nterval until dinner-time
in "shaking down," and that after dinner we should proceed to rig out
the jib-boom and unmoor the ship preparatory to going to sea. Then,
leaving Forbes in charge, I went ashore and cleared the ship for the
Pacific, paid the harbour and other dues, wrote and posted a few
letters, and took lunch. Then down on board again, overtaking the
Desmond party on the way; when, having shipped them and their somewhat
multitudinous belongings, the windlass was manned, the cable hove short,
the topsails sheeted home and mast-headed, the anchor tripped, and we
were off, reaching the open sea just in time to see the sun disappear
behind the land as we squared away upon a north-easterly course for Dick
Saint Leger's treasure island.

For a time all went merry as a marriage bell; the weather was simply
perfect, with blue skies, brilliant sunshine, and gentle breezes, with
charming glimpses of lovely tropical islands, day after day, when we
reached the Fiji and Friendly Archipelagos and threaded our way through
them. To add to the enjoyment of this time, the men were doing their
duty in a manner that ought to have satisfied the most exacting of
officers, and behaving with a quietness and steadiness of demeanour that
was absolutely unexceptionable. They seemed always willing, and always
_content_--a phenomenon that I had never hitherto met with on shipboard
for longer than the first week after leaving a port.

I was consequently very much astonished when, one dark night, in the
middle watch, when we had been at sea rather over a fortnight, Joe
Martin, who was at the wheel, took advantage of a momentary pause I made
beside him, to address me in the following terms:--

"Beg pardon, cap'n, but could you make it convenient to pitch into me,
and give me a most tremenjious blowin' up, and call me a lot of hard
names afore all hands, to-morrow, some time in the second dog-watch, if
I was to give you an excuse for so doin'?"

"Blow you up? abuse you? before all hands?" I ejaculated, as soon as my
astonishment would allow me to speak. "Why, what in the name of all
that is extraordinary do you mean, Martin?"

"Just exactly what I says, sir," was the reply. "The fact is, there's
something brewin' in the fo'c's'le, and I want to get to the bottom of
it. But I can't, because the men have got the notion into their heads
that I'm a bit of a favourite of yours, and they won't trust me. So I
want you to pitch into me