“He look berry like a t’ree hundred.”
“To me it seems a brig.”
“I t’ink him brig too, masser.”
“Or possibly, after all, the stranger may prove a schooner, with many lofty and light sails.”
“A schooner often carry a royal,” returned the black, resolute to acquiesce in all the other said.
“Who knows it is a sail at all! Forward there! It may be well to have more opinions than one on so weighty a matter. Forward there! send the foretop-man that is called Fid upon the poop. Your companions are so intelligent and so faithful, Mr. Wilder, that you are not to be surprised if I shew an undue desire for their information.”
Wilder compressed his lips, and the rest of the groupe manifested a good deal of amazement; but the latter had been too long accustomed to the caprice of their Commander, and the former was too wise, to speak at a moment when his humour seemed at the highest. The topman, however, was not long in making his appearance, and then the chief saw fit again to break the silence.
“And you think it questionable whether it be a sail at all?” he continued.
“He’m sartain nothing but a fly-away,” returned the obstinate black.
“You hear what your friend the negro says, master Fid; he thinks that yonder object, which is lifting so fast to leeward, is not a sail.”