I; to tell this man the news, as he calls it, would oblige
me to travel over fifty years of history.

"Why, Mr. Tassard," said I, "there's plenty of things happening, you
know, for Europe's full of kings and queens, and two or more of them are
nearly always at loggerheads; but sailors--merchantmen like myself--hear
little of what goes on. We know the name of our own sovereign and what
wages sailors are getting; that's about it, sir. In fact, at this moment
I could tell you more about Chili and Peru than England and France."

"Is there war between our nations?" he asked.

"Yes," said I.

"Ha!" he cried, "I doubt if this time you will come off so easily. You
have good men in Hawke and Anson; but Jonquiere and St. George, hey? and
Macon, Cellie, Letenduer!"

He shook his head knowingly, and an air of complacency, that would be
indescribable but for the word French, overspread his face. I knew the
name of Jonquiere as an admiral who had fought us in 1748 or
thereabouts; of the others I had never heard. But I held my peace, which
I suppose he put down to good manners, for he changed the subject by
asking if I was married. I answered, No, and inquired if _he_ had a
wife.

"A wife!" cried he; "what should a man of my calling do with a wife? No,
no! we gather such flowers as we want off the high seas, and wear them
till the perfume palls. They prove stubborn though; our graces are not
always relished. Trentanove reckoned himself the most killing among us,
and by St. Barnabas he proved so, for three ladies--passengers of beauty
and distinction--slew themselves for his sake. Do you understand me?
They preferred the knife to his addresses. _I_," said he, tapping his
breast and grinning, "was always fortunate."

He looked a complete satyr as he thus spoke, with his hairy cap, grey
beard, long nose, little cunning shining eyes, and broken fangs; and a
chill of disgust came upon me. But I had already seen enough of him to
understand that he was a man of a very formidable character, and that he
had awakened after eight-and-forty years of insensibility as real a
pirate at heart as ever he had been, and that it therefore behoved me to
deal very warily with him, and above all not to let him suspect my
thoughts. Yet he seemed a person superior to the calling he had adopted.
His English was good, and his articulation indicated a quality of
breeding. Whilst he smoked his pipe out he told me a story of an action
between this schooner