the fire with fuel and his host with hollands. Reserve was at length
annihilated, and the fisher jocularly said--

"Well, and so we're old acquaintance, ha?"

"Ay," said the young man, with another searching glance. "I was in
doubt at first, but _now_ I'm certain."

"And what's to be done?" said the Fisher.

"An hour after midnight you must put me on board -----'s boat, she'll
be abroad. They'll run a light to the masthead, for which you'll
steer. You're a good hand at the helm in a dark night and a rough
sea," was the reply.

"How, if I will not?"

"Then--_your life or mine!"_

They sprang to their feet simultaneously, and an immediate encounter
seemed inevitable.

"Psha!" said the Fisher, sinking on his seat, "what madness this is!
I was a thought warm with the liquor, and the recollections of past
times were rising on my memory. Think nothing of it. I heard those
words once before," and he ground his teeth in rage--"Yes, once--but
in a shriller voice than your's! Sometimes, too, the bastard rises to
my view; and then I smite him so--bah! give us another basin-full!" He
stuck short at vacancy, snatched the beverage from the stranger, and
drank it off. "An hour after midnight, said ye?"