ly use canvas when the wind was favourable, it was somewhat
extraordinary.

During the morning of the 12th of June a very unexpected incident
occurred on board.

Captain Turcott, the mate, and Godfrey, were sitting down to breakfast
when an unusual noise was heard on deck. Almost immediately afterwards
the boatswain opened the door and appeared on the threshold.

"Captain!" he said.

"What's up?" asked Turcott, sailor as he was, always on the alert.

"Here's a--Chinee!" said the boatswain.

"A Chinese!"

"Yes! a genuine Chinese we have just found by chance at the bottom of
the hold!"

"At the bottom of the hold!" exclaimed Turcott. "Well, by all
the--somethings--of Sacramento, just send him to the bottom of the sea!"

"All right!" answered the boatswain.

And that excellent man with all the contempt of a Californian for a son
of the Celestial Empire, taking the order as quite a natural one, would
have had not the slightest compunction in executing it.

However, Captain Turcott rose from his chair, and followed by Godfrey
and the mate, left the saloon and walked towards the forecastle of the
_Dream_.

There stood a Chinaman, tightly handcuffed, and held by two or three
sailors, who were by no means sparing of their nudges and knocks. He was
a man of from five-and-thirty to forty, with intelligent features, well
built, of lithe figure, but a little emaciated, owing to his sojourn for
sixteen hours at the bottom of a badly ventilated hold.

Captain Turcott made a sign to his men to leave the unhappy intruder
alone.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"A son of the sun."

"And what is your name?"

"Seng Vou," answered the Chinese, whose name in the Celestial language
signifies "he who does not live."

"And what are you doing on board here?"

"I am out for a sail!" coolly answered Seng Vou, "but am doing you as
little harm as I can."

"Really! as little harm!--and you stowed yourself away in the hold when
we started?"

"Just so, captain."

"So that we might take you for nothing from America to China, on the
other side of the Pacific?"

"If you will have it so."

"And if I don't wish to have it so, you yellow-skinned nigger. If I will
have it that you have to swim to China."

"I will try," said the Chinaman with a smile, "but I shall probably sink
on the road!"

"Well, John," exclaimed Captain Turcott, "I am going to show you how to
save your passage-money."

And Captain Turcott, much more angry