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The schooner lies protected here; the weather will moderate presently, and we may then be able to slide her off. But reason as we would the cowardly dogs refused to listen. They had broached a spirit-cask aft, and passed the liquor along the decks whilst they hoisted the pinnace out of the hold and got the other boats over. The drink maddened, yet left them wild with fear too.

While this scene was being enacted a dark creature, with darker designs, entered the drinking saloon and descended to the cellar. Finding a spirit-cask with a tap in it, Buttercup turned it on, then, pulling a match-box out of her pocket she muttered, "I t'ink de hospitals won't git much ob it!" and applied a light. The effect was more powerful than she had expected.

The big kingfisher did not put in an appearance, and the sun-birds equally failed me: the smallest item of my collection measures two and a quarter inches, and is robed in blue, crimson, and sulphur. Sharp's department of the British Museum. I killed a few little snakes and one large green tree-snake; two crocodiles, both lost in the river, and an iguana, which found its way into the spirit-cask.

The explosion that of a spirit-cask, one of the many in the hold brought up the men from the forecastle, wild with excitement; but we only saw them for, a moment, and then they were screened from us by the fire, which was singularly clear from smoke, and rose steadily upward and away from the main-mast, whose sails hung down motionless in the calm.

"Now, to my mind, Walter, both the wine and spirits are given to us as blessings; and what we have got to do is not to abuse them. If we had a disorderly crew, I would stave every spirit-cask on board sooner than let them get drunk.

In the meantime, our fellows were getting on famously with the hoops of the huge spirit-cask. 'Why, that is Richards' whistle, he exclaimed. 'What the furies can this mean? Unbar the door! This was instantly done, and a man, a sailor by his dress, rushed in. 'The Fair Rosamond is captured, and the preventive men are in possession of her.

On they came, uttering fearful oaths. "They have probably attacked the spirit-cask, and in their drunken fury are indifferent to consequences," observed Boxall. "It will be madness to show them the slightest mercy if they get up with us." While we rowed away with all our might, I could not help frequently turning my head to watch their progress.