elastic bread with each, and there were platters of hard-tack set
along the board, which every one helped himself from freely, and
broke into his broth.

"Morning, Jimmy," said the mate, as the man brought him and Lemuel
their portions. "I hate to have the dining-room chairs off a
paintin' when there's so much style about everything else, and I've
got a visitor with me. But I tell him he'll have to take us as he
finds us, and stand it this mornin'." He wasted no more words on his
joke, but plunging his large tin spoon into his bowl, kept his
breath to cool his broth, blowing upon it with easy grace, and
swallowing it at a tremendous rate, though Lemuel, after following
his example, still found it so hot that it brought the tears into
his eyes. It was delicious, and he was ravenous from his twenty-four
hours' fast, but his companion was scraping the bottom of his bowl
before Lemuel had got half-way down, and he finished his second as
Lemuel finished his first.

"Just oncet more for both of us, Jimmy," he said, pushing his bowl
across the board; and when the man brought them back he said, "Now,
I'm goin' to take it easy and enjoy myself. I can't never seem to
get the good of it, till about the third or fourth bowl. Too much of
a hurry."

"Do they give you four bowls?" gasped Lemuel in astonishment.

"They give you four barrels, if you can hold it," replied the other
proudly; "and some the mates _can_, pretty near. They got an
awful tank, as a general rule, the pards has. There ain't anything
mean about this house. They don't scamp the broth, and they don't