“We have strength, and we have courage, and we can pull, as you have seen.  I know very well which way to put the helm now, and Biddy is as strong as you are yourself, and could help me all I wished.  Then we could always call you, at need, and have your assistance.  Nay, Harry himself can be called, if there should be a real necessity for it, and I do wish he may not be disturbed until there is that necessity.”

It was with a good deal of reluctance that Jack allowed himself to be persuaded into this scheme.  He insisted, for a long time, that an officer should be called at the hour mentioned by himself, and declared he had never known such an order neglected, “marchant-man, privateer, or man-of-war.”  Rose prevailed over his scruples, however, and there was a meeting of the three females to make the final arrangements.  Mrs. Budd, a kind-hearted woman, at the worst, gave her assent most cheerfully, though Rose was a little startled with the nature of the reasoning, with which it was accompanied.

“You are quite right, Rosy dear,” said the aunt, “and the thing is very easily done.  I’ve long wanted to keep one watch, at sea; just one watch; to complete my maritime education.  Your poor uncle used to say, `Give my wife but one night-watch, and you’d have as good a seaman in her as heart could wish.’  I’m sure I’ve had night-watches enough with him and his ailings; but it seems that they were not the sort of watches he meant.  Indeed, I did n’t know till this evening there were so many watches in the world, at all.  But this is just what I want, and just what I’m resolved to have.  Tier shall command one watch and I’ll command the other.  Jack’s shall be the `dog-watch,’ as they call it, and mine shall be the `middle-watch,’ and last till morning.  You shall be in Jack’s watch, Rose, and Biddy shall be in mine.  You know a good deal that Jack do n’t know, and Biddy can do a good deal I’m rather too stout to do.  I do n’t like pulling ropes, but as for ordering, I’ll turn my back on no captain’s widow out of York.”

Rose had her own misgivings on the subject of her aunt’s issuing orders on such a subject to any one, but she made the best of necessity, and completed the arrangements without further discussion.  Her great anxiety was to secure a good night’s rest for Harry, already feeling a woman’s care in the comfort and ease of the man she loved.  And Rose did love Harry Mulford warmly and sincerely.  If the very decided preference with which she regarded him before they sailed, had not absolutely amounted to passion, it had come so very near it as to render that access of feeling certain, under the influence of the association and events which succeeded.  We have not thought it necessary to relate a tithe of the interviews and intercourse that had taken place between the handsome mate and the pretty Rose Budd, during the month they had now been shipmates, having left the reader to imagine the natural course of things,