n the frigate's quarter-deck,
and exclaimed,

"Great God! can it be possible that that boy was saved from the clutches
of the drowned pirate!"

Not so fast, good Monsieur Piron--not so fast. Your boy was saved, and
Captain Brand was not drowned. So keep quiet for a time, and you shall
not only see that bloody pirate, but hear how he departed this life;
only keep quiet!

Paddy Burns said, with a violent attempt at indignation, "Wirra, ye
spalpeen! is it thinking of old Clinker and his 'arthquake ye are?"
While Tom Stewart ejaculated, "Heeh, mon! are you for breaking the
commodoor's decanters and wine-glasses, in the belief that ye are the
eerthquak yersel?" Stingo, who was more calm, and a less excitable
Creole, merely murmured, "Commodore, we want to hear more of what took
place, and then what became of you for the past sixteen or seventeen
years."

"You shall hear more if you are not tired, gentlemen, though I have very
little to add to what Hardy has already related of the 'Centipede.'
Steward, let the servants turn in; and brew us, yourself, a light jorum
of Antigua punch! Now, then," said Commodore Cleveland, "I'm your man!

"After we had scaled the guns on both sides of the 'Scourge,' as Hardy
has told you, the captain thought it an unnecessary trouble to lower the
boats to pick up the chips floating about the mouth of the channel; and,
besides, it would have been a bit dangerous, since the sea was coming in
savagely, boiling about the ship, with a very uncertain depth of water
around and under us; and, moreover, we had our hands full the best part
of the night in reeving new running-gear, bending a new sail or two that
had flapped to pieces when every thing was let go by the run in coming
to anchor. However, before morning, we were in cruising trim once more,
and ready to cut and run in case it was expedient to lose our
ground-tackle, and get out of what we afterward learned was the Garotte
Gorge. But by sunrise the wind fell away into a flat calm, and with the
exception of the long, triple row of rollers heaving in occasionally
from seaward, we lay as snug and quiet as could be.

"After breakfast the quarter boats were lowered, and Hardy took one, and
I got in the other, and we pulled in toward the jaws of the channel,
between the Lion Rock and the ledge on the opposite side.

"There were still a good many fragments of the wreck, which had
escaped the reacting current out to sea, floating about on the
wa