“It will take you an hour,” said his friend.  “Stay where you are, and I’ll have you in a dry suit of clothes in less than fifteen minutes.”

“I tell you, William,” said Mr. Buller, as the two sat smoking after dinner, “what you ought to do; you should never go out driving without a life-preserver and a pair of oars; I always take them.  It would make you feel safer.”

Mr. Buller went home the next day, because Mr. Podington’s clothes did not fit him, and his own outdoor suit was so shrunken as to be uncomfortable.  Besides, there was another reason, connected with the desire of horses to reach their homes, which prompted his return.  But he had not forgotten his compact with his friend, and in the course of a week he wrote to Podington, inviting him to spend some days with him.  Mr. Podington was a man of honor, and in spite of his recent unfortunate water experience he would not break his word.  He went to Mr. Buller’s seaside home at the time appointed.

Early on the morning after his arrival, before the family were up, Mr. Podington went out and strolled down to the edge of the bay.  He went to look at Buller’s boat.  He was well aware that he would be asked to take a sail, and as Buller had driven with him, it would be impossible for him to decline sailing with Buller; but he must see the boat.  There was a train for his home at a quarter past seven; if he were not on the premises he could not be asked to sail.  If Buller’s boat were a little, flimsy thing, he would take that train—­but he would wait and see.

There was only one small boat anchored near the beach, and a man—­apparently a fisherman—­informed Mr. Podington that it belonged to Mr. Buller.  Podington looked at it eagerly; it was not very small and not flimsy.

“Do you consider that a safe boat?” he asked the fisherman.

“Safe?” replied the man.  “You could not upset her if you tried.  Look at her breadth of beam!  You could go anywhere in that boat!  Are you thinking of buying her?”

The idea that he would think of buying a boat made Mr. Podington laugh.  The information that it would be impossible to upset the little vessel had greatly cheered him, and he could laugh.

Shortly after breakfast Mr. Buller, like a nurse with a dose of medicine, came to Mr. Podington with the expected invitation to take a sail.

“Now, William,” said his host, “I understand perfectly your feeling about boats, and what I wish to prove to you is that it is a feeling without any foundation.  I don’t want to shock you or make you nervous, so I am not going to take you out today on the bay in my boat.  You are as safe on the bay as you would be on land—­a little safer, perhaps, under certain circumstances, to which we will not allude—­but still it is sometimes a little rough, and this, at first, might cause you some uneasiness, and so I am going to let you begin your education in the sailing line on perfectly smooth water.  About three miles back of us there is a very pretty lake several miles long.  It is part of the canal system which connects the town with the railroad.  I have sent my boat to the town, and we can walk up there and go by the canal to the lake; it is only about three miles.”