"Then you will thank me," said she. "Why, I could eat my dinner off your
deck, captain! Are all merchantmen so clean?"

John Paul smiled.

"Not all, Miss Manners," he said.

"And you are still sailing at the ebb?" I asked.

"In an hour, Richard, if the wind holds good."

With what pride he showed us over his ship, the sailors gaping at the
fine young lady. It had taken him just a day to institute his navy
discipline. And Dolly went about exclaiming, and asking an hundred
questions, and merrily catechising me upon the run of the ropes. All was
order and readiness for dropping down the stream when he led us into his
cabin, where he had a bottle of wine and some refreshments laid out
against my coming.

"Had I presumed to anticipate your visit, Miss Manners, I should have had
something more suitable for a lady," he said. "What, you will not eat,
either, Richard?"

I could not, so downcast had I become at the thought of parting.
I had sat up half the night before with him in restless argument and
indecision, and even when he had left for Rotherhithe, early that
morning, my mind had not been made. My conscience had insisted that I
should sail with John Paul; that I might never see my deaf grandfather on
earth again. I had gone to Arlington Street that morning resolved to say