up and down the quarter-deck; and so one
day, it was a Sunday, mind, the captain slips
into the cabin and soon after sends for me..
There was he with the spirit-case before him,
and the mate sitting cheek by jowl. 'Take a
seat. A glass of grog, Mr. Clank;' says he,
quite civil, and the mate gets up and shuts
the door; 'help yourself;' and with that he
shoves the rum over to me, 'and don't spoil
it with water.' You may believe I didn't
wait for twice asking; and it was prime
staff, surely; slipped down one's throat like
new milk. 'Take another,' says he; and
when he said that, I knew there was
mischief up, let alone his being so civil. When.
I'd drawed my breath, the captain began
again—

"'Bad luck so far, Mr. Clank; we shan't
have much to take home for our wives and
sweethearts, at this rate.'

"'Why no,' says I, 'we couldn't have been
more unlucky if we 'd had a black cat or a
parson aboard.'

"'And yet,' puts in the mate, 'there's
better, things than whales to be found in these
seas sometimes for those that have the pluck
to pick them up!' I could see the captain
was watching me all the time.

"So I answers, rather slow,' Well I'm game,
as long as it's follow my leader.' The captain
gives a deep 'ah,' as if he was satisfied, and
turning to the mate, with a wink, says, 'Well
I think we may put her about,' and so he
offered his box of Manillas to take my choice,
which I took for a hint to back out.

"That night we shifted our course until we
got right into the Straits of Sunda.

"One afternoon, a short time after this talk
in the cabin, the mate calls to me, and puts
his glass into my hand, and begs me to take
a squint at something right aways on our
starboard bow.

"'What do you make out ?' says he.

"'John Chinaman,' says I, 'a regular
Noah's ark; one, two, three, a regular fleet
of junks.'

"'That's just it,' says the mate, 'these are.
better than sperm whales: That's the
Monsoon fleet going down to buy goods at Singapore.
There's a merchant in every one of
those junks with a cabin like a parlour, a
regular shop all to himself. He has his goods
all nicely packed in small packages, and his
money in silver ingots and dollars in jars
ranged round like an apothecary's shop; so,
as soon as it's dusk, I think we must go and
do a bit of trade with the Chinaman.'

"I dropped down in a minute. You know,
Sir, I would not, on any account, have done
anything against Christians like ourselves,
but you see to take anything from these
Pagans, with their Idols and their Joss Houses,
was only spoiling, the Egyptian—spoiling the
Egyptian, Sir."

My squinting friend, who had been drinking
all the time at my expense, said this with a
sort of hypocritical snuffle, quite indescribable;
perhaps he was afraid of going too far with
me. He continued, "We kept edging off and
on till it was dark, just keeping the junk fleet
in view. I had a couple of boats all ready
and some picked hands, a lot of cutlasses, and
a dozen handspikes at the bottom of the boat
under a sail. We said aloud we were going
to have a trade with the Chinaman. The
lights of the joss-houses served us to steer
by; we did it as neat and comfortable as
could be. The first junk the crew were all
asleep until we were on deck, though it
was a heavy climb, but we had hooks for
that all ready.

"The mate knew where the merchant was
to be found, walked straight there, while all
but three kept guard forward, and in less
than half an hour we had all the silver and
half-a-dozen bundles of silk in the boats. The
second junk we had to quilt one fellow,
though generally a dozen will run like sheep
before one of our sort. Altogether we made
a very good night of it, and, before morning
were clean out of sight; and we played that
game as long as the season lasted. The crew
were very well satisfied; we put into South
American Ports, and got rid of the most
knowing. When we got back into Sydney
my share was better than three hundred
pounds. I don't know what the captain said
to the owners, but they seemed very well
content to ask no questions."

"Why, good heavens!" I involuntarily
and foolishly exclaimed, at the end of this
rascally relation, "that was rank piracy."

"Oh no, Sir, only not like cleaning out a
square-rigged ship; those yellow pig-eyed
fellows, with their pigtails, would not be believed
on their oaths; only spoiling the Egyptians."

So saying, he took a huge gulp at the grog.
It was too dusk under the shadow of the
sail for me to see the expression of his
countenance, or for him to see that of mine, as he
mouthed his pet phrase as if it had been an
answer to everything.

Warming with the grog, and my silence,
which he took for consent, he recommenced,
"Why, Sir, that's nothing to what a friend
of mine did to get a cargo of sandal-wood.
You see he was master of a small schooner in
the sandal wood trade—that's a bartering
trade with the South Sea Islanders, who are
most of them fierce savages, and many of
them cannibals. He'd sold his cargo pretty
well and went into port to lay in a stock of
articles for barter, and have a spree; and
spree he did, to that extent that he not only
spent all his money, but, when. he came to be
sober, he found he had married a lass that he
certainly would not have chosen if he had
known it; a regular vixen, above five feet ten,
with a colour, like a rose, and a lot of fair
hair that hung to her waist nearly; a real
beauty; but when her back was up, and that
was about twice a day, she'd smash everything
and everybody near. Well, here was a
pretty concern, his money spent and a wife