a cooks, forrard there, haven't yet
found a duplicate key to my locker. Wonderful! wonderful!"

The crew grinned, and put their backs into every stroke, for they knew
"the old man" meant that they shouldn't go dry.

"I'm the Pilot o' this here port, eh?"

"Most certainly," said the doctor.

"An' Harbour Master, in a manner o' speaking?"

"That's so."

"And captain o' this here boat?"

They were hugging the shore of the island, where the strength of the
incoming tide began to be felt in the narrow tortuous channel. The bluff
old Pilot put the steering-oar to port, and brought his boat round to
starboard, in order to keep her out of the strongest part of the
current.

"Now, lads, shake her up!" he shouted.

The men strained every nerve, and the boat was forced slowly against
the tide. With another sudden movement of the steering-oar Summerhayes
brought the boat into an eddy under the island, and she shot forward.

"Very well," he said; "it's acknowledged that I'm all that--Pilot,
Harbour Master, and skipper o' this boat. Then let me tell you that I'm
ship's doctor as well, and in that capacity, since we're outside and
there's easy going now under sail, I prescribe a good stiff glass all
round, as a preventive against plague, Yellow Jack, small-pox, or
whatever disease it is they've got on yonder barque."

Sartoris uncorked a bottle, and handed a glass to the doctor.

"And a very good prescription, too," said the tall, thin medico, who had
a colourless complexion and eyes that glittered like black beads; "but
where's the water?"

"Who drinks on my boat," growled the Pilot, "drinks his liquor neat. I
drown no man and no rum with water. If a man must needs spoil his
liquor, let him bring his own water: there's none in my locker."

The doctor took the old seaman's medicine, but not without a wry face;
Sartoris followed suit, and then the Pilot. The boat was now under sail,
and the crew laid in their oars and "spliced the main brace."

"That's the only medicine we favour in this boat or in this service,"
said the Pilot, as he returned the key of the locker to his pocket, "an'
we've never yet found it to fail. Before encount'ring plague, or after
encount'ring dirty weather, a glass all round: at other times the locker
is kept securely fastened, and I keep the key." Saying which, he
buttoned the flap of his pocket, and fixed his eyes on the strange
barque, to which they were now drawing near.

It could be see