the harbour, “My old hen can see me now,” said Mr. Black, in the tones, if not perhaps the usual terms, of sincere affection.
“See that sheet waving out at that window there?” said Mr. Anstruther. “My mother never misses our coming in.”
“Steak and eggs for tea to-night, Tim,” stipulated Phil.
“Steak an’ eggs! Vot nonsense is zat?” growled Fritz. “Zozzages . . . big!” And Tim beamed upon them both, for he had had news at the port before that his little sick son was better. It was only the passenger who made a little private moan to herself, as we made fast to the wharf, and the jolliest holiday she had ever had in her life was over. She was but little consoled, although certainly much cheered for the moment, by the discovery among her possessions, that first night ashore, of a damp parcel insinuated somehow among them, and labelled, “A keepsake from the Tikirau,” in Mr. Anstruther’s hand. It contained a large slab of duff.
Alas, the Tikirau, beautiful and beloved! Facing so willingly all the chances of the sea, she was not spared their last extreme of tragedy. A little while ago, from the deck of a bigger but not a better vessel, bound on the same trip, Captain Fletcher pointed out to me, upon the beach near one of the little ports we had touched at that bright summer, a white, lopsided object. It looked like the hull of a boat, or part of it, turned upside down. “There,” said he, “that’s all that’s left of the Tikirau,” and neither of us said much more. Carrying, as at least I might be thankful to learn, none of her old crew,
