e over that boot o' yours."

"Wha' for?" enquired Ben, who had just taken it off.

"To chuck at that swab there," said the indignant seaman.

Ben passed it over without a word, and his irritated friend, taking
careful aim, launched it at Mr. Green and caught him on the side of the
head with it. Pain standing the latter in lieu of courage, he snatched
it up and returned it, and the next moment the whole forecastle was
punching somebody else's head, while Tim, in a state of fearful joy,
peered down on it from his bunk.

Victory, rendered cheap and easy by reason of the purblindness of the
frantic cook, who was trying to persuade Mr. Green to raise his face
from the floor so that he could punch it for him, remained with Joe
and Ben, who, in reply to the angry shouts of the skipper from above,
pointed silently to the combatants. Explanations, all different and
all ready to be sworn to if desired, ensued, and Fraser, after curtly
reminding Ben of his new position and requesting him to keep order,
walked away.

A silence broken only by the general compliments of the much gratified
Tim, followed his departure, although another outbreak nearly occurred
owing to the cook supplying raw meat for Mr. Green's eye and refusing
it for Joe's. It was the lack of consideration and feeling that affected
Joe, not for the want of the beef, that little difficulty being easily
surmounted by taking Mr. Green's. The tumult was just beginning again,
when it was arrested by the sound of angry voices above. Tim, followed
by Joe, sprang up the ladder, and the couple with their heads at the
opening listened with appreciative enjoyment to a wordy duel between
Mrs. Tipping and daughter and the watchman.

"Call me a liar, then," said old George, in bereaved accents.

"I have," said Mrs. Tipping.

"Only you're so used to it you don't notice it," remarked her daughter,
scathingly.

"I tell you he's drownded," said the watchman, raising his voice; "if
you don't believe me, go and ask Mr. Fraser. He's skipper in his place
now."

He waved his hand in the direction of Fraser, who, having heard
the noise, was coming on deck to see the cause of it. Mrs. Tipping,
compressing her lips, got on board, followed by her daughter, and
marching up to him eyed him severely.

"I wonder you can look us in the face after the trick you served us the
other night," she said, fiercely.

"You brought it on yourselves," said Fraser, calmly. "You wouldn't go
away,