morning, noon
And William Earnest kept his record regularly , and he kept it well , as we have seen before ; and up to this point of time everything was set down with day and date . But now a change had clearly come over the habits of our little party . At first , as has been hitherto related , the old Captain was a little shy of the children , though he so much liked them ; but now all formality was gone between them , and so down the children came to the Captain 's cottage whenever they had a mind . The Captain was always glad to see them , be it morning , noon , or evening ; and never were the children , in all their lives before , so happy as when romping through the Captain 's grounds , or cooling themselves upon the grass beneath the Captain 's trees , or looking at the Captain 's `` traps '' or joking with that oddest boy that was ever seen , Main Brace , or playing with the Captain 's dogs , -- the biggest dogs that ever bore the odd names of Port and Starboard . The Captain now said , `` Make yourselves at home , my dears , -- quite at home '' ; and the children did it ; and the Captain always went about whatever he had to do until he was ready once more to begin his story-telling ; and then they would all rush off to the yacht , or to the `` Crow 's Nest , '' or the `` cabin , '' or the `` quarter-deck , '' or some other pleasant place ; and as the Captain related something more and more extraordinary , as it seemed to them , each time , `` the wonder grew That one small head should carry all he knew '' ; while , as for the old man himself , he might well exclaim , with the lover in the play , `` I were but little happy if I could say how much . '' Thus it came about , as we have good reason to suppose , that days and dates were lost in William 's journal ; and thus it was that the young and truthful chronicler of this veritable history simply wrote down , from time to time , what the Captain said , without mentioning much about when it was that the Captain said it . Sometimes he wrote with lead pencil , sometimes with pen and ink , and often , as is plain to see from the manuscript itself , at considerable intervals of time ; but always , as there is no doubt , with accuracy ; for William 's mind , touching the Captain 's adventures , was like the susceptible heart of the Count in the Venetian story , `` wax to receive and marble to retain . ''