ut she
struggled out of the spray and tumble, in the end, and came to harbor
unscathed in the place where Nicholas Top, himself the skipper and
crew, was born and fished as a lad.

They boarded him, and (as they tell) he was brisk and grim and
dripping upon the deck--with the lights dancing in his eyes: those
which are lit by the mastery of a ship at sea.

"Ay, mates," says he, "I'm come back. An'," says he, "I'd thank ye t'
tread lightly, for I've a wee passenger below, which I've no wish t'
have woke. He's by way o' bein' a bit of a gentleman," says he, "an'
I'd not have ye take a liberty."

This made them stare.

"An' I'd not," my uncle repeated, steadily, glancing from eye to eye,
"have ye take a liberty."

They wondered the more.

"A bit of a gentleman!" says my uncle, in savage challenge. "A bit of
a gentleman!"

He would tell them no more, nor ever did; but in imperturbable
serenity and certainty of purpose builded a tight little house in a
nook of Old Wives' Cove, within the harbor, where the _Shining Light_
might lie snug; and there he dwelt with the child he had, placidly
fishing the grounds with hook and line, save at such times as he set
out upon some ill-seeming business to the city, whence he returned at
ease, it seemed, with himself and his errand, but something grayer,
they say, than before. The child he reared was in the beginning
conscious of no incongruity, but clothed the old man with every grace
and goodly quality, in faith and understanding, as children will: for
these knowing ones, with clearer sight than we, perceive neither
guile nor weakness nor any lack of beauty in those who foster
them--God be thanked!--whatever the nature and outward show may be.
There is a beauty common to us all, neither greater nor less in any of
us, which these childish hearts discover. Looking upon us, they are
blind or of transcendent vision, as you will: the same in issue--so
what matter?--since they find no ugliness anywhere. 'Tis the way, it
may be, that God looks upon His world: either in the blindness of love
forgiving us or in His greater wisdom knowing that the sins of men do
serve His purpose and are like virtue in His plan.

But this is a mystery....

II

AT THE SIGN OF THE ANCHOR AND CHAIN

The Anchor and Chain is a warm, pleasantly noisy place by the
water-side at St. John's, with a not ungrateful reek of rum and
tobacco for such outport folk as we; forever filled, too, with big,
tw