“You might pick up a good deal of money in that way in a new country, where people are always buying and selling land, and the stump leave of timber.”
“Yes, sir; I suppose I might.”
“When you will write me that you have learned to survey, I will send you a compass, and all the instruments you want.”
“I thank you very much indeed, sir; I will get father to learn me this winter.”
When Charlie left, Mr. Welch gave him some books that treated of agriculture, text-books to study surveying, a gauge, bevel, carpenter’s pocket rule, and a case of instruments to draw geometrical figures.
“What a pretty craft this is!” said Mr. Welch, as he stood on the wharf to see them off; “she certainly don’t look or smell much like a fisherman.”
“She hasn’t been a fishing since last fall,” replied the captain. “Ben, you know, is a deep-water sailor, and keeps to his old notions. Nobody, I guess, ever caught a fisherman holy-stoning his decks, and they don’t slush the masts any higher than they can reach.”
“She’s a beauty; but she seems small to go to the stormy coast of Labrador, the Bay of Fundy, and those places where fishermen go.”
“Small! Believe me, I would sooner take my chance for life on a lee shore, or lying to in a gale of wind, in her, than in any ship I was ever in. A chebacco boat will beat square to windward where a ship couldn’t hold her own; lie to and keep dry till all is blue; and drug them, they will live forever. I served my apprenticeship in a chebacco boat; I ought to know something about them.”