They had stayed in town until Captain Talbot arrived. He was just the same brave and jolly sailor that Duncan had first known.
Would he take Frank as his apprentice?
Why, he would be glad to have the whole three. They were so bold and bright, there was not the least fear of their not getting on.
Wouldn't they come? His present ship was not so large as he would like it to be, but he would make shift somehow.
But Duncan, while he thanked him, was firm.
"Well," said Talbot, "I'll tell you what I'll do for you, for somehow I have acquired a liking for you all Frank here, then, shall come with me, not as an apprentice belonging to the owners, but as a friend who wishes to get well up in seamanship and eventually pass even for master-mariner. You see, Frank, you will be rated as apprentice to me, and not to the company, else they would hold you to the same ship for years. And my reason is this: in about a year or a little over, I shall, please God, have a ship of my own. It is to be a great project, but I am promised assistance, and many of the savants in London say the project is well worthy of the greatest success. I shall voyage first to the Antarctic regions, and come home with a paying voyage of oil and skins of the sea-elephants, and this shall smooth my way to exploring further south than any ship has yet reached.
"So you see, Duncan, as you and your brother will not be bound to any tie as regards apprenticeship, you can both sail with me to the South Pole, and who knows but you may yet become the Nansens of the Antarctic."
"Too good to be true," said Duncan laughing; "but I'm just determined to do my best, and no one can do more."
"Bravo, lad!" cried the colonel, laying his hand on Duncan's shoulder. "And you remember what the poet says:
"''T is not in mortals to command success,
But we'll do more...; we'll deserve it'"