“The Two Marys, of Barnstable! six days out.  You will be welcome on board, and such fare as we have shall be at your service!” replied the captain, in the manliness of his nature, as he at the same time ordered one of his sons to get “fasts” ready.  The yacht (which was none other than the “Saucy Kate,” of the Harlem Yacht Club) now dropped her fenders, and rounded to, like a thing of life, under the stern of the “Two Marys,” while Captain Luke put his helm down, and luffed into the wind.  Another minute and she was fast alongside, when there came rollicking on board two ladies accompanied by two gentlemen, whose demeanor, though they were dressed in garbs peculiar to the occasion, at once bespoke them persons of ease circumstance.  One of the men was peculiarly tall and and erect of person, had a long, brown mustache, and hair that is called Saxon, which he had evidently taken some pains to keep well ordered.  As to his face, though there was nothing particularly striking in it, (if a resemblance to the great General Webb be excepted,) I very much doubt if Brady could have selected a better subject to fill a vacant niche among those handsome men whose photographs adorn the entrance to his gallery on Broadway.  The other was a frisky little man, with a promising red beard and mustache, and a dull blue eye, and a little freckled face, and a puggish nose.  His dress was trowsers of white canvas, and a Norseman’s jacket, with rows of large horn buttons down the sides, and a corpulent cigar pouch in the breast pocket.

“Upon my life, now, but you can’t have much comfort aboard here,” spoke the frisky little man, in a voice of singular effeminacy, as he tipped the narrow brimmed glazed hat that had covered his narrower head.  “As for ourselves,” he continued, fingering the great blood stone studs in his brown cambric shirt bosom, “we are navigating merely for the love of the thing.  Want to get the thing right, and don’t care a straw for the expense, not we!” This he concluded by saying, in a manner so finical that one might have mistaken him for a Bond Street milliner in the garb of a sailor, that his name was Nat Bradshaw, a recently elected member of the Union Club.  The little, finicking man addressed no one in particular, but seemed much concerned lest we should not fully comprehend his respectability, though in truth he might have passed easily enough for a fool.  The man of the tall figure, and whose frank and manly manner was enough to banish the sorrow excited by the effeminacy of the other, pressed forward with his hand extended, and inquired for the captain.

“It’s me, Luke Snider, who’s skipper,” spoke the honest-hearted old salt, as the other grasped him by the hand, and gave him such a warm greeting as made him think he had met an old friend.  And while these civilities were being interchanged, one of the damsels, a blonde so beautiful that earth had not, as I thought, another to compare with her, tripped gayly about the deck, singing as unconcernedly as a lark at sunrise: