Ginger Dick looked round the room. It was a comfortable little place, with pictures on the walls and antimacassars on all the chairs, and a row of pink vases on the mantelpiece. Then 'e looked at Mrs. Finch, and thought wot a nice-looking woman she was.
"This is nicer than being aboard ship with a crew o' nasty, troublesome sailormen to look arter, Captin Small," he ses.
"It's wonderful the way he manages 'em," ses Peter Russet to Mrs. Finch. "Like a lion he is."
"A roaring lion," ses Ginger, looking at Sam. "He don't know wot fear is."
Sam began to smile, and Mrs. Finch looked at 'im so pleased that Peter Russet, who 'ad been looking at 'er and the room, and thinking much the same way as Ginger, began to think that they was on the wrong tack.
"Afore 'e got stout and old," he ses, shaking his 'ead, "there wasn't a smarter skipper afloat."
"We all 'ave our day," ses Ginger, shaking his 'ead too.
"I dessay he's good for another year or two afloat, yet," ses Peter Russet, considering. "With care," ses Ginger.
Old Sam was going to say something, but 'e stopped himself just in time. "They will 'ave their joke," he ses, turning to Mrs. Finch and trying to smile. "I feel as young as ever I did."
Mrs. Finch said that anybody with arf an eye could see that, and then she looked at a kettle that was singing on the 'ob.