one. If it was not for that,
we should have had all our throats cut by those gentry, if we hadn't
managed to beat them off; and that would have been no easy job. I may
be wrong altogether, but this is what I think," continued Peter.
"There's one thing, particularly, I want to say to you, Jack: never go
and do anything wrong, and fancy that it will end with the thing done.
There's many a man who has done a wrong thing in his youth, and has gone
through life as if he had a rope round his neck, and he has found it
turning up here and there, and staring him in the face when he has least
expected it. When once a bad thing is done, you can't get rid of it--
you can't undo it--you can't get away from it, any more than you can
call the dead to life. You may try to forget it; but something or other
will always remind you of it, as long as you live. Then, remember there
is another life we've got to look to, when every single thing we've done
on earth must be remembered--must be acknowledged--must be made known.
You and I, and every sailor, should know that any moment we may be sent
into another world to begin that new life, and to stand before God's
judgment-seat. I think of this myself sometimes; but I wish that I
could think of it always; and that I ever had remembered it. Had I
always thought of that awful truth, there are many things I could not
possibly have ventured to do which I have done; and many things which I
have left undone, which I should have done. Jack, my boy, I say I have
done you some little good, but there's no good I could ever possibly do
you greater than teaching you to remember that truth always. But I must
not knock off this matter without warning you, that I may be thinking
unjustly of the captain: and I certainly would not speak to anyone else
aboard as I have done to you."

I thanked Peter for the advice he had given me, and promised that I
would not repeat what he had said.

"Can you see the felucca, Tillson?" I heard Mr Gale say to Tom, who
was reputed to have the sharpest eyes aboard.

"No, sir; she's nowhere where she was," he answered, after peering for
some time into the darkness astern.

We all kept looking out for some time, but she did not reappear. The
mate seemed to breathe more freely, and I must say that I was glad to be
rid of the near neighbourhood of the mysterious stranger. When morning
broke, she was nowhere to be seen. Whenever, during that and the
following days, a