"'Mother of Pathrick,' said he, 'an' did ye come down all the way in your yacht and not know Timber Island when you'd see it?'
"He looked at me as if I was some strange being.
"'And where was ye last night, might I axe?'
"'Where we axe now,' I said.
"'Faith, it was a big head that brought you into the nursery here before last night came on! More be-token, I have'nt had a dhry rag on me for tin hours, and divil a sail we've got widout a shplit in it the size of a shteam-tug. Bring it in a sody-bottle, darlint, and the Lord'll love ye if ye don't spoil it. Whisht, love! You drink my health in the sody and don't lave any in the bottle.'
"I came back and got him a soda-bottle of the genuine article, and while he drank it the rapidity of his tongue was peculiar. 'So you have been here before?' I asked.
"'Whisht, darlint! till the captain won't hear you. Been here before? Begorra, this place has been a mine of goold to me many a time. For siventeen days at a slap I've laid here in Dicimber at four dollars a day, with nothin' to do but play checkers and sphlit wood for the shtove and pray for a gale o' wind down the lake till shpring-time.'
"This eloquence continued until I thought he would certainly fall off the bobstay.
"'Tell me, now,' he said, after I had got all the information I wanted, 'have ye a berth for an old salty aboard that craft?'
"I said we had not.