brought for the little colony would be destroyed by the sea-water as it
rose in her, there was great confusion. In the midst of it, Captain
Maryon was heard hailing from the beach. He had been carried down in his
hammock, and looked very bad; but he insisted on being stood there on his
feet; and I saw him, myself, come off in the boat, sitting upright in the
stern-sheets, as if nothing was wrong with him.

A quick sort of council was held, and Captain Maryon soon resolved that
we must all fall to work to get the cargo out, and that when that was
done, the guns and heavy matters must be got out, and that the sloop must
be hauled ashore, and careened, and the leak stopped. We were all
mustered (the Pirate-Chace party volunteering), and told off into
parties, with so many hours of spell and so many hours of relief, and we
all went at it with a will. Christian George King was entered one of the
party in which I worked, at his own request, and he went at it with as
good a will as any of the rest. He went at it with so much heartiness,
to say the truth, that he rose in my good opinion almost as fast as the
water rose in the ship. Which was fast enough, and faster.

Mr. Commissioner Pordage kept in a red-and-black japanned box, like a
family lump-sugar box, some document or other, which some Sambo chief or
other had got drunk and spilt some ink over (as well as I could
understand the matter), and by that means had given up lawful possession
of the Island. Through having hold of this box, Mr. Pordage got his
title of Commissioner. He was styled Consul too, and spoke of himself as
"Government."

He was a stiff-jointed, high-nosed old gentleman, without an ounce of fat
on him, of a very angry temper and a very yellow complexion. Mrs.
Commissioner Pordage, making allowance for difference of sex, was much