wooden figurehead under her bowsprit, the face and bust of a woman on
whom an ancient woodcarver had bestowed his notion of a beatific smile;
the result was an idiotic simper. The glorious gilding had been worn
off, the wood was gray and cracked. The _Polly's_ galley was entirely
hidden under a deckload of shingles and laths in bunches; the
after-house was broad and loomed high above the rail in contrast to the
mere cubbies which were provided for the other fore-and-afters in the
flotilla which came ratching in toward Saturday Cove.

The _Polly_, being old enough to be celebrated, had been the subject of
a long-coast lyric of seventeen verses, any one of which was capable of
producing most horrible profanity from Captain Epps Candage, her master,
whenever he heard the ditty echoing over the waves, sung by a satirist
aboard another craft.

In that drifting wind there was leisure; a man on board a lime-schooner
at a fairly safe distance from the _Polly_ found inclination and lifted
his voice:

"Ow-w-w, here comes the _Polly_ with a lopped-down sail,
And Rubber-boot Epps, is a-settin' on her rail.
How-w-w long will she take to get to Boston town?
Can't just tell 'cause she's headin' up and down."

"You think that kind o' ky-yi is funny, do you, you walnut-nosed,
blue-gilled, goggle-eyed son of a dough-faced americaneezus?" bellowed
Captain Candage, from his post at the _Polly's_ wheel.

"Father!" remonstrated a girl who stood in the companionway, her elbows
propped on the hatch combings. "Such language! You stop it!"

"It ain't half what I can do when I'm fair started," returned the
captain.

"You never say such things on shore."

"Well, I ain't on shore now, be I? I'm on the high seas, and I'm talking
to fit the occasion. Who's running this schooner, you or me?"

She met his testiness with a spirit of her own, "I'm on board here,
where I don't want to be, because of your silly notions, father. I have
the right to ask you to use decent language, and not shame us both."

Against the archaically homely background the beauty of the young girl
appeared in most striking contrast. Her curls peeped out from under the
white Dutch cap she wore. Her eyes sparkled with indignant protest, her
face was piquant and was just then flushed, and her nose had the least
bit of a natural uptilt, giving her the air of a young woman who had a
will of her own to spice her amiability.

Captain Candage bli