"Four," says he, "the eighteenth of September."
"And since then?" says I.
"Just the same as before," says he. "I've been right at Pemaquid."
"At what?" says I.
"Pemaquid," he repeats, leanin' hard on the "quid." "I've been there goin' on forty years, now."
"Doin' what?" says I.
"Oh, lobsterin' mostly," says he. "But late years they've been runnin' so scurce that summers I've been usin' the Curlew as a party boat. Ain't much money in it, though."
"How much, for instance?" says I.
"Wall, this season I cleaned up about one hundred and twenty dollars from the Fourth to Labor Day," says he. "But there was lots of good days when I didn't git any parties at all. You see, I look kind of old and shabby. So does the Curlew; and the spruce young fellers with the new boats gits the cream of the trade. But it don't take much to keep me."
"I should say not," says I, "if you can winter on that!"