scene, or rather the captain's face, lingered for
some time in my memory. I was no prophet, as I say; but I was something
else: I was an observer; and one thing I knew, I knew when a man was
terrified. Captain Trent, of the British brig Flying Scud, had been
glib; he had been ready; he had been loud; but in his blue eyes I could
detect the chill, and in the lines of his countenance spy the agitation
of perpetual terror. Was he trembling for his certificate? In my
judgment, it was some livelier kind of fear that thrilled in the man's
marrow as he turned to drink. Was it the result of recent shock, and had
he not yet recovered the disaster to his brig? I remembered how a friend
of mine had been in a railway accident, and shook and started for a
month; and although Captain Trent of the Flying Scud had none of the
appearance of a nervous man, I told myself, with incomplete conviction,
that his must be a similar case.

CHAPTER IX. THE WRECK OF THE "FLYING SCUD."

The next morning I found Pinkerton, who had risen before me, seated at
our usual table, and deep in the perusal of what I will call the _Daily
Occidental_. This was a paper (I know not if it be so still) that stood
out alone among its brethren in the West; the others, down to their
smallest item, were defaced with capitals, head-lines, alliterations,
swaggering misquotations, and the shoddy picturesque and unpathetic
pathos of the Harry Millers: the _Occidental_ alone appeared to be
written by a dull, sane, Christian gentleman, singly desirous of
communicating knowledge. It had not only this merit, which endeared it
to me, but was admittedly the best informed on business matters, which
attracted Pinkerton.

"Loudon," said he, looking up from the journal, "you sometimes think I
have too many irons in the fire. My notion, on the other hand, is, when
you see a dollar lying, pick it up! Well, here I've tumbled over a whole
pile of 'em on a reef in the middle of the Pacific."

"Why, Jim, you miserable fellow!" I exclaimed; "haven't we Depew City,
one of God's green centres for this State? haven't we----"

"Just listen to this," interrupted Jim. "It's miserable copy; these
_Occidental_ reporter fellows have no fire; but the facts are right
enough, I guess." And he began to read:--

"WRECK OF THE BRITISH BRIG, 'FLYING SCUD.'

"H.B.M.S. Tempest, which arrived yesterday at this port, brings Captain
Trent and four men of the British brig Flying Scud, cast away