r, upon Smallbones,
thinking how he could render the punishment adequate, in his opinion, to
the magnitude of the offence. While discussing these two important
matters, one of the men reported the boats ahead, and broke up the
commander's reverie.

"How far off?" demanded Mr Vanslyperken.

"About two miles."

"Pulling or sailing?"

"Pulling, sir; we stand right for them."

But Mr Vanslyperken was in no pleasant humour, and ordered the cutter
to be hove-to.

"I tink de men have pull enough all night," said Jansen, who had just
been relieved at the wheel, to Obadiah Coble, who was standing by him on
the forecastle.

"I think so too: but there'll be a breeze, depend upon it--never mind,
the devil will have his own all in good time."

"Got for dam," said Jansen, looking at Beachy Head, and shaking his own.

"Why, what's the matter now, old Schnapps?" said Coble.

"Schnapps--yes--the tyfel--Schnapps, I think how the French schnapped us
Dutchmen here when you Englishment wouldn't fight."

"Mind what you say, old twenty breeches--wouldn't fight--when wouldn't
we fight?"

"Here, where we were now, by Got, you leave us all in the lurch, and not
come down."

"Why, we couldn't come down."

"Bah!" replied Jansen, who referred to the defeat of the combined Dutch
and English fleet by the French off Beachy Head in 1690.

"We wouldn't fight, eh?" exclaimed Obadiah in scorn--"what do you say to
the Hogue?"

"Yes, den you fought well--dat was good."

"And shall I tell you why we fought well at the Hogue, you Dutch
porpoise--just because we had no Dutchmen to help us."

"And shall I tell you why the Dutch were beat off this Head?--because
the English wouldn't come down to help us."

Here Obadiah put his tongue into his right cheek. Jansen in return
threw his into his left, and thus the argument was finished. These
disputes were constant at the time, but seldom proceeded further than
words--certainly not between Coble and Jansen, who were great friends.

The boats were soon on board; from the time that the cutter had been
hove-to, every stroke of their oars having been accompanied with a
nautical anathema from the crews upon the head of their commander. The
steersman and first officer, who had charge of the boats, came over the
gangway and went up to Vanslyperken. He was a thick-set, stout man,
about five feet four inches high, and, wrapped up in Flushing garments,
looked very much like a bear in shape as we