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"Can you tie a knot in a rope?" asked one.

"Well, I always tie my own scarf around my neck," said Bitsy.

But he soon found that the rope was harder to handle than a scarf. Instead of tying a knot, he had tangled himself in the rope.

One of the sailors had to use a knife to free him.

"Thank you," said Bitsy.

"Myname is Olsen," said the sailor. "How would you like to sail on my boat?"

"Are there knots to tie on your boat?" asked Bitsy.

"Not a one," promised the sailor. "It's a ferry boat."

"Where do you sail?" asked Bitsy.

"We sail across the river," said Olsen. "It takes the Captain and me one game of checkers to go and one game of checkers to return."

Now, a ferry boat was not exactly what Bitsy had in mind when he thought of going to sea, but at least he would never be more than one game of checkers from shore. That was something.

"I'll sign on," he said.

Bitsy like the ferry boat when he saw how nice it was. It reminded him of home... just a little house floating in the water.

"Now you are just to be a utility wire," said Olsen. "That means you will [[strikethrough]] sometimes [[/strikethrough]] be called on to pull the whistle, hold the gate together, tie up rags for polishing, and to any other job the Captain orders."

"But what do you do?" asked Bitsy.

"I play checkers," said Olsen. "Also, I keep the rail polished so the Captain can see his face in it."

"Why doesn't he use a mirror when he wants to see his face?"

Just then the Captain stuck his hairy face straight through one of the portholes and yelled at teh top of his voice:

"A sailing we will go... A sailing we will go... Just a game of checkers or so... A sailing we will go..."

"You can see why he uses the rail instead of a mirror," said Olsen. "He would have to shave if he had a mirror."

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