was the _Santa Maria_,
Christopher Columbus's flag-ship. "I came over with Christopher
Columbus," he said.

All this was unqualifiedly enlightening to Frederick. Nor was there
anything enigmatic in Peter Schmidt's explanation that the wood of those
slowly decaying caravels was called _legno santo_ and was used for fuel,
because it contained the spirit of knowledge. Farther out to sea lay a
third vessel, with a great, black breach forward on the port side.

"It sank," said the Friesian. "It brought in a great lot of people."

Frederick looked at the vessel. He was dissatisfied. He would have liked
to ask questions about the unfamiliar, yet curiously familiar ship out
there at sea; but the Friesian left the harbour and turned into a narrow,
crooked street with a steep flight of stairs.

Here an old uncle of Frederick, who had been dead more than fifteen
years, came toward him comfortably puffing at a pipe. He had just arisen,
it seemed, from a bench by the open entrance to his house.

"How do you do?" he said. "We are all here, my boy." Frederick knew whom
the old man meant when he said, "We are all here." "We fare very well,"
the old man, who in his lifetime had not been exactly favoured by
fortune, continued, grinning. "I didn't get along so well when I was up
with you in the dismal air. In the first place, my boy, we have the
_legno santo_." With his pipe he pointed to the dark interior of his
house, where blue tongues of flame were leaping on the hearth. "And
besides, we have the Toilers of the Light. But I am detaining you. _We_
have time, but _you_ must hurry." Frederick said good-bye.
"Fiddlesticks!" exclaimed his uncle. "Do you people down there still keep
up that tiresome business of 'how-do-you-do' and 'good-bye'?"

Climbing higher up the street, Peter Schmidt led Frederick through a
number of houses and inside courtyards. In one of the courtyards with
many corners, reminding Frederick of certain ancient sections of Hamburg
and Nuremberg, was a ship-chandlery bearing the sign, "The Seagoing
Ship."

"Everything here looks quite ordinary," said Peter Schmidt, "but here we
have all the ancient models." He pointed to the small model of an ancient
vessel standing in the little window of the chandlery, among packages
of chewing tobacco and leather whips.

Ships, ships, nothing but ships! The sight of this last vessel seemed
to produce the beginning of a slight gnawing resistance in Frederick's
brain. He knew