And so, one day, he went in and sat down on a settle by an open window with a glass of French brandy and a pipe, and composed himself for half an hour's comfort. It was a sunny, blowy day with great palisades of white clouds sweeping over the city toward the sea; a tree growing near the edge of the pavement was white with buds; old horses tramping over the stones tossed their heads, and their rekindled eyes seemed to see the green pastures and bright streams of their youth. The brandy had a fine, full scent, and was thick and smooth upon the palate; the tobacco, too, was aromatic and soothing, and Anthony smiled at the day, at his own feelings, at the world; and he sat back, contentedly, to listen and see.
A thick-set little man with bandy legs, and a bullet head set aggressively upon his shoulders, stood near him.
"I understand your brig Anna and Sarah is in," said he to a Quaker-looking man. "Is she stowing anything that might take my interest?"
"I have sundry items to offer," said the Quaker-like man. "Rum of approved quality. And West Indian tobacco. On Clifford's Wharf, just taken out of the brig, I have Muscovado sugar in hogsheads, excellent for any common use."
"There's a-plenty of sugar to be had," said the thick-set man, slapping one of his bandy legs with a whip which he carried. "I could stock a warehouse with brown or white, in an hour. But of your rum, now; what's that?"
"It is of Jamaica for the most part; but there's some of Cuba. It's all of a good age, a rich brown color, excellent strong body, and has been well kept. It is mostly in barrels—barrels once used for sherry, which gives that flavor so much desired; but there is a quantity in puncheons of full ninety gallons, still in the brig, but ready for delivery in a reasonable time."
To Anthony's right was a hook-nosed man who smoked a pipe in nervous puffs; money and exchange seemed to trouble him enormously, and he talked with a stolid, comfortable-looking man across the table from him, in high exasperation.
"I wouldn't give that for all the beggarly pistareens you could cram into a sack," stated the hook-nosed man, as he snapped his fingers. "Such stuff is not money, and should not be recognized as such. And then your Netherlands guilders, your mark bancos, your florins, francs, livres, and shillings! What has such rattling metal to do with the exchanges of civilized peoples? What right, even, have their names to assume places in the conversations of men of commercial substance?"
"Their place," said the comfortable man, "is small but respectable. And when gathered together they make great weight in the world. Your florin, now, is a realer thing to many a man than your pistole, because it is nearer to his reach. Livres, pistareens, francs, and shillings turn the balance of the world in a time of stress, sir; and they make its prosperity in time of peace."
But the hook-nosed man had an eager and indignant soul.