“Don’t trouble yourself,” said Ben quietly. “I sail on whatever vessel I want to; just steam ahead, and keep cool.”
When the “Burnside” ran into Newberne, Ben was taken before the Provost Marshal; but, to the amazement of his accusers, that official said:
“This man has more power than I have. You had better make peace with him, for if he says you may go, you may; and if he says you can’t, why you can’t!”
After this startling announcement, Ben’s enemies concluded that it would be wise to hold their peace. He made the rest of the voyage to Boston on the “Burnside.”
Some time after this occurrence, Ben happened to run across the old captain in New York. He professed to be overjoyed at the meeting, and invited him to go to the nearest saloon, where they drank to one another’s health with great cordiality. The captain was a little man with an odd, weazen face, and full of eccentricities. He wore, on this particular occasion, an old-fashioned swallow-tail coat which must have seen a good many years of service. Ben made up his mind to have a little sport at his companion’s expense, and so, getting some lampblack in the saloon, he smeared it over his hands, and then stepping up to the captain, exclaimed:
“By Jove, you’ve grown fat since I saw you last!”
As he spoke, he rubbed his hands over the Captain’s face, leaving enough of the lampblack to make him look ridiculous. Then, as they stood taking a final drink at the bar, Ben dextrously slipped his hand behind him and cut off one of the tails of that wonderful coat.
“Let’s take a walk up Broadway,” suggested Hogan.
The captain at once agreed, and arm-in-arm the two started through the streets.
Wholly unconscious of the absurdity of his appearance the captain couldn’t make out what all the people were laughing at. But, remembering that his face was smeared with daubs of lampblack and that his coat was minus one of its tails, the reader will perhaps appreciate the cause of the merriment. Ben gave the wink to all the policemen they met, assured the captain that the people were not laughing at him, and thus the two traveled Broadway from Cortlandt street to Union Square. It was a richer spectacle than one is apt to see every day.