All this is merely the effect of imagination, Signore; and he who has the most is the aptest at inventing circumstances, which, though not strictly true, are vastly agreeable." "As for Homer and Ariosto, Signor Vice-governatore, I doubt if either ever saw a vessel with a boot on, or if either ever knew as much about craft in general as we who live here in Porto Ferrajo.

Harkee, friend Filippo, just ask this Americano if, in his country, he ever saw vessels wear boots.

Put the question plainly, and without any of your accursed poetry." Filippo did as desired, leaving Ithuel to put his own construction on the object of the inquiry; all that had just passed being sealed to him, in consequence of its having been uttered in good Tuscan.
"Boots!" repeated the native of the Granite state, looking round him drolly; "perhaps not exactly the foot-part, and the soles, for they ought, in reason, to be under water; but every vessel that isn't coppered shows her boot-_top_--of _them_, I'll swear I've seen ten thousand, more or less." This answer mystified the vice-governatore, and completely puzzled Vito Viti.

The grave mariners at the other table, too, thought it odd, for in no other tongue is the language of the sea as poetical, or figurative, as in the English; and the term of _boot-top,_ as applied to a vessel, was Greek to them, as well as to the other listeners.

They conversed among themselves on the subject, while their two superiors were holding a secret conference on the other side of the room, giving the American time to rally his recollection, and remember the precise circumstances in which not only he himself, but all his shipmates, were placed.