em on the
head first and sign the papers afterwards.' He was a kind-hearted
gentleman, and did a lot of good in the world!"

"He must have done, Peter," said I; "he must have done a power of good,
hearing the little you say about him. 'Tis a pity the old gentleman
isn't here this day to preach his kindness to yonder rogues. They look
in need of a friendly hand; indeed, they do."

Well, the laugh was turned on Peter; but, as a matter of fact, he spoke
sense, and I understood as well as he did the risk of parley with the
wreckers, even though they did not seem to have any fight left in
them--a fact which old Clair-de-Lune was the first to observe.

"They not fire gun this morning," says the old man. "All starve hungry.
Czerny gone. What for they fight? They no stomach left."

"Meaning they've no heart in them," puts in Doctor Gray, at his side.
"Aye, that's true, and a bit of human nature, too. You cannot fight
every day any more than you can make love every day. It comes and goes
like a fever. They had their square meal last night, and they are not
taking any this morning. I should not be afraid of them if I were you,
captain."

"I never was," said I, bluntly; "I never was, doctor. There's not
enough on my conscience for that. But I do believe you speak truly.
Making love is more in their line this watch. Ask Dolly Venn there.
From what I saw between him and little Rosamunda down below, lie's an
authority on that point. Eh, Dolly, lad," said I to him, "you could
make love every day, couldn't you?"

The lad flushed all over his face at the charge, and Peter Bligh, he
said something about "Love one another" being in the Bible, "which must
mean many of 'em, and not one in particular," says he. And what with
the laugh and the jest, and the new confidence which the sight of those
poor driven devils put into us, we came all together to the sea's edge,
and, scarcely cocking a rifle at them, we hailed the longboats and got
their story.

"Ahoy, there! And what port d'you think you're making for?" cries Peter
Bligh, in a voice that might have split the waters.

They replied to him, standing up in the boat and stretching out their
sunburnt, hairy arms to us:

"Water!--water, mate, for the love of God!"

"And how do you know," cries Peter back to them, "how do you know that
we've water for ourselves?"

"Why, Barebones saw to that," says one of them, no doubt meaning Czerny
thereby; "Barebones saw to that, though precio