“You may try as hard as you like to make out that you are not good for much,” said Ben; “but you’ll have hard work to make us, or anybody else, believe it.”
“Well, father, it makes boys smart to have friends to love them, encourage, and show them; tell them they are smart, and say ‘stuboy,’ to have plenty to eat, and see a little chance to do something for themselves, and folks trying to make them happy. If a boy has got anything in him, it must come out.”
“Yes,” said Uncle Isaac. “And if there ain’t anything, it can’t come out.”
After the rest had gone, the boys sat watching the vessel till she mingled with the thin air.
“Now, I’m glad we’ve done as we did,” said Charlie. “We might have hired the money of father, or Captain Rhines, have sent the vessel off, and, perhaps, paid for her, and paid them; but suppose she had made nothing, or been lost—then we should have been in debt, and felt mean enough; now she is ours, and paid for; if she is lost, we owe nobody: we’ve learned a good deal, and are young enough to earn more money.”
“What are you going to do now, John?”
“Going back to Portland.”
“I suppose I ought to go to Stroudwater. Mr. Foss wants me: he’s going to build two vessels.”
“I know what he wants to do,” said Fred.
“What’s that?”