w, haw, haw!" laughed Smith.

"Quiet, sir!" cried Oliver. "What have you got to laugh at?"

"Beg pardon," said the man, passing his hand across his mouth, as if the
laugh required wiping away, "but it seemed so comic for the natives to
be trying to get a spessermen of an English gent, to keep stuffed as a
cur'osity."

"Ah, they wouldn't have done that, Smith, my lad. More likely to have
rolled me up in leaves to bake in one of their stone ovens, and then
have a feast."

"Well, they aren't got yer, sir, and they sha'n't have yer, if me and
Billy Wriggs can stop it."

"God bless you both, my lads," said Panton huskily. "You stood by me
very bravely."

"Oh, I don't know, sir," said Smith bashfully. "People as is out
together, whether they're gents or only common sailors, is mates yer
know for the time, and has to stand by one another in a scrimmage. Did
one's dooty like, and I dessay I could do it again, better than what I'm
a doing here. My poor old mother never thought I should come to be a
'orspittle nuss. Like a drink a' water, sir?"

"Yes, please, my mouth's terribly dry."

Smith looked round, but there was no water in the cabin, and he went out
to get some from the breaker on deck, but he had not reached halfway to
the tub, before there was a sharp recommencement of the firing, and he
knew by the yelling that the savages were making a fresh attack.

The sailor forgot all about the wounded in the cabin, and running right
forward, he seized a capstan bar for a weapon, and then went to the side
waiting to help and repel the attack, if any of the enemy managed to
reach the deck.

But evidently somewhat daunted by the firearms and the injuries
inflicted upon several of their party, the savages did not come too
near, but stood drawing their bows from time to time, and sending their
arrows up in the air, so that they might fall nearly perpendicularly
upon the deck. Many times over the men had hairbreadth escapes from
arrows which fell with a sharp whistling sound, and stuck quivering in
the boards, while the mate made the crew hold their fire.

"Firing at them is no good," he said, "or they would have stopped away
after the first volleys. Let them shoot instead and waste their arrows.
They'll soon get tired of that game. So long as they don't hurt us,
it's of no consequence. All we want, is for them to leave us alone."

"But it does not seem as if they would do that," said Drew, to whom he
was spea