"What's to be got to do at Portsmouth more than anywhere else?" asked Mr. Vincent Crummles, melting the sealing-wax on the stem of his pipe in the candle, and rolling it out afresh with his little finger.
"There are many vessels leaving the port, I suppose," replied Nicholas. "I shall try for a berth in some ship or other. There is meat and drink there, at all events."
"Salt meat and new rum; pease-pudding and chaff-biscuits," said the manager, taking a whiff at his pipe to keep it alight, and returning to his work of embellishment.
"One may do worse than that," said Nicholas. "I can rough it, I believe, as well as most men of my age and previous habits."
"You need be able to," said the manager, "if you go on board ship; but you won't."
"Why not?"
"Because there's not a skipper or mate that would think you worth your salt, when he could get a practised hand," replied the manager; "and they as plentiful there as the oysters in the streets."
"What do you mean?" asked Nicholas, alarmed by this prediction, and the confident tone in which it had been uttered. "Men are not born able seamen. They must be reared, I suppose?"
Mr. Vincent Crummles nodded his head. "They must; but not at your age, or from young gentlemen like you."
There was a pause. The countenance of Nicholas fell, and he gazed ruefully at the fire.
"Does no other profession occur to you, which a young man of your figure and address could take up easily, and see the world to advantage in?" asked the manager.
"No," said Nicholas, shaking his head.
"Why, then, I'll tell you one," said Mr. Crummies, throwing his pipe into the fire, and raising his voice. "The stage."
"The stage!" cried Nicholas, in a voice almost as loud.
"The theatrical profession," said Mr. Vincent Crummies. "I am in the theatrical profession myself, my wife is in the theatrical profession, my children are in the theatrical profession. I had a dog that lived and died in it from a puppy; and my chaise-pony goes on in Timour the Tartar. I'll bring you out, and your friend too. Say the word. I want a novelty."
"I don't know anything about it," rejoined Nicholas, whose breath had been almost taken away by this sudden proposal. "I never acted a part in my life, except at school."
"There's genteel comedy in your walk and manner, juvenile tragedy in your eye, and touch-and-go farce in your laugh," said Mr. Vincent Crummles. "You'll do as well as if you had thought of nothing else but the lamps, from your birth downwards."
Nicholas thought of the small amount of small change there would remain in his pocket after paying the tavern bill: and he hesitated.
"You can be useful to us in a hundred ways," said Mr. Crummles. "Think what capital bills a man of your education could write for the shop-windows."
