kettles and goats!" "Turn the seven twins into a cathedral, will they?
The devil will turn them into porpoises first!" "Where is the hamari
now--where? By St. Michael, the father of fishermen, he is finding what
it is to have more noumiae than brains! Ha, ha, ha!"

Nevertheless the coolest of the thirty-five men then scudding the
slippery waterway was the hamari--he had started the coolest--he was the
coolest now.

For a half mile he allowed his crew to do their best, and with them he
had done his best. The effort sufficed to carry them to the front, where
he next satisfied himself they could stay, if they had the endurance. He
called to them:

"Well done, comrades! The prize and the money are yours! But ease up a
little. Let them pass. We will catch them again at the turn. Keep your
eyes on me."

Insensibly he lessened the dip and reach of his oars; at last, as the
thousands on the Therapian shore would have had it, the Gypsy racer was
the hinderling of the pack. Afterwards there were but trifling changes
of position until the terminal galley was reached.

By a rule of the race, the contestants were required to turn the galley,
keeping it on the right; and it was a great advantage to be a clear
first there, since the fortunate party could then make the round
unhindered and in the least space. The struggle for the point began
quite a quarter of a mile away. Each crew applied itself to quickening
the speed--every oar dipped deeper, and swept a wider span;--on a
little, and the keepers of the galley could hear the half groan, half