pe Horn."

"Which, I take it, comprises a very small portion of the whole?"
questioned he.

"A very small portion indeed," I agreed.

"Ah!" he commented. "Can you tell me whether there happens to be a map
of the Pacific on board this ship?"

"It is quite possible," I said. "She is pretty well-stocked with
charts; and, now that you come to mention it, I believe there is a chart
of the Pacific in the rack."

"Let us go down and ascertain, shall we?" said he. And, placing his
hand within my arm, he gently but firmly led me off the poop. It may,
of course, have been pure imagination on my part, but his manner seemed
to say as distinctly as words--"Don't mistake my politeness and
geniality for weakness. I believe in putting things pleasantly, but
when I make a suggestion I intend it to be accepted as a command."

We descended together to the captain's cabin--which I now occupied--and
he entered it with me, laughingly explaining that he was sure I would
excuse the liberty he was taking in doing so, and at once fell to
examining the labels of the charts in the rack.

"Ah! here we are," he exclaimed, laying his hand upon a roll labelled
"Pacific Ocean". "Let us take it into the main cabin and study it
together."

He laid it out flat upon the cabin table and placed four weights at the
corners to hold them down. Then he bent over the sheet and studied it
with extraordinary interest.

"So this is what you call a chart, is it?" he exclaimed. "I see that it
varies very materially from an ordinary map, in that it gives a great
deal of information about the sea, and not much about the land, beyond
its outline." And he began his study of it by asking the meaning of
certain mysterious lines and markings upon it. Then he asked a number
of questions respecting the various small islands dotted about, more or
less in patches, upon it, to answer which I had to hunt for a Pacific
Directory, which I fortunately found in the bookcase; and finally, after
we had thus been engaged for an hour or more, he said:

"It is perfectly clear to me that it would be idle for us to determine,
at this distance, in what particular part of the Pacific we will search
for our future home. That search must be conducted methodically; and
after studying this chart very carefully, I have come to the conclusion
that our best course will be to begin our search here,"--indicating with
his finger a point about midway between the north-western extre