nd on the Committee-ship an' hand
the cup--his _cup_--to the winner."

"She's never consented?"

"Now I call that a master-stroke. That's the bold way to win a woman.
'Come along o' me, my dear, an' find yourself the lady patroness,
life-size. . . . Madam, you'll excuse the liberty,--but may I have the
igstreme honour to request you to take my arm in the full view of all
this here assembled rabble?' So arm-in-arm it is, up the deck, and
'Ladies an' Gentlemen'--meanin' 'Attention, pray, all you scum o' the
earth'--'I'll trouble you to observe strick silence while this lady,
with whom you are all familiar--'"

"Steady on!"

"Well, 'familiar' is too strong a word, as you say. 'While this lady,
with whom you're all acquainted, presents the gallant winner with a cup,
value Five Pounds, which you may have reckoned as an igstravagance when
you heard I was the donor, 'but will now reckernise as a sprat to catch
a whale--that is, unless you're even bigger fools than I take ye for.
'Twas with the greatest difficulty I indooced Mrs Bosenna--'"

"She never would!" swore 'Bias.

"Well, as a matter o' fact, she hasn't. But you'll allow the trick was
clever, and nothin' more left for the woman, if she'd yielded, but to be
carried straight off to the altar. 'Twould have been expected of her,
and no less."

"What has she done?"

"Taken a wise an' womanly course, as I hear. 'No,' says she, 'I'll go
to bottomless brimstone before lendin' myself to such a dodge'--or words
to that effect. 'But I'll tell 'ee what I will do,' says she, 'I'll
offer this here silver cup on my own account, an' give it with my own
hands to the winner. And you can stand by,' says she, 'an' look as
pompous as you please.' Either that, or that in so many words.
I'm givin' you the gist of it, as it reached me."

"Thank 'ee," said 'Bias, perpending and digging up the roadway with the
point of his stick. "'Tis to be her own prize, you say?"

"Yes, an' presented with her own hands. If I was you--bein' a trifle
late as you are on the handicap--I'd sail in an' collar that prize.
'Twould be a facer for him."

"No time."

"Whit-Monday's not till the seventh o' June. Four clear weeks: an'
Boatbuilder Wyatt could knock you up a shell in half that time. He gets
cleverer with every boat of the class; and with a boat built to race
once only he could make pretty well sure."

Later that afternoon Mr Philp, who never lost an occasion to advertise
hims