tain Miles was standing by the mainmast bitts, there setting them
down before him for judgment.

"Now, you quarrelsome black rascals!" exclaimed the captain confronting
them, "what the dickens do you mean by kicking up all this bobbery? I
don't allow any fighting aboard my ship."

"It ain't me, Mass' Cap'en," said Jake eagerly, "it's dat nasty niggah
dere dat make all de muss 'bout nuffin' at all!"

"Dat one big lie," retorted the other scornfully. "He come 'teal de
coffee out ob de coppers, an' w'en I 'peak to him like gen'leman he hit
um in the eyeball, him."

"Belieb me, Mass' Cap'en, I'se no tief," said Jake indignantly, drawing
himself up and looking very much as if he were going to pitch into
Cuffee again. "I'se only go in de galley to get um coffee for Mass'
Tom, an' I'se ax dat poor trash dere to gib um cup in de most perliteful
way as um please; an' I no sooner done dis dan he catch um crack wid one
big ladle on de shin--golly, um hurt now! Den, ob course, I hit um back
in brace ob shakes, an' we go down in rough an' tumble togedder."

"My, what big 'tory!" exclaimed the cook in apparent amazement at Jake's
mendacity. "Me go forrud to clean de fis' for breakfus, an' w'en um
come back in galley, dere I see dat hangman tief takin' de coffee, an'
den--"

"Then you had a scuffle together, I suppose," interposed Captain Miles,
interrupting Cuffee's further harangue at this point. "Well, well, as
far as I can see you were both in the wrong. Jake, you had no business
to enter the cook's galley without his leave, or touch anything there,
for remember he's as much captain of the caboose as I am on the poop."

"Golly, Mass' Cap'en, me no go dere afore widout Cuffee ax me," put in
Jake as Captain Miles made a pause in his lecture.

"Well, don't you do it again," continued the captain. "And as for you,
Cuffee, I'd advise you not to be so handy with your soup-ladle again in
striking your brother darkey, before ascertaining what he wants when he
comes to your galley, and who sent him. There, my fighting cocks, you'd
better shake hands now and make friends, as the row's all over!"

This the two at once did, with much grinning and showing of their ivory
teeth; and they then went away forwards again together on the most
amicable terms, albeit arguing good-humouredly as to which of them had
got the best of the fray. Jake believed that he had come off with
flying colours, while Cuffee persisted that he was the