Cheaper by the Dozen

shove off?"
    The captain leaned over Fred again. "Peter and Maggie who? Speak up, boy!"
    Fred stopped crying. "I'm not allowed to tell you their last names," he said. "Mother says they're Eskimo."
    The captain was bewildered. "I wish someone would make sense," he complained. "You say Peter and Maggie, the Eskimos, have disappeared over the rail?"
    Fred nodded. Dad pointed to the empty cage. "Two canaries," Dad shouted, "known as Peter and Maggie and by other aliases, have flown the coop. No matter. We wouldn't think of delaying you further."
    "Where did they fly to, sonny?"
    Fred pointed to the roof of the warehouse. The captain sighed.
    "I can't stand to see children cry," he said. He walked back to the bridge and started giving orders.
    Four crew members, armed with crab nets, climbed to the roof of the warehouse. While passengers shouted encouragement from the rail, the men chased the birds across the roof, back to the dock, onto the rigging of the ship, and back to the warehouse again. Finally Peter and Maggie disappeared altogether, and the captain had to give up.
    "I'm sorry, Mr. Gilbreth," he said. "I guess we'll have to shove off without your canaries."
    "You've been too kind already," Dad beamed.
    Dad felt good for the rest of the trip, and even managed to convince Martha of the wisdom of throwing the empty, but still smelly, bird cage over the side of the ship.
    The next day, after we settled in our cottage, a cardboard box arrived from the captain. It was addressed to Fred, and it had holes punched in the top.
    "You don't have to tell me what's in it," Dad said glumly. "I've got a nose." He reached in his wallet and handed Martha a bill. "Take this and go down to the village and buy another cage. And after this, I hope you'll be more careful of your belongings."
    Our cottage had one small lavatory, but no hot water, shower, or bathtub. Dad thought that living a primitive life in the summer was healthful. He also believed that cleanliness was next to godliness, and as a result all of us had to go swimming at least once a day. The rule was never waived, even when the temperature dropped to the fifties, and a cold, gray rain was falling. Dad would lead the way from the house to the beach, dog-trotting, holding a bar of soap in one hand, and beating his chest with the other.
    "Look out, ocean, here comes a tidal wave. Brrr. Last one in is Kaiser Bill."
    Then he'd take a running dive and disappear in a geyser of spray. He'd swim under water a ways, allow his feet to emerge, wiggle his toes, swim under water some more, and then come up head first, grinning and spitting a thin stream of water through his teeth.
    "Come on," he'd call. "It's wonderful once you get in." And he'd start lathering himself with soap.
    Mother was the only non-swimmer, except the babies. She hated cold water, she hated salt water, and she hated bathing suits. Bathing suits itched her, and although she wore the most conservative models, with long sleeves and black stockings, she never felt modest in them. Dad used to say Mother put on more clothes than she took off when she went swimming.
    Mother's swims consisted of testing the water with the tip of a blade bathing shoe, wading cautiously out to her knees, making some tentative dabs in the water with her hands, splashing a few drops on her shoulders, and, finally, in a moment of supreme courage, pinching her nose and squatting down until the water reached her chest. The nose-pinch was an unnecessary precaution, because her nose never came within a foot of the water.
    Then, with teeth chattering, she'd hurry back to the house, where she'd take a cold water sponge bath, to get rid of the salt.
    "My, the water was delightful this morning, wasn't it?" she'd say brightly at the lunch table.
    "I've seen fish who found the air more delightful than you do the water," Dad would remark.
    As in every other phase of teaching, Dad knew his business as a swimming instructor. Some of us learned to swim when we were as young as three years old, and all of us had learned by the time we were five. It was a sore point with Dad that Mother was the only pupil he ever had encountered with whom he had no success.
    "This summer," he'd tell Mother at the start of every vacation, "I'm really going to teach you, if it's the last thing I do. It's dangerous not to know how to swim. What would you do if you were on a boat that sank? Leave me with a dozen children on my hands, I suppose! After all, you should have some