“Where have you been?” they asked him, sarcastically, from the head office.
The captain had been on the bridge all night.
“Berry-picking,” was his laconic despatch in reply.
There is another—also the captain of a coastal steamer—who thought it wise to lie in harbour through a stormy night in the early winter.
“What detains you?” came a message from the head office.
“It is not a fit night for a vessel to be at sea,” the captain replied; and thereupon he turned in, believing the matter to be at an end.
The captain had been concerned for his vessel—not for his life; nor yet for his comfort. But the underling at the head office misinterpreted the message.
“What do we pay you for?” he telegraphed.
So the captain took the ship out to sea. Men say that she went out of commission the next day, and that it cost the company a thousand dollars to refit her.