ut was ot Comox, takun’ un bunker coal, I got the letter from the owners.  The boss humself hod signed ut, an’ ot the bottom he wrut un hus own bond:  ‘The Arrata beat you by four an’ a half days.  Am dusappointed.’  Dusappointed!  When I had cabled them from Newcastle.  When she drydocked ot Portland, there was whuskers on her a foot long, barnacles the size o’ me fust, oysters like young sauce plates.  Ut took them two days afterward tull clean the dock o’ shells an’ muck.

“An’ there was the motter o’ them fire-bars ot Newcastle.  The firm ashore made them heavier than the engineer’s speecifications, an’ then forgot tull charge for the dufference.  Ot the last moment, wuth me ashore gettun’ me clearance, they come wuth the bill:  ‘Tull error on fire-bars, sux pounds.’  They’d been tull the shup an’ MacPherson hod O.K.’d ut.  I said ut was strange an’ would no pay.  ‘Then you are dootun’ the chief engineer,’ says they.  ’I’m no dootun’,’ says I, ’but I canna see my way tull sign.  Come wuth me tull the shup.  The launch wull cost ye naught an’ ut ’ull brung ye back.  An’ we wull see what MacPherson says.’

“But they would no come.  Ot Portland I got the bill un a letter.  I took no notice.  Ot Hong-Kong I got a letter from the owners.  The bill hod been sent tull them.  I wrut them from Java explainun’.  At Marseilles the owners wrut me:  ’Tull extra work un engine-room, sux pounds.  The engineer has O.K.’d ut, an’ you have no O.K.’d ut.  Are you dootun’ the engineer’s honesty?’ I wrut an’ told them I was no dootun’ his honesty; thot the bill was for extra weight o’ fire-bars; an’ thot ut was O.K.  Dud they pay ut?  They no dud.  They must unvestigate.  An’ some clerk un the office took sick, an’ the bill was lost.  An’ there was more letters.  I got letters from the owners an’ the firm—­’Tull error on fire-bars, sux pounds’—­ot Baltimore, ot Delagoa Bay, ot Moji, ot Rangoon, ot Rio, an’ ot Montevuddio.  Ut uz no settled yut.  I tell ye, Annie, the owners are hard tull please.”

He communed with himself for a moment, and then muttered indignantly:  “Tull error on fire-bars, sux pounds.”

“Hov ye heard of Jamie?” his wife asked in the pause.

Captain MacElrath shook his head.

“He was washed off the poop wuth three seamen.”

“Whereabouts?”

“Off the Horn.  ’Twas on the Thornsby.”

“They would be runnun’ homeward bound?”

“Aye,” she nodded.  “We only got the word three days gone.  His wife is greetin’ like tull die.”

“A good lod, Jamie,” he commented, “but a stiff one ot carryun’ on.  I mind me when we was mates together un the Abion.  An’ so Jamie’s gone.”

Again a pause fell, to be broken by the wife.

“An’ ye will no a-heard o’ the Bankshire?  MacDougall lost her in Magellan Straits.  ’Twas only yesterday ut was in the paper.”