r the other every year or so, and these poor fellows
may be flying to save their miserable necks. Who goes there? Who goes
there?' But, whether wanting all their energy for their oars or for
some other reason known to themselves, those in the boat made no reply
to our hail, and the next moment, ere the ship gathered way sufficient
to gain on them, they were alongside, their long unwieldy craft grating
against the ship's timbers beneath her counter.

"`Look-out there, forrads!' cried Captain Alphonse, seeing the boat
making apparently for our bows, but before a hand could be raised to
prevent them, without asking permission in any way or offering the
slightest apology or excuse in advance for their conduct, a number of
negroes jumped out of her and began climbing aboard the _Saint Pierre_.

"Heavens! gentlemen, clad in little beyond Nature's own covering, as the
majority of the intruders were, and looking in the dim light as black as
the ace of spades, they seemed like so many demons, come to take
possession of our unfortunate ship--as indeed they were. Oh dear me!"

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

THE "MARQUIS DE POMME-ROSE."

"A pretty kettle of fish that!" exclaimed the skipper, pitching the
butt-end of his cigar through one of the stern ports as he got up from
his seat and began to pace up and down the saloon in his usual quarter-
deck fashion. "You must have been mad, colonel, to let them come aboard
so quietly and in such a manner, too!"

"Stay, you have not heard all," said the other. "As the black rascals
tumbled over the side, one of them called out something in the French
tongue. This, sir, at once disarmed Captain Alphonse, who had prevented
me from teaching them good manners, which I otherwise should have done,
for I had my six-shooter ready, with the barrels all loaded, being
always prepared for any such little unpleasantness by my experiences in
Venezuela, where a man often carries his life in his own hands!

"But Captain Alphonse would not let me fire, though, by heavens! I
would have accounted for half a dozen of them, I know, before they had
advanced beyond the precincts of the ship!

"`No, no, be quiet!' cried he, knocking my arm up to prevent my taking
aim at the leader of the gang, whom I had spotted dead in the eye.
`These are my countrymen!'

"It was no use my talking after that, sir. The sound of the French
tongue, which these blacks of Hayti speak with a better accent than the
gamins of