words, and the like.

Indeed, by this time I was beginning to see how it was. The suspicion
that the watches and jewellery I had discovered on the bodies of the men
had excited was now confirmed, and I was satisfied that this schooner
had been a pirate or buccaneer, of what nationality I could not yet
divine--methought Spanish from the costume of the first figure I had
encountered; and I was also convinced by the brief glance I directed at
the things in the cabin, particularly the wearing apparel, and the make
and appearance of the firearms, that she must have been in this position
for upwards of fifty years.

The thought awed me greatly: _twenty years before I was born_ those two
men were sitting dead in the cabin!--he on deck was keeping his blind
and silent look-out; he on the rocks with his hands locked upon his
knees sat sunk in blank and frozen contemplation!

Every cabin had its port, and there were ports in the vessel's side
opposite; but on reflection I considered that the cabin would be the
warmer for their remaining closed, and so I came away and entered the
great cabin afresh, bent on exploring the forward part.

I must tell you that the mainmast, piercing the upper deck, came down
close against the bulkhead that formed the forward wall of the cabin,
and on approaching this partition, the daylight being broad enough now
that the hatch lay open on top, I remarked a sliding door on the
larboard side of the mast. I put my shoulder to it and very easily ran
it along its grooves, and then found myself in the way of a direct
communication with all the fore portion of the schooner. The arrangement
indeed was so odd that I suspected a piratical device in this uncommon
method of opening out at will the whole range of deck. The air here was
as vile as in the cabins, and I had to wait a bit.

On entering I discovered a little compartment with racks on either hand
filled with small-arms. I afterwards counted a hundred and thirteen
muskets, blunderbusses, and fusils, all of an antique kind, whilst the
sides of the vessel were hung with pistols great and little,
boarding-pikes, cutlasses, hangers, and other sorts of sword. This
armoury was a sight to set me walking very cautiously, for it was not
likely that powder should be wanting in a ship thus equipped; and where
was it stowed?

There was another sliding door in the forward partition; it stood open,
and I passed through it into what I immediately saw was the coo