Blow the Man Down - A Romance of the Coast

O Nancy Dawson, hi--o!

Cheer'ly man! She's got a notion, hi--o!

Cheer'ly manl For our old bo'sun, hi--o!

Cheer'ly man! O hauley hi--o!

Cheer'ly man!

--Hauling Song.

Boyd Mayo soon found that his ancestors had put no scrub timber into the

Polly. The old oak rib was tough as well as bulky. The task of sawing

with merely the tip of the blade in play required both muscle and

patience, and the position he was obliged to assume added to his

difficulties. He rested after he had sawed the rib in four places, and

decided to give Oakum Otie something to do; the mate had been begging

for an opportunity to grab in. He was ordered to knock away as much as

he could of the sawed section with hammer and chisel. Mayo figured that

when this section of rib had been removed it would leave room for a hole

through the bottom planks at least two feet square--and there were no

swelling girths in their party.

The mate had strength, and he was eager to display that helpful spirit

of which he had boasted. He went at the beam with all his might.

Mayo's attention had been centered on his task; now, with a moment's

leisure in which to note other matters, he was conscious of something

which provoked his apprehension; the air under the hull of the schooner

was becoming vitiated. His temples throbbed and his ears rang.

"Ain't it getting pretty stuffy in here?" asked the master, putting

words to Mayo's thoughts.

"I have been feeling like a bug under a thimble for some little time,"

stated Otie, whacking his chisel sturdily.

"Her bottom can't be awash with all this lumber in her. If we can only

get a little speck of a hole through the outside planking right now,

we'd better do it," suggested Candage.

"That's just what I have been doing," declared Mr. Speed. "I'm right

after the job, gents, when I get started on a thing. Helpful and

enterprising, that's my motto!"

The next moment, before Mayo, his thoughts busy with his new danger of

suffocation, could voice warning or had grasped the full import of the

dialogue, the chisel's edge plugged through the planking. Instantly

there was a hiss like escaping steam. Mayo yelled an oath and set his

hands against the mate, pushing him violently away. The industrious Mr.

Speed had been devoting his attention to the planking instead of to the

sawed beam.

Wan light filtered through the crevice made by the chisel and Mayo

planted his palm against the crack. The pressure held his hand as if it

were clamped against the planks, and the hissing ceased.