appearance. Our captain fairly started; turned full toward the
speaker; regarded him intently for a moment; and gulped the words he
was about to utter, like one confounded. As he gazed, however, at
little dumpy, examining his bow-legs, red broad cheeks, and coarse
snub nose, he seemed to regain his self-command, as if satisfied the
dead had not really returned to life.

"Are you acquainted with the gentleman you have named?" he asked, by
way of answer. "You speak of him like one who ought to know him."

"A body is apt to know a shipmate. Stephen Spike and I sailed
together twenty years since, and I hope to live to sail with him
again."

"You sail with Stephen Spike? when and where, may I ask, and in what
v'y'ge, pray?"

"The last time was twenty years since. Have you forgotten little
Jack Tier, Capt. Spike?"

Spike looked astonished, and well he might, for he had supposed Jack
to be dead fully fifteen years. Time and hard service had greatly
altered him, but the general resemblance in figure, stature, and
waddle, certainly remained. Notwithstanding, the Jack Tier that
Spike remembered was quite a different person from this Jack Tier.
That Jack had worn his intensely black hair clubbed and curled,
whereas this Jack had cut his locks into short bristles, which time
had turned into an intense gray. That Jack was short and thick, but
he was flat and square; whereas this Jack was just as short, a good
deal thicker, and as round as a dumpling. In one thing, however, the