A stout grizzled man of between fifty and sixty came walking along the wharf, with his bundle over his shoulder, and Coristine tried him.  The Captain was a man of few words, so, when the situation was explained, he remarked:  “Law don’t allow freight boats to take money off passengers, but law don’t say how many hands I have to have, nor what I’m to pay ’em or not to pay ’em.  If you and your friend want to ship for the trip to Barrie, you’d better hurry up, for we’re going to start right away.”

Coristine was filled with the wildest enthusiasm.  He dashed back to the hotel, the bar of which was covered with maps and old guide-books, partly the property of Wilkinson, partly of mine host, who was lazily helping him to lay out a route.  “Hurry, hurry!” cried the excited lawyer, as he swept the maps into his friend’s open knapsack.  Then he yelled “hurroo!” and sang:—­

     For the ship, it is ready, and the wind is fair,
     And I am bound for the sea, Mary Ann.

Like a whirlwind he swept Wilkinson and the two knapsacks out of the hotel door, along the sawdust paths and on to the wharf just in time to see the first sail set.  “What in the name of common sense is the meaning of this conduct?” asked the amazed schoolmaster as soon as he got his breath.

“Meaning! why, we’re indentured, you and I, as apprentice mariners on board the good ship Susan Thomas, bound for Kempenfeldt Bay.

     Brave Kempenfeldt is gone,
     His victories are o’er;
     And he and his eight hundred
     Shall plough the waves no more.

But we’ll plough them, Wilks, my boy.  We’ll splice the spanker boom, and port the helm to starboard, and ship the taffrail on to the lee scuppers of the after hatch, and dance hornpipes on the mizzen peak.  Hulloa, captain, here’s my mate, up to all sorts of sea larks; he can box the compass and do logarithm sums, and work navigation by single or double entry.”  The schoolmaster blushed for his companion, at whose exuberant spirits the sedate captain smiled, while the shock-headed man, whom Coristine named The Crew, displayed a large set of fairly preserved yellowish teeth, and guffawed loud and long.

“Do I understand, Captain, that you are willing to take us to Barrie in your—­ah—­vessel?” asked Wilkinson, politely.

“Aye, aye, my man,” answered the ancient mariner, “get your leg aboard, for we’re going to sail right away.  Hi, you, Sylvanus there, give another haul on them halliards afore you’re too mighty ready to belay, with your stupid cackle.”

So the indentured apprentices and their knapsacks got on board, while Sylvanus, alias The Crew, stopped laughing, and put a pound or two extra on to the halliards.  “Wilks,” said Coristine, “it’ll puzzle the women to find us out on our ocean home.”