Frank was delighted with the picturesque sight, and overwhelmed Herrick with questions, that the old tar answered readily enough.
"That's right, lad," he would say; "keep your eyes open, and when you don't know a thing, never be ashamed to ask. That's the way to git on—you see if it ain't! Why, there's that feller Monkey, now: 'stead o' lookin' about him when we were at Singapore, I found him fast asleep in the shadder o' the quarter-boat, never knowin' whether he was in Malacca or Massachusetts! If you'd been one o' that sort, 'stead o' bein' supercargo, you'd ha' been shovellin' coal down thar yet?'"
For some time past Frank had noticed a curious change in one of the men, who, after showing himself, a brave and able seaman in the earlier part of the voyage, had suddenly, without any apparent reason, become so gloomy and miserable that his mates nicknamed him "Dick Calamity." The surgeon, though finding no sign of actual illness about the man, had pronounced him quite unfit for duty, and thenceforth the poor fellow would sit for hours looking moodily over the side, with a weary, hopeless expression, which, as Herrick truly said, "made a man's heart ache to look at."
One evening there was some music on the after-deck (there being several good musicians among the lady passengers who had come aboard at Singapore), and Frank, with some of the officers, stood by to listen. As the last notes of "Home, Sweet Home" died away, Austin's quick ear caught a smothered sob behind him. Following the sound, he discovered poor Dick crouching under the lee of one of the boats, and crying like a child.
Frank spoke to him kindly, but for some time could get nothing from him but sobs and tears. At last, however, the whole story came out. The man was homesick.
"I want to be home agin!" he groaned, "and I don't care to live if I can't. If I could just git one glimpse o' my little farm yonder among the Vermont hills, it 'ud be worth every cent I've got."
"But you'll soon be home now, you know," said Frank, cheerily. "We're close to Hong-Kong, and you can get a passage home from there whenever you like."
Dick only shook his head mournfully; but after a time he seemed to grow quieter, and went below. His mates—who had long since left off making fun of him, and now did all they could to cheer him up—helped him into his bunk, and recommended him to go to sleep.
The next morning an unusual bustle on the forecastle attracted Frank's attention, and he went forward to ask what was the matter.