look of horror and indignation as if it was a
dead skunk, and tells the men to put off.
Our captain, by a noble stratagem worthy of
a better success, tries, during the negociations,
to pour in on the angry Portuguese
pilot all our luggage and the passengers who
are dying to land; but, this time, he all but
tosses the trunk in the sea, and shakes his
clenched fist at us. "You touch!" roars our
captain, "you in quarantine!" And with
violent benedictions we part, minus some
propitiatory cigars that I had thrown down into
the boat to lubricate the negociation.

"Quarantine?" says the steward, as if in
answer to somebody. "Why, the last time
we were at Vigo they put us in limbo
for fifteen days because we had a man on
board who had hurt his leg. But what
can you do with a captain who begins
to take soundings for Portland in the middle
of the Bay of Biscay, and who is afraid to
carry stunsails when a man-of-war would
have all her sky-scrapers and moon-rakers
out bleaching? When I was off Cape Matapan
in a fruiter—"

"Steward!"

"There they go! It's not life, this: it's
what I calls purgatory. That's the
storekeeper: he can't put out what we wants all
at once; but—"

"Steward!"

"As for that captain, if there was nothing
else to do, I think he'd set the engineer to
count the revolutions of the wheel, or the
ship's boys to shift the ballast and paint the
weights!" But goes off singing,

"No flower that blows is like the rose:"

the merriest of grumblers.

Whenever we saw the steward putting the
"fiddles" on the table at meal-times, we knew
there was mischief brewing, that the wind
was rising, and that there would not be
many at dinner. The fiddles were square
mahogany frames, put on the table to keep
the plates in place in rough weather. If the
little usher saw the fiddles coming down
from their rack over the door, he gave
himself up for the day, and did not attempt to
rise, groaning as if the rack was his bed
and his bed the rack.

It was long after we had sighted Portland,
and picked up the rough pilot who skimmed
after us in his gull-winged cutter, with the
square blue flag flying, that I heard a voice
behind me in the fo'ksal saying, "The
captain, Jack, will be a good sailor when the
devil gets blind, and he hasn't sore eyes yet."
It was the steward, who wanted me to come
down into the cabin, that he might, before
we got into dock, finish that story of his
about his friend the Sultan of Trebizond.
I went into the storekeeper's room, the
steward sat down opposite me, with his
usual grim disgusted look sobered now by a
sense of being about to impart historical
information.

"Well," he said, "sir, this is how it was;
though in regard as to not having much time
—(Tom, where's that stout broom?)—I feel
someat like a man-of-war without guns; so
it won't do for me to tell you—(Look alive,
Tom, with those dishes)—how I used to go
from Cephalonia to Patras in a fruiter; how
the fig-worms used to crawl about the
berths, and get into our very beds—(Now,
then, Tom, for those knives)—or how, one
morning when I came on deck I stuck my
eyes through the fore-rigging, and saw we
were just running on shore on the port-hand
of the Gulf—(Tell that gentleman, Tom,
as wants to get to land soon, to go and push
behind, that'll help us). But I must put a
stopper on, haul taut, and get to my story of
the Sultan. Well, you see—(Tom, no larking)
—we had him on board with all his Circassian
wives, at Trebizond: and the wives
were in this very cabin, guarded by a black
eunuch with a drawn sword at the door, who
would not let us look in, or go even to get a
saucer—(Would he, Tom?)—till one night we
gave him too much grog. Well, the Sultan's
man-sarvants used to lie about on deck with
their turbans on so that you could hardly
move without treading on them—(Could we,
Tom?). Well, it was when we were about the
third day from Trebizond, that—"

"Steward, come and look after this
luggage."

Away he went, I did not see him again
till just as we fired the gun as a notice for
the people on shore to keep the Southampton
dock-gates open.

MR. CHARLES DICKENS
WILL GIVE
THREE FINAL CHRISTMAS HOLIDAY READINGS
AT ST. MARTIN'S HALL.
THE following Additional and Final Arrangements are
made to meet the demand for places:—
On Thursday, January 13th (last time), THE CHRISTMAS
CAROL and THE TRIAL from PICKWICK.
On Thursday, January 20th, LITTLE DOMBEY and THE
TRIAL from PICKWICK.
On Friday, January 28th, THE POOR TRAVELLER, MRS.
GAMP, and THE TRIAL from PICKWICK.
The Doors will be open for each Reading at Seven.
Places for each Heading: Stalls (numbered and
reserved), Four Shillings; Centre Area and Balconies,
Two Shillings; Back Seats, One Shilling.
Tickets to be had at Messrs. Chapman and Hall's
Publishers, 193, Piccadilly; and at St. Martin's Hall,
Long Acre.

Now Ready, price 3d., stamped, 4d., THE CHRISTMAS
NUMBER of Household Words, entitled,
A HOUSE TO LET.
Contents:—1. Over the Way. 2. The Manchester
Marriage. 3. Going into Society. 4. Three Evenings in
the House. 5. Trottle's Report. 6. Let at Last.