"Ay, ay, sir."

The carpenter came. Like most artisans he
was clever in a groove: take him out of that, and
lo! a mule, a pig, ?n owl. He was not only
unable to invent, but so stiffly disinclined: a
makeshift rudder was clean out of his way; and,
as his whole struggle was to get away from every
suggestion Dodd made back to groove aforesaid,
the thing looked hopeless. Then Fullalove, who
had stood by grinning, offered to make a bunkum
rudder, provided the carpenter and mates were
put under his orders. But, said he, I must
bargain they shall be disrated if they attempt to
reason. "That is no more than fair," said
Dodd.

The Yankee inventor demanded a spare maincap,
and cut away one end of the square piece,
so as to make it fit the stern post: through the
circle of the cap he introduced a spare mizen
topmast: to this he seized a length of junk,
another to that, another to that, and so on: to
the outside junk he seized a spare maintop-gallant
mast, and this conglomerate being now
nearly as broad as a rudder, he planked over all.
The sea by this time was calm; he got the
machine over the stern, and had the square end of
the cap bolted to the stern post. He had already
fixed four spans of nine inch hawser to the sides
of the makeshift, two fastened to tackles, which
led into the gunroom ports, and were boused
taut—these kept the lower part of the
makeshift close to the stem post — and two, to which
guys were now fixed and led through the after-
most ports on to the quarter deck, where luff
tackles were attached to them, by means of
which the makeshift was to be worked as a
rudder.

Some sail was now got on the ship, and she
was found to steer very well. Dodd tried her on
every tack; and at last ordered Sharpe to make
all sail, and head for the Cape.

This electrified the first mate. The breeze
was very faint but southerly, and the Mauritius
under their lee. They could make it in a night,
and there refit, and ship a new rudder. He
suggested the danger of sailing sixteen hundred
miles steered by a Gimcrack; and implored Dodd
to put into port. Dodd answered with a roughness
and a certain wildness never seen in him
before: "Danger, sir! There will be no more
foul weather this voyage; Jonah is overboard."
Sharpe stared an inquiry. "I tell you we shan't
lower our topgallants once from this to the Cape:
Jonah is overboard:" and he slapped his
forehead in despair; then, stamping impatiently
with his foot, told Sharpe his duty was to obey
orders, not discuss them. "Certainly, sir," said
Sharpe, sullenly, and went out of the cabin with
serious thoughts of communicating to the other
mates an alarming suspicion about Dodd, that
now for the first time crossed his mind. But
long habit of discipline prevailed, and he made
all sail on the ship, and bore away for the Cape;
with a heavy heart: the sea was like a mill pond,
but in that he saw only its well known treachery,
to lead them on to this unparalleled act of
madness: each sail he hoisted seemed one more agent of Destruction rising at his own suicidal
command.

Towards evening it became nearly dead calm.
The sea heaved a little, but was waveless, glassy,
and the colour of a rose, incredibly brave and
delicate.

The look out reported pieces of wreck to
windward. As the ship was making so little
way, Dodd beat up towards them: he feared it
was a British ship that had foundered in the
storm, and thought it his duty to ascertain and
carry the sad news home. In two tacks they
got near enough to see with their glasses that
the fragments belonged, not to a stranger, but to
the Agra herself; there was one of her water-
butts, and a broken mast with some rigging: and,
as more wreck was descried coming in at a little
distance, Dodd kept the ship close to the wind
to inspect it: on drifting near it proved to be
several pieces of the bulwark and a mahogany
table out of the cuddy. This sort of flotsom
was not worth delaying the ship to pick it up;
so Dodd made sail again, steering now S.E.

He had sailed about half a mile when the look
out hailed the deck again.

"A man in the water!"

"Whereabouts?"

"A short league on the weather quarter."

"Oh, we can't beat to windward for him,"
said Sharpe. "He is dead long ago."

"Holds his head very high for a corpse," said
the look out.

"I'll soon know," cried Dodd. "Lower the
gig; I'll go myself."

The gig was lowered, and six swift rowers
pulled him to windward; while the ship kept on
her course.

It is most unusual for a captain to leave the
ship at sea on such petty errands: but Dodd
half hoped the man might be alive; and he was
so unhappy; and, like his daughter, who probably
derived the trait from him, grasped instinctively
at a chance of doing kindness to some poor fellow
alive or dead. That would soothe his own
sore, good, heart.

When they had pulled about two miles, the
sun was sinking into the horizon: " Give way,
men," said Dodd, "or we shall not be able to see
him." The men bent to their oars, and made the
boat fly.

Presently the coxswain caught sight of an
object bobbing on the water abeam.

"Why, that must be it," said he: "the lubber!
to take it for a man's head. Why, it is
nothing but a thundering old bladder, speckled
white.

"What?" cried Dodd: and fell a trembling.
"Steer for it! Give way!"

"Ay, ay, sir!"

They soon came alongside the bladder, and the
coxswain grabbed it: "Hallo! here's something
lashed to it: a bottle!"

"Give it me!" gasped Dodd, in a voice choked