the connection, for he did not receive him kindly.

On the way up, Wapoota, who felt somewhat timorous about the visit, had
made up his mind as to the best mode of address with which to approach
his friend. He had decided that, although he was not particularly
youthful, the language and manner of a respectful son to a revered
father would best befit the occasion. Accordingly when he reached the
cave and saw Zeppa busy beside his fire with a cocoa-nut, he assumed a
stooping attitude of profound respect, and drew near.

Zeppa looked up with a frown, as if annoyed at the intrusion.

"Your unworthy son," began Wapoota, "comes to--"

But he got no further. He could not well have hit upon a more
unfortunate phrase.

"My unworthy _son_!" shouted Zeppa, leaping up, while unearthly fires
seemed to shoot from his distended eyes. "My son! _son_! Ha!
ha-a-a-a!"

The horrified intruder heard the terminal yell, and saw the maniac bound
over the fire towards him, but he saw and heard no more, for his limbs
became suddenly endued with something like electric vitality. He turned
and shot over a small precipice, as if flung from an ancient catapult.
What he alighted on he did not know, still less did he care. It was
sufficiently soft to prevent death.

Another awful cry echoed and re-echoed from the heights above, and
intensified the electric battery within him. He went down the slopes
regardless of gradient at a pace that might have left even Zeppa behind
if he had followed; but Zeppa did not follow.

When Wapoota went over the precipice and disappeared, Zeppa halted and
stood erect, gazing with a questioning aspect at the sky, and drawing
his hand slowly across his brows with that wearied and puzzled aspect
which had become characteristic.

Returning after a few minutes to his cave, he reseated himself quietly
beside his fire, and, with his usual placid expression, devoted himself
earnestly to his cocoa-nut.

That was the first and last occasion on which the poor madman
experienced intrusion from the natives in his mountain retreat.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

Let us return, now, to our miserable and half-hearted pirate, far out
upon the raging sea.

It must not be supposed that the Pacific Ocean is always peaceful. No--
there are days and nights when its winds howl, and its billows roar, and
heave, and fume, with all the violence and fury of any other terrestrial
sea.

On one such night, the pirate's barque was tos