It was torn and bloody on one side.

"The topman was right, sir, you see," he said to Captain Farmer. "He must have struck some part of the ship heavily when he fell from aloft before going overboard."

"Yes," replied the captain. "I see."

Just then, Mr Jellaby, who had gone forward in the meantime to see if there were any traces there of the accident, returned aft, looking more serious than I had ever seen him before.

"His head struck against one of the flukes of the sheet-anchor, sir," he reported to Captain Farmer who had sent him on the errand. "The bill of it, just abaft the fore-rigging to port, is now spattered with the poor little chap's brains. I wonder nobody observed it before, sir."

"He would, therefore, have been killed instantly and did not suffer any pain," said the captain. "Poor young fellow, poor young fellow! He was a most promising lad and always smart at his duty!"

"Trim sails!" cried out the commander at this juncture, in a voice husky with emotion; as if anxious to hide his feelings, now that the captain had pronounced his requiem to the memory of our late shipmate. "Brace up the mainyard!"

At once our sails filled, when the ship was put upon her course again; and, the watch being then set, we all went below, the boatswain piping the hands down to supper, for it was nearly Three Bells and more than an hour after the usual time for that meal.

Naturally everybody in the gunroom was full of the accident, the fellows all thinking more of poor Dick Popplethorne when dead, for the moment at least, than they had ever done while he was living; and I, myself, could not help remembering the strange coincidence of his laughing over Mr Jellaby's yarn about the marine as we were sailing down Channel only a few days before and being especially merry over the young sentry's mistake in calling out "Dead boy" when the bell struck.

Poor chap, he was a dead boy now, indeed; although, he had been alive and as hearty and jolly as any of us that very afternoon down there at dinner in the mess.

It was almost incredible to recollect this! "I have just calculated," observed Mr Stormcock amidst the general talk about our late messmate, as if stating a most important fact, "that the youngster fell overboard in latitude 48 degrees north, pretty nearly, and longitude 8 degrees 10 minutes west—a trifle to the westward of where we met that confounded Frenchman."

"I don't see how that information can be of any use to his friends, Stormcock," said Mr Fortescue Jones, with a coarse laugh. "We can't very well put up a tombstone over him in the Bay of Biscay."

"For shame, sir!" exclaimed little Tom Mills, who was huddled up crying in a corner of the gunroom, Dick Popplethorne having been an old home friend. "Don't make fun of the po-poor fellow now he's dead!"

"That's right, youngster," put in Mr Stormcock. "Stick up for your friend. I didn't mean anything against him for a moment, for I always found him a good sort of chap; though, I can't say I had very much to do with him."

"Well, for my part, I won't say I'm sorry he has lost the number of his mess," said that brute Andrews. "He was as big a bully as Larkyns, and I don't owe him any good will, I can tell you."

"You cowardly cur!" exclaimed Tom Mills, his face flaming up, though the tears were still coursing down his cheeks. "You know you wouldn't say that if Larkyns were here now."

"Wouldn't I, cry babby?"

Tom did not reply to this in words; but he sent a telescope, that lay at the end of one of the tables near him, flying across the gunroom, catching Andrews a crack on his uplifted arm.

This saved his head, fortunately for him, Tom's shot being a vicious one and well aimed!

"What do you mean by that?" said the ill-natured brute. "Do you want to fight?"

"Not with you," rejoined Tommy, whose anger had conquered his grief, speaking with much dignity. "I only fight with gentlemen, and you're a snob! No gentleman would speak ill of those unable to defend themselves, or say a thing behind a fellow's back which he would not have the pluck to do when he was present. Andrews, you're a cad and a coward!"

"Stow that, youngster!" interposed Mr Stormcock, as little Tommy rose up and made towards the cad, who, however, showed no inclination to resent the insult offered him. "I won't allow any quarrelling in the mess! If you want to fight, my boys, you must go into the steerage."

Andrews, I noticed, did not offer to stir, however, in response to this suggestion of the master's mate, which he would certainly have done if he had been possessed of an ounce of courage in his nature.

Tom and I both agreed on this when talking over the matter subsequently; so, seeing what a chicken-hearted fellow he was, my cocky little chum sat down again and began tucking into his tea, Andrews getting up presently and sneaking away when he thought the coast clear.

Mr Stormcock proved to be a false prophet with regard to the foul weather that evening; for, when I went up on deck again to have a look round before turning in, although it was still blowing fresh from the westwards, the black cloud that had previously covered the sky had partly cleared away, leaving only a few fleecy flying masses in its stead.

Between them the moon fitfully shone occasionally and an odd star or two peeped out here and there; while our good ship was bowling along under her topgallants, which had been set again by the commander over the double-reefed topsails, with her courses and jib and spanker, and the foretopmast staysail, continuing under the same canvas during the night, without hauling a sheet or tautening a brace, the wind hardly shifting half-a-point all the while.

We made such progress, too, towards the spot where the French ship reported having passed the wreck of which we were in search, that, at Six Bells in the morning watch, the lookout man forward, who had been specially ordered to keep a good watch to windward, hailed the deck.

"Sail in sight, sir!" he sang out, just as the hands were in the middle of their breakfast. "She's hull down on the weather bow!"



CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

ON THE DECK OF THE DERELICT.

"Where away, my man?" shouted Commander Nesbitt, who, at the same moment, came up on the poop and was scanning the horizon on his own account. "How does she bear, eh?"

"Two points off the weather bow, sir," replied the lookout from the foretopsail yard. "We're rising her now, sir; and I can see one of her masts, though the rest of her spars seem to have gone by the board."

"All right, my man, keep her in your eye," sang back the commander, who then turned to the helmsman. "Give her more lee helm, quartermaster; and see if you can't luff her up a couple of points! Watch, trim sails! Head lee braces! Brace up your head yards!"

With this, we hauled our wind; and, by bracing the yards sharp up and keeping her full and bye, we were able to bring the ship's head a bit more to the westward than we had been previously sailing, steering now south-west by south instead of sou'-sou'-west as before, which was as near as we could get her to proceed in the direction where the lookout man had reported the vessel.

By Eight Bells, we could make out the derelict clearly from the deck; and, shortly after breakfast when we had closed her within half-a-mile, we could see that somehow or other she had got terribly knocked about, her bulwarks having been carried away, as well as most of her spars and rigging, only the stump of her mainmast being left still standing, with the yard, which had parted at the slings, hanging down all a-cockbill.

There was a portion of the shrouds left, also, and the backstay; but, of everything else, as far as we could judge at that distance, a clean sweep had been made fore and aft and the vessel seemed to be a complete wreck.

The commander's keen eyes, however, caught sight of something, which at the first glance had escaped the notice of both lookout and signalman; not to speak of the many officers who stood around on the poop, scrutinising the dismantled vessel through their glasses, none of whom had observed this object until Commander Nesbitt pointed it out.

"Hullo!" he exclaimed abruptly. "What is that lashed to the rigging on her port beam?"

Every glass was instantly directed to the point he had indicated.

"It's a man, sir," said the signalman, noticing the object on its now being pointed out to him, very wise after the event, as most of us are disposed to be in everyday life. "I think I can see him move, sir."

"Yes, by Jove!" cried Mr Jellaby, who stood near, holding on to one of the davits, jumping up on the gunwale to have a better view. "There he is waving one of his arms now!"

"I don't know about that, imagination sometimes goes a great way in these matters," observed Commander Nesbitt, after carefully inspecting the battered hulk with the glass Mr Jellaby handed him; "but, at all events, we'll send a boat aboard and see. Bosun's mate, pipe the watch to stand by to heave the ship to! Clew up the courses. Square the main yard!"

Larkyns, being, as I mentioned before, signal midshipman, had gone down to report the fact of our being close up with the wreck to Captain Farmer, who now appeared on the scene of action.

He at once gave an order for the first cutter to be lowered and preparations made for boarding the strange vessel, an order which was immediately carried into effect.

"Mr Jellaby had better go in charge of the boat, sir, I should think," suggested the commander. "There's a bit of a sea running and I don't like sending a midshipman in such a case; for, you know, sir, we cannot expect old heads on young shoulders."

"All right, Nesbitt," replied the captain; "do as you like."

This was a great disappointment to Ned Anstruther, who had come on deck fully equipped for the expedition in his sea boots and monkey jacket.

He had hurriedly dressed himself on hearing the cutter piped away as he was her proper officer, it being the general custom on board a man-of-war for each of the ship's boats to be under the charge of one of the midshipmen, who invariably goes away in her under all circumstances of wind or weather for whatever duty she may be required.

There is little doubt that it is mainly owing to this practice of being early trained to exercise their judgment and discretion, and taught to command as well as to obey when young, that the officers of our service acquire that dash and readiness of action which is usually found lacking, it may be asserted without being accused of any insular prejudice or partiality, amongst those of other nations, who never have the same opportunities extended to them as a rule until they are almost too old to learn.

Boat service has been the school that brought forth the Nelsons and Rodneys of the past, as it has produced the Hornbys and Kanes and Beresfords of the navy of to-day, so to speak; and, whether our sailors have to fight behind wooden walls or in armoured turrets, the practice will continue to teach self-reliance and the use of brains.

Ay, boat service will always stand our sailors, officers and men alike, in good stead; despite the fact that they go to sea now in "floating factories" instead of on board ships such as our forefathers learnt their seamanship in, and that modern scientists, who treat everything on strictly theoretical principles, and, though have never smelt blue water, lay down laws for our guidance in the naval tactics of the future, dictating how we are to act and fight and manoeuvre under any and every possible prearranged contingency!

It was an awful sell, therefore, for poor Ned Anstruther when Mr Jellaby was deputed to the charge of his boat and he was thus "left out in the cold," as the saying goes!

Nor was his mortification in any way lessened when the commander told him that the reason why he would not let him go, was because he could not swim properly; for there might be danger in getting alongside the wreck, with the wind and sea that was on.

So, Ned did not appear at all pleased when the lieutenant stepped forward to take his place in the cutter, giving him an envious look when he took his seat in the sternsheets prior to her being lowered down. I, too, cast an appealing glance at Mr Jellaby; and this, fortunately for me, Commander Nesbitt intercepted.

"I suppose you would like to go, youngster, eh?" he said to me. "Well, you may, if you like. I know that you can keep yourself afloat, at any rate if you get capsized, from what I learnt of your experiences the other day at Spithead; and, perhaps, Mr Jellaby may find you of use. Jump in, my boy."

It is hardly necessary to say how promptly I obeyed the order.

As my dear old Dad would have expressed it, "Sharp was the word and quick the action."

All the cutter's passengers, however, were not yet aboard.

"Hold on, there!" cried Captain Farmer, as the falls were slackened off and the boat slowly lowered down into the heaving water alongside, the waves coming half-way up the counter to meet her. "I think the doctor had better go with you, Mr Jellaby. There may be some poor fellow on the wreck in need of immediate medical aid; and it will be a great saving of time, indeed, it may be the means of saving a life, if it be on the spot instead of your having to send back to the ship for it. Sentry, pass the word below for Dr Nettleby."

We did not have to wait long; for, almost as soon as the captain's message could have reached the main deck, the doctor made his appearance on the poop, accompanied by my old friend, Corporal Macan, carrying a surgical case and a roll of bandages, while the neck of a suspicious-looking flask could be also seen peeping out from one of his pockets.

In another minute or so, Dr Nettleby and his factotum managed to slide down by the aid of the after life-line into the sternsheets of the boat; though, they took their seats in a rather hurried fashion beside the lieutenant and myself.

Then, watching our opportunity to lower away, we managed so to time it that the cutter lighted on the crest of one of the rollers.

This took us some yards away from the ship's side with the following swell of the sea; when our oars were dropped into the water at the word of command and we made for the wreck.

It was a stiff piece of work reaching her, for wind and waves were both against us and rowing difficult; the cutter at one moment being on the top of a mountainous billow and the next plunged deep down into a yawning valley of green water, the broken ridges of which curled over our gunwales on either hand, threatening to overwhelm us till we, rose again beyond their clutch.

But, the men "putting their backs into it," and the coxswain steering judiciously so as to prevent the boat from broaching to, we finally got alongside the battered hulk.

We boarded her under the forechains to leeward, as she was down by the head, with a considerable list to port; and this seemed the safest point at which to approach her.

Getting close up, the bowman at once threw a grapnel that caught in some of the loose ropes hanging over the side; and, before we were well alongside, Mr Jellaby had scrambled up on to the forecastle of the ill-fated vessel.

Dr Nettleby and myself were not far behind him, Corporal Macan and Bill Bates, the coxswain of the cutter, following to render any assistance that might be necessary; the boat meanwhile being veered away to the end of the grapnel rope so as to be out of harm's way and yet within easy reach of us as soon as we might want to go on board her again.

On gaining the deck, the scene presented to our gaze was piteous beyond all description, the ship appearing to have been first run into by some other craft and then left to drift about at the mercy of the elements.

Her starboard bow had been cut right through up to the head of the foremast, which had been carried away completely, with all its spars and rigging, as well as the bowsprit and maintopmast.

In addition to these, the mizzen and everything aft had gone; not a stick being left standing in her save the stump of the mainmast, as our lookout man had reported soon after just sighting her, as well as part of the lower rigging amidships.

Besides this, a section of the mainyard that had snapped in two at the slings was still held aloft by the truss, the other end of the spar having brought up, against the chain-plates, the brace being twisted round the shrouds and deadeyes in the most wonderful way!

Mr Jellaby, however, did not stop to notice these details, but made his way as well as he could through the maze of tangled cordage and heaps of wreckage that lay about in every direction towards the portion of the main rigging yet remaining intact, where, lashed to a fragment of the bulwarks that had not been washed away, was the figure of the man Commander Nesbitt had noticed.

There was no doubt now of his being alive; for, he was gesticulating violently and waving his arms about like those of a windmill.

The rolling of the ship and the clean breach which the sea made across the open deck amidships rendered the task of reaching the poor fellow all the harder; but, watching his chance between the lurches of the water-logged barque and clambering over the wreckage that rilled the waist from the forecastle up to the main hatchway, Mr Jellaby was able at last to get near enough to hear the voice of the man, who was a most ragged and miserable-looking creature, and was yelling out wildly as if he were insane in the intervals of his frantic motions, when there was a lull in the noise of the waves.

"He's saying something, doctor," he cried to Dr Nettleby, who had pluckily followed him up close, albeit so much older a man. "See if you can make him out; I don't understand the lingo."

The doctor listened for a moment and shook his head.

"It's no language that I can recognise," he said after a pause, as if thinking over all the dialects he had ever come across in his wanderings. "The poor chap has evidently gone mad and is jabbering some gibberish or other. Look how his eyes are rolling!"

By this time, however, I had managed to come up to where Mr Jellaby and the doctor were holding on to the backstay, and as the wind just then dropped for an instant and the deafening din of the clashing waters ceased, I caught a word or two out of a long sentence which the unfortunate man screamed out at the moment at the top of his voice.

"He's talking Spanish, sir!" I exclaimed, much to the surprise of my seniors. "I can make out something that sounds like 'por Dios,' which means 'for the love of God,' sir."

"Indeed!" said Mr Jellaby, gripping hold of one of the clewlines which hung down from the broken yard and swayed about in the wind, preparing to swing himself across the encumbered deck to the port shrouds beyond, where the man was lashed. "I didn't know you were so good a linguist, young Vernon. By Jove, you'll be of more use than I thought you would be when the commander told me to take you with me."

"Oh!" I cried, rather shamefaced at this, "I only know a little of the language. I learnt it when I was in the West Indies with my father. We lived in one of the islands where there were a lot of Spaniards, and I heard their lingo spoken often enough."

"Well, anyway, it's lucky that you know something about it now, for you can keep your ears cocked and hear what the poor beggar says, while we try to release him from his uncomfortable billet. Here, Bates, bear a hand!"

So saying, Mr Jellaby swung himself across the frothing chasm that lay between him and the object of his pity, with the coxswain of the cutter after him, while Dr Nettleby and I remained by the mainmast bitts, Corporal Macan busying himself in getting the doctor's medical traps ready for immediate use.

I soon had to exercise my new office of interpreter, for the man began shouting again on seeing Mr Jellaby and the coxswain near him.

"Ah del buque!" he screamed out, holding up, as if to signal with it, one of his emaciated hands, the bony fingers of which looked like those of a skeleton.

"Como se llama el buque?"

"He says 'ship ahoy!' sir," I explained to the doctor. "'What ship is that?'"

"Tell him who we are, then," replied Dr Nettleby. "He is probably out of his mind, but it may quiet him."

"Somos marineros Inglesas—we are English sailors," I therefore cried in as shrill a key as I could to reach his ear, raking up the almost forgotten memories of my early years, and, I'm afraid, speaking very bad Spanish. "Del buque de guerra el Candahar de la regna Ingleterra—we belong to Her Majesty's ship, Candahar!"

Bad Spanish or not, however, the poor fellow understood me.

"Gracias a Dios!" he said, his wild eyes brightening with a gleam of intelligence, as Mr Jellaby and Bill Bates, having unloosed him from the ropes by which he was seized up to the rigging, brought him across the deck to the doctor, who at once put a small quantity of brandy between his lips. "Habran llegado a tiempo."

"What is that, eh?"

"'Thanks be to God,'" I replied, translating what he had said. "'You've just come in time.'"

"He never made a truer statement," observed the doctor, significantly, as he plied him gently from time to time with the spirit, keeping his hand on his pulse the while. "In another half-hour he would have been a dead man; for, his circulation is down to nothing!"

Presently, the effects of the brandy told upon the poor fellow and he sprang suddenly to his feet by a sort of spasmodic effort, knocking Corporal Macan backwards into the water which was washing about the deck around us as he stood up.

"Ah los marineros cobardes!" he cried. "Vamos printo, hascia abajo!"

"Hullo, Vernon," said Mr Jellaby. "What's he talking about now, eh?"

"I believe he's referring to the crew who deserted the ship and left him behind to his fate, sir," I answered, "for he has spoken of the 'cowardly sailors,' as he calls them. I think they must have been curs, sir, to have left him to die tied up like that, sir!"

"Anything else, eh?"

"He also says, 'be quick and look below.' I suppose he means for us to examine the vessel's hold."

"Si si—yes, yes," exclaimed the rescued man as I said this, seeming to understand what I suggested. "Abajo—abajo—go below! go below!"

He nodded his head also as he spoke, looking towards the after part of the wreck and pointing downwards with his finger; while a shudder of horror passed over his corpse-like face, the dark hair surrounding which made it look all the paler.

"By Jove, I think there is something in what you say, my boy," cried the lieutenant, moving away at once in the direction indicated as quickly as he could, telling the coxswain to follow him. "I ought to have overhauled the cabin before. The sea is getting up again, I notice; and, we'll soon have to shove off from here if we wish to get back to our own ship again!"

The moment the Spaniard saw Mr Jellaby start off on this mission, he drew a deep breath of satisfaction.

"Buena, buena—good, good!" he murmured softly, as if talking to himself. "Soy muy mal—I feel very ill!"

He then threw up his arms and dropped down as if he had been shot, Corporal Macan just catching him in time, crying out in a loud tone as he fell, louder indeed than he had yet spoken, as if giving a peremptory order—

"Fonde el ancla!"

"Begorrah, I can't say to his ankles!" said the Irishman, not understanding of course what he said, and mistaking the sound of the words. "Till him they're all right, sor. Faix it's all I can do to hould his arms, let alone his legs, sure!"

"Nonsense, Macan," I cried, not able to keep from laughing. "He didn't say anything about his ankles, or legs either."

"Thin, what did he say, sor, if ye'll excuse me for axin?"

"'Fonde el ancla,'" I replied, "means, you donkey, to 'let go the anchor!'"



CHAPTER NINETEEN.

MUTINY OR MURDER?

"Poor fellow!" said Dr Nettleby, on my thus translating the Spaniard's exclamation for Corporal Macan's benefit. "I'm afraid he has dropped his anchor in real earnest."

"Oh, doctor," I cried, "you don't mean that he is dead?"

"Not quite yet, but pretty nearly so," he replied, feeling the man's pulse again and then putting his hand to his heart. "I do wish Jellaby would come out of that cabin; for, I should like to take our patient to the ship at once and put him under treatment without further delay as he's in a very bad way. I can't think what's keeping the lieutenant so long!"

"Shall I go and see, sir?"

"I wish you would, my boy. Really, I don't like the look of the weather at all!"

"Faix, sor, naythor does I, sure," I heard the corporal say as I turned to go in search of Mr Jellaby, who having made his way to the after part of the vessel, with the coxswain, had been out of our sight now for some time. "It'll be blowin' great guns in a brace of shakes, or I'm a Dutchman, for the say is gettin' purty rough already, an', begorrah, it's wishin' I wor safe aboord the ould Candahar agen, I am; ay, an' alongside ov the cook's galley sure!"

I could not catch what the doctor said in reply to this, being too much occupied in looking after my own safety while trying to pick my steps towards the stern; for there was a lot of loose dunnage washing backwards and forwards as the hulk rolled sluggishly from side to side and tons of water continually came in as the waves broke over her, causing me to keep my weather eye open and clutch hold of every stray rope I could grip that was secured in any way to prevent me from going overboard. The noise of the wind and sea and creaking and groaning of the poor ship's timbers, too, was something awful.

When I succeeded at last on getting aft, I found the entrance to the cabin from the deck was blocked by the wreck of the mizzenmast.

By means of this, I climbed up on to the poop, the proper ladder belonging to which had also been smashed by the fall of the spars from aloft, as well as the covering of the booby hatch and skylight; a yawning chasm of splintered glass and broken framework only now representing the latter structure, while the former had disappeared entirely.

The companion way, however, seemed still firm enough, although nearly filled up with fragments of wood and odds-and-ends of all sorts, besides being about a foot or so of water over all at the bottom of the stairway; and, I was just on the point of adventuring down in my quest of the lieutenant, when the latter emerged from the passage that led into the cabin or saloon below, followed by Bill Bates.

Mr Jellaby's face was as pale as that of the man we had rescued.

So was the coxswain's; and both seemed to start on seeing me as if I had been a ghost.

"Good heavens, my boy!" exclaimed the lieutenant. "How did you get here?"

"The doctor sent me, sir," I answered glibly. "He was getting anxious about you and thought something had happened."

"By Jove, you gave me quite a turn after coming out of that infernal den there!" he said with a shudder, pointing over his shoulder. "I never saw such a sight in my life. Did you, Bates?"

"No, sir," replied the coxswain. "I hopes to God, sir, I never shall again, sir!"

"What is it, sir?" I asked, all my curiosity aroused. "May I come down and see the place, sir?"

"No, Vernon, it's not fit for a boy like you to look at such a horrible sight. Why, it would haunt your memory for months, as I'm sure it will mine!"

So saying, he began to mount the companion way towards me slowly, but had hardly ascended a couple of steps when he came to a halt, looking up for a moment as if undecided in his mind.

"Stay; I think you may come down, youngster, after all," he said at length. "Perhaps it might be as well that you should see with your own eyes what Bates and I have seen; for, then you will serve as an additional witness in the event of there being any future inquiry. I hope you have a good strong stomach, my boy, and are not squeamish?"

"Oh, no, sir," I rejoined as I followed him down the steps again to the gangway below, "I'm not squeamish."

"Well, then," he cried, throwing open the opposite door which gave entrance to the cabin directly under the broken skylight, "look in there!"

It was fortunate that I had a steady nerve and was not easily frightened, for the sight that met my gaze would have startled most grown-up persons, let alone one of my age!

The place was in as great confusion as the open deck above, the sea having worked its ravages here as well as there and littered it with lumber of every description, which the water that had likewise gained admittance was washing about the floor, in company with the overturned tables and chairs.

Broken plates and dishes were mixed up with stray articles of clothing; while books and empty bottles, which, strangely whole, bobbed up and down amidst the general ruin, floated in and out between the heavier dunnage.

I noticed even a mandoline, with a blue riband attached to it cruising round the bottles; which seemed quite out of its latitude there! But, this was not all.

There was a strange, sickly smell in the room; and what was that looking up at me from the rubbish-strewn deck close to where I stood by the cabin door?

I almost shrieked out as it caught my wandering glance, the eyes seeming to look right into mine, opened wide in one fixed stare.

It was the face of a dead woman, over whose marble-like features the water rippled as the ship lurched, tossing her long hair about as if playing with it and giving her the appearance of being alive.

"Poor thing!" I whispered to Mr Jellaby, who was near me and also gazing down at her, the presence of the dead making me drop my voice. "She was drowned, I suppose?"

"Murdered!" he replied laconically, drawing my attention to a terrible cut across her neck, which I had not observed before, almost severing the head from the body. "Look there—and there, Vernon!"

I followed the motions of his directing hand, and saw, first, a poor little dead baby floating about in the corner of the cabin; and then, behind the door by which we had entered, the corpse of a big, handsome man propped up against one of the lockers, in a kneeling position.

The man was only half-dressed, being in his shirt and trousers, as if caught unawares, holding a cocked revolver yet in his rigid fingers, stretched out in steady aim; while, at the further end of the cabin, where there was another doorway, communicating apparently with the main saloon, lay four ruffianly-looking fellows, all with long Spanish knives in their hands tightly clutched as if to strike.

These scoundrels had evidently killed the lady and little baby, and had then been shot by the poor chap on his knees, before he had himself fallen a victim to the cowardly stab from behind of a fifth scoundrel.

The latter he had got down, however, before he died; for, he was kneeling on his chest, as the second lieutenant pointed out to me prior to our leaving this chamber of horrors, though the villain's dagger was still sticking in the brave fellow's back.

I could see this now for myself as a gleam of sunshine came down through the shattered skylight, showing up all the hideous details of the place, with the sides of the cabin and the bulkhead dividing it from the passage, as well as the deck beams overhead, all spattered with blood; albeit, the water sluicing about below had removed all traces of the sad tragedy from thence long since.

"Let us go now," said Mr Jellaby, as soon as I had taken in all these sickening surroundings, leading the way out of the accursed place. "We have stopped here long enough!"

"We have indeed, sir," I replied, following him up the companion, with Bill Bates bringing up the rear in silence. "But, what do you think has happened, sir?"

"It's a case of mutiny first, most probably; and then, murder," said the second lieutenant, gravely, stepping over the coaming of the hatchway on to the deck of the poop as he emerged from the companion way.

"We'll never know the rights of it, however, unless the doctor manages to bring round that poor chap we released from the rigging, who must have been tied up by the mutineers and thus escaped them somehow or other! I couldn't find a log-book or anything else in the cabin which would give us a scrap of information about the vessel or those belonging to her; and, all the rest of the wreck is under water—indeed, I don't think she's far off sinking."

"Beg pardon, sir," observed the coxswain, interrupting him. "The ship's just sent up our recall, and she's bearing away now to pick us up to leeward when we cast off from here, sir."

"Yes, my man, I see, and I notice, also, she has sent down her topgallants and taken in another reef," returned Mr Jellaby, proceeding to work his way back amidships to those we had left there, wading through the water and wreckage and tophamper strewing the waist. "The old doctor, too, looks in a precious wax and is carrying on at a grand rate about our keeping him waiting, I bet. He's jawing away now to that knowing hand of a marine of his; so the sooner we see about getting him aboard our old barquey again the better!"

He could not have come to a wiser conclusion, for the wind had increased in force rapidly, even during the short interval since I had left the deck, now blowing more than half a gale; while the sea was beginning to run high, breaking over the bows of the half-submerged hulk, sending up columns of spray that wetted us where we were and almost drenching Doctor Nettleby and the corporal, who were attending to the poor Spaniard amidships, just under the lee of the mainmast.

"You're a nice fellow!" cried the doctor to Mr Jellaby on our approaching near enough to hear what he said. "It won't be your fault if we're not all drowned here like rats in a hole and never reach the ship. As for the cutter, I believe she's swamped already!"

He was in a fine rage, certainly; but, the lieutenant, whose good temper was proof against any amount of irritability, soon calmed him down.

"I beg your pardon, doctor," he said, as he hailed the bowman of the cutter, which was not swamped as yet, although making very bad weather of it, telling him to haul up alongside under the lee of the wreck. "I really beg your pardon, doctor, but I could not be any quicker; for the captain ordered me to examine the vessel and see if I could find her papers."

He thereupon described to Doctor Nettleby what the three of us had seen in the cabin; when that gentleman was as much shocked as we were.

"Can I do anything, Jellaby?" he asked. "Are you sure they were all lifeless?"

"As dead as herrings, doctor."

"Then there would be no use in my going down to see the poor creatures?"

"My dear sir, you couldn't do them an ounce of good, for they're long past the reach of all human aid!" replied the lieutenant, while he gave a helping hand to Corporal Macan to lift up the still unconscious Spaniard whom we had rescued, the sole survivor, so far as we knew, of all those who had perhaps started gaily enough on their disastrous voyage in the now dismantled and water-logged barque. "Besides, my dear doctor, we haven't got the time. If we don't clear out of this pretty sharp, we'll all go below, I'm afraid! Steady there, Bates, with that grapnel rope! You'll have the boat coming broadside on against the wreck, if you don't take care and she'll be stove in. Be smart now and rig-out that clewline there to the brace-block at the end of the yardarm. It will serve to lower down this poor beggar into the boat, which you must all fend off. Let her just come under the spar handsomely, without touching the side."

These directions being carefully adhered to, we contrived, by using great caution, though not without considerable risk, to lower down the almost lifeless man into the cutter; after which we descended ourselves, Mr Jellaby being the last to leave the hapless hulk, letting go the grapnel as he dropped into the sternsheets.

The doctor and I caught him as he joined us, everyone else having enough to do to keep the boat steady with the oars; while Bates, of course, was busy with the tiller, which he kept amidships.

As the boat drifted past the low rail of the vessel, now almost level with the water, which partly sheltered us from the full force of the wind and waves, I had the opportunity, when we glided under the stern, to read her name emblazoned thereon in large gilt letters.

It was La Bella Catarina.

"Give way, men!" cried the lieutenant, on our getting out into the open sea the next moment beyond the hull of the derelict, the coxswain heading the cutter directly for our ship, which had run down to leeward of the wreck so that we could fetch her more easily. "Pull all you can, my lads. Our lives depend on it!"

We were about half-way towards the Candahar, which had gone about on the port tack, beating to windward and coming up to meet us, the crew of the boat bending their backs and pulling their hardest till the stout ash blades nearly doubled in two with the strain, while the big, rolling sea raced after us, trying to catch us up; when, all of a sudden, the man holding the stroke oar on the after thwart uttered an exclamation which made the lieutenant look behind.

"By Jove!" he cried, "we've had a narrow shave."

The doctor and I both turned round at this.

We were only just in time to see the ill-fated vessel which we had so recently left, rear herself end on and sink beneath the waves, bow foremost!



CHAPTER TWENTY.

"A BIT OF A BLOW!"

The doctor did not like the flippant way in which the lieutenant alluded to our providential escape.

"You ought to thank God, Mr Jellaby, with all your heart that you have not gone down in her," he said in a grave and impressive tone, looking him full in the face. "It is far too serious a matter for you to speak of so lightly. Just think, man, we've only been saved by a hair's-breadth from death!"

The lieutenant, however, was incorrigible.

"A miss is as good as a mile, doctor," he rejoined with a laugh, which made all the boat's crew grin in sympathy, his devil-may-care philosophy appealing more strongly to their sailor nature than the doctor's moral reflections. "Stand by, bows!"

On this, the bowmen unshipped their oars with great care, so as not to cause any rocking; and, laying them in dexterously, faced round at the same time, one holding a boathook ready and the other the grapnel with a coil of rope attached, prepared to fling it when we were near enough to the ship.

Our gallant vessel was plunging along athwart our course as if she meant to give us the go-by, the sea foaming up at her bows in a big wave that curled up in front of her forefoot and broke over her figurehead as she dipped, sending the surf high in the air in a sheet of foam over her forecastle.

Those on board, though, had no intention of abandoning us, as we could quickly see, had we needed any assurance on the point.

Just as she was within half a cable's length of our starboard beam, we could hear the sound of the shrill boatswain's pipe above the splash of the sea; when she came up to the wind so close to the cutter that it looked as if she was going to run us down instanter.

But, we knew better than that.

"Way enough!" shouted Mr Jellaby; and, by an adroit turn of the tiller, the boat's nose shoved in under her lee to port into the slack water made by her hull. "Be ready with that grapnel there forrud!"

There was no necessity, however, for using this, for Commander Nesbitt had stationed a man in the chains to watch for us; and, immediately we rounded-in under the counter the seaman payed out a long grass rope attached to a buoy, which, as it floated past the bowman was easily able to pick up with his boathook and make fast beneath the thwarts of the cutter forwards.

We were, by this means, hauled up alongside until we were right below the quarter, with the side of our noble vessel towering above us like a great wall, and swinging over our heads; the creaking boat falls, oscillating backwards and forwards as if they were a couple of pendulums, rendering it very difficult to hook on the cutter, especially as she was lifted up one moment by a wave passing under the keel to the main deck ports, and lowered the next down to the ship's bilge.

But, at last, the task was accomplished, and then at the pipe of the boatswain, which we could now hear more clearly than before, the cutter, with all her crew and passengers still in her, was run up to the davits and secured, the ship at once filling and bearing away on her course again, now close-hauled on the starboard tack.

Captain Farmer was standing on the poop talking with the commander when we gained the deck; and, as Mr Jellaby at once went up to them to make his report, while Dr Nettleby was busying himself with superintending the removal of the man we had rescued, who had not yet regained consciousness, down to the sick bay, a couple of other marines being called to help the corporal, I thought I might as well go below also and shift my uniform, which was pretty nearly soaked through, making me feel very cold and uncomfortable.

This was a day of surprises.

For, no sooner had I got down to my chest in the steerage and begun to peel off my wet clothes, than Ned Anstruther came up to me.

I thought at first he was going to congratulate me on having got off from the wreck before she foundered, all on board, having, of course, seen her sink.

But, greatly to my astonishment, my watch-mate raised a rope's-end which he held in his outstretched hand and proceeded to lay it across my shoulders; the beggar giving me several sharp cuts with the "colt" ere I realised what he was up to.

"That will teach you not to supplant me and go in my boat again, you young rascal!" he cried, pegging away merrily with the rope's-end on my bare back. "I intend to give you one of the best thrashings you ever had in your life for doing it!"

"What do you mean?" I exclaimed, trying to ward off the cuts with my arm. "Anstruther, you're mad, I think! I never wished to supplant you. It was the commander who would not let you go in the cutter, not I."

"Oh, was it?" said he, ironically, still laying on as hard as he could with the rope's-end, which really stung me very much. "Well, as I can't lick him, my joker, I shall lick you!"

"Will you?" I retorted; and, finding expostulation of no avail, I tried retaliation, commencing now to hit out with my fists in return. "Two can play at that game, old fellow; and as you force me to do it, take that and that!"

My action followed suit to my words, as I gave him a smart "one, two" with my left, which knocked him backwards against Mr Stormcock just as the latter was coming out of the gunroom.

"Hullo, what is this?" cried the master's mate, as Ned Anstruther, cannoned off his stomach, sending him flying across the deck from the ship lurching. "Fighting again? By jingo, I never saw such a pack of young gamecocks in my life. There was, cheeky little Tom Mills wanting to peg into that swab Andrews last night, and now here are you two at it hammer and tongs. Why, I thought you were chums and both of you in the same watch, the very closest of friends."

"Of course we are," said I, laughing at the comicality of the situation, which struck me all of a moment. "Anstruther and I are very good friends. I'm sure I don't want to do him any harm."

"So I should think," replied Mr Stormcock, drily. "It looks uncommonly like it, judging by the way you are slogging each other about! But come now, I won't have any more of this. Shake hands and make it up at once, do you hear, or I'll report you to the commander."

"Why," exclaimed my antagonist, rubbing his eye ruefully, "Commander Nesbitt is the cause of it all!"

"Indeed!" said Mr Stormcock, with a whistle of surprise at this extraordinary assertion. "How do you make that out?"

"Because he sent Jack Vernon in the first cutter in my place."

"Oh, you ass! It was for that, then, that you were fighting this poor chap here, who I'm sure you ought to be grateful to for taking a very nasty job off your hands. See, he's not only wet to the skin, but narrowly escaped going to the bottom, as you know; and now, in return for this kindness, you try to wop him, and end in getting wopped instead yourself. Anstruther, you're an ass, and more than that, you're an ungrateful ass; and I've half a mind to thrash you myself for your conduct to Vernon!"

"I never thought of it in that light," said Ned, holding out his fist to me in a different fashion to that in which I had presented mine to him shortly before. "Let us be friends again, old chap. I'm very sorry I struck you, Jack; but I was so jealous of your going off in the cutter and angry at being left behind that I didn't think of what I was doing."

"Well, I'm sorry I hit you, too, my dear Ned," said I, shaking hands in a cordial grip. "I hope I didn't hurt you much."

"You've only given me a black eye, which will make me go on the sick list," he replied with a grin. "I can't very well appear on the quarter-deck with the 'Blue Peter' hoisted; for, the cap'en would notice it in a minute and ask me how I came by it."

"There would be no difficulty about that," interposed Mr Stormcock; "you could tell him the commander gave it to you, for you said just now he was the cause of all the row, you know."

This made us both laugh, and dinner being now ready, Ned Anstruther and I went into the gunroom together as soon as I had completed my interrupted toilet.

Here, sitting side by side, the best of friends, and enjoying our pea soup, no one looking at us not in the secret would have readily imagined that any such "little unpleasantness," as I have described had just occurred between us two; though, I am happy to be able to state, this was our first and last quarrel, Ned and I remaining the closest chums ever after and never subsequently having even a word squabble.

During the afternoon, the wind veered to the north-west, blowing stronger after the sun passed the meridian and increasing hourly so much in force that, at Four Bells, we hauled down the jib and close-reefed the spanker, the mizzen topsail being also taken in at the same time.

There was every indication of our having a gale, the barometer having fallen considerably since the morning; while the sea got up more and more and the horizon ahead became banked with a mass of blue-black clouds as dark as night, patches of lighter vapour also scudding rapidly across the sky.

At Six Bells things began to look serious, the wind now shrieking as it tore through the rigging and the heavy rolling waves to break inboard, washing the decks fore and aft; so, the hands were turned up to furl the mainsail and take in the spanker.

This relieved the ship somewhat; but, as she still laboured very much, the topsails were close-reefed and a reef taken in the foresail, the men being almost blown off the yards when aloft while doing this and having hard work to get down safely on deck again when the job was done, the force of the gale being such that they were flattened against the rigging and had to hold on "by the skin of their teeth," as sailor folk say.

Even this amount of canvas, however, reduced though it was, presently proved too much for her; and the commander therefore gave the order to furl the foresail and haul down the foretopmast staysail, a storm staysail being set on the forestay to keep the vessel under steerage way as she tore through the tempest-tossed water like a maddened thing, rolling her gunwales under and pitching sometimes to that extent that she seemed about to dive into the deep never to rise again.

There were four men at the wheel; and yet, with all their exertion, it was impossible to preserve a straight course, for the ship yawed from side to side, as if seeking to escape the following seas that raced after her, rearing their threatening crests right over the taffrail.

So, fearing that we might get pooped, we now furled the foretopsail and lay-to under our close-reefed maintopsail and storm staysails; thus awaiting what might further be in store for us, although it did not then seem possible that anything could be worse!

We were all soon undeceived, however, on this point; although we had about half-an-hour's let off, during which interval the commander and gunnery lieutenant employed themselves in having the guns secured with double breechings and stout seven-inch hawsers triced up along the decks in their rear, a separate tackle being bent on into this and passing under the neck ring of each of the long thirty-two pounders, in order to prevent their taking charge and waltzing about amidships when the vessel rolled.

Ay, and she did roll, too!

The decks also were battened down to keep out the floods of water, which she was continually taking in over the bows, from passing too freely below, where a considerable quantity had already, indeed, gone, making us rather damp down in the steerage.

Lifelines were likewise rove on the poop and upper deck, where it was now impossible to move a step without having something to lay hold of.

This was not only on account of the heavy lurches the vessel gave from port to starboard and then back again to port; but, the planks were wet and slippery, and besides, as she plunged and pitched, head to sea, great green, rolling waves would break on the forecastle and pour down into the waist, rushing aft like a river and sweeping anyone off his legs who was caught unprepared.

The wind itself was blowing so strongly that I couldn't stand upright, having to shelter myself under the lee of the bulwarks when I was on the poop.

But, this was nothing to what came later, old Boreas then putting a fresh hand to his bellows.

Hardly had the guns been properly secured and everything made snug and fast below and aloft, when the gale recommenced with tenfold violence; constant squalls bursting over the ship, accompanied by showers of hail that pattered on the planks like rifle bullets and took the skin off any fellow's face that was exposed to it without protection.

It made mine smart, I know!

In the midst of one of these sharp squalls, the maintopsail was blown to pieces with a report that sounded as if a gun had been fired off close to my ear; and, at the same moment, there was a loud crack heard from the top as if something had given way in addition to the sail.

Nothing, though, could be done about this for the moment, more pressing business being on hand; for, in consequence of the topsail giving, the ship's head payed off and getting into the hollow of the sea she precious nearly rolled her masts out her in less time than one could count.

"Down with that fore staysail," shouted the commander through his speaking trumpet. "Look alive man and set the topsail at once!"

His voice could not be distinguished beyond the length of the trumpet he roared through; but the boatswain's mates passed on the order from hand to hand until it reached the first lieutenant and the master, both of whom were stationed forwards, where it was instantly acted on and the ship's head brought back to the wind.

After this the storm staysail was rehoisted and we lay-to again in comparative safety.

Mr Cleete, the carpenter, then went up into the maintop to see what had happened to cause the loud crack we had heard.

He came back from his perilous journey with the unwelcome news that the topsail yard had been sprung and was in a very ticklish state, the carpenter adding that the spar ought to be fished as soon as possible or it might part company.

It had to remain as it was, however, for the present, the commander not wishing to peril the men's lives needlessly by sending them aloft unless it was absolutely necessary for the safety of the ship; for it was not any easy thing to shift such a big spar as the topsail yard in a gale of wind. "If it chooses to go by the board before it could be seen to," said he, "why, well and good, go it must, that's all!"

So Commander Nesbitt evidently thought, I was sure, from the way in which he shrugged his shoulders and pointed in dumb show aloft and then to the sea, when the carpenter tried to press the claims of the topsail yard on his notice.

When the hands were sent down and the watch set at Eight Bells, to my inexperienced eyes the hurricane appeared to be at its height; the howling of the wind and angry roar of the clashing waves being absolutely awful to listen to, drowning as they did every other sound on board the ship on deck.

Nor was it any the better below, the groaning of the timbers there, as of a lost soul crying out in its last agony, with the rattling of crockery and other mess gear, adding to the tumult without, made a perfect pandemonium of the gunroom.

A fellow could not hear what another said, though it were shouted in his ear as loudly as the speaker could bawl; albeit some of my messmates certainly had powerful lungs of their own—lungs which they were not chary of testing when occasion offered!

I turned in early; but, not being able to sleep for the racket that was going on, I returned to the deck, remaining there in the most sheltered corner I could find with Tom Mills, the two of us watching with spellbound attention until close on midnight the wonderful struggle between the spirits of the air and the demons of the deep—the pale-faced moon shining out occasionally from the dark vault of the heavens overhead, lighting up the stormy sea that served as the battle-ground of the storm fiends with her sickly gleams and making it seem like a field of snow, its vast expanse being covered with yeasty foam as far as the eye could reach.

The gale lasted all that night and the following day; when, late in the evening, the weather commenced to moderate, the wind calming down finally towards the close of the middle watch next morning.

It had then been blowing for thirty-six hours, during the whole of which time neither Captain Farmer nor the commander had left the deck; while most of the officers and men also had remained up on duty, it being a case almost of "all hands" from the beginning of the tempest to its end!



CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

THE SPANISH CAPTAIN'S STORY.

When I went up on deck that morning I could hardly believe my eyes, on seeing that the storm and all its wild surroundings had miraculously disappeared; for, the sun was shining brightly on a blue sea that seemed to ripple with laughter and the good old ship was speeding along under all plain sail, looking none the worse for the buffeting she had experienced only a few hours before!

"Rather a change from yesterday, ain't it, youngster?" observed Mr Gilham, who was officer of the watch, addressing me kindly, noticing the expression of astonishment on my face as I glanced up aloft and then over the side. "Things look a little more ship-shape than they were then."

"Yes, sir," I replied. "But what a fearful gale it was!"

"Pooh, nonsense, Vernon!" cried he, with a laugh. "Don't overlay your yarns like that. We've certainly had a bit of a blow, but I've seen it much worse crossing the bay!"

Of course, I could not contradict him; and, I may here mention that on narrating the circumstance to Dad on my return home some time afterwards, he said that he had never known a sailor acknowledge anything unusual about a storm at the immediate moment of its occurrence, or even shortly afterwards.

All those with whom he had ever been brought in contact, Dad told me, might possibly allow that the wind was "freshening," perhaps, or "blowing stiffly," or "inclined to be rough"; but, a gale or a hurricane they would never admit, in spite of the fact of its "blowing great guns and small-arms!"

Should anyone, Dad also said, incautiously hazard some definite opinion on the state of the weather, any seaman thus spoken to would invariably recall a previous occasion within his own experience when it was really bad enough to speak about—it being the rule with all true sons of the sea to minimise danger and laugh at the perils they have escaped, instead of making mountains out of molehills in the manner natural to most landsmen!

Besides thus upsetting my ideas as to the terrible ordeal we had gone through, concerning which, however, I held to my own view in spite of his protest to be contrary, although, of course, I did not tell him so, Mr Gilham informed me that we had suffered no serious damage beyond the injury to the topsail yard.

This, he said, too, was much less than Mr Cleete, the carpenter, had made out, that worthy being one of the sort of men who always take a despondent view of everything.

The spar, however, was sent down and replaced by a spare yard which we carried; and everything was all right aloft now.

We had lost something in another way, though; for, when Mr Quadrant took the sun at noon, with all of us youngsters standing round him with our sextants, like a parcel of chickens gathered about an old hen, which indeed the master greatly resembled with his shock head of hair and fussy manner, the ship was found to be in latitude 44 degrees 5 minutes north and longitude 7 degrees 50 minutes west.

She had been driven to the south-east by the gale, aided by the drift of the current setting in to the Bay of Biscay.

This was more than two hundred miles out of our proper track, and far too much to the eastward to be able to weather the northern extremity of the Spanish coast, which would soon be perilously near to us, running as we then were to the sou'-sou'-west.

Fortunately for us, though, the wind had now veered to the southward; and, as we were sailing on the port tack, by giving the ship a good deal of weather helm and bracing round the yards, we were able to bear up to the westward out of the ill-omened bay, steering west by south until we were in longitude 11 degrees 10 minutes west and well clear of Cape Finisterre, when we hauled our wind and shaped a course direct for Madeira.

This, however, was not until next day; and, I recollect, after we luffed up again and bore to the southward, a lot of talk went on in the gunroom at dinner-time about the probability of our stopping or not at that beautiful island, the gem of the Atlantic.

"I say, Jack Vernon," sang out Larkyns to me, across the table, "I suppose you know why it is called Madeira?"

"No," I replied. "Why?"

"Well," he began, "it is rather a romantic story—"

"Then, I shouldn't think it can be much in your line," interrupted Mr Stormcock, who somehow or other was always down upon any chap for ever starting a yarn. "You tell very practical ones; only, instead of the term 'story' I would use a shorter and more expressive word."

"Say 'lie' if you like; I know you mean it," rejoined Larkyns, in no way put out by the rude insinuation and continuing his narrative quite composedly. "But, you're wrong in this case, old Stormy, for 'faix it's no lie I'm telling you now,' as the doctor's Irish marine would say. It's the plain, unadulterated truth. I had the tale from a Portuguese monk at Funchal."

"Funchal," put in Mr Fortescue Jones, the assistant-paymaster, caressing his whiskers as usual and cocking his eye as if he were going to catch Larkyns tripping. "When were you there?"

"In the Majestic, when I was a cadet," promptly returned the mid, taking up the cudgels at once. "It was in the same year you were tried by court-martial for breaking your leave!"

This was a "settler" for poor Mr Jones.

"Go on, Larkyns," I said, at this point, to change the conversation and cover the paymaster's confusion as he bent his head over his plate. "I want to hear that yarn of yours about Madeira."

"All right, Johnny," he replied in his chaffy way; "only, you don't pronounce the name right, my son. It should be called 'My-deary,' not 'Madeir-ah.' Hang it all, Stormcock, stow that!"

"Don't apologise," said the master's mate, who just at that instant had thrown a biscuit at Larkyns, causing the violent interjection which he interpolated in his story. "I thought I would supply the proper accentuation for you, that's all."

"If you don't look out and leave me alone, I will pretty soon accentuate your nose, Stormy," retorted the other, all good humour again, as he always was; for he took a joke, even of the most practical sort, as freely as he perpetrated one. "Yes, Johnny Vernon, it should be called 'My-deary,' and I'll tell you why. The island, so the monk told me, owes its origin, or rather discovery, to two lovers who fled thither in the year fourteen hundred and something. One of these lovyers, my young friend, was a Scotchman named Robert Matchim, and the other was a Miss Anna D'Arfet, a young lady residing at Lisbon, whose parents objected to Robert and refused to match her with Matchim."

Mr Stormcock pitched another biscuit immediately at Larkyns, crying out at the same time—

"That's for your bad pun!"

The wag, however, dodged it and proceeded with his yarn.

"Being a Scotchman, although poor, as few of the nation are," proceeded he, aiming this retaliatory shot at the master's mate, who, he knew, hailed from the North and hadn't a spare bawbee to bless himself with, "our friend, Robert Matchim, being as brave as he was bold, would not be done by a pitiful Portuguese laird. So, he pawned the title-deeds of his ancestral estates in Skye, where I forgot to mention he lived when at home; and, chartering a caravel, which happened luckily to be lying at anchor off the port at the time, smuggled his sweetheart on board and sailed away—with the intention of eloping to France, where her stern paryent would, he thought, be unable to follow him for certain political reasons."

"Very good so far," interposed Mr Stormcock again at this point, in an ironical tone. "Pray go on; it is most interesting!"

"Glad you like it," said Larkyns, coolly, without turning a hair. "Well, then, to finish the story. Very unfortunately for these fond lovyers, a storm arose, like that bit of breeze we had t'other day. This blew them out of their course and they lost their reckoning, landing at this very island, of which we are speaking instead of at some French port as they expected. The spot they pitched on was called Machico Bay on the eastern side; and there they lived happy ever after, having the additional satisfaction after departing this life of being both buried in one grave. Their last resting-place was seen by a party of Spaniards who subsequently re-discovered the island; when these sentimental mariners, noting the names of the aforesaid lovyers on their joint tombstone, and the account there detailed of their strange adventures, very romantically and devoutly erected a chapel to their memory. This chapel exists to this very day and can be seen by you, Stormy, or any other unbeliever in the truthfulness of my yarn! It is for this reason, my worthy Johnny, that I insist that the island shall be properly styled 'My-deary'; for, as Robert loved Anna, he would naturally have addressed her as 'My-deary.' Do you twig, young 'un, eh?"

"Oh, yes," I answered with a snigger, "I think, though, it's rather far-fetched."

"So it is," said he. "It came from Madeira; and that's some six hundred miles, more or less, from where we now are."

At that moment, Corporal Macan appeared at the door of the gunroom and walked up to where I was sitting.

"If you plaize, sor," he said, pulling his forelock, "the docthor would loike to say yez in the sick bay."

"Indeed, Macan," I cried. "Do you know what he wants me for?"

"The jintleman we tuk off the wrack's rekivered his sinses, an' none ov us, sure, can under-constubble his furrin lingo barrin' yersilf, sor. So, the docther wants ye fur to say what he's jabberin' about."

"All right," said I, bolting as quickly as I could a piece of "plum duff" which Dobbs had just brought me. "Tell the doctor I'm coming."

"By jingo, talk of the devil!" observed Larkyns, bursting into a laugh as Macan turned to go away. "Why, I was only just talking of that blessed Irish marine a minute ago, and here he has come on the scene in person, with his rum brogue."

"Hush!" I said. "He'll hear you."

"No matter if he does," rejoined Larkyns. "I suppose he knows he has got the Cork brogue strong enough to hang a cat-block from. Besides, he won't mind what I say."

"Faix, that's thrue for yez, sor," muttered the corporal, who caught this remark as he was going out of the gunroom door, his ears being as sharp as those of a fox. "Begorrah, it's moighty little onyone ivver does mind what ye says at all, at all!"

With which doubtful compliment, capable of a double construction, Corporal Macan marched on in front of me, holding his head very erect and with a broad grin on his face, as if conscious of carrying off the honours of the war, towards Dr Nettleby's sanctum on the main deck.

Here, on entering, I noticed the Spaniard sitting up in one of the doctor's easy chairs.

He was near an open port, looking very different to what he was the last time I had seen him, a healthy colour being now in his face; although this was still very much drawn and careworn, but his black hair and beard were tidily arranged, much improving his personal appearance.

He raised his eyes as I came into the cabin, and smiled faintly, seeming to recognise me somehow or other, though he was certainly off his head on board the wreck and could not have remembered what took place there.

"He, senor muchaco—so, young gentleman," said he, on my approaching nearer to him. "Ta hablas Espanola—you speak my language then?"

"Si, senor—yes, sir," I replied. "Un poco—a very little!"

His face instantly brightened, and he poured out a flood of Spanish which I could hardly follow, he spoke so quickly; although, I could gather that he wanted to know where he was and how he had been rescued, inquiring as well what had become of the rest who were in the ship with him.

The doctor, to whom I tried to translate what he said, cautioned me to be very careful what I told him in reply; for, the man, he said, was still in a critical state and any sudden shock would retard his recovery.

I was, therefore, very guarded in my answers to his questions, letting out all he wished to learn only little by little, as he drew it from me by his interrogations.

He expressed the most fervent gratitude on my narrating how we had boarded his water-logged vessel and the difficulty Mr Jellaby had in releasing him from his dangerous position; and, he bowed his thanks to Doctor Nettleby, addressing him as "Senor Medico—Mr Doctor," for his kind care of him.

But, when I came to describe what the lieutenant and I had seen in the cabin, his manner changed at once; his eyes rolling with fury and his thin, nervous hands clenching in impotent rage and despair, and he tried to stand up, raising himself out of the chair.

"Ay la povera senora—oh, the poor lady!" he cried out, his eyes now filling and his mouth working with emotion, which he vainly tried to suppress as I told him of the poor dead lady and the little baby floating about on the floor, both of them murdered—"E la pequina nina— and the little child, too!"

On my telling him next, in answer to another question, about the fine-looking fellow with the revolver in his hand, his feelings could no longer be suppressed.

"Mi hermano! Oh, my brother!" he exclaimed, bursting into tears. "Muerto! muerto! dead, dead!"

Doctor Nettleby and I turned away, it being painful in the extreme to see a grown man such as he crying like a child; for his breast was heaving and his shoulders shaking with the sobs he endeavoured to conceal, and he hid his face in his hands as he leant back again in the chair.

After a bit, on his becoming more composed again, the doctor gave him a stimulant, which quieted his nerves.

Just then the captain came in, followed by Lieutenant Jellaby, to make inquiries, the doctor having reported his patient convalescent.

"El capitano—this is the Captain," said I, to attract his attention to the new arrivals as they advanced up to his chair. "El capitano del nostro buque—the captain of our ship!"

I also pointed out in like fashion Mr Jellaby, saying that he was the officer who had effected his rescue; and the Spaniard bowed silently to both.

Captain Farmer, however, did not need any introduction from me, for he spoke the other's language fluently, being a most accomplished linguist; so, he and the poor fellow were soon on the best of terms, the survivor from the wreck proceeding presently to tell the succinct history of the ill-fated vessel.

This we had all been longing to hear; and Captain Farmer now translated it word for word for the benefit of the doctor and Mr Jellaby, who, as I have already said, did not understand the original Spanish in which it was rendered.

The Spaniard said that his name was Don Ferdinando Olivarez and that he had been the captain and part owner of the barque, which was bound from Cadiz to Havana with a cargo of the wines of Xeres. She had on board, besides, a large quantity of specie, which the Spanish Government were sending out for the payment of the troops in Cuba.

"Your ship was named La Bella Catarina, senor," said I, at this point, as he had not mentioned this fact, though I don't think Captain Farmer approved of my interruption, for he gave me a look which made me shut up at once, "was she not sir?"

"Yes, young gentleman," he replied. "She was so-called after my poor sister-in-law, the murdered lady whose body you saw in the cabin which proved her tomb—Ay que hermosa esta—oh, how beautiful she was! She was the wife of my only brother, Don Pedro Olivarez, who died in defending her. Thus his corpse you also beheld. Oh, my friends, he was the noblest, best and bravest brother in the world. He had, alas, a joint share with me in that accursed vessel."

He was overcome with emotion again when he had got so far; and Dr Nettleby, fearing the narration was too much for him in his present weak state, wanted him to leave off his story until he felt better.

But after resting a minute or two and taking another sip of the cordial the doctor handed him, the Spaniard insisted on going on with the painful recital.

His brother, he said, had charge of the specie sent out in their ship; and, as his wife had been recommended change of air, he determined to take her with him on the voyage to Cuba, thinking the trip out and home would do her good, as well as the poor little baby, who had been only born two months to the very day on which they sailed from Cadiz.

All went well with them until they were near the Azores, or Western Islands, where the ship sprang a leak and met with such baffling winds that she was driven back to the eastward, close in to the Portuguese coast; when the crew, who were tired out with keeping to the pumps, managed to broach the cargo and madden themselves with the liquor they found below.

"What happened next?" asked Captain Farmer, on his pausing here to take breath and put the cordial to his lips. "I suppose they got drunk on the sherry, my friend?"

"Ah, yes, los maladettos—the cursed devils!" replied the Spanish captain, his eyes flashing with anger. "If the brutes had only got drunk, neither my brother nor I would have minded it much, although they might have done so at our expense, it being our wine which they wasted, the brutes!"

He then went on to state that the men became so violent and insubordinate, that when his brother and himself battened down the hatches to prevent their broaching any more of the casks, they broke into open mutiny.

The mate was the ringleader of the conspiracy.

It was this rascal, he said, who informed the crew that they had specie aboard, which the mutineers now demanded should be given up to them and they be allowed to leave the ship in one of her boats, the mate telling them that the vessel was almost in sight of Vigo—a fact which he, the captain, had only disclosed to him in confidence that very day within an hour or so of the outbreak, so that the mutiny appeared to be a planned thing.

"Well," said Captain Farmer, "what did you do then?"

"We refused their insolent demand, of course," he answered, "in spite of the mate and another scoundrel drawing their knives and making for us. My brother knocked down Gomez at once, and the sailor I kicked into the scuppers; the two of us then retreated to the cabin, where we kept them at bay for the whole of that night and all the following day, as we had with us all the firearms in the ship, and it was out of their power to dislodge us."

"And how was it then you did not succeed in getting the upper hand of them in the end, instead of the affair turning out as it did?"

In reply to this question from our captain, the Spaniard's emotion again overcame him.

"Ay, it was all my fault, and I of all men am the most miserable!" he cried. "Yo, I it was who caused the death of those I loved best!"

"Carramba, Senor Capitano," said Captain Farmer, trying to soothe him. "You do yourself an injustice. I can't see where you were to blame!"

"Ah, but I do," he answered doggedly, as if he had made up his mind on the point and no argument would persuade him to the contrary. "I ought to have recollected that there was no water or provisions in the cabin, the steward, who had joined the mutineers, keeping these always in the fore part of the ship; and, there was the poor senora, who had her little baby to nurse, suffering from hunger and thirst, as we could see, my brother and I, although she never uttered a word of complaint!"

"Poor, brave lady," observed the captain. "She deserved a better fate!"

"Si, si, yes, yes," said the other, "She did not complain—no, never; but, how could we stand by and see her suffer? My brother Pedro, when it came on to nightfall on the close of the second day of our blockade in the cabin, said that he would adventure out in search of food and water, the mutineers then having drunk themselves to sleep. I, however, pointed out that he had a wife and child dependent on his life, while I had no claims on mine and insisted on my right to take the risk, the more especially from my being the master of the ship. Still, he would not give in; and, ultimately, we cast the dice to decide the matter and I won the cast."

"You then left the cabin?"

"Yes, senor. My brother barricaded the door behind me and kept watch with his revolver, while I crept forwards stealthily. I reached the steward's pantry in the deckhouse amidships, without being seen and secured some polenta and a baraca of water; when, as I was creeping aft again and close to the poop, that villain of a mate caught hold of my arm, pointing a stiletto in my face at the same time, and threatening to stab me if I uttered a cry. But, before I could open my mouth, he shoved a gag in it and then proceeded to drag me to the side of the ship, lashing me to the spot whence your two officers released me some three days afterwards, if my calculation is correct."

"Good heavens!" exclaimed the captain. "What agony you must have suffered tied up like that, and without anything to eat or drink, I suppose, all the while?"

"Nothing, not a bite or drop, passed my lips from the time of the night of the mutiny until your brave officers and men, Senor Capitano, so nobly came to my assistance."

"You must then have been quite five days without sustenance," said Captain Farmer, astonished at his endurance. "I wonder you lived through it, with all that exposure to the weather, too!"

"Ah, it was nothing. I did not think of myself," replied the other. "I was in torture for my brother and his poor wife and little child, for, as soon as I was gagged and bound, I saw Gomez and six of the villains all draw their knives and start towards the poop; and, presently, I heard the shriek of a woman's voice which I recognised as my sister's, the senora, and then four pistol-shots in rapid succession, after which I don't know what happened for a time. I must have lost my senses or fainted."

"And then?"

"When I came to myself again," continued the Spanish captain, as we all listened breathlessly to his narrative, "it was near morning and the light of the coming dawn beginning to show in the eastern sky; so, hearing a lot of talking and quarrelling going on, I looked towards the forecastle, whence the sound seemed to proceed."

"Well," said Captain Farmer, who was as interested apparently as I was, "what did you see?"

"I saw a lot of the crew sitting round a tub of brandy, some of which we had shipped along with the wine as part of our cargo, although it had escaped their observation at first, being stowed low down, under the casks of the sherry. However, they had discovered it now, and had evidently been having an orgie, all of them being more than half drunk. They were swearing and fighting, playing cards by the dim light of one of the ship's lanterns, which was stuck up on the deck beside them. I noticed, too, that a heap of gold was piled up on top of an empty brandy tub, standing to the right of the man dealing the cards, which showed that they had managed to break open the treasure chest containing the government specie; and, I was in an agony of apprehension about my brother's fate, not to speak of his wife and child, when, with a wild shout, one of the villains threw down his cards and clutched at the pile of gold, scrambling up on his feet at the same time and making for the side of the ship where I was lashed against the bulwarks. It was that scoundrel Gomez."

"The mate, eh?"

"Yes, Senor Capitano. He had a revolver, I saw, in his hand, which he must have got from the cabin after murdering my brother. This thought flashed through my mind instantly, and as it did so, the wretch advanced nearer to the break of the forecastle and fired at me, calling out at the same time, 'Carramba, I've settled your dog of a brother and now I am going to finish you off!' The good God, however, defeated his purpose, for the bullet did not penetrate my brain as he intended. No, strange to say, it shot away the knot of the rope's-end that was passed across my mouth to gag me, relieving me at once from considerable pain."

"Did he not fire again?"

"No," replied the Spaniard, his countenance lighting up with a sort of ferocious joy that made me think for the moment he had gone suddenly mad at the recollection of his past sufferings. "Before the villain could aim a second shot in my direction, the most wonderful thing happened that, I believe, could ever have occurred. Yes, Senor Capitano, I declare to you, it was the most wonderful thing, now that I recall it again in speaking to you, that I have ever heard of in all my life. Ay, so wonderful and providential, that it would seem incredible to me were I not certain by this very occurrence, which has brought it home to me, that there is a Power above which watches over us and preserves us from danger, no matter how imminent that danger may be, and when the help of man is of no avail; a Power, too, that as frequently punishes the wicked in the very act of their wickedness, as happened in this case."

At that moment, the sentry who always stood on guard without the door of the sick bay entered the cabin, and saluting Captain Farmer, said the first lieutenant wished to speak to him; whereupon the captain, apologising for having to absent himself at such a critical point, at once withdrew, saying that he would not be long away.



CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

"A DIOS!"

"I can quite believe you, senor," said Captain Farmer on his return after a very brief interval, resuming the thread of the discourse as if no interruption had occurred. "Pray continue your story. I am dying to know what happened to checkmate that scoundrel of a mate as he was going to take another shot at you, thus defeating the design of the murdering ruffian."

"Without doubt, Senor Capitano, I will tell you," replied the Spaniard, drawing a long breath as he recommenced his yarn. "As the villain Gomez cocked and raised the revolver again—for I could see him plainly from the light of the ship's lantern flashing on the barrel—Dios! I perceived under the sheet of the foresail, which was flapping loosely about, for we were becalmed and the vessel was drifting aimlessly as she pleased, the mutineers taking no heed of anything but their accursed drink—I perceived, I say, a steamer approaching, end on and going apparently at full speed. I could have shouted out to warn the men on the forecastle, for the gag had been miraculously removed from my mouth, as I have told you, only a minute or so. But, Carramba, I would not have lifted my voice to have saved them, had I possessed a hundred mouths; for, I thought of my brother and his wife and child, and I exulted at their coming fate—Dios! My heart was throbbing with joy."

"How awful," said Captain Farmer, on the Spaniard's voice failing him at the terrible recollection of his experiences; "but, I can sympathise with you."

"Es Verdad, it was awful—so awful, that my heart was nigh bursting and my brain seemed on fire," replied the other in a calmer tone. "However, I had not long to wait, the whole thing, from the first moment I observed the steamer to the collision, lasting barely a second of time, although to me it was an eternity; for, as I saw the steamer, and heard the sound of her paddle-wheels, even as the villain Gomez aimed at me, the prow of the avenging vessel—which I regarded then, as now, as an instrument in the hand of God—came crashing into the bows of our ship, cutting through her hull and deck, and crumpling up the forecastle, senor, as if it had been a paper bag."

"And the mutineers?"

"Carramba!" cried the Spaniard, whose vindictiveness I thought appalling; only, of course, one had to make allowances for what he had suffered and the crimes the men of whom he spoke had committed. "They were all mangled and crushed in a moment, in the midst of their game of monte, as they were fighting and quarrelling over the stakes. The villain Gomez had his skull cracked like an eggshell by the foremast coming down on top of him, as it went by the board with all its yards and gear. The maintopmast, then fell also leaving La Bella Catarina the wreck you saw, Senor Lieutenant, and you, young gentleman, before she foundered."

He bowed to Mr Jellaby, as well as to myself, on saying this, as if to emphasise his description.

"Did not the steamer stop?"

"No, Senor Capitano," replied he in answer to this question of Captain Farmer's. "Everybody must have been asleep aboard, I think, just before it happened, and they had no lookout man on the watch; although as it was in the early grey of the morning, and we had no lights except that lantern on the forecastle, which could not have been seen at any distance, and was, of course, extinguished in the general smash-up afterwards, it was perhaps not to be wondered that they ran us down. The collision, though, appeared to wake them up, for I saw a dark figure on the paddle-box nearest to me as the steamer swung herself clear of us and forged ahead again. She had a good deal of way on, and by the time she stopped her engines she was some distance away and lost to sight in the darkness, there being a slight surface fog on the water; so, hearing nothing and seeing nothing of us, her people must have come to the conclusion that we had gone to the bottom, and so put her on her course again."

"Why," inquired the captain, "did not those wretched scoundrels cry out when the steamer came on them like that?"

"How could they? It was all done in a moment, as I have told you. One instant the devils were there, gambling and drinking and swearing amongst themselves, and the next, cr-r-r-ash, and they were gone to their patron saint below!"

"And then you were alone?"

"Yes, so far as I knew; but I was not quite certain yet that the scoundrel Gomez had not lied merely to sport with my misery, and that, perhaps, my poor brother might be still alive. However as the hours wore on without him ever making his appearance, and the crash of the collision would have well-nigh wakened the dead, I gave up hope, beginning to wonder then, as the sun rose up and the sea became illumined with light, whether some passing vessel might not sight the wreck and bear down to rescue me. By-and-by, though, on morning melting into day, and, later on, the afternoon waning on the approach of the shades of night, without ever a distant sail coming in sight to banish my despair, this hope, too, fled."

"You saw nothing, then?"

"Nothing but the seagulls, which swooped down over my head to see whether I were alive or dead; and it was fortunate my hands were free, or else they would have pecked out my eyes. Nothing but these and the boundless waste of the ocean, whose waters lapped the sides of the ship, which kept afloat, much to my surprise. Her buoyant cargo supported her, although her hold was full up to the main deck, and the sea washing in and out of her forwards; and, there was I, tied up there in the rigging like a dog, listening to the melancholy sound of the breaking waves. I was, you must recollect, utterly unable to help myself, for my arms were pinioned like my legs, although my hands were loose and I could move them about: but, otherwise, I was powerless and could not stir from the place where I was lashed, the ropes binding me being just secured beyond my reach by that villain Gomez, so as to make my agony all the greater."

"It must have been fearful," said Captain Farmer. "I wonder your brain did not give way."

"Thanks be to God, no! My reason was preserved throughout this terrible ordeal for some wise purpose or other; though, I must say, I prayed for death to release me from my sufferings, a maddening thirst now consuming me, to add to the torture that was preying on my mind," replied the other, shuddering at the recollection. "At last, the wind began to blow more strongly and the sea to get up. This lessened my pangs of thirst; but, the waves, constantly breaking over the side, almost drowned me, so one evil took the place of another, and this was all the benefit I reaped from the change. It must have been the following day, I think, for I became so numbed with the cold and exposure, the circulation of my blood being arrested by my cramped position, that I took no heed how the time went, when a ship at length hove in sight, and my heart began to beat again with renewed hope, in spite of my despairing thoughts and misery. Oh, heavens! The ship came nearer and nearer, so that I could see she was a vessel of war belonging to the French nation, and my torturing hope became a certainty. But, would you believe it, senor, when she had closed the wreck so that I could see the gun-ports on her upper deck, she luffed up and bore away again, hoisting her tricolour flag, which I shall always loathe the sight of now, as if in mockery of my condition. Fancy, deserting a shipwrecked man like that!"

"The commander of this very ship stopped us to say he had sighted the wreck of your vessel; but, unhappily, he was unable to lay-to to send a boat aboard," explained Captain Farmer, to excuse the French captain's conduct. "If he had not done this, perhaps we would never have come across you and been able to take you off, which I am heartily glad we were fortunate enough to succeed in doing!"

"Gracias, senor," rejoined the Spaniard, stretching out his hand, which our captain gripped in cordial interchange of friendship, "but you did not tell another ship to go to my rescue, you came yourself! The English are always brave and generous!"

"By Jove, he's right about that French ship," observed Mr Jellaby to me, aside, when the captain had translated this remark of the Spaniard, leaving out, however, his personal compliment to himself and our nation. "It was a scurvy trick to sail off like that, without examining the wreck. But it's just like those Johnny Crapauds, youngster. They're deuced good fair-weather friends but never stand by a fellow in distress!"

"I have not much more to tell you," went on the Spaniard after those little reciprocities between him and the captain. "It was one morning that the French vessel abandoned me and the next that yours came to my help. Dios, I could not believe I was in my senses when I heard the voices of your officers! I thought I was in a state of delirium and that the sight of your ship, especially after the disappointment of the preceding day, was only a mirage of my imagination, like the Fata Morgana!"

"But, you hailed us, sir," I said here, on the captain motioning me to come forward. "Why, you answered me when I spoke to you, sir!"

"I may have done so, my dear young gentleman," he replied with a faint smile, patting me on the head in an affectionate sort of way, as if he were caressing a pet poodle, so at least Mr Jellaby said afterwards to the other fellows; "but, I have no recollection of it, I assure you. Still, I must say that your voice seemed familiar to me just now, when you first came into the cabin here and addressed me. It seemed to me a voice that I had heard in a dream."

He then proceeded to compliment me on my Spanish, saying, in true hidalgo fashion, that I spoke it better than himself, which, as Mr Jellaby remarked, had to be taken "with a good deal of side on!"

Don Ferdinando Olivarez, to give him his rightful name, concluded his narrative by asking Captain Farmer to land him at Madeira, where he had friends who would supply all his needs, giving him the means to return home to Cadiz, to which port, he said, he must go back for business reasons; besides having to report the loss of his ship, though, as he added with a sigh, he no longer had a "home" there, now that his poor brother was dead, for he was the last of his race!

Of course, the captain promised to comply with his request, explaining that, although he had not intended stopping at the island, we would in any case have passed pretty close to it in our passage to the Cape; and that he would be only too glad to call in and put our passenger ashore, regretting, however, that he should have to lose the pleasure of his company so soon.

Dr Nettleby at this point interrupted any further exchange of civilities between the captain and the Spaniard, who was profuse in his thanks, declaring that his patient required rest, or he would not be able to go ashore either at Madeira or any other place on this planet.

The stern medico, who had been very much interested in Don Ferdinando's story, or he would never have permitted so much talking, then bundled us all incontinently out of the sick bay, Captain Farmer included.

Four days later we arrived off Funchal, passing, at the eastern extremity of the island, Machico Bay, where the lovers mentioned by Larkyns landed and lived and died, according to the legend. This, the Spanish captain said was quite true, for he had seen the grave himself and the little church erected to their memory, a statement that quite delighted our friend Larkyns, as he was able to throw it in the teeth of Mr Stormcock as soon as he heard it, in refutation of the base calumny of the latter in asserting that he had invented the yarn he told us at mess.

I was very sorry when Don Ferdinando left the ship, for his misfortunes and the fact of my having been in the boat that rescued him, made him seem like an old friend whom I had known for years, although we had only been such a short time acquainted.

He was very kind, too, in noticing me; and, before he was rowed ashore in the captain's gig, he presented me with a real gold medallion with the image and superscription stamped thereon of Saint Nicholas, the protector of all sailors. The Spanish captain told me that this had originally belonged to the great navigator, Christopher Columbus, of whom he was a distant descendant, and that it had been in his family for generations. He had always worn it, he said, next his heart as a preservative against shipwreck, and he fervently believed it was owing to his having it on him that he had been so miraculously saved when everyone else who had been on board La Bella Catarina with him had perished.

His now giving it to me was the most practical proof of his friendship he could offer, as he valued it beyond anything he possessed, and I only took it for fear of hurting his feelings, for I did not like to deprive him of it. He was, in truth, a noble fellow, and showed that his gratitude did not merely lie in mere empty words and idle compliments.

No, "out of sight out of mind" was not his guiding maxim, like it is of some people whom we all have met in the course of our lives; for, even after he had uttered his farewell as he rowed away from the ship in the captain's gig, wishing us with a graceful wave of the hand "A Dios!" he did not forget us, sending back by the coxswain a splendid present of flowers and fruit and vegetables, almost loading the gig, indeed, for the acceptance of the wardroom and gunroom messes. He forwarded, as well, a case of valuable wine of some special vintage for Captain Farmer's own table.

No one in fact who had done him a kindness when on board passed out of his remembrance, apparently, on his leaving; for, to the doctor he sent a diamond ring, to Lieutenant Jellaby a lady's fan, which, judging by what he had heard of his partiality for the fair sex, I suppose he thought would please him most; and to Corporal Macan and Bill Bates, who had been especially prominent at his rescue, a box of cigars each, while he also sent to the captain a handsome sum of money for him to distribute amongst the crew as he thought best.



CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

"CAPE SMOKE!"

We only stopped at Madeira long enough to get a few purser's stores to add to the supply with which the generosity of Don Ferdinando had already provided us. We also took in some water, for two of our tanks below had been "started" during our bucketting about in the bay, and Captain Farmer feared we might run short when we reached the warm latitudes; as, in the event of our falling across the usual calms prevalent in the neighbourhood of the Equator, we might be rolling about a week or two, roasting, in the Doldrums!

But, luckily, we were blessed with favouring winds and made a good passage, picking up the North-East Trades shortly after we said "good-bye" to Funchal, with its pretty white villas nestling on the hillside amid a background of greenery; and then, meeting with strong westerly breezes instead of calms, on getting further south into the Tropics, we crossed the Line on Christmas Day, when all the good people at home, I thought at the time, would be shivering with cold and saying, as they snuggled up to the fire, gazing perhaps on a snow-covered landscape without, "What seasonable weather we are having!" while we were sweltering in the heat under a copper sky, with the thermometer up to 98 degrees in the shade of the awnings!

From the Equator, we had a splendid run to the Cape, taking altogether exactly sixty-five days clear for our passage from England.

During this interval I and my brother cadets had to attend "school" every morning from half-past 9 o'clock to 11:30 in the captain's outer cabin under the poop, where the chaplain, who also filled the post of naval instructor, officiated as schoolmaster-in-chief, teaching us mathematics and the theory of navigation, as well as seeing that we kept up our logs, which Captain Farmer himself inspected once a week, to make certain that the chaplain, on his part, attended to his duty.

We got on very well with the Reverend Mr Smythe, who had all his longshore starchiness knocked out of him by his long bout of sea-sickness, the poor man having been confined to his bunk and completely prostrate with the fell malady from the hour that we weighed anchor at Plymouth until we "brought up" at Madeira. I should not, perhaps, have made use of this term, as it savours of tautology, the unfortunate chaplain having been industriously occupied in doing little else save "bringing up" all the time; especially when we were pitching and rolling in the Bay of Biscay!

Every day, too, at a quarter of an hour before noon, we had to muster on the poop, where, under the tutelage of the master, Mr Quadrant, we watched for the dip of the sun; and, as soon as the master reported that it was twelve o'clock to the captain, who told him "to make it so," and Eight Bells was struck on the ship's bell forwards, we would adjourn to the gunroom below.

There we all worked out the reckoning, showing our respective calculations or "fudgings" as the case might be, to Mr Quadrant; when if these "passed muster," we entered the result in our log-books, along with other observations and facts connected with the daily routine of the ship and her progress towards her destination.

To ascertain this, in addition to taking the sun at noon and noting the attitude of certain stars at night, the log was hove every hour; and each of us learnt in turn to fix the pin in the "dead man," as the log-ship is styled—the triangular piece of wood, with a long line attached, by which the speed of the ship is ascertained.

The first piece of this cord is termed the "stray line," and is generally of the same length as the ship, so as to allow for the eddy and wash of the wake astern; and, at the end of this stray line, a piece of bunting is inserted in the coil, from which a length of forty-seven feet three inches is measured off and a disc of leather put on the line to mark the termination of the first knot, or nautical mile. Two knots are put at the end of another length of forty-seven feet three inches; three knots at a third, and so on, until as much of the line has been thus measured and marked off at equal distances as will test the utmost sailing capacity of the ship—a single knot being placed midway, also, between each of these divisions, to denote the half knots.

Two sand-glasses are used in connection with the log-line, as the old quartermaster, who was our instructor in this branch of our nautical education, explained, the one called "the long glass," which runs out in twenty-eight seconds, while the other is a fourteen-second glass, which is generally adopted at sea when the ship is going over five knots with a fair wind.