“His own children?” I interrupted, trying to get the thing straight.

“No, sir; just children he picked up around, here and there.”

Here is a curious character, sure enough, I thought—­one well worth looking into.

Another lull, and then as I was leaving the room to give the matter a little quiet attention, I remarked to the boat-maker: 

“Outside of his foolish giving, you haven’t anything against Charlie Potter, have you?”

“Not a thing,” he replied, in apparent astonishment.  “Charlie Potter’s one of the best men that ever lived.  He’s a good man.”

I smiled at the inconsistency and went my way.

A day or two later the loft of the sail-maker, instead of the shed of the boat-builder, happened to be my lounging place, and thinking of this theme, now uppermost in my mind, I said to him: 

“Do you know a man around here by the name of Charlie Potter?”

“Well, I might say that I do.  He lived here for over fifteen years.”

“What sort of a man is he?”

He stopped in his stitching a moment to look at me, and then said: 

“How d’ye mean?  By trade, so to speak, or religious-like?”

“What is it he has done,” I said, “that makes him so popular with all you people?  Everybody says he’s a good man.  Just what do you mean by that?”

“Well,” he said, ceasing his work as though the subject were one of extreme importance to him, “he’s a peculiar man, Charlie is.  He believes in giving nearly everything he has away, if any one else needs it.  He’d give the coat off his back if you asked him for it.  Some folks condemn him for this, and for not giving everything to his wife and them orphans he has, but I always thought the man was nearer right than most of us.  I’ve got a family myself—­but, then, so’s he, now, for that matter.  It’s pretty hard to live up to your light always.”

He looked away as if he expected some objection to be made to this, but hearing none, he went on.  “I always liked him personally very much.  He ain’t around here now any more—­lives up in Norwich, I think.  He’s a man of his word, though, as truthful as kin be.  He ain’t never done nothin’ for me, I not bein’ a takin’ kind, but that’s neither here nor there.”

He paused, in doubt apparently, as to what else to say.

“You say he’s so good,” I said.  “Tell me one thing that he ever did that struck you as being preeminently good.”

“Well, now, I can’t say as I kin, exactly, offhand,” he replied, “there bein’ so many of them from time to time.  He was always doin’ things one way and another.  He give to everybody around here that asked him, and to a good many that didn’t.  I remember once”—­and a smile gave evidence of a genial memory—­“he give away a lot of pork that he’d put up for the winter to some colored people back here—­two or three barrels, maybe.  His wife didn’t object, exactly, but my, how his mother-in-law did go on about it.  She was livin’ with him then.  She went and railed against him all around.”