ous products. Corn of two or three kinds waved on the eastern
slopes, half a dozen head of cattle and perhaps a couple of dozen sheep
grazed on the opposite side of the valley; cocoa-nuts reared their tall
slender stems and waved their feathery branches by hundreds, and behind
them again as the ground sloped gently upward it became more and more
densely covered with palm, banana, and plantain groves thickly
interspersed with various trees, some of considerable size and dense
foliage, among which brilliant orchids and gaudy parasites of the gayest
hues entwined themselves to the very summits.

A light gig shot alongside the brig as her anchor was let go, and a tall
swarthy man with the unmistakable classic features of a Greek stepped on
board. He would have been a strikingly handsome man but for the
expression of cunning and cruelty which glittered in his keen black
eyes.

"Well, capitan," said he to Johnson as he joined the pirate skipper, "so
you have returned once more, and with a full hold, I hope. The people
began to think you were gone for good, you have been away so long time."

"Yes," returned Johnson, "back again, Alec, like a bad penny; and we've
not brought so _very_ much with us, either; but the little we have 'll
be useful, I daresay. The brig don't seem to sail so well as she used
to, and we fell in with over half a dozen fine craft that we couldn't
get near. They just walked away from us like we was at anchor. We've
come in now to give the old hooker an overhaul--she wants it badly
enough--and then I think I shall try my luck further to the east'ard,
away on t'other side of the Cape altogether. But if we haven't brought
a whole ship-load of plunder, I guess we've brought what's most as good.
We picked up boat-load of shipwrecked people, and among 'em there's
one--that tall soldier-looking chap over there on the larboard side of
the skylight--who says he can fortify the place for us, and build us out
of these old hulks a craft that 'll beat anything we're likely to meet,
'cepting perhaps steamers."

"_Says_!" ejaculated the Greek contemptuously.

"Ay, and he can do it too," remarked Johnson. "He's one of them English
soldiers who does all the battery-building and fortifying business, and
he has a yacht which he designed himself, and which sails so fast that
he didn't think the brig's sailing amounted to shucks. I tell you,
Alec, the way he talked about that yacht jest set me a longing, it did,