replied that I intended leaving for London by the afternoon train,
and thought of going up for examination to get my master's
certificate. I had just enough service for that. He commended me
for not wasting my time, with such an evident interest in my case
that I was quite surprised; then, rising from his chair, he said:

"Have you a ship in view after you have passed?"

I answered that I had nothing whatever in view.

He shook hands with me, and pronounced the memorable words:

"If you happen to be in want of employment, remember that as long
as I have a ship you have a ship, too."

In the way of compliment there is nothing to beat this from a
ship's captain to his second mate at the end of a voyage, when the
work is over and the subordinate is done with. And there is a
pathos in that memory, for the poor fellow never went to sea again
after all. He was already ailing when we passed St. Helena; was
laid up for a time when we were off the Western Islands, but got
out of bed to make his Landfall. He managed to keep up on deck as
far as the Downs, where, giving his orders in an exhausted voice,
he anchored for a few hours to send a wire to his wife and take
aboard a North Sea pilot to help him sail the ship up the east
coast. He had not felt equal to the task by himself, for it is the
sort of thing that keeps a deep-water man on his feet pretty well
night and day.

When we arrived in Dundee, Mrs. B- was already there, waiting to