Sometimes they would send each other presents, like those that are exchanged between tribes,--fruits from distant countries.

At other times, suddenly inimical, without knowing why, they would shake their fists over the railing, yelling insults at each other in which, between every two or three words, would appear the names of the Virgin and her holy Son.
This was the signal for Uncle Caragol, religious soul, to return in haughty silence to his galley.

Toni, the mate, used to make fun of his devout enthusiasm.

On the other hand, the foremast hands, materialistic and gluttonous, used to listen to him with deference, because he was the one who doled out the wine and the choicest tid-bits.

The old man used to speak to them of the _Cristo del Grao_, whose pictures occupied the most prominent site in the kitchen, and they would all listen as to a new tale, to the story of the arrival by sea of the sacred image, mounted upon a ladder in a boat that had dissolved in smoke after discharging its miraculous cargo.
This had been when the _Grao_ was no more than a group of huts far from the walls of Valencia and threatened by the raids of the Moorish pirates.