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The tide was half out, and they sailed squarely in on the sand, grounding in a row, with the salmon boat in the middle. Immediately Hans, one of French Frank's sailors, was into a skiff and pulling rapidly for the north shore. The big demijohn in the stern-sheets told his errand. They couldn't wait a moment to celebrate the fifty dollars they had so easily earned.
It should be placed on a bracket in the pier. Nor is an old-fashioned silver ladle, nor a chased dinner-castor, nor a fine portly demijohn, nor anything, indeed, that savors of eating and drinking, bad to drive off the spleen. But perhaps the best of all is a shelf of merrily-bound books, containing comedies, farces, songs, and humorous novels.
To say that we all felt happy at seeing the crossing behind us does not half express our feelings. The nervous strain had been terrible, and at no time in our journey had we been so nearly taxed to the utmost. One man dug out a demijohn of brandy from his traps and treated all hands, remarking, "That the success of that undertaking merits something extraordinary."
The interior seen through the open door was fitted up with side shelves, a counter carelessly piled with provisions, groceries, clothing, and hardware with no attempt at display or even ordinary selection and a table, on which stood a demijohn and three or four dirty glasses.
On the table were tumblers, cups, a sugar-basin, a monstrous tin teapot, and a demijohn, which I soon ascertained was half-full of Brazilian rum, or cana. Round the table five men were seated smoking, drinking tea and rum, and talking excitedly, all of them more or less intoxicated.
Fit for the severest toil, weathered to the color of the red man, at home under any roof that harbored a demijohn and a fiddle, these hardy nomads of early commerce were the custodians of the largest amount of traffic in their day.
She kept her eyes still fixed upon the paper, not knowing where else to turn them, for she would not look into her tormentor's face for pity. "Ain't it sad?" said Clara Demijohn. Then there came a deep sigh. "Sad," she said, repeating the word; "sad! Yes, it's sad. I think, if you don't mind, I'll ask you to leave me now. Oh, yes; there's the newspaper."
"Then I could have had decent dinners, been wearing the mate's sou'wester, been " "Cut it out!" snapped Madden. "Will you do your duty or not?" The dock gave a great lurch that flattened both men against the door, juggled Caradoc in his berth and sent kit bag and demijohn sliding toward the visitors. "Not!" bawled Smith.
Strange packages of tapa cloth were carried out; bundles of mats, paddles, guns, a tin of kerosene, a huge stone for an anchor, a water demijohn, more pigs, a baby, and a parrakeet in a bamboo cage. These were all thrown in, and stored with noisy good-humor and a dozen different readjustments. The baby, in turn, was given the bow, the stern, the center, as though nothing would satisfy it.
She rose presently, and, going to the little sideboard, brought out a number of glasses; these she handed to each of the party, and then, producing a demijohn of whiskey, slung it dexterously and gracefully over her arm, so that it rested on her elbow like a cradle, and, going to each one in succession, filled their glasses.
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