, and taught by somebody
else; but I don't really mind. I only want to go along steadily to the
end, and when that comes shake my friend by the hand and say
"Farewell." It is plain, is it not, that I am no business man?

I am still dreaming when our noisy little crowd elbow their way out
and pass up the street into a tavern. Here my friend the Second is
known. He pats the fair barmaid on the cheeks, chucks the dark one
under the chin, calls the landlady "old dear," and orders drinks _in
extenso_. I am introduced to one and all, and another girl, neither
dark nor fair, emerges from an inner room for my especial regard. We
are invited within, and with glass in hand and girl on knee, we toast
our coming voyage. One by one the girls are kissed; the landlady
jocularly asks why she is left out, and a sense of justice makes me
salute her chastely. You see, old man, this is the last night ashore.
We bid them "good-bye," they wish us good luck, and we depart to our
own place once more. The Second is silent. He has said good-bye to his
girl--he hung back a moment as we left the tavern. And there is
something burning in my brain, just behind the eyeballs. I have not
said good-bye to my girl. Or rather I mean--but I cannot formulate to
myself just what I do mean at the time. I only feel, as I turn in,
that I ought to have told my friend all that happened when I met her,
a month ago, and that, after all, nothing really matters, and the
sooner I get away to sea again the better.

XVII

_Cleared for sea._
_s.s. Benvenuto, for S. Africa._

It is ten-thirty this clear, cold December day; the sun shines on the
turquoise patch of open Channel which I can see from the bridge where
I am testing the whistle; the tide is rising; the last cases of
general cargo are being lowered into Number Two Hold, and from all
along the deck rise little jets of steam, for the Mate is already
trying the windlass. Once more we are "cleared for sea." In an hour's
time the tug _Implacable_, mingling her frenzied little yelp with our
deeper note, will pull us out into the middle of the dock, then round,
and slowly through the big gates, into the locks. The hatches are
already on the after combings, and sailors are spreading the tarpaulin
covers over them and battening down with the big wood wedges.

"Steam for eleven o'clock," said the Chief last night. Right! The
gauges are trembling over the 150 mark now--enough to get away with.
"O