all--the
fear that he might be actually subjected to the unspeakable indignity of
personal violence. And when, as I uttered the final words, I advanced a
step toward him, as though about to carry out my threat, he suddenly
turned tail and slunk off like a whipped cur.

Some time later, when Polson, having at length accomplished his mission,
brought me the signed agreement--which of course I knew was, as a
binding document, not worth the paper upon which it was written,
although I still hoped that it might be to some extent effective--I
related to him the little incident that had occurred between Wilde and
myself; at which he expressed some concern, although he fully agreed
with me that the schoolmaster--at all events while aboard ship and at
sea--must be held as amenable to discipline as anyone else, and that it
would never do to give him the least bit more liberty than we were
prepared to accord to every one of the other emigrants. Having secured
which admission from the boatswain, I sent there and then for the
steward and ordered him at once to bundle Wilde's belongings out of the
cabin back to the 'tween-decks.

During the second dogwatch, that same evening, Wilde sought out the
boatswain and carpenter, and complained to them of what he termed my
tyrannical conduct, which, he represented to his two listeners, was of
so grossly humiliating a character that it was calculated very seriously
to detract from his influence with his followers. So serious a
grievance did he make of it that at length Polson and Tudsbery
approached me with something in the nature of a remonstrance,
accompanied by a mildly offered suggestion that I should concede
something to enable Wilde to preserve his dignity. Probably I should
have been wiser to have accepted and acted upon this suggestion; but I
had got the idea into my head that the matter had resolved itself into a
struggle for supremacy between Wilde and myself, and I obstinately
refused to yield a hairbreadth, thereby exciting the permanent hostility
not only of Wilde himself, but also--as I afterward found--of several of
his followers. The boatswain and carpenter were at first disposed to
regard me as unnecessarily firm, but this feeling soon yielded to one of
quiet gratification that they had, as leader, one who, young as he was,
would not submit to dictation from anybody. And I feel convinced that
whatever I may have lost in popularity I more than regained in the shape
of p