inquired my companion.

"Only that he nearly drove his knife through one of the men, that's
all," replied the mate; "English sailors ar'n't fond of knives."

He then touched his hat, and went down again to the pool, desiring me to
follow him with a kid for our share of the supper. I did so, and on my
return she asked me why I had drawn my knife upon the seaman, and I
narrated how it occurred. She pointed out to me the impropriety of what
I had done, asking me whether the Bible did not tell us we were to
forgive injuries.

"Yes," replied I; "but is it not injuries to ourselves? I did forgive
Jackson; but this was to prevent his hurting another."

"Another! Why you talk of Nero as if the animal was a rational being,
and his life of as much consequence as that of a fellow-creature. I do
not mean to say but that the man was very wrong, and that you must have
felt angry if an animal you were so fond of had been killed; but there
is a great difference between the life of an animal and that of a
fellow-creature. The animal dies, and there is an end of it; but a man
has an immortal soul, which never perishes, and nothing can excuse your
taking the life of a man, except in self-defence. Does not the
commandment say, `Thou shalt not kill?'"

She then talked to me a long while upon the subject, and fully made me
understand that I had been very wrong, and I confessed that I had been
so.

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

I now resolved to speak to her relative to the belt which contained the
diamonds; and I was first obliged to narrate to her in a few words what
Jackson had told me. She heard me with great interest, now and then
asking a question. When I had told her all, I said--

"Now, as they talk of not taking my chest, what shall I do? Shall I
wear the belt myself, or shall I put it in the bundle? Or will you wear
it for me, as my mother would have done, if she had been alive?"

She did not reply for some time, at last she said, as if talking to
herself, and not to me--

"How unsearchable are thy ways, O God!"

Indeed, although I did not feel it at the time, I have afterwards
thought, and she told me herself, how great her surprise was at finding
in the unshorn little savage, thus living alone upon a desolate rock, a
lad of good birth, and although he did not know it, with a fortune in
his charge, which would, in all probability, be ultimately his own.
This is certain, that the interest she felt towards me incre