“If I could not do better.”
“But you shall do better, my good boy. I will try you instead of poor Peter, and if you are an honest and good, careful boy, it will be much better than going to sea. Dear me! how like he is,—but now I must call you Peter; it will make me think I have him with me, poor fellow!”
“If you please,” said Joey, who was not sorry to exchange his name.
“Well, then, where do you sleep to-night?”
“I did intend to ask for a bed at the house where I left my bundle.”
“Then, don’t do so; go for your bundle, and you shall sleep in Peter’s bed (poor fellow, his last was a watery bed, as the papers say), and then to-morrow morning you can go off with me.”
Joey accepted the offer, went back for his bundle, and returned to Mrs Chopper in a quarter of an hour; she was then preparing her supper, which Joey was not sorry to partake of; after which she led him into a small room, in which was a small bed without curtains; the room itself was hung round with strings of onions, papers of sweet herbs, and flitches of bacon; the floor was strewed with empty ginger-beer bottles, oakum in bags, and many other articles. Altogether, the smell was anything but agreeable.
“Here is poor Peter’s bed,” said Mrs Chopper; “I changed his sheets the night before he was drowned, poor fellow! Can I trust you to put the candle out?”
“Oh, yes; I’ll be very careful.”
“Then, good night, boy. Do you ever say your prayers? poor Peter always did.”