The name of Ulysses Ferragut began to be famous among the captains of the Spanish ports, although the nautical adventures of his early days contributed very little to this popularity.  The most of them had encountered greater dangers, but they appreciated him because of the instinctive respect that energetic and simple men have for an intelligence which they consider superior to their own.  Reading nothing except what pertained to their career, they used to speak with consternation of the numerous books that filled Ferragut’s stateroom, many of them upon matters which appeared to them most mysterious.  Some even made inexact statements in order to enlarge the prestige of their comrade.

“He knows much....  He is a lawyer as well as a sailor.”

Consideration of his fortune also contributed to the general appreciation.  He was an important share-holder of the company by which he was employed.  His companions loved to calculate with proud exaggeration the riches of his mother, piling it up into millions.

He met friends on every ship carrying the Spanish flag, whatever might be its home port or the nationality of its crews.

They all liked him:—­the Basque captains, economical in words, rude and sparing in affectionate discourse; the Asturian and Galician captains, self-confident and spendthrift in strange contrast to their sobriety and avaricious character when ashore; the Andalusian captains, reflecting in their witty talk white Cadiz and its luminous wines; the Valencian captains who talk of politics on the bridge, imagining that they are going to become the navy of a future republic; and the captains from Catalunia and Mallorca as thoroughly acquainted with business affairs as are their ship-owners.  Whenever necessity obliged them to defend their rights, they immediately thought of Ulysses.  Nobody could write as he could.

The old mates who had worked their way up from the lower ranks, men of the sea who had begun their career on coasting vessels and could only with great difficulty adjust their practical knowledge to the handling of books, used to speak of Ferragut with pride.

“They say that men of the sea are an uncultivated people....  Here they have Don Luis who is one of us.  They may ask him whatever they wish....  A real sage!”

The name of Ulysses always made them stammer.  They believed it a nickname, and not wishing to show any lack of respect, they had finally transformed it into “Don Luis.”  For some of them, Ferragut’s only defect was his good luck.  So far not a single boat of which he had had command had been lost.  And every sailor constantly on the sea ought to have at least one of these misfortunes in his history in order to be a real captain.  Only landlubbers never lose their boats.

When his mother died, Ulysses was very undecided about the future, not knowing whether to continue his sea life, or undertake something entirely different.  His relatives at Barcelona, merchants quick to understand and appraise a fortune, added up what the notary and his wife had left him and put with that what Labarta and the doctor had contributed, until it amounted to a million pesetas....  And was a man with as much money as that to go on living like a poor captain dependent upon wages to maintain his family!...