s the
only comfort I could bestow on his shivering limbs.

This last dram was our forlorn hope, but it only created a passing
comfort, which soon went off leaving our bodies more chill and
dejected than before. My head swam with feverish emptiness. I seemed
suddenly possessed by a feeling of wild independence--seeing nothing,
fearing nothing. Presently, this died away, and I fell back in utter
helplessness, wholly benumbed.

I do not remember how long this stupor lasted, but I was aroused by
the Krooman with the report of a land-breeze, and a sail which he
declared to be a cruiser. It cost me considerable effort to shake off
my lethargy, nor do I know whether I would have succeeded had there
not been a medical magic in the idea of a man-of-war, which flashed
athwart my mind a recollection of the slave accounts in our keg!

I had hardly time to throw the implement overboard before the craft
was within hail; but instead of a cruiser she turned out to be a
slaver, destined, like myself, for Gallinas. A warm welcome awaited me
in the cabin, and a comfortable bed with plenty of blankets restored
me for a while to health, though in all likelihood my perilous flight
from Digby and its horrors, will ache rheumatically in my limbs till
the hour of my death.

It was well that I did not venture through the breakers on the day
that the dead shark was hoisted _in terrorem_ as a telegraph. Such was
the swarm of these monsters in the surf of Gallinas, that more than a
hundred slaves had been devoured by them in attempting a shipment a
few nights before!

CHAPTER LXIII.

"Don Pedro Blanco had left Gallinas,--a retired _millionnaire_!" When
I heard this announcement at the factory, I could with difficulty
restrain the open expression of my sorrow. It confirmed me in a desire
that for some time had been strengthening in my mind. Years rolled
over my head since, first of all, I plunged accidentally into the
slave-trade. My passion for a roving life and daring adventure was
decidedly cooled. The late barbarities inflicted on the conquered in a
war of which I was the involuntary cause, appalled me with the
traffic; and humanity called louder and louder than ever for the
devotion of my remaining days to honest industry.

As I sailed down the coast to restore a child to his father,--the King
of Cape Mount,--I was particularly charmed with the bold promontory,
the beautiful lake, and the lovely islands, that are comprised in t