“Overboard with it!” said David Bright in a voice of decision.
With a mingling of wild amazement, glee, and good-will, Billy, exerting all his strength, hurled the rum-keg into the air, and it fell with a heavy splash upon the sea.
“There, Billy,” said David, placing his hand gently on the boy’s head, “you go below and say your prayers, an’ if ye don’t know how to pray, get Luke Trevor to teach you, an’ don’t forget to thank God that your old father’s bin an’ done it at last.”
We are not informed how far Billy complied with these remarkable orders, but certain we are that David Bright did not taste a drop of strong drink during the remainder of that voyage. Whether he tasted it afterwards at all must be left for this chronicle to tell at the proper time and place.
At present it is necessary that we should return to Yarmouth, where Captain Bream, in pursuance of his deep-laid schemes, entered a bookseller’s shop and made a sweeping demand for theological literature.
“What particular work do you require, sir?” asked the surprised and somewhat amused bookseller.
“I don’t know that I want any one in particular,” said the captain, “I want pretty well all that have bin published up to this date. You know the names of ’em all, I suppose?”
“Indeed no, sir,” answered the man with a look of uncertainty. “Theological works are very numerous, and some of them very expensive. Perhaps if—”
“Now, look here. I’ve got neither time nor inclination to get upon the subject just now,” said the captain. “You just set your clerk to work to make out a list o’ the principal works o’ the kind you’ve got on hand, an’ I’ll come back in the evenin’ to see about it. Never mind the price. I won’t stick at that—nor yet the quality. Anything that throws light on religion will do.”
“But, sir,” said the shopman, “some of the theological works of the present day are supposed—at least by the orthodox—to throw darkness instead of light on religion.”