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leadin' or conviction, but fer the sake o' bearin' an example to
these two blame boys of aours."

"Didn't I tell you, Harve, 'twould come araound to us 'fore we'd
done'? Always those blame boys. But I wouldn't have missed the
show fer a half-share in a halibutter," Dan whispered.

"Still, things should ha' been kep' sep'rate," said Disko, and the
light of new argument lit in Salters's eye as he crumbled cut plug
into his pipe.

"There's a power av vartue in keepin' things sep'rate," said Long
Jack, intent on stilling the storm. "That's fwhat Steyning of
Steyning and Hare's f'und when he sent Counahan fer skipper on the
Manila D. Kuhn, instid o' Cap. Newton that was took with
inflam't'ry rheumatism an' couldn't go. Counahan the Navigator we
called him."

"Nick Counahan he never went aboard fer a night 'thout a pond o'
rum somewheres in the manifest," said Tom Platt, playing up to the
lead. "He used to bum araound the c'mission houses to Boston
lookin' fer the Lord to make him captain of a towboat on his
merits. Sam Coy, up to Atlantic Avenoo, give him his board free
fer a year or more on account of his stories. Counahan the
Navigator! Tck! Tck! Dead these fifteen year, ain't he?"

"Seventeen, I guess. He died the year the Caspar McVeagh was
built; but he could niver keep things sep'rate. Steyning tuk him
fer the reason the thief tuk the hot stove - bekaze there was
nothin' else that season. The men was all to the Banks, and
Counahan he whacked up an iverlastin' hard crowd fer crew. Rum! Ye
c'u'd ha' floated the Manila, insurance and all, in fwhat they
stowed aboard her. They lef' Boston Harbour for the great Grand
Bank wid a roarin' nor'wester behind 'em an' all hands full to the
bung. An' the hivens looked after thim, for divil a watch did they
set, an' divil a rope did they lay hand to, till they'd seen the
bottom av a fifteen-gallon cask o' bug-juice. That was about wan
week, so far as Counahan remembered. (If' I c'u'd only tell the
tale as he told ut!) All that whoile the wind blew like ould
glory, an' the Manila - 'twas summer, and they'd give her a
foretopmast - struck her gait and kept ut. Then Counahan tuk the
hog-yoke an' thrembled over it for a whoile, an' made out, betwix'
that an' the chart an' the singin' in his head, that they was to
the south'ard o' Sable Island, gettin' along glorious, but
speakin' nothin'. Then they broached another keg, an' quit
speculatin' about anythin' fer another spell. The Manila she lay
down whin she dropped Boston Light, and she never lufted her lee-
rail up to that time - hustlin' on one an' the same slant. But
they saw no weed, nor gulls, nor schooners; an' prisintly they
obsarved they'd been out a matter o' fourteen days, and they
mistrusted the Bank had suspinded payment. So they sounded, an'
got sixty fathom. 'That's me,' sez Counahan. 'That's me iv'ry
time! I've run her slat on the Bank fer you, an' when we get

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