"Bertha Millner" was in the latitude of Point Conception, he and
three Chinamen, under Kitchell's directions, ratlined down the
forerigging and affixed the crow's nest upon the for'mast. The
next morning, during Charlie's watch on deck, a Chinaman was sent
up into the crow's nest, and from that time on there was always a
lookout maintained from the masthead.

More than once Wilbur looked around him at the empty coruscating
indigo of the ocean floor, wondering at the necessity of the
lookout, and finally expressed his curiosity to Kitchell. The
Captain had now taken not a little to Wilbur; at first for the
sake of a white man's company, and afterward because he began to
place a certain vague reliance upon Wilbur's judgment. Kitchell
had reemarked as how he had brains.

"Well, you see, son," Kitchell had explained to Wilbur, "os-
tensiblee we are after shark-liver oil--and so we are; but also we
are on any lay that turns up; ready for any game, from wrecking to
barratry. Strike me, if I haven't thought of scuttling the dough-
dish for her insoorance. There's regular trade, son, to be done
in ships, and then there's pickin's an' pickin's an' pickin's.
Lord, the ocean's rich with pickin's. Do you know there's
millions made out of the day-bree and refuse of a big city? How
about an ocean's day-bree, just chew on that notion a turn; an' as
fur a lookout, lemmee tell you, son, cast your eye out yon," and
he swept the sea with a forearm; "nothin', hey, so it looks, but
lemmee tell you, son, there ain't no manner of place on the ball
of dirt where you're likely to run up afoul of so many things--
unexpected things--as at sea. When you're clear o' land lay to
this here pree-cep', 'A million to one on the unexpected.'"