"You're a damned rogue, my man," said the Captain.

"Come, come, Cap'n, be just," returned the other. "There's no call
to be angry with me in earnest. I'm on'y a chara'ter in a sea
story. I don't really exist."

"Well, I don't really exist either," says the Captain, "which seems
to meet that."

"I wouldn't set no limits to what a virtuous chara'ter might
consider argument," responded Silver. "But I'm the villain of this
tale, I am; and speaking as one sea-faring man to another, what I
want to know is, what's the odds?"

"Were you never taught your catechism?" said the Captain. "Don't
you know there's such a thing as an Author?"

"Such a thing as a Author?" returned John, derisively. "And who
better'n me? And the p'int is, if the Author made you, he made
Long John, and he made Hands, and Pew, and George Merry - not that
George is up to much, for he's little more'n a name; and he made
Flint, what there is of him; and he made this here mutiny, you keep
such a work about; and he had Tom Redruth shot; and - well, if
that's a Author, give me Pew!"

"Don't you believe in a future state?" said Smollett. "Do you
think there's nothing but the present story-paper?"

"I don't rightly know for that," said Silver; "and I don't see what
it's got to do with it, anyway. What I know is this: if there is