it easily with Jerry still under his arm. The deck was cluttered with an
exciting crowd. Exciting the crowd would have been to untravelled humans
of civilization, and exciting it was to Jerry; although to Tom Haggin and
Captain Van Horn it was a mere commonplace of everyday life.

The deck was small because the _Arangi_ was small. Originally a teak-
built, gentleman's yacht, brass-fitted, copper-fastened, angle-ironed,
sheathed in man-of-war copper and with a fin-keel of bronze, she had been
sold into the Solomon Islands' trade for the purpose of blackbirding or
nigger-running. Under the law, however, this traffic was dignified by
being called "recruiting."

The _Arangi_ was a labour-recruit ship that carried the new-caught,
cannibal blacks from remote islands to labour on the new plantations
where white men turned dank and pestilential swamp and jungle into rich
and stately cocoanut groves. The _Arangi's_ two masts were of Oregon
cedar, so scraped and hot-paraffined that they shone like tan opals in
the glare of sun. Her excessive sail plan enabled her to sail like a
witch, and, on occasion, gave Captain Van Horn, his white mate, and his
fifteen black boat's crew as much as they could handle. She was sixty
feet over all, and the cross beams of her crown deck had not been
weakened by deck-houses. The only breaks--and no beams had been cut for
them--were the main cabin skylight and companionway, the booby hatch
for'ard over the tiny forecastle, and the small hatch aft that let down
into the store-room.

And on this small deck, in addition to the crew, were the "return"
niggers from three far-flung plantations. By "return" was meant that
their three years of contract labour was up, and that, according to
contract, they were being returned to their home villages on the wild