knife. I've
set more bones, mended more heads, and plugged more shot-holes on this
passage than ever before, and my officers have grown perceptibly
thinner; but little by little, man by man, we've broken them in. Still,
I admit, it was a job. Why, that same Seldom Helward I ironed and ran
up on the fall of a main-buntline. We were rolling before a stiff
breeze and sea, and he would swing six feet over each rail and bat
against the mast in transit; but the dog stood it eight hours before he
stopped cursing us. Then he was unconscious. When he came to in the
forecastle, he was ready to begin again; but they stopped him. They're
keeping a log, I learn, and are going to law. Every time a man gets
thumped they enter the tragedy, and all sign their names."

Captain Benson smiled dignifiedly in answer to the outburst of laughter
evoked by this, and the men below lifted their haggard, hopeless faces
an instant, and looked at the party with eyes that were
furtive--cat-like. The grinding of the stones prevented their hearing
the talk, but they knew that they were being laughed at.

"Never knew a sailor yet," wheezed a portly and asthmatic captain, "who
wasn't ready to sue the devil and try the court in hell when he's at
sea. Trouble is, they never get past the first saloon."

"They got a little law here," resumed Captain Benson, quietly. "I put
them all in the guardo. The consul advised it, and committed them for
fear they might desert when we lay at the dock. When I took them out to
run to the islands, they complained of being starved; and to tell the
truth, they didn't throw their next meal overboard as usual.
Nevertheless, a good four weeks' board-bill comes out of their wages. I
don't think they'll have a big pay-day in New York: the natives cleaned
out the forecastle in their absence, and they'll have to draw heavily
on my slop-chest."

"That's where captains have the best of it," said one of the mates,
jocularly--and presumptuously, to judge by his captain's frown; "we
hammer 'em round and wear out their clothes, and it's the captain that
sells 'em new ones."

"Captain," said the grizzled one, who had been scanning the crew
intently, "I'd pay that crew off if I were you; you ought to ha' let
'em run, or worked 'em out and saved their pay. Look at 'em--look at
the devils in their eyes. I notice your mates seldom turn their backs
on 'em. I'd get rid of 'em."

"What! Just when we have them under control and useful? Oh,