k in t' harbour, Doctor,
and molasses be scarce, too, till t' fish be dry."

Everything was so clean that you could have eaten off the floor. The
pots and pans and tin cooking-utensils shone so brightly from the
walls that the flame of the tiny kerosene lamp, reflected from so many
sides at once, suggested ten hundredfold the candle-power it
possessed. A museumful of treasures could not have added to the charm
of the simplicity of the room, which, though small, was ever so cosy
compared with the surroundings outside. Three children were playing on
the hearth with a younger man, evidently their father.

"No, Doctor, they aren't ours exactly," replied our host, in answer to
my question, "but us took Sam as our own when he was born, and his
mother lay dead, and he've been with us ever since. Those be his
little ones. You remember Kate, his wife, what died in the hospital?"

Yes, I remembered her very well, and the struggle we had had in trying
to save her.

"Skipper John," I said as soon as tea was over, "let's get out and
see the old Englishman. He'll be tired waiting."

"Youse needn't go out, Doctor. He be upstairs in bed."

So upstairs, or rather up the ladder, we went, to find the oddest
arrangement, and yet far the most sensible under the peculiar
circumstances. "Upstairs" was the triangular space between the roof
and the ceiling of the ground floor. At each end was a tiny window,
and the whole, windows included, had been divided longitudinally by a
single thickness of hand-sawn lumber, up to the tiny cross-beams.
There was no lofting, and both windows were open, so that a cool
breeze was blowing right through. Cheerfulness was given by a bright
white paper which had been pasted on over everything. Home-made rag
mats covered the planed boards. At one end a screen of cheesecloth
veiled off the corner. Sitting bolt upright on a low bench, and
leaning against the partition, was a very aged-looking woman, staring
fixedly in front of her, and swaying forwards and backwards like some
whirling Dervish. She ceaselessly monotoned what was intended for a
hymn.

"The old gentleman sleeps over there," said the skipper with his head
just above the floor level. He indicated the screened corner, and then
bobbed down and disappeared, being far too courteous a man to intrude.

The old lady took no notice whatever as I approached. No head was
visible among the rude collection of bedclothes which, with a mattress
on the boards