FullReads

“That’s my business. Will it do if you find ’em after harvest?”

“To be sure ’twill. I only want to know where they be.”

“Very well, then; after harvest they’ll be found.”

Home the farmer went. Sure enough, after harvest, he went to unwind Tommy’s two big bundles of straw-rope for thatching the mow, and in the middle of each was one of his missing pack-saddles.

“Well, now,” said Joby’s wife, “that fellow must have a real gift of conjurin’! I wonder, my dear, you don’t go and consult him about that there cross-eye of yours.”

“I will, then,” said Joby; and he walked over to Penryn again the very next market-day.

“‘Cure your eyes,’ is it?” said Tommy Warne. “Why, to be sure I can. Why didn’t you ax me afore? I thought you liked squintin’.”

“I don’t, then; I hate it.”

“Very well; you shall see straight this very night if you do what I tell you. Go home and tell your wife to make your bed on the roof of the four-poster; and she must make it widdershins, turnin’ bed-tie and all against the sun, and puttin’ the pillow where the feet come as a rule. That’s all.”

“Fancy my never thinkin’ of anything so simple as that!” said Joby. He went home and told his wife. She made his bed on the roof of the four-poster, and widdershins, as he ordered; and they slept that night, the wife as usual, and Joby up close to the rafters.

But scarcely had Joby closed an eye before there came a rousing knock at the door, and in walked Joby’s eldest brother, the sea-captain, that he hadn’t seen for years.

“Get up, Joby, and come along with me if you want that eye of yours mended.”

“Thank you, Sam, it’s curin’ very easy and nice, and I hope you won’t disturb me.”

“If ’tis Tommy Warne’s cure you’re trying, why then I’m part of it; so you’d best get up quickly.”

“Aw, that’s another matter, though you might have said so at first. I’d no notion you and Tommy was hand-‘n-glove.”

Joby rose up and followed his brother out of doors. He had nothing on but his night-shirt, but his brother seemed in a hurry, and he didn’t like to object.

They set their faces to the road and they walked and walked, neither saying a word, till they came to Penryn. There was a fair going on in the town; swing-boats and shooting-galleries and lillybanger standings, and naphtha lamps flaming, and in the middle of all, a great whirly-go-round, with striped horses and boats, and a steam-organ playing “Yankee Doodle.” As soon as they started Joby saw that the whole thing was going around widdershins; and his brother stood up under the naphtha-lamp and pulled out a sextant and began to take observations.

“What’s the latitude?” asked Joby. He felt that he ought to say something to his brother, after being parted all these years.

“Decimal nothing to speak of,” answered Sam.

“Then we ought to be nearing the Line,” said Joby. He hadn’t noticed the change, but now he saw that the boat they sat in was floating on the sea, and that Sam had stuck his walking-stick out over the stern and was steering.

“What’s the longitude?” asked Joby.

“That doesn’t concern us.”

“‘Tis west o’ Grinnidge, I suppose?” Joby knew very little about navigation, and wanted to make the most of it.

“West o’ Penryn,” said Sam, very sharp and short. “‘Twasn’ Grinnidge Fair we started from.”

But presently he sings out “Here we are!” and Joby saw a white line, like a popping-crease, painted across the blue sea ahead of them. First he thought ’twas paint, and then he thought ’twas catgut, for when the keel of their boat scraped over it, it sang like a bird.

“That was the Equator,” said Sam. “Now let’s see if your eyes be any better.”

But when Joby tried them, what was his disappointment to find the cast as bad as ever?–only now they were slewing right the other way, towards the South Pole.