it the pickle-jar it
belonged to. This made the ball bound when we played 'prisoner's
base.'

"My father gave me the broken driving-whip that had lost the lash, and
an old pair of his gloves, to play coachman with; these I had long
wished for, since next to sailing in a ship, in my ideas, came the
honour and glory of driving a coach.

"My whole soul, I must tell you, was set upon being a sailor. In those
days I had rather put to sea once on Farmer Fodder's duck-pond than
ride twice atop of his hay-waggon; and between the smell of hay and
the softness of it, and the height you are up above other folk, and
the danger of tumbling off if you don't look out--for hay is elastic
as well as soft--you don't easily beat a ride on a hay-waggon for
pleasure. But as I say, I'd rather put to sea on the duck-pond, though
the best craft I could borrow was the pigstye-door, and a pole to punt
with, and the village boys jeering when I got aground, which was most
of the time--besides the duck-pond never having a wave on it worth the
name, punt as you would, and so shallow you could not have got drowned
in it to save your life.

"You're laughing now, little master, are you? But let me tell you that
drowning's the death for a sailor, whatever you may think. So I've
always maintained, and have given every navigable sea in the known
world a chance, though here I am after all, laid up in arm-chairs and
feather-beds, to wait for bronchitis or some other slow poison.
_Grumph_!

"Well, we must all go as we're called, sailors or landsmen, and as I
was saying, if I was never to sail a ship, I would have liked to drive
a coach. A mail coach, serving His Majesty (Her Majesty now, GOD
bless her!), carrying the Royal Arms, and bound to go, rough weather
and fair. Many's the time I've done it (in play you understand) with
that whip and those gloves. Dear! dear! The pains I took to teach my
sister Patty to be a highwayman, and jump out on me from the
drying-ground hedge in the dusk with a 'Stand and deliver!' which she
couldn't get out of her throat for fright, and wouldn't jump hard
enough for fear of hurting me.

"The whip and the gloves gave me joy, I can tell you; but there was
more to come.

"Kitty the servant gave me a shell that she had had by her for years.
How I had coveted that shell! It had this remarkable property: when
you put it to your ear, you could hear the roaring of the sea. I had
never seen the sea, but Kitty was born in a fi