This is a business, you must know, at which we do a good deal at Stunin'tun, and at which we are commonly thought to be handy," "Put your questions, Captain Poke; I hope the answers will be satisfactory." "Your name ?" "John Goldencalf--by the favor of his majesty, Sir John Goldencalf, Baronet." "Sir John Goldencalf--by the favor of his majesty, a baronet! Is baronet a calling?
or what sort of a crittur or thing is it ?" "It is my rank in the kingdom to which I belong." "I begin to understand what you mean.

Among your nation mankind is what we call stationed, like a ship's people that are called to go about; you have a certain berth in that kingdom of yours, much as I should have in a sealing schooner." "Exactly so; and I presume you will allow that order, and propriety, and safety result from this method among mariners ?" "No doubt--no doubt, we station anew, however, each v'yage, according to experience; I'm not so sure that it would do to take even the cook from father to son, or we might have a pretty mess of it." Here the sealer commenced a series of questions, which he put with a vigor and perseverance that I fear left me without a single fact of my life unrevealed, except those connected with the sacred sentiment that bound me to Anna, and which were far too hallowed to escape me even under the ordeal of a Stunin'tun inquisitor.

In short, finding that I was nearly helpless in such hands, I made a merit of necessity, and yielded up my secrets as wood in a vice discharges its moisture.

It was scarcely possible that a mind like mine, subjected to the action of such a pair of moral screws, should not yield some hints touching its besetting propensities.

The Captain seized this clew, and he went at the theory like a bulldog at the muzzle of an ox.
To oblige him, therefore, I entered at some length into an explanation of my system.