he
struck a light, and, with great civility, tendered an explanation. The
ship, he said, had labored a good deal in the last gale, and he had
discovered one or two flaws in her, which were of no immediate
importance; but experience had taught him that in calm weather a ship
ought to be kept tight. "As they say ashore, a stitch in time saves
nine."

"But drilling holes in her is not the way," said Hazel sternly.

The mate laughed. "Why, sir," said he, "what other way is there? We
cannot stop an irregular crack; we can frame nothing to fit it. The way
is to get ready a plug measured a trifle larger than the aperture you are
going to make; then drill a round hole and force in the plug. I know no
other way than that; and I was a ship's carpenter for ten years before I
was a mate."

This explanation, and the manner in which it was given, removed Mr.
Hazel's apprehensions for the time being. "It was very alarming," said
he; "but I suppose you know your business."

"Nobody better, sir," said Wylie. "Why, it is not one seaman in three
that would trouble his head about a flaw in a ship's inner skin; but I'm
a man that looks ahead. Will you have a glass of grog, sir, now you are
here? I keep that under my eye, too; between ourselves, if the skipper
had as much in his cabin as I have here, that might be worse for us all
than a crack or two in the ship's inner skin."

Mr. Hazel declined to drink grog at that time in the morning, but wished
him good-night and left him with a better opinion of him than he had ever
had till then.

Wylie, when he was gone, drew a tumbler of neat spirits, drank half, and
carried the rest back to his work.

Yet Wylie was a very sober man in a general way. Rum was his tool; not
his master.

When Hazel came to think of it all next day, he did not feel quite so
easy as he had done. The inner skin! But, when Wylie withdrew his auger,
the water had squirted in furiously. He felt it hard to believe that this
keen jet of water could be caused by a small quantity that had found its
way between the skin of the ship and her copper, or her top booting; it
seemed rather to be due to the direct pressure of the liquid monster
outside.

He went to the captain that afternoon, and first told him what he had
seen, offering no solution. The captain, on that occasion, was in an
amphibious state; neither wet nor dry; and his reply was altogether
exceptional. He received the communication with pompous civility; th