"Men and women," said he, "what I told that poor devil is Gospel truth;
but I didn't tell him we'd no chance of saving our lives, did I? Not
me, because we have! Keep your heads and listen to me. There's two
good boats on the davits amidships; the chief will take one, the second
officer the other; and there ain't no reason why every blessed one of
you shouldn't sleep in Ascension to-morrow night. As for me, let me see
every soul off of my ship and perhaps I may follow; but by the God that
made you, look alive! Mr. Arnott--Mr. McClellan--man them boats and
lower away. You can't get quit o' the ship too soon, an' I don't mind
tellin' you why. I'll tell you the worst, an' then you'll know. There's
been a lot o' gossip goin', gossip about my cargo. I give out as I'd
none but ship's stores and ballast, an' I give out a lie. I don't mind
tellin' you now. I give out a cussed lie, but I give it out for the
good o' the ship! What was the use o' frightenin' folks? But where's the
sense in keepin' it back now? We have a bit of a cargo," shouted Harris;
"and it's gunpowder--every damned ton of it!"

The effect of this announcement may be imagined; my hand has not the
cunning to reproduce it on paper; and if it had, it would shrink from
the task. Mild men became brutes, brutal men, devils, women--God help
them!--shrieking beldams for the most part. Never shall I forget them
with their streaming hair, their screaming open mouths, and the cruel
ascending fire glinting on their starting eyeballs!

Pell-mell they tumbled down the poop-ladders; pell-mell they raced
amidships past that yawning open furnace; the pitch was boiling through
the seams of the crackling deck; they slipped and fell upon it, one over
another, and the wonder is that none plunged headlong into the flames.
A handful remained on the poop, cowering and undone with terror. Upon
these turned Captain Harris, as Ready and I, stemming the torrent of
maddened humanity, regained the poop ourselves.

"For'ard with ye!" yelled the skipper. "The powder's underneath you in
the lazarette!"

They were gone like hunted sheep. And now abaft the flaming hatchway
there were only we four surviving saloon passengers, the captain, his
steward, the Zambesi negro, and the quarter-master at the wheel. The
steward and the black I observed putting stores aboard the captain's gig
as it overhung the water from the stern davits.

"Now, gentlemen," said Harris to the two of us, "I must trou