ause they are most certainly drowned," I answered.

He sniffed incredulously and went on warming his hands.

"Men of that kind are never drowned," he said, after a pause. "Their
father, the devil, looks after them. Did you see them standing on the
poop and rolling cigarettes at the time when the mizzen was carried away
and the quarter-boats stove? That was enough for me. I'm not surprised
at you landsmen not being able to take it in, but the captain here,
who's been sailing since he was the height of the binnacle, ought to
know by this time that a cat and a priest are the worst cargo you can
carry. If a Christian priest is bad, I guess an idolatrous pagan one is
fifty times worse. I stand by the old religion, and be d--d to it!"

My father and I could not help laughing at the rough sailor's very
unorthodox way of proclaiming his orthodoxy. The mate, however, was
evidently in deadly earnest, and proceeded to state his case, marking
off the different points upon the rough, red fingers of his left hand.

"It was at Kurrachee, directly after they come that I warned ye," he
said reproachfully to the captain. "There was three Buddhist Lascars in
my watch, and what did they do when them chaps come aboard? Why, they
down on their stomachs and rubbed their noses on the deck--that's what
they did. They wouldn't ha' done as much for an admiral of the R'yal
Navy. They know who's who--these niggers do; and I smelt mischief
the moment I saw them on their faces. I asked them afterwards in your
presence, Captain, why they had done it, and they answered that the
passengers were holy men. You heard 'em yourself."

"Well, there's no harm in that, Hawkins," said Captain Meadows.

"I don't know that," the mate said doubtfully. "The holiest Christian
is the one that's nearest God, but the holiest nigger is, in my opinion,
the one that's nearest the devil. Then you saw yourself, Captain
Meadows, how they went on during the voyage, reading books that was
writ on wood instead o' paper, and sitting up right through the night to
jabber together on the quarter-deck. What did they want to have a chart
of their own for and to mark the course of the vessel every day?"

"They didn't," said the captain.

"Indeed they did, and if I did not tell you sooner it was because
you were always ready to laugh at what I said about them. They had
instruments o' their own--when they used them I can't say--but every day
at noon they worked out the latitude an