CHAPTER V.

TITE TOODLEBURG AND A MODERN REFORMER.


Young Tite Toodleburg has grown up to be a boy of sixteen. A bright,
handsome fellow he is, every inch a sailor, and full of the spirit of
adventure. There is something more than Dutch blood in Tite, and it
begins to show itself. His figure is erect and slender, his hair soft
and flaxen, and his blue eyes and fresh, smiling face, almost girlish in
its expression, gave to his regular features a softness almost feminine.
And yet there was something manly, resolute, and even daring in his
actions. There was no such thing as fear in his nature. He had acquired
such a knowledge of seamanship that he could handle the good sloop
Heinrich quite as skilfully as the skipper, and, indeed, make the voyage
to New York as promptly as the greatest navigator on the Tappan Zee. He
was expert, too, at taking in and delivering out cargo, could keep the
sloop's account, and drive as good a trade as any of them with the
merchants in Fly Market. In this way Tite made a host of friends, who
began to look forward to the time when he would have a sloop of his own,
and be in a way to do friendly acts for them, perhaps to make a fortune
for himself.

Tite thought very differently. Navigating the river in a sloop, to be
passed by one of Mr. Fulton's steamboats, was not the sort of sea-faring
that suited his ambition. He had seen big ships come home, after long