"Oh," he answered, turning again to contemplate the starlit sky, "jus' a
little psa'm from my Bible."
I left him to read on, myself engaged with a perusal of the serene and
comforting text-book of philosophy spread overhead. The night was
favorably inclined and radiant: a soft southerly wind blowing without
menace, a sky of infinite depth and tender shadow, the sea asleep under
the moon. With a gentle, aimlessly wandering wind astern--an idle,
dawdling, contemptuous breeze, following the old craft lazily, now and
again whipping her nose under water to remind her of suspended
strength--the trader _Good Samaritan_ ran on, wing and wing, through the
moonlight, bound across from Sinners' Tickle to Afterward Bight, there
to deal for the first of the catch.
"Them little stars jus' _will_ wink!" Tumm complained.