daybreak, "dere, is de soup for de yaller
nigger's gang!"

The other hands were just turning out as Bill reached the forecastle,
and Jem Backstay and the rest were soon made aware of their danger from
within as well as without; but, before the boatswain could explain
himself properly or give any orders he was startled at seeing that some
one had cut the jib halliards, and the sail had come down by the run,
and was towing in the water right across the ship's bows.

"Treachery, shipmates!" he called out. "No wonder the poor crippled
thing couldn't make more'n three knots with that 'ere sail towing under
her fore-foot. Those blessed Lascars did this, I suppose!"

He was in the midst of his exclamation when the lateen-rigged schooner,
as if disdaining further concealment, hoisted the dread black pirate
flag; and the serang, in response to the signal, gave a shrill whistle,
at the same time drawing his crease.

With a yell of defiance he and his Lascar gang rushed aft in a body for
the poop, where the captain and his officers were standing together,
while the forecastle hands stood for the moment dumbfounded at the
suddenness of the attack.

Only for a moment, however; for, almost at the same instant, Snowball,
uttering a shout which might have been heard on board the pirate, now
little over a mile off, dashed at the Malay chief, with his long knife
gripped between his teeth and his arms working like windmills; and as he
clutched the serang in his deadly grip the cabin-doors beneath the poop
flew open, and the Lascar gang stopped their advance as if struck by
lightning, uttering at the same time a howl of terror and dismay.

VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER FIVE.

CATCHING A TARTAR.

No wonder that the murderous band of treacherous Malays stopped
paralysed in their desperate assault on the poop.

There, right facing them, in front of the saloon doors, stood the whilom
quiet, delicate-looking passenger "Mr Meredith," dressed in the smart
uniform of a lieutenant in the Royal Navy, a drawn sword in one hand and
a revolver in the other; while drawn up behind him were the whole of the
first cutter's crew of HMS _Albatross_, the name of which vessel stood
out embossed on the bright ribbons of their straw hats--ten in number of
stalwart blue-jackets, armed with cutlasses and with pistols stuck in
their belts--levelling the shining barrels of their Snider rifles point-
blank at their heads. No wonder that the swarthy scoundrels