"Same name as his mother's, suh—Sam Crouch."
"NEVER HAD NO SLEEP"
t was on the upper deck of a Chesapeake Bay boat, en route for Old Point Comfort and Norfolk. I was bound for Norfolk.
"Kinder ca'm, ain't it?"
The voice proceeded from a pinched-up old fellow with a colorless face, straggling white beard, and sharp eyes. He wore a flat-topped slouch hat resting on his ears, and a red silk handkerchief tied in a sporting knot around his neck. His teeth were missing, the lips puckered up like the mouth of a sponge-bag. In his hand he carried a cane with a round ivory handle. This served as a prop to his mouth, the puckered lips fumbling about the knob. He was shadowed by an old woman wearing a shiny brown silk, that glistened like a wet waterproof, black mitts, poke-bonnet, flat lace collar, and a long gold watch chain. I had noticed them at supper. She was cutting up his food.
"Kinder ca'm, ain't it?" he exclaimed again, looking my way. "Fust real nat'ral vittles I've eat fur a year. Spect it's ther sea air. This water's brackish, ain't it?"
I confirmed his diagnosis of the saline qualities of the Chesapeake, and asked if he had been an invalid.
"Waal, I should say so! Bin livin' on hospital mush fur nigh on ter a year; but, by gum! ter-night I jist said ter Mommie: 'Mommie, shuv them soft-shells this way. Ain't seen none sence I kep' tavern.'"