r Jarwin was so visibly affected at parting from
his kind old master, that the steward of the ship, a sympathetic man,
was induced to offer him a glass of grog and a pipe. He accepted both,
mechanically, still gazing with earnest looks at the fast-receding
canoe.

Presently he raised the glass to his lips, and his nose became aware of
the long-forgotten odour! The current of his thoughts was violently
changed. He looked intently at the glass and then at the pipe.

"Drink," said the sympathetic steward, "and take a whiff. It'll do you
good."

"Drink! whiff!" exclaimed Jarwin, while a dark frown gathered on his
brow. "There, old Father Neptune," he cried, tossing the glass and pipe
overboard, "_you_ drink and whiff, if you choose; John Jarwin has done
wi' drinkin' an' whiffin' for ever! Thanks to _you_, all the same, an'
no offence meant," he added in a gentler tone, turning to the astonished
steward, and patting him on the shoulder, "but if you had suffered all
that I have suffered through bein' a slave to the glass and the pipe--
when I _thought_ I was no slave, mark you, an' would have larfed any one
to scorn who'd said I wos--if you'd see'd me groanin', an yearnin', an'
dreamin' of baccy an' grog, as I _have_ done w'en I couldn't get neither
of 'em for love or money--you wouldn't wonder that I ain't goin' to be
such a born fool as to go an' sell myself over again!"

Turning quickly towards the shore, as if regretting that he should, for
a moment, have appeared to forget his old friend, he pulled out his
handkerchief and waved it over the side. Big Chief replied
energetically with a scrap of native cloth--not having got the length of
handkerchiefs at that time.

"Look at 'im, Cuff" exclaimed Jarwin, placing his dog on the bulwarks of
the ship, "look at him, Cuff, and wag your `spanker boom' to him, too--
ay, that's right--for he's as kind-hearted a nigger as ever owned a
Breetish tar for a slave."

He said no more, but continued to wave his handkerchief at intervals
until the canoe seemed a mere speck on the horizon, and, after it was
gone, he and his little dog continued to gaze sadly at the island, as it
grew fainter and fainter, until it sank at last into the great bosom of
the Pacific Ocean.

The next land seen by Jarwin and Cuffy was--the white cliffs of Old
England!

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Jarwin and Cuffy, by R.M. Ballantyne

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JARW