Oliver took great pride in this picture,
and it was commonly believed that he had had a hand in the painting
of it. When it was praised he was profuse in his acknowledgments;
but if a critical captain asked him how it was that, though the
ship was sailing before the wind, yet her colours were all flying
aft, or inquired whether it was grass or cabbages she sailed upon,
Oliver was less eager to claim any artistic ability, and hurried
the critic into the house lest he should also discover that the
shrouds had been omitted by the painter.
Gray's Inn was not an ordinary public house, and beyond the
signboard announcement that "Spiritis and aile is retailed here"
there was little to indicate its commercial character. The parlour
was a large room with a window at each end--one facing the street,
the other being so situated that the seamen sitting at the large
centre table could look out at their ships riding at anchor across
the bay. There was no counter or bar, and the liquor was brought
"ben" by Oliver or his sonsie wife.
One Saturday morning I had to go there to see old David Flett about
a boat that Captain Gordon wanted to buy from him. I found him at
the inn before me, sitting there with a goodly company of Stromness
men and skippers, whose ships were, like the Lydia, undergoing
repairs or waiting for fair winds.
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