But it did not impair his usefulness, and his
Captain could see indications of a better defined point in his
ambitions.
So that was the way things were with him when, on a gray December
afternoon, the day before Christmas, the _Hydrographer_, just arrived
from Providence, slid against her pier in Jersey City, and the crew
with jocular shouts made the hawsers fast to the bitts. Some months
before, the _Hydrographer_ had stumbled across a lumber-laden schooner,
abandoned in good condition off Fire Island, and had towed her into
port. The courts had awarded goodly salvage; and the tug's owners,
filled with the spirit of the season, had sent a man to the pier to
announce that at the office each of the crew would find his share of
the bounty, and a little extra, in recognition of work in the company's
interest.
"Dan," said the Captain, as the young man entered the pilot-house in
his well-fitting shore clothes, "you ought to get a pot of money out of
this; now don't go ashore and spend it all tonight. You bank most of
it. Take it from me--if I'd started to bank my money at your age, I
would be paying men to run tugboats for me now."
"Oh, I've money in the bank," laughed Dan. "I'll bank most of this;
but first I'm going to lay out just fifty dollars, which ought to buy
about all the Christmas joy I need.
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