too: then when 'tis beginnin' to drop a bit, in with
more liquor, and so go on till the job's over."

"And how long do they keep it up?" said Reuben.

"Wa-all, that's more than I can answer for. Let me see," said Triggs,
reflectively. "There was ole Zeke Spry: he was up eighty-seben, and he
used to say he'd never, that he knowed by and could help, bin to bed not
to say _sober_ since he'd comed to years o' discretion. But in that ways
he was only wan o' many; and after he was dead 't happened just as 't
ole chap had said it wud, for he used to say, 'When I'm tooked folks
'ull get up a talk that ole Zeke Spry killed hisself with drink; but
don't you listen to it,' he says, ''cos 'tain't nothin' o' the sort: he
died for want o' breath--that's what killed he;' and I reckon he was
about right, else there wudn't be nobody left to die in Polperro."

"Polperro?" said Reuben: "that's where your ship goes to?"

"No, not ezactly: I goes to Fowey, but they bain't over a step or so
apart--a matter o' six miles, say."

There was a pause, which Captain Triggs broke by saying, "Iss, I thought
whether it wudn't surprise 'ee to hear 'bout it bein' Adam Pascal.
They'm none of 'em overmuch took with it, I reckon, for they allays
counted on 'im havin' Joan Hocken: her's another cousin, and another
nice handful, by all that's told up."

Reuben's spirit groaned within him. "Oh, if I'd only known of this
before!" he said. "I'd have kept her by force from going, or if she
would have gone I'd have gone with her. She was brought up so
differently!" he continued, addressing Triggs. "A more respectable woman
never lived than her mother was."

"Awh! so the Pascals all be: there's none of 'em but what's respectable
and well-to-do. What I've bin tellin' of 'ee is their ways, you knaw:
'tain't nothing agen 'em."

"It's quite decided me to go down and see her, though," said Reuben. "I
feel it's what her mother would have me do: she in a way asked me to act
a brother's part to her when she was dying, for she didn't dream about
her having anything to do with these relations whom she's got among
now."

"Wa-all, 'twas a thousand pities you let her go, then," said Triggs;
"and, though I'm not wantin' to hinder 'ee--for you'm so welcome to a
passage down to Fowey as you be round to Bristol--still, don't it strike
'ee that if her wudn't stay here for yer axin' then, her ain't likely to
budge from there for your axin' now?"

"I can but try, though,