n he did of kicking that skulking,
icy-eyed sailor on board--detesting as he did the entire Saxon race ever
since Cadiz was bombarded--and feeding him on rotten jerked beef? There
were no prayers, only curses, on board that brigantine as she dropped
anchor in St. Jago that fine Sunday morning.

And where was our ancient one-eyed mariner, formerly in command of the
colonial guarda costa felucca, the "Panchita," named after his fat
banana of a sposa? Oh, the Don--simply Ignacio now--had had a quiet
confab with the deputy administrador all about some treasure which he
knew was concealed, and where--for he had seen with his bright eye the
light of a torch in a cleft of a crag--and he would go shares with that
official if he would give him a little assistance.

"_Oh, cierto!_" Why not? And there was an old launch, with a torn lateen
sail, which Columbus might have been proud to command; and, in this fine
weather, he might sail back to Port Palos in her.

Oh yes! But, to keep all secret, he would merely take old Pancha, his
wife, for crew. And so, with a few bundles of paper cigars, and some
dried fish and water--the only property they possessed, save his eye
and a pack of cards, and those valuables rescued with difficulty--they
sailed the night before the blessed Sunday. _He_ never came back,
though. No blame attributable to the eye--that was as bright and
wary an old burning spark of suspicious fire as ever; but then old
Pancha held the cards, and this time she won. Very singular it was,
_cierto_. If Ignacio had not gone back again for another bag which
was not there, why, the _sota_ of a knave being the next card--Ah! we
won't anticipate.

But we are all alive yet, except those murdered women, whose white coral
head-stones still stand up there in the cactus, and poor Binks, and
those slashing blades of the poisonous, many-legged "Centipede," who
were eaten by the sharks--all alive the rest of us, and wide awake!

CHAPTER XLIX.

THE ROPE LAID UP.

"The captain is walking his quarter-deck
With a troubled brow and a bended neck;
One eye is down the hatchway cast,
The other turns up to the truck on the mast."

"The breeze is blowing--huzza, huzza!
The breeze is blowing--away, away!
The breeze is blowing--a race, a race!
The breeze is blowing--we near the chase."

Well, the positions of all hands were simply these. The icy-eyed man,
without snuff-box, or ring on that mutilate