he
exclaimed--

"There is a poor fellow entangled in the rigging--he seems alive. I
think that I could bring him up."

Influenced by a generous impulse, and forgetting the fearful monsters in
the neighbourhood, he was on the point of leaping overboard, when the
black boatman seized his arm, crying out--

"No, no, massa, dat one shark, hisself."

Jack looked again, and the object he had mistaken for a seaman's white
shirt resolved itself into the white belly of a shark, the creature
being employed in gnawing the throat of its victim.

"Dat is what dey always do," observed the black coolly. "Dey drag down
by de feet, and den dey begin to eat at de trote."

Probably because the throat is the part of the body most exposed. Jack
and Terence carried the survivors up to Kingston. Except that they
uttered a few expressions of regret at the sad fate of their shipmates,
the men seemed very little concerned, or grateful to Heaven for their
own preservation; and immediately on landing they went into a grog-shop,
where they probably soon forgot all about the matter. Such is the force
of habit. Jack and Terence were not enchanted with the silent,
half-deserted streets of Kingston, through which, having lost their way,
they paraded for half an hour or more; but after eating a pink-coloured
shaddock, and half-a-dozen juicy oranges, obtained from a smiling-faced
negress market-woman, their spirits rose.

"Things begin to wear a more roseate hue, maybe tinged with the juice of
the fruit we've swallowed," said Terence, laughing, "and here's Johnny
Ferong's store we were looking for, I've no doubt."

They entered, and received a hearty welcome from that most loquacious
and facetious of Frenchmen, who offered to supply them with every
possible article they could require in any quantity, from a needle to an
anchor. They wanted something--it was information--how best to get out
to Saint David's, not a profitable article to supply them with, but
Johnny Ferong afforded it, with apparently infinite pleasure, and
further assisted to raise their spirits, and confirm their resolution of
becoming customers, by handing them each a glass of cool, sparkling
champagne, and immediately replenishing it when empty.

"And you want to pay visit to Madame Bradsaw? Charmante lady--den I
vill order one voiture for vous, vich vill take vous dere, let me see,
in two hours and one half; and vous stay dere, and come back in de cool
of de morning