give him a few thousand dollars' credit any day."

Bully and Peese sailed for the Ellice and Gilbert groups, and soon news
reached Sydney that they had been playing havoc with the traders there.
With the traders of Captain Eury, and those of Captain Daly, of the
Sydney brig _Lady Alicia_, they were very rough, appropriating all
their oil and other native produce and giving them sarcastically written
receipts. Hayes stated that this was in retaliation for Daly having
visited his (Hayes's) stations in some of the Kingsmill Islands, and
having been too friendly with some of the local fair.

When the brig returned to Samoa, Hayes alone was in command; the
voluble, bearded Peese had, he said, sold him his interest in the ship
and gone to China again. People talked and said that Hayes had killed
him, but as the strength of the big captain's right arm was well known
in Samoa, nobody talked too loud. It was on this occasion that Hayes
"had" the German firm for some thousands of dollars. It seems that in
returning through the Kingsmill and Gilbert Groups he found a number of
the German firm's traders in terror of their lives, the natives having
warned them to clear out or be killed, they would have no white men on
their islands. Hayes consented to give them all passages to Samoa--for a
consideration, of course, and they agreed on behalf of their firm to pay
him each 50 dollars passage money--a reasonable enough sum. Most of them
had large quantities of oil and copra--this also was shipped. After the
last island had been visited, Hayes called them together in the cabin
and addressed them: "Now, boys, I've promised to give you all passages
to Samoa, and I will--if you do what I want. Now you've all got money
belonging to the German firm. Well, each of you must give me 50 dollars,
and if you take my advice you'll stick to the remainder. One thing you
all know as well as I do, and that is, that the Dutchmen will take your
souls out of their cases if you owe them anything. As for the oil and
copra _I'll_ see to that. That's all I've got to say, and if any of you
won't agree to this let him come on deck and try and convince me." The
traders grinned and consented to take the offer of a passage and the
privilege of annexing the firm's dollars, and each paid his 50 dollars.
When Hayes got to Samoa, Weber, the German manager, interviewed Bully,
who detailed the dangers the traders had escaped, and genially said, "I
hardly like to make you