ositive she was, although on this occasion he had only two backers.

The dispute was carried on with warmth, the host of the Green
Cormorant defending his view, and the dissentients maintaining that
the fast-approaching schooner was either English or American, until
she was near enough to hoist her flag and the Union Jack went
fluttering up into the sky. Shortly after the _Halbrane_ lay at anchor
in the middle of Christmas Harbour.

The captain of the _Halbrane_, who received the demonstrative greeting
of Atkins very coolly, it seemed to me, was about forty-five,
red-faced, and solidly built, like his schooner; his head was large,
his hair was already turning grey, his black eyes shone like coals
of fire under his thick eyebrows, and his strong white teeth were
set like rocks in his powerful jaws; his chin was lengthened by a
coarse red beard, and his arms and legs were strong and firm. Such
was Captain Len Guy, and he impressed me with the notion that he was
rather impassive than hard, a shut-up sort of person, whose secrets
it would not be easy to get at. I was told the very same day that my
impression was correct, by a person who was better informed than
Atkins, although the latter pretended to great intimacy with the
captain. The truth was that nobody had penetrated that reserved
nature.

I may as well say at once that the person to whom I have alluded was
the boatswain of the _Halbrane_, a man named Hurliguerly, who came
from the Isle of Wight. This person was about forty-four, short,
stout, strong, and bow-legged; his arms stuck out from his body, his
head was set like a ball on a bull neck, his chest was broad enough
to hold two pairs of lungs (and he seemed to want a double supply,
for he was always puffing, blowing, and talking), he had droll
roguish eyes, with a network of wrinkles under them. A noteworthy
detail was an ear-ring, one only, which hung from the lobe of his
left ear. What a contrast to the captain of the schooner, and how
did two such dissimilar beings contrive to get on together? They had
contrived it, somehow, for they had been at sea in each other's
company for fifteen years, first in the brig _Power_, which had been
replaced by the schooner _Halbrane_, six years before the beginning of
this story.

Atkins had told Hurliguerly on his arrival that I would take passage
on the _Halbrane_, if Captain Len Guy consented to my doing so, and
the boatswain presented himself on the following mornin