There was no gas in those days, and the Captain read by the aid of a small block-tin lamp, which he held in one hand.

I observed that he had a habit of dropping off into a doze every three or four minutes, and I forgot my homesickness at intervals in watching him.

Two or three times, to my vast amusement, he scorched the edges of the newspaper with the wick of the lamp; and at about half past eight o'clock I had the satisfactions--I am sorry to confess it was a satisfaction--of seeing the Rivermouth Barnacle in flames.
My grandfather leisurely extinguished the fire with his hands, and Miss Abigail, who sat near a low table, knitting by the light of an astral lamp, did not even look up.

She was quite used to this catastrophe.
There was little or no conversation during the evening.

In fact, I do not remember that anyone spoke at all, excepting once, when the Captain remarked, in a meditative manner, that my parents "must have reached New York by this time"; at which supposition I nearly strangled myself in attempting to intercept a sob.
The monotonous "click click" of Miss Abigail's needles made me nervous after a while, and finally drove me out of the sitting-room into the kitchen, where Kitty caused me to laugh by saying Miss Abigail thought that what I needed was "a good dose of hot-drops," a remedy she was forever ready to administer in all emergencies.