od pilot; and as neither freight nor insurance had been paid, he
and his wife would feast us on music; having learned that I especially
was fond of it. They had screeched operas for a lifetime in Italy, but I
didn't care for that. As arranged, therefore, I was on deck at the
appointed time and place, to stay at all hazards.

The pianos, as I had fully expected, were fearfully out of
tune--suffering, I should say, from the effects of seasickness!

So much so that I shall always believe this opportunity was seized upon
by the artist to avenge the damage to his instruments, which, indeed, I
could not avert, in the storm that we passed through. The good Strichine
and his charming wife were astonished at the number of opera airs I
could name. And they tried to persuade me to sing Il Trovatore; but
concluding that damage enough had already been done, I refrained, that
is, I refracted my song.

CHAPTER VI

Mutiny--Attempt at robbery and murder--Four against one--Two go
down before a rifle--Order restored.

July 23rd, 1887, brings me to a sudden and shocking point in the history
of the voyage that I fain would forget, but that will not be possible.
Between the hours of 11 and 12 p.m. of this day I was called instantly
to defend my life and all that is dear to a man.

The bark, anchored alone in the harbour of Antonina, was hid from the
town in the darkness of a night that might well have covered the
blackest of tragedies. My pirates thought their opportunity had surely
come to capture the _Aquidneck_, and this they undertook to do. The
ringleader of the gang was a burly scoundrel, whose boast was that he
had "licked" both the mate and second mate of the last vessel he had
sailed in, and had "busted the captain in the jaw" when they landed in
Rio, where the vessel was bound, and where, of course, the captain had
discharged him. It was there the villain shipped with me, in lieu of one
of the Rosario gang who had been kindly taken in charge by the guard at
Ilha Grande and brought to Rio to be tried before the American Consul
for insubordination. Said he, one day when I urged him to make haste and
help save the topsails in a squall, "Oh, I'm no soft-horn to be
hurried!" It was the time the bark lost her topgallant-mast and was cast
on her beam-ends on the voyage to Antonina, already told; it was, in
fact, no time for loafing, and this braggart at a decisive word hurried
aloft with the rest to do his duty. Wh