anxious enough to do so. By this
time, too, after my men had left the deck of the ship, the crew had
somehow got hold of a barrel of wine, and, letting the pumps work
themselves, were guzzling away in grand style. I began to lose patience
at last, and shouted to the old lady to come at once, or I should be
compelled to leave her. She merely leaned over the rail, however, and
chattered forth that all she had in the world was at my service--of
course, figuratively she meant--but she must stay another minute to find
a jar of preserved ginger, which was her only cure for the cholic."

"You didn't take the offer of the old lady as a figure of speech, I
presume?" asked the doctor.

"No!" muttered the one-eyed old wretch, with a sneer. "And that jar of
ginger spared her any more attacks of cholic!"

"_Caballeros_, you are both right. I did accept the gift of her worldly
goods in the frank spirit in which it was offered, without any
reservation; and, to my almost certain knowledge, the Senora Lavarona
was never more troubled with illness of any kind.

"The fact was, that, finding the ship fast sinking, and her crew
becoming boisterous and rebellious as the imminent danger burst upon
them, they proposed, since their own boats were stove, to take
possession of mine! That _was_ a joke, to be sure! A dozen drunken
swabs, with naked hands, to capture ten of the old 'Centipede's' picked
men, with a pistol and knife each under their shirts; and"--here the
speaker laughed heartily--"and Captain Brand beside them! _Diavolo!_
what silly people there are in this world!"

The good padre joined his superior in this ebullition of feeling, and
seemed to enjoy the joke immensely, rolling his goggle eyes and head
from side to side, kissing his crucifix, and exclaiming, with devotion,

"_Que hombre es eso!_"--"What a man he is!"

[Illustration: THE PIRATE'S PREY.]

"Well, _senores_, the next minute we let go the painter and floated
astern past the ship's counter, and a few strokes of the oar-blades sent
us dancing away to leeward, where the schooner was lying with her
main-sail up, and the jib-sheet hauled well to windward. We made no
unnecessary noise in getting alongside, and it took no great time to get
the boat clear, a tackle hooked on, and to swing her on board over the
long gun. Then we drew aft the sheets, set the fore-sail, and the
'Centipede' was once more reeling off the knots on her course."

"But the ship, my son?"

"Why