d with a
sneer replied--

"Oh, well--please yourselves. It matters nothing to me if you get
washed overboard. Make all fast, lads," he added, turning to his crew,
who stood prepared for what one of them styled a scrimmage. Malines
returned to the quarter-deck, followed by a half-suppressed laugh from
some of the mutinous emigrants.

"You see, David," remarked Joe, in a quiet tone, to a man beside him, as
he turned down his cuffs, "I think, from the look of him, that if we was
to strike on rocks, or run on shore, or take to sinking, or anything o'
that sort, the mate is mean enough to look arter hisself and leave the
poor things below to be choked in a hole. So you an' me must keep on
deck, so as to let 'em all out if need be."

"Right, Joe, right you are."

The man who thus replied bore such a strong resemblance to Joe in grave
kindliness of expression and colossal size of frame, that even a
stranger could not fail to recognise them as brothers, and such they
were--in truth they were twins, having first seen the light together
just thirty years before. There was this difference in the character of
the brothers, however, that Joe Binney was the more intellectual and
resolute of the two. David Binney, recognising this fact, and loving
his brother with all the fervour of a strong nature, was in the habit of
looking up to him for advice, and submitting to him as if he had been an
elder brother. Nevertheless, David was not without a mind of his own,
and sometimes differed in opinion with Joe. He even occasionally
disputed, but never with the slightest tinge of ill-feeling.

While the brothers were conversing in an undertone on the dangers of the
sea, and the disagreeables of a fore-cabin, the mass of unfortunates
below were cowering in their berths, rendered almost forgetful of the
stifling atmosphere, and the wailing of sick children, by the fear of
shipwreck, as they listened with throbbing hearts to the howling wind
and rattling cordage overhead, and felt the tremendous shocks when the
good ship was buffeted by the sea.

Near to Joe Binney stood one of the sailors on outlook. He was a
dark-complexioned, savage-looking man, who had done more than any one
else to foment the bad feeling that had existed between the captain and
his men.

"Ye look somethin' skeared, Hugh Morris," said Joe, observing that the
look-out was gazing over the bow with an expression of alarm.

"Breakers ahead!" roared the man at th