All I cared
about was the sea, and boats, and sailors, and sea talk. I ran away
down to the wharf whenever I could get a chance, and left my work.
Why, even when I went to meetin', 'stead o' listenin', to the
minister, I was lookin' out the places about them as go down to the
sea in ships, ye know, and 'that leviathan whom Thou hast made,' and
all that. And there was Hiram, King of Tyre, and his ships! Lord!
how I used to think about them ships, and wonder how they was rigged,
and how many tons they were, and all about it. Yes! I was a wild un,
and no mistake; and after awhile I got so roused up--after my mother
died, it was, and my father married again--that I just run away, and
shipped aboard of a whaler, bound for the north seas. Wal, Honey,
'twould take me a week to tell ye about all my voyages. Long and short
of it, 'twas the life I was meant for, and I done well in it. Had
tumbles and toss-ups, here and there, same as everybody has in any
kind o' life; but I done well, and by the time I was forty year old
I was captain of the _Bonito_, East Indiaman, sailin' from New York
to Calcutta."
The Captain paused, and puffed gravely at his pipe for a few minutes.
"Well, Rosebud," he continued, presently, "you know what comes next.
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