or the
liberty men, and the purser gives this breaker, which was at least half
full, and I dare say there might be three gallons in it, under my charge
as coxswain, to deliver to madam at the house. Well, as soon as we
landed, I shoulders the breaker, and starts with it up the hill.

"`What have you there, Tom?' said Bill Short.

"`What I wish I could share with you, Bill,' says I; `it's some of old
Nipcheese's _eights_, that he has sent on shore to bowse his jib up
with, with his sweetheart.'

"`I've seen the madam,' said Holmes to me--for you see all the liberty
men were walking up the hill at the same time--`and I'd rather make love
to the breaker than to her. She's as fat as an ox, as broad as she's
long, built like a Dutch schuyt, and as yellow as a nabob.'

"`But old Tummings knows what he's about,' said a Scotch lad of the name
of M'Alpine; `they say she has lots of gold dust, more ducks and ingons,
and more inches of water in her tank than any on the island.'

"You see, boys, Bermuda be a queer sort of place, and water very scarce;
all they get there is a Godsend, as it comes from Heaven; and they look
sharp for the rain, which is collected in large tanks, and an inch or
two more of water in the tank is considered a great catch. I've often
heard the ladies there talking for a shower:--

"`Good morning, marm. How do you do this fine morning?'

"`Pretty well, I tank you, marm. Charming shower hab last night.'

"`Yes, so all say; but me not very lucky. Cloud not come over my tank.
How many inches of water you get last night, marm?'

"`I get good seven inches, and I tink a little bit more, which make me
very happy.'

"`Me no so lucky, marm; so help me God, me only get four inches of water
in my tank; and dat nothing.'

"Well, but I've been yawing again, so now to keep my course. As soon as
I came to the house I knocked at the door, and a little black girl opens
the jalousies, and put her finger to her thick lips.

"`No make noise; missy sleep.'

"`Where am I to put this?'

"`Put down there; by-and-by I come fetch it;' and then she closed the
jalousies, for fear her mistress should be woke up, and she get a
hiding, poor devil. So I puts the breaker down at the door, and walks
back to the boat again. Now, you see, these liberty men were all by
when I spoke to the girl, and seeing the liquor left with no one to
guard it, the temptation was too strong for them. So they looked all
about them, a