om everybody else, but where
anybody could see me that wanted to, and he says--

"`Hullo, Joe, old shipmate,' says he, `what's the matter? You looks as
if the hazin' that the skipper's been givin' of you to-day has give you
a fit of the blues!'

"`Blues?' says I. `Blues ain't no name for it! I'm sick and tired of
the ship, and everybody in her. I haven't been given no peace nor
rest,' says I, `since the day when I was clumsy enough to smash the gig.
Of course I was sorry I done it,' I says, `and I'd ha' said so if the
skipper had only treated me properly; but I ain't sorry _now_, and I
means to take it out of him for the rest of the v'yage by doin' every
blessed thing I can think of to vex him. He's made it pretty hot for me
lately, and I means to make it hot for _him_,' I says; `and you may go
aft and tell him so if you like,' says I.

"`No, Joey,' says he, `I'm not the man to tell tales upon a shipmate;
nor there ain't nobody else in the fo'c's'le as'll do such a dirty
trick. But what's come over ye, man? You're that changed as your own
mother wouldn't know ye. I'm surprised at you,' he says--`a man that
used to be such a tremenjous favourite with the skipper and the rest of
'em aft. What's the meanin' of it all?'

"`Look here, Bill Rogers,' says I, turnin' upon him as savage as you
please, `just you drop that--d'ye hear? I gets hectorin' and hazin'
enough from the quarter-deck; I won't have none of it from _you_, nor
from any other man what's in this ship's fo'c's'le; so now I hopes you
understand,' I says.

"`All right, mate,' he says; `you needn't lose your temper with me;
there's no occasion for it. Besides, I'm a short-tempered man myself,
and if it comes to--but that's neither here nor there. I don't want to
quarrel with you, Joe; I'd a deal rather we was all fast friends in the
fo'c's'le. We foremast men ought to stick to one another, and back one
another up; don't you think so?'

"`Yes, I do,' says I; `but how much have any of you chaps stuck to me,
or backed me up? You've been as thick as thieves together,' I says;
`but--because, I s'pose, I haven't been to the gold-fields--you've made
me feel like a houtsider, from the very commencement of the v'yage,' I
says.

"`Well, if we did,' says he, `it was because we didn't know you so well
as we do now.'

"After that he stood pullin' away at his pipe, and cogitatin' like, for
a minute or two; and then he looks up in my face, and says--

"`L