red yards of each other. The scene which took
place in the cabin exhibited a licentious brutality. The sick officer,
Mr. Gibson, was dragged from his berth; the clothes of the other
passengers stripped from their backs, and the whole of the cabin
passengers driven on deck, except the females, whom they locked up in
the round-house on deck, and the steward, who was detained to serve the
pirates with wine and eatables. This treatment, no doubt hastened the
death of Gibson; the unfortunate gentleman did not long survive it. As
the passengers were forced up the cabin ladder, the feelings of Major
Logie, it may be imagined, were of the most heart-rending description.
In vain did he entreat to be allowed to remain; he was hurried away from
even the chance of protecting his defenceless wife, and battened down
with the rest in the hold, there to be racked with the fearful
apprehensions of their almost certain doom.

The labors of the robbers being now concluded, they sat down to regale
themselves, preparatory to the _chef d'oeuvre_ of their diabolical
enterprise; and a more terrible group of demi-devils, the steward
declares, could not be well imagined than commanded his attention at the
cabin table. However, as he was a Frenchman, and naturally polite, he
acquitted himself of the office of cup-bearer, if not as gracefully, at
least as anxiously, as ever did Ganymede herself. Yet, notwithstanding
this readiness to serve the visitors in their gastronomic desires, the
poor steward felt ill-requited; he was twice frightened into an icicle,
and twice thawed back into conscious horror, by the rudeness of those he
entertained. In one instance, when he had filled out a sparkling glass
for a ruffian, and believed he had quite won the heart of the drinker by
the act, he found himself grasped roughly and tightly by the throat, and
the point of a knife staring him in the face. It seems the fellow who
thus seized him, had felt between his teeth a sharp bit of broken glass,
and fancying that something had been put in the wine to poison him, he
determined to prove his suspicions by making the steward swallow what
remained in the bottle from which the liquor had been drawn, and thus
unceremoniously prefaced his command; however, ready and implicit
obedience averted further bad consequences. The other instance of the
steward's jeopardy was this; when the repast was ended, one of the
gentlemen coolly requested him to waive all delicacy, and poin