ft on the wind, and it is to be
believed that she is no duller off. I have rarely known a vessel rise so
rapidly as she has done since first we made her."

The youth spoke with such earnestness, as to draw the attention of his
companion from the object he was studying to the countenance of the
speaker.

"Mr Wilder," he said quickly, and with an air of decision, "you know the
ship?"

"I'll not deny it. If my opinion be true, she will be found too heavy for
the 'Dolphin,' and a vessel that offers little inducement for us to
attempt to carry."

"Her size?"

"You heard it from the black."

"Your followers know her also?"

"It would be difficult to deceive a topman in the cut and trim of sails
among which he has passed months, nay years."

"I understand the 'new cloths' in her top-gallant-royal! Mr Wilder, your
departure from that vessel has been recent?"

"As my arrival in this."

The Rover continued silent for several minutes communing with his own
thoughts. His companion made no offer to disturb his meditations; though
the furtive glances, he often cast in the direction of the other's musing
eye, betrayed some little anxiety to learn the result of his
self-communication.

"And her guns?" at length his Commander abruptly demanded.

"She numbers four more than the 'Dolphin.'"

"The metal?"

"Is still heavier. In every particular is she a ship a size above your
own."

"Doubtless she is the property of the King?"

"She is."

"Then shall she change her masters. By heaven she shall be mine!"

Wilder shook his head, answering only with an incredulous smile.

"You doubt it," resumed the Rover. "Come hither, and look upon that deck.
Can he whom you so lately quitted muster fellows like these, to do his
biddings?"

The crew of the 'Dolphin' had been chosen, by one who thoroughly
understood the character of a seaman, from among all the different people
of the Christian world. There was not a maritime nation in Europe which
had not its representative among; that band of turbulent and desperate
spirits. Even the descendant of the aboriginal possessors of America had
been made to abandon the habits and opinions of his progenitors, to become
a wanderer on that element which had laved the shores of his native land
for ages, without exciting a wish to penetrate its mysteries in the
bosoms of his simple-minded ancestry. All had been suited, by lives of
wild adventure, on the two elements, for their present lawle