Page:Cornelia Meigs--The Pool of Stars.djvu/115

 ends of the world and back again. And I will have you for executive officer, Jonathan."

"No," Jonathan would return seriously, "I get sick when I go to sea and I don't like hardtack and salt pork. No, I will stop at home in my father's yards and some day I will build a ship that is a real ship and not just tubs like these."

They parted when they were seventeen and did not meet again for years, for Humphrey went into the Navy as he had planned and Jonathan, with mallet and chisel in hand and with that sober, earnest air that always clung to him, was already at work in his father's shipyard. In time he became master of the entire business, while Humphrey was scouring the seas, sailing on just those far voyages of which he had so often dreamed. Jonathan had his dreams also, but he did not speak of them, only toiled away at building the heavy, sturdy vessels that carried America's trade overseas early in the last century. Honest ships they were and reliable, as sure of coming to port as though they had belonged to the age of steam, but oh, how long it took them to make a voyage! In the privacy of his dingy little office Jonathan, with the door fastened, would push aside the clutter of plans and drawings and would get out the model of a strange vessel, sharp, slender and graceful, with a hull like a racing yacht. He would set it upon the bench to carve a little here,