--Rafe, lad, mubbe 'ee 'd ruther go down
cove-ways, an' overhaul the punt a bit."
Ralph, who perhaps had stood waiting for the very dismissal that he
now got, assented and left us three. Prudence, to be sure, looked after
him as if she would a good deal rather go with him than stay; but she
stayed, nevertheless, and worked at the seine. I interpreted to myself
Skipper Benjie's sending away of one of his hearers by supposing that
his son-in-law had often heard his tales; but the planter explained
himself:--
"'Ee sees, Sir, I knocked off goun to th' Ice becase 't was sech a
tarrible cruel place, to my seemun. They swiles[3] be so knowun
like,--as knowun as a dog, in a manner, an' lovun to their own, like
Christens, a'most, more than bastes; an' they'm got red blood, for all
they lives most-partly in water; an' then I found 'em so friendly, when
I was wantun friends badly. But I s'pose the swile-fishery's needful;
an' I knows, in course, that even Christens' blood's got to be taken
sometimes, when it's bad blood, an' I would n' be childish about they
things: on'y--ef it's me--when I can live by fishun, I don' want to
go an' club an' shoot an' cut an' slash among poor harmless things that
'ould never harm man or 'oman, an' 'ould cry great tears down for
pity-sake, an' got a sound like a Christen: I 'ould n' like to go
a-swilun for gain,--not after beun among 'em, way I was, anyways.
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