“It’s the living in that old rookery, Cliff Castle, that has turned his head and made him so conceited.”
“No, he’s been high-toned ever since he saved that schooner from being wrecked in Hopeless Haven; but I say let us take him down a peg or two, mates.”
“I’m with you.”
“So am I.”
“Me, too;” and all of a group of five lads joined in with their leader to set upon a youth who was just running for the shore in a trim little surf-skiff with a leg-of-mutton sail.
The scene was at a small seaport upon the rugged, though beautiful coast of Maine, and the lads, a wild lot of reckless spirits, half-sailors, half-landsmen, stood in front of an old-fashioned tavern fronting the water, and from whence they had sighted the surf-skiff running swiftly in toward the wharf, and had recognized its occupant, a lad of sixteen.
He was neatly dressed in duck pants and a sailor shirt with wide collar, in each corner of which was embroidered an anchor in blue silk.
A blue tarpaulin sat jauntily upon his head, giving him something of a rakish look, and a sash encircled his slender waist.
But in spite of his rather picturesque attire, he had a face of rare manliness for one so young, a face that was bronzed by exposure, strong in character and stamped with resolution and daring beyond his years.
He ran his little skiff in cleverly alongside the wharf, lowered sail, and carefully taking up a toy ship, stepped ashore and started toward the tavern.