the hospital ill with choleraic symptoms I felt bereaved of the only
decent person at the after end of the ship. He was fully expected to
recover, but in the meantime had to be replaced by some sort of servant.
And on the recommendation of a certain Schomberg, the proprietor of the
smaller of the two hotels in the place, I engaged a Chinaman. Schomberg,
a brawny, hairy Alsatian, and an awful gossip, assured me that it was
all right. "First-class boy that. Came in the suite of his Excellency
Tseng the Commissioner--you know. His Excellency Tseng lodged with me
here for three weeks."

He mouthed the Chinese Excellency at me with great unction, though
the specimen of the "suite" did not seem very promising. At the time,
however, I did not know what an untrustworthy humbug Schomberg was. The
"boy" might have been forty or a hundred and forty for all you could
tell--one of those Chinamen of the death's-head type of face and
completely inscrutable. Before the end of the third day he had revealed
himself as a confirmed opium-smoker, a gambler, a most audacious thief,
and a first-class sprinter. When he departed at the top of his speed
with thirty-two golden sovereigns of my own hard-earned savings it was
the last straw. I had reserved that money in case my difficulties came
to the worst. Now it was gone I felt as poor and naked as a fakir. I
clung to my ship, for all the bother she caused me, but what I could not
bear were the long lonely evenings in her cuddy, where the atmosphere,
made smelly by a leaky lamp, was agitated by the snoring of the mate.
That fellow shut himself up in his stuffy cabin punctually at eight, and
made gross and revolting noises like a water-logged trump. It was odious
not to be able to worry oneself in comfort on board one's own ship.
Everything in this world, I reflected, even the command of a nice little
barque, may be made a delusion and a snare for the unwary spirit of
pride in man.