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"Well, do you hear?" cried Mark. "Wall, captain, I'm willing," said the skipper, "but my lads here say air yew to be trusted? and what's to become o' them if they come up and yew and yewr men turn nasty, and them without weepons?" "You heard what I said, sir; hand up your pistols," said Mark, firmly. "Guess we can't do that, squaire. But look here, captain."
The sounds ceased, and there was a hail from the forecastle. "Hey, there, yew, on the watch!" "Hullo! What is it?" cried Tom Fillot. "Ask yewr young skipper to pitch us down a little 'bacco, will you, mister? My lads here is out, and they want to make their miserable lives happy." "I oughtn't to let them have any," thought Mark; "but it may keep them quiet.
Yewr cap'en don't like it, p'r'aps; but I see yew pulling away at a cigar threw my glass." Mark turned crimson. "Needn't tell a cracker about it, squaire. Here we are," he continued, taking the papers from Ephraim evidently his mate. "Hev a look at 'em, squaire; but I reckon if one of our officers was to board one of your traders, and ask for 'em, yewr folk'd make no end of a fizzle about it."
"I'll be darned if yew will, though, stranger!" he snapped. "No, sirree; not much, I don't think! Why, yew're even more ignorant than I thought yew was, and I must teach ye another little bit of yewr business. Why, yew goldarned Britisher, d'ye know that yew haven't got no right at all to stop me from pursooin' my v'yage, or to demand a sight o' my papers?
"That's right, squaire; that's right. Theer, I shan't cut up rusty, though I might, of course. It was yewr dewty, I s'pose." "Yes, of course," said Mark. "That's right, squaire. Allus dew yewr dewty. I ain't riled. But yew'll trade that barl or tew o' whites flour with me, I reckon, and anything I've got you shall hev. What dew yew say to some Chicago pork? Rale good."
"Waal," exclaimed the Yankee skipper, when I at length refolded and handed the papers back to him, "are ye satisfied, stranger?" I intimated that I was. "Then git out o' here, ye darned galoot, as quick as you knows how," he snarled, "and thank your lucky stars that I don't freshen yewr way wi' a rope's end!"
But he did not actually permit himself these solaces; he only clenched and unclenched his fingers several times, and continued to listen. "Geev a-mee yewr ra-smile, The luv va-ligh TIN yew rise, Life cooed not hold a fairrerr paradise. Geev a-mee the righ to luv va-yew all the wile, My worrlda for AIV-vorr, The sunshigh NUV vyewr-ra-smile!"
Squire Woodbridge an Ginral Ashley an Doctor Sergeant, Cap'n Jones an schoolmaster Gleason, an a slew more o' the silk stockins be a goin' tew." "Are you going to murder them?" exclaimed the frantic woman. "Wal," drawled Meshech, "that depends. Ef govment hangs any o' our fellers wat they've got in jail, we're gonter hang yewr husban' an the res' on em, sure's taxes.
And p'rhaps that won't be so very difficult, a'ter all, for when I next see my friend Rodriguez that's the cap'n of the Preciosa I'll tell him that yew're out arter him, and maybe he'll lay for yew; for Rodriguez hates the Britishers 'most as bad as I do, and I'm sure he'd enjy blowin' El Caiman outer the water now that she's fallen into yewr hands.
"Thar 's somethin' abeout a log," continued Captain Leezur; "when ye go inter the heouse in warm weather, an' sets deown in a cheer, the women kind o' looks at ye as though you was sick or dreffle lazy; but when ye're eout settin' on a log ye feels as though God was on yewr side, an' man nor woman wa'n't able to afflict ye.
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