We arrived at Sheerness the next morning, landed the bricks, which were for the Government buildings, and returned in ballast to the . My first was for the Dominie; but he had not yet returned; and Mr Drummond further informed me that he had been obliged to send away his under-clerk and wished me to simply take his place until he could another. The therefore took in her , and sailed without me, which was of consequence, as my still went on. I now lived with Mr Drummond as one of his own family, and wanted for nothing. His continual kindness to me made me strive all I could to please him by diligence and attention, and I soon became very expert at accounts, and, as he said, very useful. The advantages to me, I hardly need observe were considerable, and I gained information every day. Still, although I was glad to be of any use to Mr Drummond, the at the desk was irksome, and I anxiously looked for the arrival of the new clerk to take my place and leave me free to join the lighter. Mr Drummond did not appear to me to be in any hurry; indeed, I believe that he would have retained me altogether, had he not perceived that I still wished to be on the river.  
“At all events, Jacob, I shall keep you here until you are master of your work; it will be useful to you hereafter,” he said to me one day; “and you do not gain much by sailing up and down the river.”
 
This was true; and I also much advantage from the evenings spent with Mrs Drummond, who was a very sensible good woman, and would make me read aloud to her and little Sarah as they sat at their needle. I had no idea, until I was employed posting up the book, that Mr Drummond’s concern was so extensive, or that there was so much capital employed in the business. The Dominie returned a few days after my arrival. When we met his nose had resumed its former appearance, and he never brought up the subject of the evening on board of the lighter. I saw him frequently, mostly on Sundays after I had been to church with the family; and half-an-hour, at least, was certain to be to our reading together one of the classics.
 
As I was on shore several months, I became acquainted with many families, one or two of which were worth noticing. Among the foremost was Captain Turnbull, at least such was his until within the last two months previous to my making his acquaintance, when Mr Turnbull sent out his cards, George Turnbull, Esquire. The history of Captain Turnbull was as follows:— He had, with his twin brother, been hung up at the knocker, and afterwards had been educated at the Foundling Hospital; they had both been to the sea; grown up thorough-bred, capital, in the Greenland fishery; rose to be mates then captains; had been very successful, owned part, then the whole of the ship, afterwards two or three ships; and had wound up with handsome fortunes. Captain Turnbull was a married man without a family; his wife, fine in person, vulgar in speech, a would-be fashionable lady, against which fashion Captain T had for years pleaded poverty; but his brother, who had remained a bachelor, died, leaving him forty thousand pounds—a fact which could not be . Captain Turnbull had not allowed his wife to be aware of the extent of his own fortune, more from a wish to live quietly and happily than from any of , for he was liberal to excess; but now he had no further excuse to plead, and Mrs Turnbull insisted upon fashion. The house they had lived in was given up, and a on the borders of the Thames to a certain degree met the views of both parties; Mrs Turnbull anticipating dinners and fêtes, and the captain content to watch what was going on in the river, and amuse himself in a wherry. They had long been acquaintances of Mr and Mrs Drummond; and Captain Turnbull’s character was such as always to command the respect of Mr Drummond, as he was an honest, friendly man. Mrs Turnbull had now set up her carriage, and she was, in her own opinion, a very great personage. She would have cut all her former acquaintance; but on that point the captain was , particularly as regarded the Drummonds. As far as they were concerned, Mrs Turnbull gave way, Mrs Drummond being a lady-like woman, and Mr Drummond universally respected as a man of talent and information. Captain, or rather, Mr Turnbull, was a constant visitor at our house, and very partial to me. He used to scold Mr Drummond for keeping me so close to my desk, and would often persuade him to give me a couple of hours’ run. When this was obtained, he would call a waterman, throw him a crown, and tell him to get out of his wherry as fast as he could. We then , and amused ourselves pulling up and down the river, while Mrs Turnbull, dressed in the of the fashion, rode out in the carriage and left her cards in every direction.
 
One day Mr Turnbull called upon the Drummonds, and asked them to dine with him on the following Saturday; they accepted the invitation. “By-the-by,” said he, “I got what my wife calls a remind in my pocket;” and he pulled out of his coat-pocket a large card, “with Mr and Mrs Turnbull’s compliments,” etcetera, which card he had doubled in two by his sitting down upon it, shortly after he came in. Mr Turnbull straightened it again as well as he could, and laid it on the table. “And Jacob,” said he, “you’ll come too. You don’t want a remind; but if you do, my wife will send you one.”
 
I replied, “that I wanted no remind for a good dinner.”
 
“No, I dare say not, my boy; but that you come an hour or two before the dinner-hour, to help me; there’s so much fuss with one thing or another, that I’m left in the ; and as for trusting the keys of the spirit-room to that long-togged of a butler, I’ll see him harpoon’d first; so do you come and help me, Jacob.”
 
This having been promised, he asked Mr Drummond to lend me for an hour or so, as he wished to take a row up the river. This was also consented to; we embarked and pulled away for Kew Bridge. Mr Turnbull was as good a hand at a as old Tom, and many were the adventures he to me of what had taken place during the of his life, more especially when he was employed in the Greenland fishery. He related an accident that morning, which particularly bore upon the marvellous, although I do not believe that he was at all guilty of indulging in a traveller’s licence.
 
“Jacob,” said he, “I recollect once when I was very near eaten alive by foxes, and that in a very singular manner. I was then mate of a Greenland ship. We had been on the fishing ground for three months, and had twelve fish on board. Finding we were doing well, we our ice-anchors upon a very large , drifting up and down with it, and taking fish as we fell in with them. One morning we had just cast loose the carcass of a fish which we had cut up, when the man in the crow’s nest, on the look-out for another ‘fall,’ cried out that a large polar bear and her were swimming over to the iceberg, against the side of which, and about half-a-mile from us, the carcass of a whale was beating. As we had nothing to do, seven of us immediately started in chase we had intended to have gone after the foxes, which had gathered there also in hundreds, to upon the dead whale. It was then quite calm: we soon came up with the bear, who at first was for making off; but as the cub could not get on over the rough ice as well as the old one, she at last turned round to bay. We shot the cub to make sure of her, and it did make sure of the dam not leaving us till either she or we perished in the conflict. I never shall forget her moaning over the cub, as it lay b............