ll into the fireplace, overturned the still, and scattered the fire.
Fortunately, the embers were nearly out by this time. Tumbling over the
stools and wreck, these men--who had begun the evening as friends,
continued it as fools, and ended it as fiends--fell side by side into
one of the sleeping-bunks, the bottom of which was driven down by the
shock as they sank exhausted amid the wreck, foaming with passion, and
covered with blood. This was the climax; they fell into a state of
partial insensibility, which degenerated at last into a deep lethargic
slumber.

Hitherto the quarrels and fights that had so disturbed the peace of
Pitcairn, and darkened her moral sky, had been at least intelligently
founded on hatred or revenge, with a definite object and murderous end
in view. Now, for the first time, a furious battle had been fought for
nothing, with no object to be gained, and no end in view; with besotted
idiots for the champions, and with strong drink for the cause.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

AQUATIC AMUSEMENTS.

Now, it must not be supposed that the wives and widows of these
mutineers gave themselves up to moping or sadness after the failure of
their wild attempt to make their condition worse by slaying all the men.
By no means. By degrees they recovered the natural tone of their mild
yet hearty dispositions, and at last, we presume, came to wonder that
they had ever been so mad or so bad.

Neither must it be imagined that these women were condemned to be the
laborious drudges who are fitly described as "hewers of wood and drawers
of water." They did indeed draw a good deal of water in the course of
each day, but they spent much time also in making the tapa cloth with
which they repaired the worn-out clothes of their husbands, or
fabricated petticoats for themselves and such of the children as had
grown old enough to require such garments. But besides these
occupations, they spent a portion of their time in prattling gossip,
which, whatever the subject might be, was always accompanied with a
great deal of merriment and hearty laughter. They also spent no small
portion of their time in the sea, for bathing was one of the favourite
amusements of the Pitcairners, young and old.

Coming up one day to Susannah, the wife of Edward Young, Thursday
October Christian begged that she would go with him and bathe.

Susannah was engaged in making the native cloth at the time, and laid
down her mallet with a look of ind