A few hours after landing, this man had made a bargain with a middle-aged widow, in very humble circumstances, and who dwelt quite near to the residence of Deacon Pratt, to receive him as a temporary inmate; or, until he could get a “chance across to the Vineyard.”  At first, Daggett kept about, and was much in the open air.  While able to walk, he met the deacon, and singular, nay, unaccountable as it seemed to the niece, the uncle soon contracted a species of friendship for, not to say intimacy with, this stranger.  In the first place, the deacon was a little particular in not having intimates among the necessitous, and the Widow White soon let it be known that her guest had not even a “red cent.”  He had chattels, however, that were of some estimation among seamen; and Roswell Gardiner, or “Gar’ner,” as he was called, the young seaman par excellence of the Point, one who had been not only a whaling, but who had also been a sealing, and who at that moment was on board the deacon’s schooner, in the capacity of master, had been applied to for advice and assistance.  By the agency of Mr. Gar’ner, as the young mate was then termed, sundry palms, sets of sail-needles, a fid or two, and various other similar articles, that obviously could no longer be of any use to Daggett, were sent across to the ‘Harbour,’ and disposed of there, to advantage, among the many seamen of the port.  By these means the stranger was, for a few weeks, enabled to pay his way, the board he got being both poor and cheap.

A much better result attended this intercourse with Gardiner, than that of raising the worn-out seaman’s immediate ways and means.  Between Mary Pratt and Roswell Gardiner there existed an intimacy of long standing for their years, as well as of some peculiar features, to which there will be occasion to advert hereafter.  Mary was the very soul of charity in all its significations, and this Gardiner knew.  When, therefore, Daggett became really necessitous, in the way of comforts that even money could not command beneath the roof of the Widow White, the young man let the fact be known to the deacon’s niece, who immediately provided sundry delicacies that were acceptable to the palate of even disease.  As for her uncle, nothing was at first said to him on the subject.  Although his intimacy with Daggett went on increasing, and they were daily more and more together, in long and secret conference, not a suggestion was ever made by the deacon in the way of contributing to his new friend’s comforts.  To own the truth, to give was the last idea that ever occurred to this man’s thoughts.