“Proceed,” answered James; “but be sure and not ask too hard ones.”

“You see, I’ve kept school some in the backwoods of Steuben County, Indiana,” added the captain.

“Schoolmaster and Captain,” repeated James. “Honour enough for one family. What did you teach?”

“Redin’, writin’, spellin’, g’ography, ’rithmetic, and grammer.”

“Go ahead, then,” continued James, “and examine me in these branches. I’ll answer the best I know.”

The captain proceeded with his questions, first in arithmetic, then in geography and grammar, and James answered every question promptly.

“You are a trump, Jim; I’ve heard a good deal about your talents, and I wanted to see whether it was so, or not. You’ll not shame your relations; I’ll own ye for cousin,” remarked the captain, discontinuing his questions.

“Now, s’pose I put a few questions to you,” said James; “it’s a poor rule that won’t work both ways.”

“As many as you choose,” answered the captain.

The captain could not answer the first question that James put, nor the second, nor third; nor, indeed, any of them. James had studied all the branches named far more thoroughly than the captain, so that “hard questions” were at his command. He intended to confound the captain, and he did.

“If you’ll let me alone, I’ll let you alone,” remarked the captain, after several ineffectual attempts to answer James’s questions.

The captain did not know so much as he thought he did. Because he had taught school in Indiana, and studied arithmetic, grammar, and geography, he thought he was superior even to James, of whom he had heard large stories. A few years ago he spoke of the matter to a friend, and said: “I was just green enough in those days to think that I knew it all. You see, I had been teacher for three years in the backwoods of Steuben County, Indiana.” That over-estimate of himself put him into an awkward position before James. At the close of the interview the captain said, seriously:

“Jim, you’ve too good a head on you to be a wood-chopper or a canal-driver.”

“Do you really think so?” asked James.

“Yes, I do, honest.”

“What would you have me do?”

“Teach school. Go to school one or two terms, and then you will be qualified to teach a common school; and after that you can make anything you have a mind to out of yourself.”

“That is more easily said than done,” answered James. “What do you think of my goin’ to sea?”

“I don’t think much of it, to tell you the truth, Jim. It’s a terrible hard, rough life, and it’s a pity to throw away your talents on the deck of a ship. Never do any such thing, Jim. That’s my advice.”

“But I don’t intend to serve all my days, if I become a sailor,” said James; “I intend to command.”

“Command or serve, it will be all the same to you, Jim. You will be greater than the business, any way, and that’s unfortunate for any one. It won’t help the matter any to be called Captain Garfield.”