“I’m afraid you’re thinking more of the fun you are going to have than the real reason for this voyage, Bob.  It is a punishment for your prank on the minister.”

“I know it, but, mom, I can’t seem to feel that way about it.”

“And I don’t know as I blame you, Bob, though of course it was very wrong to put glue on the reverend gentleman’s chair.”

Bob felt he must tell the news of his prospective voyage to his chums.  Leaving his mother to sort out his clothes, he went out in the street.  It was Saturday and there was no school.  In fact, the term would close in another week, so Bob would miss little instruction by taking the cruise.

The first lad Bob met was Ted Neefus.  His chum hurried up to him and Inquired: 

“Did he hurt you very much?”

“Who?”

“Your father.”

“My father?  What do you mean?”

“Didn’t he give you a good walloping for that joke?”

“No.  Not a bit of it.  I’m going on a sea voyage with Captain Spark.”

“Honest?”

“Cross my heart,” and Bob went through a rapid motion with his hands somewhere over the region of his stomach.

“Where to?”

“Around Cape Horn.”

“No jokin’?”

“Of course not.  But that’s nothing.  Captain Spark has been all over the world.”

Bob spoke as though doubling the Horn was the easiest thing a mariner meets with.

“I wonder if he doesn’t want another boy,” mused Ted wistfully.

“Don’t believe so.”

“Wish he did.  We could have jolly times together.”

“I’m going out to learn how to sail a ship, not to have fun,” replied Bob, with an air of lofty virtue.  He had said nothing about this voyage being a sort of discipline as punishment for his prank.  He did not think that necessary.

“When are you goin’?”

“Next week.”  And then the two boys fell to discussing the trip in all its aspects.  Soon other boys joined Bob and Ted, but the perpetrator of the glue-joke was the center of attraction.

In fact, Bob was regarded as a sort of village hero.  There was more interest manifested in geography at school the following week than ever before.  Everybody knew, without telling, where Cape Horn was, and as for the Straits of Magellan, they could have pointed them out in the dark.

The prospect of the trip, too, had a certain effect on Bob.  His mind was so filled with the thought of it, that he actually forgot about planning any jokes.  Nor would he take part in any with the other village boys.

“Let’s go down past old Mary Bounder’s house and throw stones at the door.  Then she’ll come out and chase us and one of us can go in and get her pet cat and tie a can to its tail,” proposed Ted the following Monday.  Mary Bounder was a curious old woman, who lived all alone in a cabin near the woods, and was the mark for many a joke on the part of the boys.