during the last half of the eighteenth century, afford the groundwork for the incidents of this tale.

The younger of the two was William Henry Harrison, sometime President of the United States, and the elder, his companion and faithful attendant through life, was Carolinus Bassett, Sergeant of the old First Infantry, and in an irregular sort of a way Captain of Virginian Horse. He it is who tells the story a few years after President Harrison’s death, his granddaughter acting as critic and amanuensis.

The story has to do with the early days of the Republic, when the great, wild, unknown West was beset by dangers on every hand, and the Government at Washington was at its wits’ end to provide ways and means to meet the perplexing problems of national existence.

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THE ORCUTT GIRLS; or, One Term at the Academy. By Charlotte M. Vaile. 316 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

A well-told story of school life which will interest its readers deeply, and hold before them a high standard of living. The heroines are charming girls and their adventures are described in an entertaining way.—Pilgrim Teacher.

Mrs. Vaile gives us a story here which will become famous as a description of a phase of New England educational history which has now become a thing of the past, with an exception here and there.—Boston Transcript.

SUE ORCUTT. A Sequel to “The Orcutt Girls.” By Charlotte M. Vaile. 330 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

It is a charming story from beginning to end and is written in that easy flowing style which characterizes the best stories of our best writers.—Christian Work.

It is wholly a piece of good fortune for young folks that brings this book to market in such ample season for the selection of holiday gifts.—Denver Republican.

The story teaches a good moral without any preaching, in fact it is as good in a way as Miss Alcott’s books, which is high but deserved praise.—Chronicle.

THE M. M. C. A Story of the Great Rockies. By Charlotte M. Vaile. 232 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

The pluck of the little school teacher, struggling against adverse circumstances, to hold for her friend the promising claim, which he has secured after years of misfortune in other ventures, is well brought out. The almost resistless bad luck which has made “Old Hopefull’s” nickname a hollow mockery still followed him when a fortune was almost within his grasp. The little school teacher was, however, a new element in “Old Hopefull’s” experience, and the result, as the story shows, was most satisfactory.

THE ROMANCE OF DISCOVERY; or, a Thousand Years of Exploration, etc. By William Elliot Griffis. 305 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

It is a book of profit and interest involving a variety of correlated instances and influences which impart the flavor of the unexpected.—Philadelphia Presbyterian.

An intensely interesting narrative following well-authenticated history.—Telescope.

Boys will read it for the romance in it and be delighted, and when they get through, behold! they have read a history of America.—Awakener.

THE ROMANCE OF AMERICAN COLONIZATION; or, How the Foundations of Our Country Were Laid. By William Elliot Griffis. 295 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

To this continent, across a great ocean, came two distinct streams of humanity and two rival civilizations,—the one Latin, led and typified by the Spanish, with Portuguese and French also, and the other Germanic, or Anglo-Saxon, led and typified by the English and reinforced by Dutch, German, and British people.

A SON OF THE REVOLUTION. An Historical Novel of the Days of Aaron Burr. By Elbridge S. Brooks. 301 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

The story of Tom Edwards, adventurer, as it is connected with Aaron Burr, is in every way faithful to the facts of history. As the story progresses the reader will wonder where the line between fact and fiction is to be drawn. Among the characters that figure in it are President Jefferson, Gen. Andrew Jackson, General Wilkinson, and many other prominent government and army officials.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Boston and Chicago.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Publishers.

MALVERN, A NEIGHBORHOOD STORY. By Ellen Douglas Deland. 341 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

Her descriptions of boys and girls are so true, and her knowledge of their ways is so accurate, that one must feel an admiration for her complete mastery of her chosen field.—The Argus, Albany.

Miss Deland was accorded a place with Louisa M. Alcott and Nora Perry as a successful writer of books for girls. We think this praise none too high.—The Post.

A SUCCESSFUL VENTURE. By Ellen Douglas Deland. 340 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

One of the many successful books that have come from her pen, which is certainly the very best.—Boston Herald.

It is a good piece of work and its blending of good sense and entertainment will be appreciated.—Congregationalist.

KATRINA. By Ellen Douglas Deland. 340 pp. Cloth, $1.50.

“Katrina” is the story of a girl who was brought up by an aunt in a remote village of Vermont. Her life is somewhat lonely until a family from New York come there to board during the summer. Katrina’s aunt, who is a reserved woman, has told her little of her antecedents, and she supposes that she has no other relatives. Her New York friends grow very fond of her and finally persuade her to visit them during the winter. There new pleasures and new temptations present themselves, and Katrina’s character develops through them to new strength.

ABOVE THE RANGE. By Theodora R. Jenness. 332 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

The quaintness of the characters described will be sure to make the story very popular.—Book News, Philadelphia.

A book of much interest and novelty.—The Book Buyer, New York.

BIG CYPRESS. By Kirk Munroe. 164 pp. Cloth, 1.00.

If there is a man who understands writing a story for boys better than another, it is Kirk Munroe.—Springfield Republican.

A capital writer of boys’ stories is Mr. Kirk Munroe.—Outlook.

FOREMAN JENNIE. By Amos R. Wells. A Young Woman of Business. 268 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

It is a delightful story.—The Advance, Chicago.

It is full of action.—The Standard, Chicago.

A story of decided merit.—The Epworth Herald, Chicago.

MYSTERIOUS VOYAGE OF THE DAPHNE. By Lieut. H. P. Whitmarsh. 305 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

One of the best collections of short stories for boys and girls that has been published in recent years. Such writers as Hezekiah Butterworth, Wm. O. Stoddard, and Jane G. Austin have contributed characteristic stories which add greatly to the general interest of the book.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Boston and Chicago.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Publishers.

PHILLIP LEICESTER. By Jessie E. Wright. 264 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

The book ought to make any reader thankful for a good home, and thoughtful for the homeless and neglected.—Golden Rule.

The story is intensely interesting.—Christian Inquirer.

CAP’N THISTLETOP. By Sophie Swett. 282 pp. Cloth, $1.25.

Sophie Swett knows how to please young folks as well as old; for both she writes simple, unaffected, cheerful stories with a judicious mingling of humor and plot. Such a story is “Cap’n Thistletop.”—The Outlook.

LADY BETTY’S TWINS. By E. M. Waterworth. 117 pp. With 12 illustrations. 75 cents.

The story of a little boy and girl who did not know the meaning of the word “obedience.” They learned the lesson, however, after some trying experiences.

THE MOONSTONE RING. By Jennie Chappell. 118 pp. With 6 illustrations. 75 cents.

A home story with the true ring to it. The happenings of the story are somewhat out of the usual run of events.

THE BEACON LIGHT SERIES. Edited by Natalie L. Rice. 5 vols. Fully Illustrated. The Set, $2.50.

The stories contained in this set of books are all by well-known writers, carefully selected and edited, and they cannot, therefore, fail to be both helpful and instructive.

THE ALLAN BOOKS. Edited by Miss Lucy Wheelock. 10 vols. Over 400 illustrations. The set in a box, $2.50.

One of the best and most attractive sets of books for little folks ever published. They are full of bright and pleasing illustrations and charming little stories just adapted to young children.

THE MARJORIE BOOKS. Edited by Miss Lucy Wheelock. 6 vols. Over 200 illustrations. The set, $1.50.

A very attractive set of books for the little folks, full of pictures and good stories.

DOTS LIBRARY. Edited by Miss Lucy Wheelock. 10 vols. Over 400 illustrations. The set, $2.50.

In every way a most valuable set of books for the little people. Miss Wheelock possesses rare skill in interesting and entertaining the little ones.

W. A. Wilde & Co., Boston and Chicago.

Transcriber’s Note:

Punctuation has been standardised. Hyphenation has been retained as it appears in the original publication. There is perhaps confusion between the names “Harry” and “Henry” but these also have been retained as they appear in the original publication. Changes have been made as follows:

- Facing page 48
YOU ARE YOUNG FOR A SUPERCARGO, SENOR changed to
YOU ARE YOUNG FOR A SUPERCARGO, SEÑOR

- Page 69
loquats, sappadillos, sour sops, changed to
loquats, sapadillos, sour sops,

- Page 119
men were trying to lassoo changed to
men were trying to lasso

- Page 142
The Flower City changed to
The Flower City

- Page 167
be done by the great num- changed to
be done by the great number

- Page 173
advice it sure to be good changed to
advice is sure to be good

- Page 196
some of our American millionnaires changed to
some of our American millionaires

- Page 198
sighted the Belearic Isleschanged to
sighted the Balearic Isles

- Page 209
in a large store-paved courtyard changed to
in a large stone-paved courtyard

- Page 226
Captain Grffith had always treated him changed to
Captain Griffith had always treated him

- Page 269
treasures ever since Kit bought it home changed to
treasures ever since Kit brought it home

- Page 305
his throat like a vice changed to
his throat like a vise

- Page 317
not all millionnaires here changed to
not all millionaires here

- Page 350
easily spoiled; sp cially cabin boys changed to
easily spoiled; specially cabin boys

- Page v of the advertisements
Portugese and French also changed to
Portuguese and French also

- Page vii of the advertisements
Edited by Natalie L. Rice. changed to
Edited by Natalie L. Rice.

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Table of Contents

- THE YOUNG SUPERCARGO

- CONTENTS.

- ILLUSTRATIONS.

- CHAPTER I. KIT SILBURN’S START IN LIFE.

- CHAPTER II. A VOYAGE TO YUCATAN.

- CHAPTER III. A NORTHER ON THE GULF.

- CHAPTER IV. KIT’S CONNECTICUT HOME.

- CHAPTER V. A BURGLAR IN THE CABIN.

- CHAPTER VI. THE STRANGE CASE OF JOHN DOE.

- CHAPTER VII. KIT BECOMES A SUPERCARGO.

- CHAPTER VIII. NEWS FROM THE WRECKED SCHOONER.

- CHAPTER IX. KIT INSPECTS LONDON.

- CHAPTER X. A LETTER FROM THE STATE DEPARTMENT.

- CHAPTER XI. A VOYAGE TO MARSEILLES.

- CHAPTER XII. IMPRISONED IN THE CASTLE D’IF.

- CHAPTER XIII. A VISIT TO NOTRE-DAME-DE-LA-GARDE.

- CHAPTER XIV. THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER FROM ROME.

- CHAPTER XV. NEWS FROM NEW ZEALAND.

- CHAPTER XVI. KIT LEAVES THE “NORTH CAPE.”

- CHAPTER XVII. OVERBOARD IN THE PITCH LAKE.

- CHAPTER XVIII. A VOYAGE TO BERMUDA.

- CHAPTER XIX. KIT FINDS HIS FATHER.

- CHAPTER XX. LOVE’S YOUNG DREAM IN BARBADOES.

- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE