etch and threw him heavily down upon his face; two knelt upon him, and
in a trice heavy chains were fitted to his legs and wrists, the latter
being dragged behind his back. Then, by one consent, the four Chinamen
leaped up, and waited for the prisoner to follow their example, but he
lay still.

"If he has any gumption he won't move," whispered Barkins, who like
myself was an interested spectator.

Mr Reardon walked to us.

"Silence, young gentlemen," he said sternly. "Let us show these
barbarians what dishipline is.--Brute!"

This last applied to one of the Chinamen, who said something to the
prisoner, who merely wagged his tail, and then received a tremendous
kick in the ribs.

He sprang up then like a wild-beast, but he was seized by as many as
could get a grip of him, bundled to the gangway, and almost thrown down
into the barge, where other men seized him and dragged him forward to
where some spearmen stood ready on guard.

By this time another had been thrown down and chained. He made no
scruple about rising and walking to the side to be bundled down.

Another followed, and another, the grandees hardly glancing at what was
going on, but standing coolly indifferent and fanning away, now and then
making some remark about the ship, the guns, or the crew.

Seven had been chained, and the eighth was brought forward by two
marines, seized, thrown down, and fettered. Then, instead of allowing
himself to be bundled into the boat as apathetically as the others, he
gazed fiercely to right and left, and I saw that something was coming.

So did the indifferent-looking Chinese, for one of the most gorgeously
dressed of the party whipped out a heavy curved sword, whose blade was
broader at the end than near the hilt, and made for him; but, active as
a cat, and in spite of the weight of his chains, the man made a series
of bounds, knocked over two of the soldiers, and leaped at the gangway
behind them, reached the top, and fell more than jumped over, to go down
into the water with a heavy splash.

Half-a-dozen of the men leaped on to the rail, and stood looking down,
before the captain could give an order; while a few words were shouted
from the barge below.

The officer returned his sword, and began fanning himself again; the
soldiers seized the next prisoner and began chaining him, but no one
stirred to save the man overboard, and we all grasped the reason why,--
twenty pounds of iron fetters took him to the bo