Loading the Wagon. 105 



work than walking, sips at the ' pots ' handed to the 

 captain by his mates, and nothing to think about. 

 Nor was there ever a more popular song in the 

 country than 



We'll jump into the wagon, 



And we '11 all take a ride ! 



Though in winter, when the horses' shoes have to 

 be roughed for the frost, or, worse, when the wheels 

 sink deep into the spongy turf, and rain and sleet 

 and snow make the decks slippery, it is not quite so 

 jolly. Yet even then, so strong is the love of mo- 

 tion, a run with the wagon is preferred to stationary 

 work. 



The captain, when bound on a voyage, generally 

 slips his cable or weighs anchor with the rising sun. 

 His crew are first-rate helmsmen ; and to see them 

 sweep into the rickyard through the narrow gateway, 

 with a heavy deck cargo piled to the skies, all sail 

 set, a stiff breeze, and the timbers creaking, is a 

 glorious sight ! Not a scrape against the jetty, 

 though ' touch and go ' is the sign of a good pilot. 

 His greatest trouble is when his cargo shifts out of 

 sight of land : sometimes the vessel turns on her 

 beam-ends with a too ponderous and ill-built load 

 of straw, and then the wreck lies right in the fairway 

 of all the ships coming up the channel. To load a 

 wagon successfully is indeed a work of art : on the 

 hills where the wagons have to run ' sidelong ' to 

 pick up the crops, one side higher than the other, 

 no one but an experienced hand can make the stuff 

 stay on. Then there is often a tremendous bumping 

 and scraping of the keel on the rocks of the newly- 

 mended roads, and the nasty chopping seas of the 



