ndians as possible without causing death.

But he was not in command, and he started with surprise, for the
captain's voice suddenly rang out with an order, though not the one he
anticipated.

"Stand by, a couple of you," he said, "and be handy there, Mr Dellow,
to let go the port anchor. I expect they'll foul the cable and send us
adrift."

There was a pattering of feet upon the deck, and the next moment Captain
Banes's hand was upon Brace's shoulder.

"Your eyes are a little out of focus, squire," he said quietly. "They
magnify too much, and see more than there is."

"Why--what--surely--" stammered Brace.

"It's all right, my lad," said the captain quietly. "Better than seeing
nothing when there's real danger coming on board."

"They deceived me, captain," said Briscoe.

"So they did me, sir, at the first squint. I thought we were in for a
scrimmage, and that before long I should be cutting up sticking-plaster
and putting it on. Two fine old sticks of timber those, squire, and
they must have come down some fierce falls to be stripped of their
boughs like that. Now, then, are they going to foul our cable and send
us adrift or will they slip quietly by?"

Brace felt so annoyed and disgusted that he could find no words for the
moment, and he stood there watching the two old tree-trunks coming
closer and closer, till the foremost just missed the cable, and directly
after touched the brig's bows with a slow, dull, heavy impact which made
her jar from end to end.

"Bah!" ejaculated the lad, in his disgust, and, turning away, he left
the deck, glad of the excuse of going down into the cabin to see after
his brother.

But the second mate was waiting for him when he came up, ready with a
bantering laugh.

"I say, sir," he whispered, "aren't you a bit too eager for a fight?"

Brace said nothing, but, mortified by his mistake, walked right aft, to
stand leaning over the stern, gazing down into the black waters as they
came rushing and whispering from beneath the vessel, eddying about the
rudder, and suggesting wonders of the mysterious monsters that might
even then be gazing up at him with glassy eyes, meditating a spring and
a snatch to seize and drag him down to their lair, as he had seen the
two savages snatched from life not many hours before.

"Horrible!" he muttered, half-aloud, as he shrank away with a shudder.

"What's horrible?" said the familiar voice of the American behind him;
"being chaffed