major is shot dead. Secure de magazine; call out de artillery.' Den one loud buz buz pass along de line -de hofficer voice was heard-Men, if you move one step I will cut you down by G-d.' Anoder say-Stand to your arms, men; if one of you stir, I will run him troo.' Who is de willain?-who is de willain?' shout some one else. Someting come over me-I rush out five pace -order my fusee, and touch my cap-wery graceful-so-[suiting the action to the word] Captain, and gentlemen-dere are de mutineers.' 'Where?' Dere.' 'Name dem,' say one. I will,' say me Quacco Ogly Jack, Mundingo Tom, and Yellow-skin Paul.' Dey were all immediately secure-and marshed to de front;-dem say noting-not one word. I look at dem -all tree cool and collected. May be,' tink I, dere will have be some mistake; if so, all people will tink I mosh have been de mutineer, murserer you call, and dat to shave my self I was peach on dem.' My heart sink when de agitant seize me by de shoulder. My fine fellow, you make mosh noise-we shall see what you are make of very shortly yourself.' Here, secure Corporal Quacco.' By dis time we were again marching into de fortde gate was shut-four field piece nine pounder, manned by white artillerymen, was pointed so as to enfilade us as we were formed in close column-and my tree friend, and myself were instantly brought to one drum-head court-martial. Some young hofficer say, 'Oh, hang him all-hang him all.' Please not, young gentleman, if de same ting to you,' say I. No hurry,' say I.

I am willing to be hang if dese tree willains are not de men. Secure dem hands'-dis was done. 'Now,' say I, we were all sarve wid eight blank cartridge-look at dem muskets-plain dey all have been fire''What has all dis to do wid it?' say de agitant. Mosh,' say I, mosh now see how many cartridge each on dem hab.' 'Ha, ha,' say my Captain, Quacco is right-dem all tree have each de eight cartridge untouch, yet it quite evident dey all have fired.' What say you, ye scoundrels,' again say de Captain'what say you why you should not

be hang immediately?' Dem would not speak one word-den I tell all I hear and so dem try, find guilty, and were hang-and I as one reward got my discharge." (Here our friend made a long pause-at length he continued.) "Why I take him—I can't tell-and still more, why I leave dear Jamaica, where de Governor hoffer me ground to grow nyam in, and house-and as for wife, I hab several. What de debil was possess me to leave my pig, and wives, and allowance-pension you call him, and take into my head for come here again? -Heaven know-I Quacco do not. -Here-where one can scarcely breathe for stinking mud, and every night brings dangers wid it, and you never can tell whidder de next morning will not see you carried away into slavery, or may be sacrificed before one Fetish, or who know dat he shall not, some fine forenoon, be roast or grill, and eaten like one monkey. Oh, I wish I was back again."

"But," said Sprawl, "you seem to have left off as corporalwhen became you sergeant?

Quacco laughed, " by brevet, my good sir-by bre"

"A gun-Sir Oliver speaking to us in the offing."

"Hurrah for Old Gazelle once more!" shouted Sprawl, in a voice like thunder.

"Out of my way, friend Quacco," cried I.

"Room if you please, old Daddy Longyarn," quoth master Marline. And to the great dismay of poor Quacco, who little expected to have been so suddenly and unceremoniously swept aside, we all tumbled on deck as fast as our legs could carry us. The first man I encountered was Clinker, the master at arms.

"Who has seen the frigate?" said I. "Why, there she is, sir," replied the man." There, you see her topgallant sails over the green bushes there, sir. Now, you see the heads of her fore and maintopsails."

"I see, I see. What signal is that flying at the fore, Mr Marline ?" said I to the midshipman who was looking out.

"The signal to close, sir."

"Close," croaked old Sprawl"close easier said than done, Sir Oliver."

Here the frigate in the offing slowly and majestically shoved her long jib-boom past the mangroves on the westernmost bank, and gradually the whole beautiful machine hove in sight, rising and falling on the long swell.

As she came round the point, she took in topgallant sails, and hauled down the foretopmast staysail; and whenever she had fairly opened the river, and come nearly abreast of us, she laid her maintopsail to the mast, with her fore and mainsails hanging in graceful festoons in the brails, and hove to under her three topsails, jib, and spanker. She slid silently and majestically along, the bright green wave curling outwards from her beautifully moulded bows, like the shell-shaped canopy of Daddy Neptune's car, as the cutwater slid gently through the calm heaving of the blue swell, gradually subsiding, as the glorious old hooker lost her way and became stationary, until she floated, like a swan asleep on the dark waters, the bright sun shining cheerily on her white sails and hammocks, and clear white streak, and sparkling on her glittering sides, as they rose and fell fresh and wet from the embraces of old Ocean; and as the land-breeze laid her over, her goldbright copper blazed like one vast polished mirror, wherein the burning sun was reflected in dazzling glances. And bright blinding rays flashed out starlike, from the window in the quarter gallery, and the glass in the scuttles of the officer's cabins, and from every burnished piece of metal throughout the whole length of the gallant craft, converting her black hull into a brilliant constellation, while her heavy lower masts, with their strong shrouds and stays, and the swelling sails, and the tall and taper spars aloft, were seen clear and distinct against the deep cold blue of the seaward horizon.

A string of small round bundles, apparently each about the size of a man's head, now twisted and struggled, and stopped, and finally slid up to the main royal-mast-head. The instant the uppermost reached the truck, as if it had touched a spring-bang-a gun was fired, and at the same moment, the round balls blew out steadily in so many flags.

"What signal now, Mr Marline ?" "The signal to weigh and stand out, sir."

66

Why we can't; it is impossible; although the wind is fair, the swell on the bar puts it out of our power." "Very true," said old Pumpbolt, "and you had better say so, Brail. I, for one, won't undertake to carry you over until there is less broken water at the river's mouth, I know." I telegraphed to this effect; the frigate acknowledged it, and answered, that she would remain in the offing all night, in expectation of our getting over at high water, during it, when possibly there would be less sea on the bar.

Having made this signal, she run her jib up, set topgallant-sails, and let fall the foresail: the ponderous mainyard slowly swung round, and as the noble frigate fetched way again, she gradually fell off before the wind, her long low hull foreshortened into a mere tub of a vessel to look at, and finally presenting her stern to us, she lay over, and inclined herself gracefully to the breeze, as if she was bidding us farewell, and glided cheerily away, indicating by the increasing whiteness of her wake, the accelerated speed with which she clove the heaving billows.

"There goes the dear old beauty," said Davie; "there's a retiring curtsy for you; that beats the stateliest of my lady patronesses at Almacks."

Having gained an offing of about three miles, she again shortened sail, and hove to in her station to await our joining, when the bar became passable in the night.

"Weary work, master Benjie, weary work," said Davie Doublepipe; "so here we must lie, roasting another whole day, while there is plenty of water on the bar, if that confounded swell would only fall."

By this it was drawing near the men's dinner-time; and while the lieutenant and I were pacing the deck, rather disconsolately, trying to steer clear of the smoke of the galley, that streamed aft as we rode head to wind, we noticed that our sable visitor, Sergeant Quacco, had, with the true spirit of resignation, declined into cook's mate, (indeed if there be a Negro on board when this birth becomes vacant, he inva

riably slides into it, as naturally as a snail into his shell,) and was busy in assisting the maimed seaman who was watching the coppers. The fire seemed to burn very indifferently from the greenness of the wood, which gave out more smoke than flame.

"Drainings, my man," said I to cookey, "don't choke us if you please. Do get some dry chips from Shavings, will you ?

Ay, ay, sir," said the man. "Here, Quacco, mind the fire, till I get some splinters from forward there.-Stay-Lennox, my dear boy, do get me a handful of dry chips from old Shavings, will ye?"

The Scotch corporal civilly complied; and after a little, we saw him split up a block of wood where the carpenter had been at work in the bows of the felucca, and presently he returned with a bundle of them, which Sergeant Quacco busily employed himself in poking into the fire, blowing lustily with his blubber lips all the while. When Lennox turned away, I could not help noticing, that he stuck his tongue in his cheek, and winked to one of the crew as he went below.

Presently I desired the boatswain to pipe to dinner. In place of bundling down below, according to the etiquette of the service in larger vessels, I winked at the poor fellows breaking away forward into messes, which they contrived to screen from the view of the quarterdeck, by slewing the long yard nearly athwart ships, and loosing the sail as if to dry.

Notwithstanding all this, we could easily see what was going on forward. Close too, sat the old cook himself, with Shavings the carpenter, and Wadding the gunner, warrant officers in a small way, with a little snipe of a boy waiting on them.

About a fathom from them, was another group squatted on the deck, consisting of Corporal Lennox, Old Clinker the master at arms, Dogvane the quartermaster, and no smaller a personage than Sergeant Quacco.

The food was peas-soup, and salt junk and biscuit. The hands, as we turned and returned, seemed exceedingly comfortable and happy; when all at once, the old cook

pressed his hands on the pit of his stomach, and began to make a variety of rather odd grimaces. Dogvane looked in his face, and instantly seemed to catch the infection; so he next began to screw himself up into a variety of indescriba ble contortions. Sergeant Quacco looked first at one, and then at another, as theygroaned in any thing but a melodious concert, until he too, through sympathy, or in reality from pain, began also to twist himself about, and to make such hideous faces, that to have trusted him near a respectable pig in the family way, would have been as much as the nine farrow were worth.

At length the contagion became general apparently, and Corporal Lennox began to groan, and wincé, as he ejaculated-"Oh dear, what can this be? what an awful pain in my stomach! Why, Mr Drainings, what have you clapt into that peas-soup? Something bye common you must have put into it, for we are all dying here with "

"My eye!" said old Drainings, speaking slowly and deliberately, as if the paroxysm had subsided, and some strange light had flashed on him, " you are quite right, Lennox. That same peas soup is none of the right sort-that is clear now. I have just been telling Mr Wadding that a wery-most-remarkable circumstance took place in the boiling on't."

Here the old fellow, who had just finished his pease-soup, very solemnly looked upwards, and wiped his muzzle with what hovered between a pocket-handkerchief and a dishclout, of any colour but that of unsunned snow.

"Why," continued the cook, "just when it began to simmer about the edges of the boiler-Ah—ah—oh -there it is again-there it is again," -and once more he began to tumble about on the deck, giving friend Quacco several miscellaneous kicks and punches during his make-believe involuntary convulsions. This fit seemed also to pass over.

"Why," said he, "just when the soup began to simmer about the edges of the copper, and thin streaks of white froth began to shoot inwards towards the middle, where the hot soup was whirling round in

a bubbling eddy, and poppling up for all the world like the sea on the bar there, I saw-I saw".

Here he looked unutterable things with his one eye, turning it up like a duck in thunder.

"What did you see?" said old Clinker, staring in his face with sham earnestness.

"I saw-80 sure as I see Mr Weevil the purser's d-d ugly mug aft on the quarterdeck there-a small devil rise out of the boiling peassoup in the very middle of the copper, and fly up and away over the mast-head like a shot, whipping the vane at the mast-head off its spindle with the bight of his tail." "No; did you though?" said several voices.

"To be sure I did," rejoined Drainings, "as distinct as I now see my thumb-none of the cleanest, by the way."

between every word, "at the wery instant of time, by the glass, that Sergeant Quacco there mended the fire.'

"Oh-oh-oh!"-Here all hands of the rogues who were in the secret, began again to roll about, and gri mace, as if a travelling menagerie of baboons had suddenly burst, and capsized its inmates all about.

Quacco all this while was twisting and turning himself, and, although evidently in a deuced quandary, trying to laugh the affair off as a joke.

"Well," at length said he, “I don't believe in Fetish-now dat I is among whiteman Christian. So I will tank you, Massa Draining, to hand me over my chocolate."

But I noticed that the devil a drop would he take into his mouth, although he made believe to drink it. The jest went on-at length there was a calm, when who should again break ground but Sergeant Quacco

Why, as like the little heathen god brought on board by Quacco there, as you can fancy any thing." Oh-oh-oh"-again resounded from all hands.

It

"But it could not be he," at length struck in the black sergeant. could not be he, seeing he is safe stow below de heel of de bowsprit dere."

"Heaven grant it may be so," whined Dogvane.

"If it really be as Quacco says," said Wadding, in a sympathizing tone" why, then, I will believe it is all fancy-all a bam."

Here the black sergeant, in great tribulation, rose to go forward, evidently with a desire to reconnoitre whether the graven image was really there in the body or no. After a long search, he came back and sat down, blank and stupified, on the spot where he had risen from.

"And pray, Mr Drainings, when did you see this curious appearance?" persisted Lennox.

"At the wery instant of time," drawled Cookey, with his arms crossed, and stuck into the open bo. som of his greasy shirt, that had once been red flannel, and with a short black stump of a pipe in his mouth, from which he puffed out a cloud

off the whole affair.

"But where de debil can he be?" said he, almost involuntarily-"gone, sure enough."

"Oh-oh-oh-" sung out all hands once more, with their fists stuck into their midriffs.

"Oh, that vile Fetish," screamed Lennox; "we must all be bewitched -Quacco, we are all bewitched."

"Bewitch!" responded the black sergeant, jumping off the deck, and now at his wit's end; "and I believe it is so. I hab pain in my tomack too-just dis moment-oh, wery sharp!"

"Confound your Fetish," groaned the old cook; "it was just as you stuck those chips of cedarwood into the fire-precisely at the wery moment I snuffed the delicious smell of them, that I saw the devil himself first put his ugly fiz up in the middle of the peas-soup, and gibber, and twinkle his eyes, and say ".

"Say!" shouted Lennox-" why did he really and truly speak, Mr Drainings?"

"Speak!" responded he of the slush bucket-" speak! ay, as plain as I do."

"And what said he?" quoth Dogvane.

"Why, just as he shook off the chocolate spray from the barb at the

"Where got I the chips, did you ask, Quacco? Oh, oh, oh!Why, Heaven forgive me; but I am punished for it now-they are the very splinters of your Fetish, that you brought on board!"

Up started the black resetter, as if bit by a rattle-snake, dancing and jumping. "Oh, my tomack, oh, my tomack !-de Fetish have get into my tomack-de leetle debil in a my tomack. Oh, doctor, doctor!-one evil spirit in me-oh, doctor, someting to make him fly-someting to get him out! Doctor, de debil in a my belly-physic-physic, doctor; de strongerer de more betterer. Oh Lord!" And away he tumbled down the fore-hatchway, roaring for Esculapius like a perfect bull of Bashan. While we were laughing at this to our heart's content, Mr Marline came aft to us.

"There are a good many dark specks passing and repassing above us in the further most reach of the river, yonder, sir-as far as you can see there, sir. Will you please to look at them, Mr Sprawl?"

Sprawl took a long squint first, and then handed the glass to me. I peered, and peered. The glorious stream was rolling down like a shining flow of quicksilver; but although all continued quiet in our vicinity, yet, where it narrowed nearly to a bright point in the distance above, I could perceive a tiny dark object slowly descend the river, and send up a thick cloud of smoke, after which it remained stationary, while a number of small black spots

were seen cruising hither and thither all around it.

Sprawl had also noticed this."Why, Brail, those gentry seem mustering in some strength. There cannot be many fewer than a hundred canoes paddling about there. What say you?"

It was now near three P.M., and we were bethinking ourselves of going to dinner, when a perfect cloud of the dark specks, fifty at the least, began to drop down with the ebb in a solid phalanx, three deep, looking in the distance like a compact black raft of wood. Presently they sheered off right and left; and although the craft from which we had seen the smoke arise, still remained at anchor in the stream, the attendant canoes soon vanished, one and all, amongst the mangroves, on each bank. "Poo -nonsense!" said I. "Come along, Sprawl-come along. Why, man, we shall get as thin as whippingposts, if we allow these barbarian demonstrations to interfere with our comforts."

"You may be right, Brail-you may be right," said old Davie; but he appeared to have some strange misgivings.

However, we went to dinner; the reefers were all with us, little Joe Peake among the rest, who was now quite recovered from the thump he had got on shore, and old Pumpbolt; and we were in the very middle of it, when down came Wadding, the gunner.

"Beg pardon, sir," said the old seaman, sidling in, and trying to appear at his ease, although he was very far from that same. Beg pardon-but them chaps are coming more nearer, sir, than seems quite convenient, sir-they are fast dropping down with the afternoon's ebb,

sir."

"Indeed!" said old Sprawl. "We must keep a bright look-out here, Brail, at any rate."

We went on deck, and the report was literally true; but although the mass above us continued to increase until the whole surface of the river in the distance seemed swarming, as one has seen a pool, with those blue-water insects, which, I believe, as boys, we used to call sailors, still there was no warlike demonstration made, beyond the oc