arently over the flavour of the
fowl; "p'raps the critter's gall bladder got busted--hey?"

"P'raps so, Flinders," rejoined the skipper; "but I hope thet durned
nigger hasn't be'n meddlin' with it! Them darkeys air awful vengeful,
an' when I hed him up jist now, an' told him he'd hev ter go forrud, I
heard him mutter sunthin' about `not forgettin''--guess I did, so."

Captain Snaggs looked so solemn as he said this, with his face bent down
into his plate to examine what was on it the more closely, and his
billy-goat beard almost touching the gravy, that I had to cough to
prevent myself from laughing; for, I was standing just by him, handing
round a dish of potatoes at the time.

"Hillo!" he exclaimed, looking up and staring at me so that I flushed up
as red as a turkey cock, "what's the matter with ye, b'y?"

"N-n-nothing, sir," I stammered. "I--I couldn't help it, sir; I have
got a sort of tickling in my throat."

"Guess a ticklin' on yer back would kinder teach ye better manners when
ye're a-waitin' at table," he said, grimly. "Go an' tell the stooard to
fetch the rum bottle out of my bunk, with a couple of tumblers, an' then
ye can claar out right away. I don't want no b'ys a-hangin' round when
I'm feedin'!"

Glad enough was I at thus getting my dismissal without any further
questioning; and, after giving Jones the captain's message, I went out
from the pantry on to the maindeck, and so forward to the galley, where
I expected to find Sam.

He wasn't there, however; but, hearing his voice on the fo'c's'le, I
looked up, and saw him there, in the centre of a little knot of men,
consisting of Tom Bullover, the carpenter, Hiram Bangs, and another
sailor, to whom, as I quickly learnt from a stray word here and there,
the darkey cook was laying down the law anent the skipper and his
doings.

"De ole man's a hard row to hoe, yer bet," I heard him say, "but he
don't get over dis chile nohow! I'se heer tell ob him afore I ship't as
how he wer the hardest cap'n as sailed out ob Libberpool."

"Then, why did you jine?" asked Hiram Bangs; "good cooks ain't so common
as you couldn't git another vessel."

"Why did yer jine, Mass' Hiram, sin' yer sailed wid him afore, an'
knowed he was de bery debble?"

"'Cause I wants ter go to 'Frisco," replied the other; "an', 'sides, I
ain't afeared of the old skunk. He's more jaw nor actin', an' a good
sailor, too, an' no mistake, spite of his bad temper an' hard words."

"G