a thin, light-yellow mulatto lad may resemble a big, stout, middle-
aged white man. It was the exotic complexion and the slightness of
his build which had put me off so completely. Now I saw in him
unmistakably the Jacobus strain, weakened, attenuated, diluted as
it were in a bucket of water--and I refrained from finishing my
speech. I had intended to say: "Crack this brute's head for him."
I still felt the conclusion to be sound. But it is no trifling
responsibility to counsel parricide to any one, however deeply
injured.

"Beggarly--cheeky--skippers."

I despised the emphatic growl at my back; only, being much vexed
and upset, I regret to say that I slammed the door behind me in a
most undignified manner.

It may not appear altogether absurd if I say that I brought out
from that interview a kindlier view of the other Jacobus. It was
with a feeling resembling partisanship that, a few days later, I
called at his "store." That long, cavern-like place of business,
very dim at the back and stuffed full of all sorts of goods, was
entered from the street by a lofty archway. At the far end I saw
my Jacobus exerting himself in his shirt-sleeves among his
assistants. The captains' room was a small, vaulted apartment with
a stone floor and heavy iron bars in its windows like a dungeon
converted to hospitable purposes. A couple of cheerful bottles and
several gleaming glasses made a brilliant cluster round a tall,
cool red earthenware pitcher on the centre table which was littered
with newspapers from all parts of the world. A well-groomed
stranger in a smart grey check suit, sitting with one leg flung