2/29 Not alone was his capital depleted by the amount of her value, but her earnings were no longer to be reckoned on, and it was her earnings that largely paid the running expenses of the plantation. "I'm glad you didn't live to see it, old man. What a cropper, what a cropper!" Between squalls the _Flibberty-Gibbet_ ran in to anchorage, and her skipper, Pete Oleson (brother to the Oleson of the _Jessie_), ancient, grizzled, wild-eyed, emaciated by fever, dragged his weary frame up the veranda steps and collapsed in a steamer-chair. Whisky and soda kept him going while he made report and turned in his accounts. "Why don't you run down to Sydney for a blow of decent climate ?" The old skipper shook his head. |