th-east gale. They
ain't a man here that 'uld dare to try and cross it when the sea's
breakin' on it. The man that says he would, lies!" And he looked at
the foreman, and waited a moment.

"When my wife took sick, and I stopped goin' to sea, two year ago, and
took up boat-fishin', I didn't know half as much about the coast as
the young boys do, and one afternoon it was blowin' a gale, and we
was all hands comin' in, and passin' along the Bar to go sheer 'round
it to the west'ard, and Captain Fred Cook--he's short-sighted--got on
to the Bar before he knew it, and then he had to go ahead, whether or
no; and I was right after him, and I s'posed he knew, and I followed
him. Well, he was floated over, as luck was, all right; but when I'd
just got on the Bar, a roller dropped back and let my bowsprit down
into the sand, and then come up quicker'n lightnin' and shouldered the
boat over, t'other end first, and slung me into the water; and when I
come up, I see somethin' black, and there was John Wood's boat runnin'
by me before the wind with a rush--and 'fore I knew an'thing he had me
by the hair by one hand and in his boat, and we was over the Bar. Now,
I tell you, a man that looks the way I saw him look when I come over
the gunwale, face up, don't go 'round breakin' in and hookin' things.
He hadn't one chance in five, and he was a married man, too, with
small children. And what's more," he added, incautiously, "he didn't
stop there. When he found out, this last spring, that I was goin' to
lose my place, he lent me money enough to pay the interest that was
overdue on the mortgage, of his own acord."

And he stopped suddenly.

"You have certainly explained yourself," said the foreman. "I think we
understand you distinctly."

"There isn't one word of truth in that idea," said Eli, flushing up,
"and you know it. I've paid him back every cent. I know him better'n
any of you, that's all, and when I know he ain't guilty, I won't say
he is; and I can set here as long as any other man."

"Lively times some folks'll hev, when they go home," said a spare
tin-peddler, stroking his long yellow goatee. "Go into the store:
nobody speak to you; go to cattle-show: everybody follow you 'round;
go to the wharf: nobody weigh your fish; go to buy seed-cakes at the
cart: baker won't give no tick."

"How much does it cost, Mr. Foreman," said the butcher, "for a man
't's obliged to leave town, to move a family out West? I only ask for
inform