of
the earnings of the boat than he was entitled to I cannot say. Certainly
he began to thrive exceedingly about this time, and, as an old
longshoreman seven years Posh's senior, said to me the other day, "He
might ha' been a gennleman! He used to kape his greyhounds, and he had
as pratty a mare as the' wuz in Lowestoft. Ah! Mr. FitzGerald was a
_good_ gennleman to him--that he _wuz_!"

Once again the epithet "good," which he so pre-eminently merited.

But whether the year had been bad or good, it was necessary for the
sleeping partner to look into the accounts of the firm.

On Christmas Day of 1867, when the season was over and all the herring
drifters had "made up," that is to say, had worked out their accounts and
struck a balance of profit or loss, Fitzgerald wrote to Posh:--

"WOODBRIDGE, _Christmas Day_.

"DEAR CAPTAIN,

"Unless I hear from you to-morrow that _you_ are coming over _here_, I
shall most likely run over myself to Miss Green's at Lowestoft--by the
Train which gets there about 2.

"I shall look in upon you in the evening, if so be that I do not see
you in the course of the day. I say I shall look in upon [_sic_] _to-
morrow_, I dare say:--But, as this is Christmas time and I suppose you
have many friends to see, I shall not want you to be at school every
evening.

"This is Newson's piloting week, so he cannot come.

"E. FG."

Posh did not go to Woodbridge, so FitzGerald went to Miss Green's,
whence, on December the 28th, he wrote one of his most characteristic
letters (in that it embraced interests so widely different) to Professor
Cowell. The letter begins with a reference to M. Garcin de Tassy and his
"annual oration," and continues with some passages of great interest
concerning the _Rubaiyat_ and Attar's "Birds." (Dr. Aldis Wright's
Eversley Edition of _Letters_, II, 100.) Then from a delicate and dainty
piece of criticism the poet turns to his herring business. "I have come
here to wind up accounts for our Herring-lugger: much against us as the
season has been a bad one. My dear Captain [Posh], who looks in his
Cottage like King Alfred in the Story, was rather saddened by all this,
as he had prophesied better things. I tell him that if he is but what I
think him--and surely my sixty years of considering men will not so
deceive me at last!--I would rather lose money with him than gain it with
others. Indeed I never proposed Gain, as you ma