“Capitaine, you will have him at ten, so much as you want of him.”
“Well, measure me off half a cord.”
“What!” said he, opening both eyes to their full extent.
“Measure me off half a cord.”
“Didn’t you say you wanted twenty or thirty cord?”
“No,” sais I, “I said I must have that much if I wanted it, but I don’t want it, it is only worth three dollars, and you have had the modesty to ask ten, and then ten and a half, but I will take half a cord to please you, so measure it off.”
He stormed, and raved, and swore, and threw his cap down on the deck and jumped on it, and stretched out his arm as if he was going to fight, and stretched out his wizzened face, as if it made halloing easier, and foamed at the mouth like a hoss that has eat lobelia in his hay.
“Be gar,” he said, “I shall sue you before the common scoundrels (council) at Halifax, I shall take it before the sperm (supreme) court, and try it out.”
“How much ile will you get,” sais I, “by tryin’ me out, do you think?
“Never mind,” said I, in a loud voice, and looking over him at the mate, and pretending to answer him. “Never mind if he won’t go on shore, he is welcome to stay, and we will land him on the Isle of Sable, and catch a wild hoss for him to swim home on.”