ng himself of one of the most
precious practical tenets ever discovered by human wisdom, 'is to lay
your head well to the wind, and we'll fight through it!'

Old Sol returned the pressure of his hand, and thanked him.

Captain Cuttle, then, with a gravity suitable to the nature of
the occasion, put down upon the table the two tea-spoons and the
sugar-tongs, the silver watch, and the ready money; and asked Mr
Brogley, the broker, what the damage was.

'Come! What do you make of it?' said Captain Cuttle.

'Why, Lord help you!' returned the broker; 'you don't suppose that
property's of any use, do you?'

'Why not?' inquired the Captain.

'Why? The amount's three hundred and seventy, odd,' replied the broker.

'Never mind,' returned the Captain, though he was evidently dismayed by
the figures: 'all's fish that comes to your net, I suppose?'

'Certainly,' said Mr Brogley. 'But sprats ain't whales, you know.'

The philosophy of this observation seemed to strike the Captain. He
ruminated for a minute; eyeing the broker, meanwhile, as a deep genius;
and then called the Instrument-maker aside.

'Gills,' said Captain Cuttle, 'what's the bearings of this business?
Who's the creditor?'

'Hush!' returned the old man. 'Come away. Don't speak before Wally. It's
a matter of security for Wally's father--an old bond. I've paid a good
deal of it, Ned, but the times are so bad with me that I can't do more
just now. I've foreseen it, but I couldn't help it. Not a word before
Wally, for all the world.'

'You've got some money, haven't you?' whispered the Captain.

'Yes, yes--oh yes--I've got some,' returned old Sol, first putting his
hands into his empty pockets, and then squeezing his Welsh wig between
them, as if he thought he might wring some gold out of it; 'but I--the
little I have got, isn't convertible, Ned; it can't be got at. I have
been trying to do something with it for Wally, and I'm old fashioned,
and behind the time. It's here and there, and--and, in short, it's as
good as nowhere,' said the old man, looking in bewilderment about him.

He had so much the air of a half-witted person who had been hiding his
money in a variety of places, and had forgotten where, that the Captain
followed his eyes, not without a faint hope that he might remember some
few hundred pounds concealed up the chimney, or down in the cellar. But
Solomon Gills knew better than that.

'I'm behind the time altogether, my dear Ned,' said Sol,