'Bless me, Mus' Dan, I've been asleep,' he said. 'An' I've
dreamed a dream which has made me laugh - laugh as I ain't
laughed in a long day. I can't remember what 'twas all about, but
they do say that when old men take to laughin' in their sleep,
they're middlin' ripe for the next world. Have you been workin'
honest, Mus' Dan?'

'Ra-ather,' said Dan, unclamping the schooner from the vice.
'And look how I've cut myself with the small gouge.'

'Ye-es. You want a lump o' cobwebs to that,' said Mr
Springett. 'Oh, I see you've put it on already. That's right, Mus'
Dan.'



King Henry VII and the Shipwrights

Harry our King in England from London town is gone,
And comen to Hamull on the Hoke in the countie of Suthampton.
For there lay the MARY OF THE TOWER, his ship of war so strong,
And he would discover, certaynely, if his shipwrights did him wrong.

He told not none of his setting forth, nor yet where he would go
(But only my Lord of Arundel), and meanly did he show,
In an old jerkin and patched hose that no man might him mark;
With his frieze hood and cloak about, he looked like any clerk.
He was at Hamull on the Hoke about the hour of the tide,
And saw the MARY haled into dock, the winter to abide,
With all her tackle and habiliments which are the King his own;