how to put his tiller up and down when his tiller was a wheel, and how
to vary the order according as his skipper stood to windward or to
lee; he learnt to box a compass and to steer by it; to gauge the
leeway he was making by the angle of his wake and the black line in
the compass; above all, he learnt to love the boat like a live thing,
as a man loves his horse, and to want every scanty inch of brass on
her to shine.

But it was not for this that Duncan had come out to sea. He gazed out
at night across the rippling starlit water, and the smacks nestling
upon it, and asked of his God: "Is this all?" And his God answered
him.

The beginning of it was the sudden looming of ships upon the horizon,
very clear, till they looked like carved toys. The skipper got out his
accounts and totted up his catches, and the prices they had fetched
in Billingsgate Market. Then he went on deck and watched the sun set.
There were no cloud-banks in the west, and he shook his head.

"It'll blow a bit from the east before morning," said he, and he
tapped on the barometer. Then he returned to his accounts and added
them up again. After a little he looked up, and saw the first hand
watching him with comprehension.

"Two or three really good hauls would do the trick," suggested Weeks.

The first hand nodded. "If it was my boat I should chance it to-morrow
before the weather blows up."

Weeks drummed his fists on the table and agreed.