he other, `can you pray, sonny?'

"`No, Josh,' replied Quashee gloomily. `I nebber learnt, nohow.'

"`Can you sing hymn, den?' questioned his brother in misfortune again.

"`No, Josh,' answered the other still more gloomily. `Um can't pray,
can't sing hymn, can't do nuffin'!'

"`Den,' said Josh as if a brilliant idea had suddenly struck him, `we
must hab collection--must do sumfin' to git out ob dis hole, an' I know
when dey don't pray or sing in de chapel dey always hab collection; so
we'll hab one now!'"

"I wouldn't mind betting," observed Mr Marline, when he had done
laughing at this anecdote, "that the clergyman who related the story did
it as a sort of introduction for `passing round the hat' at the very
meeting where you heard it!"

"That's just precisely what he did!" replied Captain Miles, joining in
the other's laugh; "and, it was a very good introduction to a
collection, too, I think!"

It was on a Sunday evening that the little fracas between Jake and
Cuffee occurred. This squabble terminated amicably enough; but the next
day, Monday, a bit of a real row happened on board, which did not end
quite so agreeably to one of the persons concerned.

It was a blazing hot day, with the sun like a ball of fire in the
heavens above and the sea steaming below with the heat. The atmosphere
was close and hazy, making it so stifling that one could hardly breathe
freely--just exactly the sort of weather, in fact, that is met with on
the West Coast of Africa at the mouths of some of those pestilential and
swampy rivers there that have been the death of so many gallant officers
and seamen annually sent to the station for the purpose of putting down
the slave-trade and protecting greedy traders in their pursuit of palm-
oil and gold dust!

During the afternoon of this day, when the sun was about its hottest,
making the pitch melt and ooze out from the seams of the deck planking,
Davis, who had charge of the starboard watch, came up from below to
relieve Mr Marline.

He was late in coming to his post, and I could see he had been drinking,
a habit he had lately taken to indulging in, especially after the calm
set in; and, as he mounted the poop-ladder, he certainly did not look
particularly amiable, for his dark eyes were glaring and his tumbled
hair gave him a most ferocious appearance.

The men were mostly doing nothing, lying along the waist under what
shelter they could find from the fiery rays of the scorch