“There’s enough of that in any way, at sea. A little more or less is not of much account in the long-run. It’s all in the voyage. I wish I had never been such a fool as to choose the sea. But I did choose it; so it’s of no use kicking against it now.”
“I wish you were not going as you are!” said Maria earnestly. “I wish you had shipped as third mate!”
“When a sailor can’t afford the time to ship as he would, he must ship as he can. Many a hundred has done the same before me. To one third mate wanted in the port of London, there are scores and scores of able seamen.”
“What does mamma say to it?”
“Well, you know she can’t afford to be fastidious now. She cried a bit, but I told her I should be all right. Hard work and fo’castle living won’t break bones. The parson told me——”
“Don’t, Reginald!”
“Papa, then. He told me it was a move in the right direction, and if I would only go on so, I might make up for past shortcomings. I say, Isaac told me to give you his love.”
“Did you see much of him?”
“No. On a Sunday now and then. He doesn’t much like his new post. They are dreadfully over-worked, he says. It’s quite a different thing from what the Bank was down here.”
“Will he stop in it?”