the marvel, the Colonel had a servant, a close-tongued
fellow, William Bale by name, and reputed an Englishman, who, if he was
not like his master, was as unlike other folk. He was as quiet-spoken
as the Colonel, and as precise, and as peaceable. He had even been
heard to talk of his duty. But while the Colonel was tall and spare,
with a gentle eye and a long, kindly face, and was altogether of a
pensive cast, Bale was short and stout, of a black pallor, and very
forbidding. His mouth, when he opened it--which was seldom--dropped
honey. But his brow scowled, his lip sneered, and his silence invited
no confidence.

Such being the skipper's passenger, and such his man, the wonder was
that Captain Augustin's astonishment had not long ago melted into
contempt. But it had not. For one thing, a seaman had been hurt, and
the Colonel had exhibited a skill in the treatment of wounds which
would not have disgraced an experienced chirurgeon. Then in the Bay the
sloop had met with half a gale, and the passenger, in circumstances
which the skipper knew to be more trying to landsmen than to himself,
had maintained a serenity beyond applause. He had even, clinging to the
same ring-bolt with the skipper, while the south-wester tore overhead
and the gallant little vessel lay over wellnigh to her beam-ends,
praised with a queer condescension the conduct of the crew.

"This is the finest thing in the world," he had shouted, amid the roar
of things, "to see men doing their duty! I would not have missed this
for a hundred crowns!"

"I'd give as much to be safe in Cherbourg," had been the skipper's grim
reply as he watched his mast.

But Augustin had not forgotten the Colonel's coolness. A landsman, for
whom the trough of the wave had no terrors, and the leeward breakers,
falling mountain high on Ushant, no message, was not a man to be
despised.

Indeed, from that time the skipper had begun to find a charm in the
Colonel's gentleness and courtesy. He had fought against the feeling,
but it had grown upon him. Something that was almost affection began to
mingle with and augment his wonder. Hence the patience with which, with
Kerry on the beam, he listened while the Colonel sang his siren song.

"He will be one of the people called Quakers," the skipper thought,
after a while. "I've heard of them, but never seen one. Yes, he will be
a Quaker."

Unfortunately, as he arrived at this conclusion a cry from the
steersman roused him. He spra