A month or so after his return he was away among the mountains with his master and a friend who was wearing a jersey.

“You sailor, Bob?” asked Ponto.

“Yes, Ponto.  I’m sailor-man.”

“No.  You no sailor,” responded Ponto decisively.

“Yes.  I tell you true.  I’m sailor.”

Ponto:  “Ah! me think you no big salt-water sailor.  You only little fella creek sailor.  You no got jacket—­flash collar, knife alonga string!”

A FATEFUL BARGAIN

A squatter, travelling on foot with his black boy, came to a river almost a “banker,” and there was no recourse but to swim.  After Charcoal had taken a couple of trips with the clothes, the Boss told the boy to swim alongside him, in case of emergency.  Halfway across, just as the Boss was feeling that there was some risk in swimming a flooded river in which were many snags, Charcoal cheerily observed—­“Suppose you drowned finish, Boss, you gib me you pipe?” Summing up all the possibilities in a second, the Boss gasped out—­“No; you bin get pipe when I’m across!” The boy’s aid was prompt and effective.

EXCUSABLE BIAS

Two of the beachcombing class resumed an oft-recurring discussion on the seaworthiness of their respective dinghies.  Tom, the silent black boy, a more experienced boatman than either, listened as he watched his own frail bark canoe dancing like a feather in response to every ripple.

“Tom!” shouted one of the disputants, “suppose you want to go out in big wind and big sea, which boat you take?  This one belonga me, or that one belonga your Boss?”

Tom glanced at the boats with the eye of an expert, paused in the exercise of his judgment, and said with emphasis—­“Me take ’em my boat!”

THE TRIAL SCENE

“Boiling Down,” a boy with a not very reputable past, had once stood his trial for a serious offence.  On returning to his free hills, he was wont to describe with rare art the trial scene.

Clearing a patch of ground, he would place one chip to represent the judge—­“big fella master”; a small chip would be His Honour’s associate; twelve chips were the jurymen; three were the lawyers; a big chip between two others was “Boiling Down” with attendant policemen, and many scattered about stood for the audience.

Having arranged his properties, the boy would proceed.

“Big fella master, he bin say—­’Boinin’ Down, you hear me?  You guinty—­you not guinty?’ Me bin say ‘Guinty!’”

At this point “Boiling Down” invariably broke into such paroxsyms of laughter that further utterance was impossible.  Often as he attempted it, his narrative of the proceedings ended in such violent mirth that his hearers could not restrain themselves from joining in.  They were obliged to acknowledge that he looked upon the affair as the funniest incident of his life.