Joe was mate
of the Esperanza, and he was a very promising chap. He knew his way
about the North Sea blindfold, and all he didn't know about his trade
wasn't worth knowing. If you had asked him who Mr. Gladstone was he
would probably have said, "I've heerd on him," but he could not have
told you anything about Mr. Gladstone or any other statesman. So far as
the world ashore went, Joe was as ignorant as a five-year-old child, and
you would have laughed till you cried had you seen his delight when the
pictures in a nursery-book were explained to him. It is hardly possible
to imagine the existence of a grown man who is ignorant of things that
are known to a child in the infant school; but there are many such
knocking about at sea. What can you expect? They live amid the moaning
desolation of that sad sea all the year round; they never used to have
any schooling, and their world even now is limited by the blank horizon,
with the rail of their boat for inner barrier. Glenn could very nearly
read Moore's Almanac, and, as that great work was the only literature on
board, he often interpreted it, and he was counted a great scholar.
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