M one bitter cold day in winter, caught in the
branches of a tree by his durn-fool ribbon collar. He was almost
starving. If you could have seen his eyes, Mistress Blythe! He was
nothing but a kitten, and he'd got his living somehow since he'd been
left until he got hung up. When I loosed him he gave my hand a pitiful
swipe with his little red tongue. He wasn't the able seaman you see
now. He was meek as Moses. That was nine years ago. His life has
been long in the land for a cat. He's a good old pal, the First Mate
is."

"I should have expected you to have a dog," said Gilbert.

Captain Jim shook his head.

"I had a dog once. I thought so much of him that when he died I
couldn't bear the thought of getting another in his place. He was a
FRIEND--you understand, Mistress Blythe? Matey's only a pal. I'm fond
of Matey--all the fonder on account of the spice of devilment that's in
him--like there is in all cats. But I LOVED my dog. I always had a
sneaking sympathy for Alexander Elliott about HIS dog. There isn't any
devil in a good dog. That's why they're more lovable than cats, I
reckon. But I'm darned if they're as interesting. Here I am, talking
too much. Why don't you check me? When I do get a chance to talk to
anyone I run on turrible. If you've done your tea I've a few little
things you might like to look at--picked 'em up in the queer corners I
used to be poking my nose into."

Captain Jim's "few little things" turned out to be a most interesting
collection of curios, hideous, quaint and beautiful. And almost every
one had some striking story attached to it.

Anne never forgot the delight with which she listened to those old
tales that moonlit evening by that enchanted driftwood fire, while the
silver sea called to them through the open window and sobbed against
the rocks below them.

Captain Jim never said a boastful word, but it was impossible to help
seeing what a hero the man had been--brave, true, resourceful,
unselfish. He sat there in his little room and made those things live
again for his hearers. By a lift of the eyebrow, a twist of the lip, a
gesture, a word, he painted a whole scene or character so that they saw
it as it was.

Some of Captain Jim's adventures had such a marvellous edge that Anne
and Gilbert secretly wondered if he were not drawing a rather long bow
at their credulous expense. But in this, as they found later, they did
him injustice. His tales were all l