"Nothin'," said Henry. "She's flying light."
"Werry good too. An' may I be run down an' sunk by a bar'l o' your mother's hot biscuit ef this here warn't the werry identical way wot it happened. I shipped in St. Thomas as second mate onto the four-masted schooner Raw Tomatters. She were bound fur Noo Yawk with an assorted cargo o' cigarettes, pickled pigs' feet, mares' nests, and ice-cream."
"Mares' nests!" exclaimed Henry.
"Ice-cream!" cried George.
"Them's it! The mares' nests is built in the mountains by the wild mares, an' is imported to this country for political purposes. The ice-cream made in St. Thomas are werry bad, werry bad indeed; but it won't melt in this here climate 'cos it are so hot where it are made, an' so it are imported here in bricks an' sold as ice-cream candy, w'ich the same you may have eat, but don't do so no more. Howsumever that 'ain't got nothin' to do with this 'ere yarn wot I'm a-tellin' ye. The Raw Tomatters are a werry big schooner, an' she got under way with a crew o' twenty men, all told, includin' me, wot were the second mate, an' the Cap'n's mother, w'ich the same she were the cause o' the whole bilin'. The Cap'n's name were Janders Blue, an' he were a smallish man with a turned-up nose, one glass eye, an' a wooden arm, w'ich the same he got in the whalin' trade. His mother's name were Mehitabel Blue, an' she stood six feet three, an' could lift a barrel o' salt horse. So bein', it putty soon come to be knowed that she were not only the Cap'n's mother, but a mother-in-law to the hull crew. The trouble with her were that she weren't brought up among seafarin' pussons, but in a werry respectable country town where there were more churches than stores. She'd went down to St. Thomas on a steamer fur her health, she said, an' were now goin' fur to make the v'yidge back with her good son. I didn't see wot she wanted o' any more health than she had; but I didn't say nothin', her bein' the Cap'n's mother an' me the second mate, w'ich the same 'ain't got much to say.
"Waal, the squalls commenced fur to make up jes as soon as ever we started to git the anchor. The old lady, wearin' a wide-brimmed straw hat with a long red feather into 't, an' holdin' a white umbreller over her head, stood aft alongside o' her son. Sez he, 'H'ist the outer jib.' Sez I, 'Lively there, you swabs.' With that the old woman she shet the umbreller down with a snap, jumped forrad in about four hops, an' sez she ter me, sez she,
"'Wot kind o' langwidge are that ter use in the presence of a lady?'
"'Beggin' yer pardon, ma'am,' sez I to she, sez I, 'I weren't aware as how it were onperlite,' sez I, jes like that.
"'Don't you dast to call no man no sich names ag'in w'ile I'm on this 'ere boat,' sez she; 'ef ye do, I'll git my son ter discharge ye right off.'
"Then she h'isted the umbreller ag'in an' went aft. The men looked at me an' I looked at them, an' we didn't none on us say nothin'; 'cos why, there weren't nothin' to say. But blow me fur pickles ef 'twere more'n five minutes afore she bruk out in a noo place. Bill Doosenbury, the fust mate, he sings out fur some un to set the torps'ls.