Page:Barbour--For the freedom from the seas.djvu/194

 shining and they could see far out onto the channel southward and even locate Cork by the haze of smoke that lay in the northwest. Toward two o'clock they reached the town again and set out in search of dinner. They found it at last, but the least said of it the better. The only point in its favor that Nelson could think of was its price, and that was so ridiculous that he felt as though he had cheated the proprietor of the little water-front hotel.

They wrote letters that afternoon in the Y. M. C. A. hut, disputing a table with so many others that elbows knocked together. Nelson's brief epistle to his uncle was soon finished and then he wrote a longer letter to his relations in Boston and, finally, a shorter one to Billy Masters, After that he looked through a two-months-old American magazine and waited for Martin to finish "pouring his heart out." The expression is Nelson's. Perhaps he was a little bit envious. Having someone to write to, someone who really cared to hear from a chap, was pretty nice! Neither found letters from home, a fact which disturbed Martin more than it did his companion. Nelson pointed out, however, that American mail hadn't had time to reach Queenstown yet, and Martin felt better. They joined forces with nearly a dozen members 169