A body is always doing what
he sees somebody else doing, though there mayn't be no sense in it.
Pretty soon I see a black something floating on the water away off to
stabboard and quartering behind us. I see he was looking at it, too. I
says -
'"What's that?" He says, sort of pettish, -
'"Tain't nothing but an old empty bar'l."
'"An empty bar'l!" says I, "why," says I, "a spy-glass is a fool to your
eyes. How can you tell it's an empty bar'l?" He says -
'"I don't know; I reckon it ain't a bar'l, but I thought it might be,"
says he.
'"Yes," I says, "so it might be, and it might be anything else, too; a
body can't tell nothing about it, such a distance as that," I says.
'We hadn't nothing else to do, so we kept on watching it. By and by I
says -
'"Why looky-here, Dick Allbright, that thing's a-gaining on us, I
believe."
'He never said nothing. The thing gained and gained, and I judged it
must be a dog that was about tired out. Well, we swung down into the
crossing, and the thing floated across the bright streak of the
moonshine, and, by George, it was bar'l. Says I -
'"Dick Allbright, what made you think that thing was a bar'l, when it
was a half a mile off," says I. Says he -
'"I don't know." Says I -
'"You tell me, Dick Allbright." He says -
'"Well, I knowed it was a bar'l; I've seen it before; lots has seen it;
they says it's a haunted bar'l."
'I called the rest of the watch, and they come and stood there, and I
told them what Dick said.
