rs of my boat's crew, and to make
arrangements for obtaining our parole. By way of reply to this I
received a curt intimation that Captain Renouf was in his cabin, and
that I was to proceed thereto forthwith.

In response to this summons I at once mounted to the deck for the first
time, and, flinging a keen, hurried glance about me, found that I was on
board a slashing schooner, some fifty or sixty tons bigger than the
_Dolphin_. She was a tremendously beamy craft, flush-decked fore-and-
aft, and was armed with ten twelve-pounders in her broadside batteries,
with a thirty-two-pounder between her masts--a truly formidable craft of
her kind. And it was evident, moreover, that she was manned in
accordance with her armament, for the watch on deck, although I did not
stay to count them, mustered fully forty men, as ruffianly-looking a set
of scoundrels as I ever set eyes on. A glance over the side showed me
that the vessel was a regular flier; for although there was but a
moderate breeze blowing, and the craft was close-hauled, she was going
along at a pace of fully nine knots. So smart a vessel, so heavily
armed and manned, ought to have been the pride of her captain; but I
could detect no traces of any such feeling, her decks being dark with
dirt, while a general air of slovenliness pervaded the craft from stem
to stern.

I was conducted aft to the companion by Ollivier, who whispered to me,
just as I was about to descend:

"_Courage, mon ami_!"

That the man should have deemed such an exhortation necessary was the
reverse of encouraging, for it seemed to indicate that, in his opinion,
I was about to undergo some more or less trying ordeal, a suggestion
that only too strongly confirmed my own forebodings. If, however, I was
about to be involved in a difficulty, my first step was, manifestly, to
ascertain its nature; so, making my way down the companion ladder, I
knocked at a door which confronted me, and was immediately bidden, in
French, to enter.

Turning the handle of the door and flinging it open, I obeyed, finding
myself in a fine, roomy, well-lighted cabin, the beams of which,
however, were so low that I could only stand upright when between them.
The place was rather flashily decorated, with a good deal of gilding,
and several crudely executed paintings in the panelling of the woodwork.
A large mirror, nearly ruined by damp, surmounted a buffet against the
fore-bulkhead, and the after-bulkhead was decora