Shipping Gazette' two days before we left the Mersey: the I'll Away, from New Orleans; barquentine, and for shape in tonnage might be own sister to the Hannah Hoo; but soft wood and Salcombe built. I was half fearing 'Bias might get down to Troy ahead of me.

"He hasn't reported himself to me, anyway. . . . But we'll talk about him and other things later on."

Mr Rogers dismissed the subject 88 the Quaymaster came sidling up to join them. Mild gossip was a passion with the Quaymaster, and eavesdropping his infirmity.

"Well, Cap'n Cai, and so you've hauled ashore-and for good, if I hear true?"

"For good it is, please God," answered Captain Cai, lifting his hat at the word. He was a simple man and pious.

"And a householder you've become already, by all ac

counts. I don't set much store by Town Quay talk as a rule

"That's right," interrupted Mr Rogers. "There's no man ought to know its worth better than you, that sets most of it goin'."

"They do say as you've started by leasin' the two cottages in Harbour Terrace."

"Do they?" Captain Cai glanced at the ship - chandler for confirmation. "Well, then, I hope 'tis true."

"Tis nothing of the sort," snapped Mr Rogers. Seeing how Captain Cai's face fell, he added, "I may be wrong, o'

course, but I reckon there was two tenants, and they wanted a cottage apiece.'

"Ah, to be sure!" agreed the honest captain, visibly relieved. But the Quaymaster persisted. "Yes, yes; there was talk of a friend o' yours, an' that you two were for settin' up house alongside one another. Hunken was the name, if I remember?"

Again Captain Cai glanced at the ship-chandler. He was plainly puzzled, as the shipchandler was plainly nettled. But he answered simply

"That's it 'Bias Hunken." "Have I met the man, by any chance?”

"No," said Captain Cai firmly, "you haven't, or you wouldn't ask the question. He's the best man ever wore shoe-leather, and you can trust him to the end o' the earth."

"I can't say as I know a Hunken answerin' that description," Mr Bussa confessed dubiously.

"You've heard the description, anyway," suggested Mr Rogers, losing patience. "And now, Peter Bussa, what d'ye say to running off and annoying somebody else?"

The Quaymaster fawned, and was backing away. But at this point up came Barber Toy, who for some minutes had been fretting to attract Captain Cai's notice, and could wait no longer.

"Hulloa, there! Is it Cap'n Cai?-an' still carryin' his gafftops'!, I see" (this in pleasant allusion to the tall hat). "Well, home you be, it seems, an' welcome as flowers in May!"

Cai shook hands.

"We was talkin' business," said the ship - chandler pointedly.

"Then you might ha' waited for a better occasion," Mr Toy retorted. "'Twasn' mannerly of ye, to say the least." "Better be unmannerly than troublesome, I've heard."

"Better be both than unfeelin'. What! Leave Cap'n Cai, here, pass my door, an' never a home-comin' word?"

"I was meanin' to pay you a visit straight away; indeed I was," said Captain Cai contritely. "Troy streets be nar

"Ay, Cap'n: East or West, home is best."

"And too far East is West, as every sailor man knows. . . . There, now, take me along and think that out while you're giving me a clip; for the longer you stand scratching your head the longer my hair's growing." He turned to Mr Rogers. "So long, soce! I'll be punctual at twelve-thirty-what's left of

me."

"I've heard married men call it better," said Mr Toy, fetching forth a clean wrapper.

"Very likely." The Captain sighed again contentedly. "I take no truck in marriage, for my part. A friend's company enough for me."

"What's his name, Cap'n? The whole town's dyin' to know."

"He's called Hunken-Tobias Hunken."

The barber paused, snapping his scissors and nodding. "Bussa was right then, or Bussa and Philp between 'em." Hey?"

""Tis wonderful how news gets abroad in Troy. . . . 'Hunken,' now? And where might he be one of? I don't seem to

"You wouldn't. He comes from t'other side of the Duchy -Я Padstow-born man, and he've never set eyes on Troy in his life."

"Yet he takes a house an' settles here? That's queer, as you might say."

"I see nothing queer about it. He's my friend-that's why. And what's more, the Lord never put bowels into a better man."

"He'll be a pleasure to shave, then," opined Mr Toy.

"No, he won't; he wears his hair all over his face. Talkin' of that reminds mewhen you've done croppin' me I want a clean shave.'

"Chin-beard an' all, Cap'n?" "Take it off-take it off! 'Twas recommended to me against sore throat; but I

never liked the thing nor the look of it."

"Then there's one point, it seems, on which you an' your friend don't agree, sir?"

The barber meant this facetiously, but Captain Cai considered it in all seriousness.

"You're mistaken," he answered. "Between friends there's a give-an'-take, and until you understand that you don't understand friendship. 'Bias Hunken likes me to do as I choose, and I like 'Bias to do as he chooses: by consekence o' which the more we goes our own ways the more we goes one another's. That clear, I hope."

"'Twasn't a good illustration, I admit. But the p'int is, I like 'Bias because he's 'Bias, an' 'Bias likes me because I'm Cai Hocken. That bein' so, don't it follow we're goin' to be better friends than ever, now we've hauled ashore to do as likes us?"

ashore

"You're determined to have off your chin-beard?" "To be sure. I'm now, aren't I?-and free to wear what face I choose.”

"You won't find it so, Cap'n." "T'ch't! You landsmen be so fed with liberty you don't know your privileges. If you don't like your habits, what hinders you from changin' 'em? But do you? Here I come back: here's th' old Town Quay same as ever it was; and here likewise you all be, runnin' on as I left 'ee, like a clockwork— a bit slower with age maybethat's all. Whereby I conclude your ways content ye.”

"You're wrong, Cap'n Cai -you're wrong. We bide by our habits-an', more by token, here comes Mr Philp. 'Morning, Mr Philp." The barber, without turning, nodded towards the newcomer as he entered-a short man, aged about sixty, with a square-out grey beard, sanguine complexion, and blue eyes that twinkled with a deceptive appearance of humour. "Here's Cap'n Cai Hocken, home from sea.

"Eh? I am very glad to see you, Cap'n Hocken," said Mr Philp politely. "There's a post-card waitin' for you, up at the Office."

Captain Cai sat bolt upright of a sudden, narrowly missing a wound from the scissors. "That will be from 'Bias! To think I hadn' sense enough to go straight to the Post Office and inquire!"

"He paid off his crew last Toosday, an' took his discharge an' the train down to Plymouth. He've bought a wardrobe there-real wornut -an' 'tis comin' round by sea. There's a plate-chest, too, he thinks you may fancy-price thirty-five shillin' secondhand: an' he hopes to reach Troy the day after next, which by the post-mark is to-morra."

"Mr Philp," explained the barber, "calls in at the Office every mornin' to read all the post-cards. 'Tis one of his habits."

"Recent bereavement ? " asked Mr Philp, before Captain Cai could well digest this. "Eh?" "Recent

bereavement?"

Mr Philp was examining the tall hat, which he had picked up to make room for his own person on the customers' bench.

"That's another of his aptitoods," the barber interpolated. "He attends all the funerals in the parish."

"In the midst o' life we are in death," observed Mr Philp. "That's a cert, Cap'n Hocken, an' your hat put me in mind of it."

"Oh, 'tis my hat you're meanin'? What's wrong with it ?"

"Did I say there was anything wrong? No, I didn'tGod forbid ! An' no doubt," concluded Mr Philp cheerfully, "the fashions 'll work round to it again."

"I'll change it for another." "You won't find that too easy, will you?" The barber

paused in his snipping, and turned about for a thoughtful look at the hat.

"I mean I'll buy another, of a different shape. First the beard, then the headgear-as I was tellin' Toy, a man ashore can reggilate his ways as he chooses, an' here's to prove it."

"They do say a clean shave is worth two virtuous resolutions," answered the barber, shaking his head again. "And you're makin' a brave start, I don't deny. But wait till you pick up with a few real habits."

"What sort o' habits?" "The sort that come to man first-along in the shape o' duties - like church - goin'.

Look here, Cap'n, I'll lay a wager with 'ee. . . Soon as you begin to walk about this town a bit, you'll notice a terrible lot o' things that want improvin

"I don't need to walk off the Town Quay for that."

66

'Ah, an' I daresay it came into your head that if you had the orderin' of Bussa you wouldn' be long about it? The town'll think it, anyway. We're a small popilation in Troy, all tied up in neighbourly feelin's an' hangin' together till-as the sayin' is— you can't touch a cobweb without hurtin' a rafter. What the town's cryin' out for is a new broom-a man with ideas, eh, Mr Philp?above all, a man who's independent. So first of all they'll flatter ye up into standin' for the Parish Council, and put ye head o' the poll—

"Tut, man!" interrupted Captain Cai, flushing a little. "What do I know about such things? Not o' course that I shan't take an interest-as a ratepayer

"To be sure. I heard a man say, only last Saturday, sittin' in that very chair, as there was never a ship's captain hauled ashore but in three weeks he'd be ready to teach the Chancellor of th' Exchequer his business an' inclined to wonder how soon he'd be offered the job."

"A ship's captain needn't be altogether a born fool."

"No: an' next you'll be bent on larnin' to speak in public; and takin' occasions to practise, secondin' votes o' thanks an' such like. After that you'll be marryin' a wife-

"I don't want to marry a wife, I tell 'ee!"

"Who said you did? Well, then, you'll get married-they dotes on a public man as a rule; and for tanglin' a man up in habits there's no snare like wedlock, not in the whole world. I've known scores o' men get married o' purpose to break clear o' their habits an' take a fresh start; but ne'er a man that didn't tie himself up thereby in twenty new habits for e'er a one he'd let drop."

"Go on with your folly, if it amuses you."

"Then, again, you've taken a house."

"So Rogers tells me. I don't even know the rent, at this moment."

"Twenty-five pound p'r annum," put in Mr Philp.

Captain Cai-released just then from his wrapper-turned and stared at him.

"I had it from the Postmistress," Mr Philp's tone was matter-of-fact, his gaze unabashed. "Bein' paralytic, Rogers did your business with the widow by letter; he keeps a type-writin' machine an' pays Tabb's girl three shillin' a-week to work it. The paper's thin, as I've had a mind to warn 'er more than once.'

""Twould be a Christian act," suggested Mr Toy. "If there's truth in half what folks say, some of old Johnny Rogers' correspondence'd make pretty readin' for the devil."

"But look here," interposed Captain Cai, "what's this about doin' business with a widow ? Whose widow?"

"Why, your landlady, to be sure-the Widow Bosenna, up to Rilla Farm."

"No-stop a minute-take that blessed latherin'-brush out o' my mouth! You don't tell me old Bosenna's dead, up there?"

"It didn' altogether surprise most of us when it happened," said the barber philosophically, "a man risin' sixty-five, with his habits. . . . But it all came about by the County Council's widenin' the road up at Four Turnin's. . . . You see, o' late years th' old man 'd ride home on Saturdays so full he had to drop off somewhere 'pon the road; an' his mare gettin' to find this out, as dumb animals do, had picked up a comfortable