“No one, thank you.”
“You won't stand on ceremony now, will you, with me?” said Tom.
“You see I haven't.”
“And you never will again?”
“No, never. Now, father, you can heave ahead about those oars.”
The Captain went on charging his pipe, and proceeded: “You see, Mr. Brown, they must have been at least twenty feet long, because, if you allow the lowest bank of oars to have been three feet above the water-line, which even Jack thinks they must have been—”
“Certainly. That height at least to do any good,” said Hardy.
“Not that I think Jack's opinion worth much on the point,” went on his father.
“It's very ungrateful of you, then, to say so, father,” said Hardy, “after all the time I've wasted trying to make it all clear to you.”
“I don't say that Jack's is not a good opinion on most things, Mr. Brown,” said the Captain; “but he is all at sea about triremes. He believes that the men of the uppermost bank rowed somehow like lightermen on the Thames, walking up and down.”