This was their criticism on his exquisite sensibility.
To the white men in the waterside business and to the captains of ships he was just Jim--nothing more.

He had, of course, another name, but he was anxious that it should not be pronounced.

His incognito, which had as many holes as a sieve, was not meant to hide a personality but a fact.

When the fact broke through the incognito he would leave suddenly the seaport where he happened to be at the time and go to another--generally farther east.

He kept to seaports because he was a seaman in exile from the sea, and had Ability in the abstract, which is good for no other work but that of a water-clerk.