begging before that, some of 'em. Old Pew, as had lost
his sight, and might have thought shame, spends twelve hundred pounds in
a year, like a lord in Parliament. Where is he now? Well, he's dead now
and under hatches; but for two years before that, shiver my timbers! the
man was starving. He begged, and he stole, and he cut throats, and
starved at that, by the powers!"

"Well, it ain't much use, after all," said the young seaman.

"'Tain't much use for fools, you may lay to it--that, nor nothing,"
cried Silver. "But now, you look here; you're young, you are, but you're
as smart as paint. I see that when I set my eyes on you, and I'll talk
to you like a man."

You can imagine how I felt when I heard this abominable old rogue
addressing another in the very same words of flattery as he had used to
myself. I think, if I had been able, that I would have killed him
through the barrel. Meantime he ran on, little supposing he was
overheard.

"Here it is about gentlemen of fortune. They lives rough, and they risk
swinging, but they eat and drink like fighting-cocks, and when a cruise
is done, why it's hundreds of pounds instead of hundreds of farthings in
their pockets. Now, the most goes for rum and a good fling, and to sea
again in their shirts. But that's not the course I lay. I puts it all
away, some here, some there, and none too much anywheres, by reason of
suspicion. I'm fifty, mark you; once back from this cruise I set up
gentleman in earnest. Time enough, too, says you. Ah, but I've lived
easy in the meantime; never denied myself o' nothing heart desires, and
slept soft and ate dainty all my days, but when at sea. And how did I
begin? Before the mast, like you!"

"Well," said the other, "but all the other money's gone now, ain't it?
You daren't show face in Bristol after this."

"Why, where might you suppose it was?" asked Silver, derisively.

"At Bristol, in banks and places," answered his companion.

"It were," said the cook; "it were when we weighed anchor. But my old
missis has it all by now. And the 'Spy-glass' is sold, lease and good
will and rigging; and the old girl's off to meet me. I would tell you
where, for I trust you; but it 'ud make jealousy among the mates."

"And you can trust your missis?" asked the other.

"Gentlemen of fortune," returned the cook, "usually trust little among
themselves, and right they are, you may lay to it. But I have a way with
me, I have. When a mate brings a slip on h