mind of the reader in
the preceding chapter. Then one night an incident occurred that in a
moment explained everything, and revealed to me the unpleasant fact
that, so far as my enemy Morillo was concerned, I was still in as great
danger as when on board the felucca, although in the present case the
danger was perhaps a trifle more remote.

I have already mentioned Lemaitre's habit of drinking himself into a
state of intoxication every night. This habit, and the obscene language
that the man seemed to revel in when in such a condition, was so
disgusting to me that not the least-prized advantage afforded by my
convalescence was the ability to remain on deck until the nightly
saturnalia was at an end and Lemaitre and his companion had retired to
their cabins. On the particular night, however, of which I am about to
speak, a slight recurrent touch of fever caused me to slip quietly below
and turn in before the orgy began; not that I expected to get to sleep,
but simply because I believed the warmth and dryness of my bunk would be
better for me than the damp night air on deck.

Punctually at nine o'clock Lemaitre and his chief mate came noisily
clattering down the companion ladder, glasses and a bottle of rum were
produced, and the carouse began. It had not progressed very far before
it became apparent to me, as I lay there in my hot bunk, tossing
restlessly, that Lemaitre was in an unusually excited and quarrelsome
condition, and that Francois, the chief mate, was rapidly approaching a
similar condition as he gulped down tumbler after tumbler of liquor.
They were always argumentative and contradictory when drinking together,
but to-night they were unusually so. At length Francois made some
remark as to the extraordinary good fortune they had met with on this
particular voyage, in having come so far without falling in with a
British cruiser; at which Lemaitre laughed scornfully declaring that
there was not a British cruiser afloat that could catch _La belle
Jeannette_; and that, even if it were otherwise, he should have no fear
of them this voyage. "For," said he, "have we not a guarantee of safety
in the presence of that simple fool Courtenay on board? Have we not
saved his life by rescuing him from the raft? And do you suppose they
would reward our humanity, ha, ha! by making a prize of the schooner?
Not they! If there is one thing those asses of British pride themselves
upon more than another it is their chival