le Bay.'"

"Troth an' the owld fellow was right there," said Larry McGee.

"So I took the doubloon, but I was too weak to say much, and when I got
out of hospital I worked that bit of gold into this here star, with the
Admiral's name on it, and the date, and Mobile, and all the other things
I could think of. There's a picture of the old _Hartford_ on the other
side. She was a ship, she was."

Rob and Larry took a long and careful look at the star, and then the old
man stumped away.

"How thim owld sailors does hate the shtamers!" said Larry.

"I don't care, the sailing ships are prettier."

"So they be, but the shtamers goes betther. How'd ye loike to wait for a
wind whin yez wanted to go to the city, instid of shtamin' over in a
ferry-boat?"

Rob talked with his father that evening, and showed him his four-masted
ship with a bowsprit at each end.

"Rob, my boy, your old sailor friend is right. I think I'll take you
over with me in the morning, and we'll walk up South Street, along the
wharves, and I'll show you what he means."

"That's what I'd like."

"Wounded at Mobile Bay, was he? One of Farragut's men? I must hunt him
up. Every American boy ought to touch his hat when he speaks of
Farragut."

Mr. Drake was a little of an enthusiast about ships and sailors, and it
was no wonder Rob took after him.

The next morning, when the great ferry-boat took over its biggest crowd
of passengers, and ever so many teams and loaded wagons, Rob and his
father were standing out in front by the railing, looking hard at every
vessel they came near, and talking about them all.

When they landed in the city, they walked on from the ferry along South
Street, which is lined on one side by warehouses, and on the other by
docks and piers. The docks were all full of vessels, and the great
bowsprits of the larger ships sometimes stuck halfway across the street
to the buildings.

They were both so busy with the shipping that they hardly noticed
anything on the other side of them, but suddenly Rob heard a cracked
voice exclaim:

"Robert Fulton Drake. That was his name. Drake's a good one; but then--
Fulton! I say, boy, look here!"

Rob looked, and so did his father.

There sat the old one-legged sailor, Jack Peabody, on the stone steps of
one of the warehouses, with his bright gold star on his breast, and a
cane in his hand.

Just beyond him, however, on the upper step, stood a beautiful model of
a brig, with a hull abo