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Williams was evidently very much pleased at the prospect of getting out to sea again, for as he passed Sibylla he raised his hat with more grace than could have been expected of him and wished her "good-morning!" a salutation which the young lady silently acknowledged with one of her most stately bows. Presently the cry came from Rogers: "Anchor's aweigh, sir."
"Well, it's to be hoped the girl was worth risking your neck for. However, as you did not find her after all, you deserve to get off, to look for her in a more likely place." Then turning to the seaman he said: "Off with the irons, Gillions, and put the youngster ashore when the anchor's down." "Ay, ay, sir!" said Gillions.
It may be good holdin' ground, but what o' that? the anchor's an old 'un, or too small; the fluke gives way, and ye're adrift; or the cable's too small, and can't stand the strain, so you let go both anchors, an' ye'd let go a dozen more if ye had 'em for dear life; but it's o' no use.
There are only two passengers besides ourselves, a Mr and Mrs S. With the master and mate we make six at dinner, and the concert after, in which the first mate plays piano accompaniments to all the chanties we can scrape together "Stormy Long," "Run, let the Bulgine Run," "Away Rio:" cheerful chanties like "The Anchor's Weighed," with its "Fare ye well, Polly, and farewell Sue," and sad, sad songs of ocean's distress, like "Leave her, Johnnie; Its time to leave her."
"Anchor's in sight, sir, and a clear anchor, too!" was the next cry from the forecastle that went from hand to hand aft, causing `The Girl I Left Behind Me' to come out stronger than previously and the tramping feet to hasten their measured tread; and, in another minute or so, the ring of the anchor was chock up to the hawse pipe at the bows, and the boatswain piped "Belay!"
"Yes, of course, there they are, exemplifying the attraction of gravitation or some other long-winded theory of your scientific gentlemen," replied the skipper, who seemed to have got science on the brain this morning, being violently antagonistic to it, somehow or other. "Ah, Fosset, see, our anchor's come home without weighing.
More clink-clanking ensued from the windlass; and, then, as the vessel's head slewed round with the tide, showing that she was released from the ground, Mr Saunders shouted, "Anchor's now in sight, sir!"
But here, to our surprise, the noise of an anchor's cable rattling and racing away grated on our ears. "She's dropping anchor till the morning," said Monty. "All right, then we'll sit down." We placed hammock-chairs on a lonely part of the boat-deck. I reclined on the right of Monty, and Doe took his chair and placed it on his left.
"I've wanted money," he wrote, "ever since I was a little chap sitting in the fields among the cows.... I want it for you now, and I mean to have it. I've studied the thing two years; I know what I know.... "The moment this is in the post I leave for London. There are a hundred things to look after still; I can't trust myself within reach of you again till the anchor's weighed.
Here's poor Rory come to see you before you die, and receive your blessing. What, man! Don't despair you have been a great sinner, 'tis true. What then? There's a righteous judge above ain't there? Yes, yes, he's agoing He minds me no more than a porpoise, the land crabs will have him, I see that his anchor's apeak, i'faith."