“Chips,” said he, addressing his chum, “we’ve got a new log on board and the skipper and mate don’t know how to use it. Now, I’ll bet you they will have to get me to show them, and if I do, I’ll make them shove me up the next voyage. Why, I tell you, putting a good instrument like that in the hands of such men is like casting pearls before—before—Captain Green and Gantline. You just wait and see.”
That night there was very little wind, but the third mate wound the log up for about fifty miles more than the ship travelled.
“We don’t need any more sights for a while,” said the skipper the next morning. “Mr. Snatchblock said that the log was dead accurate, so we’ll let her run. Must have blown pretty stiff during the mid-watch, Mr. Gantline, eh?” he continued, as he looked at what the log registered.
“No, I can’t say as it did,” said the mate, scratching his head thoughtfully as he looked at the night’s run.
“’Pears to me as if we made an all-fired long run of it.”
“Well, I guess you were a little off your first night out. You’ll be sober in a day or so,” said the skipper, with a grin.
The next day it was dead calm and foggy, but in spite of this the log registered a good fifty-mile run, and, as the ship was to put into Norfolk to complete her cargo, she was headed more to the southward.
“I haven’t any faith in that log, captain,” said Mr. Gantline; “it don’t seem as if we were off shore enough to head the way we do.”
“Well, haul it in and let’s look at it,” said the skipper.
The third mate was standing close by and helped haul in the line. “Captain,” said he, as the screw came over the rail, “this log is not set right; and if we’ve been running by it, we are too close in to the beach.”