ne on board the ship
with Doyle to get some of her clothing, and had been carried off. The
only remaining member of the _Portland's_ crew was a Malay--a man of
whom she had an instinctive dread; for, since the massacre of the ship's
company he had one day asked her with a mocking grin if she could not
"clean his coat." His coat was Melton's white duck jacket, and the
ensanguined garment brought all the horror of her lover's death before
her again.

Then followed fifteen long, long months of horror, misery, and agony.
She was a woman, and her terrible fate evokes the warmest pity. Whatever
may have been her past before she met Captain Melton and accompanied
him on his fateful voyage, her sufferings during those fifteen dreadful
months may be imagined but not written of nor suggested, except by
the neurotic "new woman" writer, who loves to dwell upon things vile,
degrading, terrifying, and abhorrent to the clean and healthy mind.

*****

In August, 1804, the American whaler _Union_, of Nantucket, after having
refreshed at Sydney Cove, as Port Jackson was then called, sailed on
a sperm-whaling cruise among the South Sea Islands. She arrived at
Tongatabu on the last day of September. As soon as the anchor was let
go a fleet of canoes appeared, and the occupants made the most friendly
demonstrations towards Captain Pendleton and his officers. In the
leading canoe was a man whom the captain took to be a Malay, and upon
being questioned this surmise proved to be correct In broken English he
informed Pendleton that the ship would be provided with plenty of
fresh food, water, and wood, if the ship's boats were sent ashore. The
captain's boat was thereupon swung out and lowered, and manned by six
men, the captain and Mr. John Boston, the supercargo, going with them.
These people were armed with six muskets and two cutlasses.

As soon as the boat was well clear of the ship the natives became very
troublesome, clambering up the chain plates, and forcing themselves on
board in great numbers. The chief mate, Daniel Wright, seems to
have shown more sense than most of the poor fools who, by their own
negligence, brought about--and still bring about even to the present
day--these South Sea tragedies. He got his men together and tried to
drive off the intruders, but despite his endeavours thirty or forty
of them kept to the deck, and their countrymen in the canoes alongside
rapidly passed them up a number of war-clubs.

Wright, wit