uped together near the
companionway smoking the pipes of peace and anxious to discuss the next
managerial move. Handy, of course, was the prime mover in all
things--the one man to whom they all looked to pilot them safely through
the difficulties they expected to encounter. So far they considered he
had made good. He appeared to be in the best of spirits. Seated on an
up-turned bucket, drawing meditatively on his well-seasoned briarwood,
he looked a perfect picture of content. Not so, however, the "little
'un," as the boys playfully addressed the dwarf. The motion of the
vessel did not harmonize with peculiarities of his interior
arrangements, and unless the _Gem_ stopped rolling and pitching there
was evidently trouble ahead. Matters were approaching a crisis with him.
He had little or nothing to say. In fact, he was doing his best, as he
afterwards admitted, to keep his spirits up while he manfully struggled
to keep material matter down.

"Is it always as rough as this, Handy?" he asked in a plaintive voice.

"Rough as this, eh, my bold buccaneer," responded Handy, cheerily;
"rough as this? Why, there's scarcely a whitecap on the water. You ain't
going to be seasick, are you? Well, at any rate, if you are, possibly it
may be all for the best. 'Twill make a new man of you."

"Maybe he don't want to be made a new man of," suggested the low comedy
man.

"Oh, cork up and give us a rest," appealed the Little 'Un, somewhat
testily. "I'm all right, only I don't relish the confounded motion of
the craft. First she rocks one way, then another, and then again she
seems to have the fidgets, and pitches in fits and starts. I don't see
any sense in it. Steamboats don't cut up such capers, at least, none of
those that I've had any experience with."

"Brace up, my hearty," said Handy, removing the briarwood from his lips.
"Brace up. You'll feel all right anon."

"Anon isn't half bad," again jocularly interposed the comedy gentleman.

The wind was gradually freshening. There was by this time quite a sea
on, and the Little 'Un was beginning to succumb to the influence of
prevailing conditions. A sudden gust struck the _Gem_, and, yielding to
it, the group that was sitting so contentedly a few seconds before about
the companionway went rolling in a heap down to leeward in the cockpit.
This was altogether too much for the Little 'Un. He picked himself
together as well as he could, and doubled over the rail, Handy holding
on to h