The captain paused again to choke and wheeze.
"Well, in a day or two there come a high tide, an' they got whale-boats, an' hawsers, an' some fellers on the island, an' they got her off all right,--she wa'n't no ways hurt in the sand, an' they went on their way rej'icin',--'cept Melvin Bailey, who had had a hunderd an' forty dollars of his forked out to the fellers with the whale-boats. However, he didn't know nothin' 'bout this till months arterwards. Silas set out ag'in, he was bound for Fayal,--d'yer know where Fayal is?"
We were silent, till at last I suggested:
"It's in Spain, I mean Portugal, isn't it?"
"Now look at that! I betcher when I was your age there wa'n't any boy in _this_ town that didn't know Fayal. It's one o' the Azores, an' some ways this side of Spain or Portugal either. Well, Silas was bound for Fayal, but he had the most terrible luck you ever see. Fust, he run into a gale and got drove way south of the Capes. When he wrote back to Melvin Bailey 'bout this gale he said that the seas run tremenjus high, an' that the ship was put into great jeopardy. Well, Melvin wa'n't what yer call a very edjicated man, an' he got down his atlas an'--hee, hee, hee! an' tried to find Great Jeopardy! Hee, hee, hee!"
I thought I was not appreciating the joke to its utmost, so I inquired politely:
"It ain't nowhere, son. That's just the pint of the hull thing,--there ain't no such place! 'Jeopardy' means _danger_, an' all Silas meant was that, owin' to the gale, the ship was put into danger,--hee, hee, hee! I s'pose Melvin thought 'twas one of them islands like the Lesser Antilles, or some of _them_."
This time Ed Mason and I could join in Captain Bannister's mirth. The captain, still chuckling, led the way across the yard and sat down on the stone doorstep, warm in the noon sunshine. Ed and I perched on a grass banking beside him to hear the further adventures of Silas Winkley.
"Well, Silas he kep' havin' bad luck. His fust mate, Andy Spauldin', was took down sick pretty soon with yaller janders, an' that left Silas an' my father to navigate the ship. It was my father's fust v'yge as an officer, an' I guess he wa'n't no great shakes navigatin',--though he was most as good as Silas was, at that."