By The Sea | Page 7

some one upon the weather.
All this time he will be going; through various evolutions, swinging in the hammock, sitting on the fence, opening his bucket to show you what he has to eat, closing the bucket and sitting down upon the cover, or turning somersaults upon the grass. Then he will encamp under an apple-tree to wait until his grandfather appears, enlivening the time by a score of minute excursions after hens and cats. Then he will go into the house again, and rock while the old man finishes his coffee, sure of a greeting, confident in a sense of entire good-fellowship, until the meal is finished, and James Parsons is ready to take his coat and a red-bladed oar, and set out. Then the boy is like a setter off for a walk,--all sorts of whimsical expressions in his face, of absolute delight; every form of extravagance in his bearing. The only trouble is, one has to laugh too much; but with all this, something so manly, so companionable.
He is no little of a philosopher in his way. He has been a great deal with older people, and has caught the habit of discussion of affairs, or rather, perhaps, of unconsciously reflecting forth discussions which he has heard. He has an infinite curiosity upon all matters of human life. He likes, within limits, to discuss character.
In the boat his chief delights are to talk, to eat cookies, and to steer. When it is not blowing too hard for him to stand at the tiller, he will steer for an hour together, watching with the most constant care the trembling of the leach.
It makes no difference to him at what hour he returns,--from oystering or from the cranberry-bog. If it is in the middle of the afternoon, good and well. Instantly upon landing he will collect a troop of urchins; in an incredibly short space of time there will be a heap of little clothes upon the bank; in a moment a procession of small naked figures will go running down to the wharf, diving, one after the other. If distance or tide or a calm keeps him out late, so much the better. In that case there is the romance of coasting along the shore by night; of counting and distinguishing the lights; of guessing the nearness to land from the dull roar of the sea breaking on the beach. "Don't you think," he will sometimes say, "that we are nearer shore than we think we are?"
It is amusing sometimes, on a distant voyage of fifteen or twenty miles, after seed oysters, when a landing is made at some little port, to see him drop the mariner at once and become a child, with a burning desire to find a shop where he can buy animal-crackers. Finding such a place,--and usually it is not difficult,--he will lay in a supply of lions and tigers, and then go marching about with great delight, with mockery in his eyes, keenly appreciating the satire involved in eating the head off a cooky lion, incapable of resistance.
No picture of Joe would be complete which left out his dog. Kit was a black, fine-haired creature, smaller than a collie, but of much the same gentle disposition,--a present from Captain Pelham. When Kit was first presented to the boy he domesticated himself at once, and in a week it was impossible to tell, from his relations with the household, which was boy and which was dog. They were both boys and they were both dogs. Kit had an unqualified sense of being at home, and of being beloved and indispensable. It was long before he became a sailor. When, at the outset, it was attempted to make a man of him by taking him when they went out to fish, the failure seemed to be complete. He was a little sea-sick. Then he was sad, and sighed and groaned as dogs never do on shore. He would not lie still, but was nervous and feverish. Once he leaped out of the boat and made for shore, and had to be pursued and rescued, exhausted and half-drowned. Still, whenever he had to be left at home, it was a struggle every time to reconcile him and leave him. Once he pursued a boat which he mistook for James's along the shore of the bay, half down to Benson's Narrows, got involved in the creeks which the tide was beginning to fill, and had to be brought ingloriously home by a farmer, made fast on the top of a load of sweet, salt hay.
He would tease like a child to be allowed to go. He would listen with an unsatisfied and appealing look while Joe, with an exuberant but regretful air, explained to him in detail the