us; sometimes in broad, compact bodies, miles in extent, then, in long narrow beds, as regular as if laid out by the hand of man.

"This surely must be Neptune's garden," said the delighted Mary; "here are all the plants of the rock, all the blossoms of the sea collected."

"Beautiful as they are, my dear," said her father, "they have frighted stouter hearts than yours. When the sailors of Columbus found themselves surrounded as we are, they began to think that they had passed the limits of navigation or reached the end of the world, and that their ship would finally be fettered in the midst of these unknown seas, as a monument of the vengeance of Heaven for the temerity of their leader."

On the twenty-eighth of April we crossed the tropic. As all but Miss Douglas had passed it before, the sailors reluctantly consented to dispense with the usual rites in honour of his aquatic majesty. Early the next morning, a pair of uncouth looking birds, styled, in nautical ornithology, Neptune's doves, and known on land as the beautiful white bird of the tropics, made their appear. ance. After reconnoitering us fore and aft, without deigning any reply to our hail of what news from their master, the outlandish strangers flew off to the southward. Then Jack Cable, the oracle of the forecastle, shook his head.

"Ah! my lads," said he, "I knew that no good would come of not paying your compliments to the commodore yesterday. You never see his fowls but when there is some bad luck stirring, and if you don't hear from it before we make Turks Island, you may set me adrift before a twenty knot breeze, in a leaky long-boat."

But notwithstanding the prognostications of evil, and though the sea-god's constable, John Shark, came prowling round us at evening, we arrived safe the next day at the dreary Isle of Salt.

Turks Island is a most dismal looking spot. It is too low to be seen farther than five or six miles, and we were accordingly obliged to lie to, the preceding night, to avoid running it down.

We glided rapidly past, and were the next morning close in by St. Domingo.

And here, as if during the night we had been translated to another planet, everything was new and full of wonder. Our eyes had been used to nothing but the tame scenery of the southern section of New England and New York. Judge, then, of our astonishment, when more than the most eloquent pens have written, or the most vivid fancy conceived of the wonders of the tropics, burst upon us in the full reality of vision. The giant mountains formed the grandest feature of the amazing picture. Around their base rolled vast volumes of the whitest mist, above which their summits rose, like islands of the

upper world from an etherial ocean. The deep hue of the forests which told that they never wore other dress than green, the myriads of strange sea fowl that screamed around us, the very colour of the water was that of a new climate. At length, the sun rose with a splendour that is never witnessed north of the tropics, pouring a broad and almost intolerable flood of light upon the scene, flashing through the clouds and along the waters like living fire. The sea of vapour seemed to heave, and mounting higher till it caught the sunbeams, circled the head of each fantastic peak with a diadem glowing with a thousand dyes.

It

Our breeze was now leaving us. We spread all sail to catch its last flutters, but soon relinquished the hope of proceeding far that day; for the grampus, the sure precursor of calms, now came tumbling his huge form towards us, and when we reached the middle of the Windward Passage, the green turtle, whom the slightest movement in air or water frights to the caverns of the deep, might be seen sunning himself on the surface of the sea. was then that we felt, for the first time, the full power of a tropical sun. In the cabin the mercury stood at one hundred and ten degrees, in the sun at one hundred and thirty degrees; and when it is remembered that we had left the North American shore only ten days before, in the wintry month of April, it will be readily imagined that our sufferings from the heat were extreme. But as regularly as the curtain of evening fell,

"The land wind from woods of palm And orange groves and fields of balm, Blew o'er the Haytien seas," and, with its reviving freshness, in some measure repaid us for the sufferings of the day. On deck, therefore, we spent this and the two succeeding nights, creeping like nocturnal birds from our coverts in the cabin or beneath a sail.

There is nothing that a seaman loves less than a calm. The rushing of the wind in a small hurricane, is far more welcome if it only blow the right way; and peculiarly aggravating is it to be becalmed within sight of his destined haven. We could not as yet see Jamaica, but along the southwestern quarter of the horizon lay a pile of dusky clouds which the captain assured us was the loom of that island. The reader will not wonder, then, if, in our circumstances, all the strange oaths and imprecations found in a seaman's vocabulary, were called into service by our nettlesome captain and his crew, and hurled without mercy on the winds and weather.

"You may have more wind than you want before you reach Kingston moorings," said I, a little nettled at their absurd conduct.

"Blow-blow-let it blow!" roared the captain; "I would rather go to the bottom at once than lie here roasting in this sun

that's enough to cook a guineaman. Besides, Mr. Brae," added he, in a milder tone, and pointing to the northwest, "yonder is Cape Maise, the eastern end of Cuba, not fifteen miles off. Two hours' rowing would bring us off a gang of the picarooning rascals to cut our throats if we shouldn't happen to hit their fancy; and though this good ship is called the Seabird, she is one of that kind which can't rise without a swell. I say then, let it blow." So saying he took his glass and went into the main top, from whence he might be seen for an hour reconnoitering the Cuba shore.

It was, as I have already stated, the fourth afternoon of the calm. Impatience was visible in almost every face. But my feelings agreed perfectly with the weather. There reigned as complete a tranquillity in my bosom as in the elements. Mary Douglas was there; it was enough; I felt not the sun; I feared no pirates. Mistake me not, gentle reader. I do not say that I was in love, for on the doctrine of tender sentiments, I entertain some sceptical, perhaps treasonable ideas. I only found myself strangely fascinated, was glad I was just there, and as I was. I pitied Mary Douglas, and would have done much to have made her happy. She seemed better than when we sailed, but well or substantially happy she certainly was not. Still that hectic glow would appear on her cheek and flutter and depart like the tints of sunset, leaving it colourless as marble. I would have given worlds to have placed the rose in its stead. She lived in a world of fancy, and beautifully would she deck the objects of her own creation; but then there would come a revulsion in her feelings, a deep dejection, when one who studied her speaking countenance might rightly conceive that fancy, aided by memory, that busy fiend, was conjuring up a far different scene. Oh! how has my heart yearned, as I have gazed upon her in these sad moments, for power to extract the worm that had taken such deep hold upon her peace; to recall her to a world she was so eminently qualified to bless and adorn, and that should no longer fright her from its stern realities by dreadful images of the past.

She had closed her book and I had been sitting by her side, I know not how long, perhaps an hour. Our conversation had been interesting, but of its subject I have only a confused recollection.

"Say no more, Mr. Brae," said she, rising; "I should be weak to deny that I understand you; but," looking up into my face with a melancholy smile," you know something of my past history; you know that I once loved;" here her lip quivered and the colour left her cheeks; "but he proved himself unworthy, and I tore him from my heart! But oh! in doing this, think you that I did not rend my heart strings?" She left me in tears, and retired to her cabin, adding only as she passed,

"There is a spot in the sun," I exclaimed. The captain looked at it a moment, and then smiling grimly, "Ay, a spot, and a dark one too," said he; "watch it, Mr. Brae, and see if it sets."

The dark object, which appeared on the very disc of the sun, and which I had taken for one of those spots that are occasionally seen on his surface, instead of sinking behind the bright and level waters with the part of the luminary on which it was first observed, seemed to mount upwards, and after lingering a moment on the last visible arch of the glorious orb, it sprang into that pure and glowing element which the sun had shed along the western horizon. It wavered for a moment between the heavens and the earth, as if uncertain to which to attach itself, till, as the flashings of the dying light became fainter, it appeared on the sea, a dark and motionless speck.

"The sun has found water to wash him clear of your spot, Mr. Brae," said the captain, with another of his mysterious smiles; "I wish to God it had sunk with him."

An air of deep care settled over his face. I knew not what to make of him or of his words.

"Why, what do you take that speck to be?" I at length inquired.

"Look for yourself, Mr. Brae," said he. I took the glass from his hand, and examined the dim distant object. "It is a boat, captain."

"and coming

"Ay, a boat!" echoed he, for us as fast as twelve stout rowers can shove her through the water. Now you know why I wished for a wind, and a hard wind too."

The beautiful twilight of the tropics had now settled, in all its softness, over the quiet bosom of the deep. The heights of Cuba rose majestically from its crystal depths, boldly lifting their pointed peaks to the spotless heavens, and I fancied that I could hear the

small wave break upon its coral strand, with a murmur as soft as if it had never washed from those shores the stains of crime. The heavy loom in the southwest, as if it had only waited to grace the setting of the king of day, after glittering for a moment in a thousand gorgeous colours, settled behind the heaving breast of ocean, leaving only a dark mass like a church with its spire in bold relief against the sky. It no sooner caught our captain's eye than he shouted with as much rapture as a seaman ever allows himself to express, "The Blue Mountain Peak of Jamaica!"

The cry was echoed with enthusiasm by a dozen joyful voices. We were still one hun

dred miles from the island, and were not gain ing an inch on our way towards it; still every eye was turned to it with affection as to a long sought home, and an emotion awoke even in my breast, distinct from those which, of late, had usurped its entire possession. The whole view to the westward was beauty, unbroken by a single blemish, and nothing of alarm was there save the dark spot on the sea to which so suspicious a character had been attached by our captain, but which had already disappeared in the increasing darkness of the hour. But the east, as if envious of the tranquillity that reigned in the opposite quarter, wore a savage scowl.

Enormous piles of vapour, black as the smoke from a volcano's crater, shrouded the heights of St. Domingo, and blotted out the very shores from our view. It looked indeed as if the island had sunk, and another of subterranean formation had risen from the depths of the sea to fill its place.

"I would give a month's wages," said the captain, with an air of deep thought, "if we could have that squall upon us within an hour."

I stared at him with a feeling between contempt and astonishment.

"You doubtless do honour to a seaman's taste," said I, drily; "for my part, I dislike my fellow creatures so little, that I would rather see a piratical privateer within gun-shot than encounter the contents of yonder mass of solid darkness."

"It may be proved before you leave the ship, Mr. Brae," replied he with great coolness, "that I fear the face of man as little as another." Then turning to the whole ship's company, with very considerable dignity, "Gentlemen and shipmates," said he, "I have reason to apprehend that danger is at hand. The boat that is putting off to us is doubtless a pirate. Of armed men she is certainly full; for I have lived too long on the sea not to know the glitter of arms in the sun. It is more than probable that she has comrades; for would one open boat venture to attack a vessel of our size? Something has been hinted about fear, and, to say the truth, I had rather run than meet these gentry. But that is out of the question, and fight we must as

long as there is a man to stand at one of those brass guns, or to pull a trigger."

Three cheers were the echo to this chivalric speech; and not a moment was lost in preparing to give the pirate a warm reception. A formidable show of miscellaneous articles of warfare was drawn from the secret places of the ship, and there were finally mustered on deck fifteen men, twenty stands of arms, and two brass cannon. These last, after being wheeled to the starboard side of the quarter deck, and charged nearly to the muzzle, were thrust through port-holes towards the quarter from whence our foes were expected. Our small arms were loaded with three balls each

every man girded with a cutlass and a brace of pistols and the captain even carried his precaution so far as to have the railings, bulwarks, and sides of the ship well slushed, in order to give a slippery foothold if they attempted boarding.

After all this bustle of preparation, every man posted himself in a situation to command a view of the whole prospect to the westward, and a look-out was stationed in every top. By this time night had drawn her curtain close around the scene, and no trace of the sun's existence remained but in his pale-faced representative, now riding near her meridian. For an hour no sound broke the deep silence that reigned throughout the ship. murmur to excite alarm, or even suspicion, arose from the slumbering ocean, and it seemed even criminal to believe that any being could be found daring enough to disturb a tranquillity so deep and holy.

Not a

"It is a lovely hour," said Mary, in a wisper, as if afraid to trust her voice. "Can there be danger?"

"It is just such an hour as man selects for the exercise of his evil genius," replied I, in her own tone.

Then came the land wind from Cuba, shaking a thousand odours from its dewy wings."

"Can it be possible," again said Mary, "that an air which breathes of Araby, and which fans us as lightly as does the mother's breath her sleeping infant-that this pure and gentle element can cradle the hurricane, and nurture the seeds of pestilence?"

"Just as possible, and as true, as that these beautiful islands are peopled by the most unlovely of all the human race. Look there," continued I, pointing eastward, "for proof in part of what I say.'

The gigantic piles of vapour remained motionless as rocks of adamant, resembling more the black smoke of some smouldering mine of coal than exhalations of the sun's raising. No lightning glanced from its bosom. The feeble and timorous moonbeams were unable to penetrate its dark depths, only faintly silvering their edges, and rendering visible and more gloomy the blackness below.

"There is a hurricane in a visible shape," said I.

Still the dark mass moved not, but stood upon the waters, motionless, and black as a mountain of infernal elements.

Hour after hour rolled on and the scenes on either hand continued the same. Suspense had rendered the men fretful and impatient, and after straining in vain to discover some dim trace of the foe or to detect the dip of their oars, many had closed their eyes in slumber. Mr. Douglas and his daughter had retired for the night. The hour of midnight came and the moon was fast sinking towards the sea. Like the rest I had become weary. "Well, captain," said I, "what has become of our friends from Cuba?"

"Gone to Davy's locker, I hope," replied he; "but there is no knowing how to calculate for the rascals, so we had better keep a sharp look out yet."

"For my part," said I, "I am tired with looking at nothing, and will just see how the squall comes on." I turned accordingly, and a flashing on the water rising and disappearing in quick and regular succession met my eye.

"There they are!" exclaimed the captain, whose eye had taken the direction of mine; "the rascals have rowed clear round us, and are coming on from the San Domingo side. Stand to your arms, boys! the rogues are

upon us.

In an instant every man was at his post, and on the alert.

"Stand in the shadow of the spars and rigging to be out of sight," continued the captain, "and not a man of you fire till I give the word."

"Ay, ay, Sir!" responded the crew with nautical precision.

"And now," said the captain, who really went to work in a business style, "let us get this gun on the other tack, Mr. Brae, to be ready for the gentlemen."

The piece was accordingly soon seen to thrust its deadly muzzle through the opposite port, keeping a dead aim on the boat, which, like an alligator, cautiously dropped towards us, at less than a quarter of a mile's distance.

"Strange," said I, "that the fellows should choose to row against the moon when by so doing they must know we should see the glit

ter of their oars."

"I suspect," replied the captain, "that they had no choice about it. You forget that we have had more or less wind off the land since sunset, and are at least six miles from where we were then. The probability is that the rogues lost us after night fall-so, as the Paddy says, when they came where we were, we were not there. But it seems they have found us at last."

The boat was now very near us. Still not a sound came from her. The closest and

This threat and the firebrand which I flourished with great fierceness seemed to make the pirate hesitate. The motion of the boat was arrested. Captain Boltrop thought the victory already achieved, and he again raised his voice in tones of authority ;“Throw your arms overboard, and come alongside.'

;

A volley of musketry was the reply to this summons, and a dozen balls whistled by and the captain's hat flew across the deck. A deep imprecation burst from his lips. The next instant a broad stream of flame issued from the quarter deck, and the explosion of the piece broke upon the dead stillness of the elements with a noise like thunder. A distant crash, a heavy splashing in the water, above which a cry of mortal agony was terribly distinct, had arisen in the direction of the foe before the smoke dispersed sufficiently to enable us to see the effect of one shot. No boat was then to be seen, nor any trace of her crew; we had probably sent every soul into eternity.

"By George!" cried the captain with something like compunction in his tone, and rubbing his head with his handkerchief, “I would rather have taken the rascals and had them decently hanged than send them to the bottom in this off-hand manner. You couldn't have made a better shot, Mr. Brae, if you—

A horrid yell, rising apparently from the very depths beneath the ship, stopped him in the middle of his speech. A boat glided out of the smoke, and, shooting under our bows, a dozen dark forms were seen springing from it to the side of the ship. But our precautions had been wisely taken, and were completely successful. No sooner did they touch the slippery vessel, than most of them, with the most horrid blasphemies, fell back into the sea, snapping their pistols at us even after they were filled with water. At the same moment their boat, which had been completely riddled by our shot, filled and sunk to the bottom. Three only got upon deck and were immediately overpowered and secured. Five more were with difficulty dragged out of the water and disposed of in the same manner. One powerful fellow, however, was not so easily quelled. He had succeeded in getting one foot upon deck, when a young seaman, named Ralph, flew at him with the fierceness of a tiger. They clenched, and after balancing a moment between the deck and the water,

the pirate, who was much the heavier man, fell backwards overboard, dragging his antagonist with him. They both sunk, but soon rose again about four rods from the ship clinging closely together. Then commenced a combat the most singular and appalling I had ever witnessed. No one on board seemed to think of devising means of assisting our champion. No one dared to fire upon the pirate; for so closely were they coiled together, so rapid were their evolutions, and so dim the light shed by the moon, that it was impossible to hit one without endangering the life of the other. At the commencement of the struggle, their efforts seemed to be aimed solely at drowning each other. They whirled over on the top of the water, dashing it about like wounded sharks. Both then sunk and were for a while lost to our sight. Presently they rose again, and exchanged thick and heavy blows, and closing with redoubled fury sunk again. Neglecting to use their weapons, which would have put a speedy end to the fray, they fought more like savage beasts of prey, bent on throttling each other, than like human beings.

"Shall we stand and see our man murdered?" at length_exclaimed a voice from among the crew. It operated like magic to break the spell that had fallen upon us all.

"Clear away the boat there !" shouted the captain, and six men sprang to execute the order.

Just then, after an effort of unusual fierceness, both of the combatants sunk. They remained out of sight so long, that the men who were letting down the boat, suspended their operations, and we all stood breathless with uncertainty and anxiety awaiting their re. appearance. At length, about thirty yards, off, the waters parted; but only one man was seen to rise.

"Is it you, Ralph?" cried the captain in a suppressed voice.

"Here is some of him at least on my knifeblade," responded the freebooter with the accent and laugh of a fiend; and springing nearly to his whole height out of water, he threw the weapon, with great force towards us. It passed over our heads and striking the mizen mast, remained quivering, with its point buried in the wood.

Another hollow laugh rang over the waters, and on looking round, wide circles of ripples were seen moving on the face of the moonlit sea, as if some heavy body had just sunk into it. Vengeance was the tardy thought that now rushed on every heart. Some, in the blinded fury of the moment, actually discharged their pieces into the centre of those waving eddies, without staying to reflect upon its utter uselessness. Others with their guns in readiness, and eyes glaring upon the sea like panthers robbed of their prey, stood prepared to fire the moment he should show his head above the water. But he rose no

more. The winged messengers of death that had been aimed at his life, sped harmlessly over his head, and had it been possible to penetrate the secrets of the great deep, he might have been seen reposing peacefully on its sandy bottom by the side of his late antagonist.

A sullen silence pervaded the ship. The men looked gloomily at each other, and with lowering brows on their helpless prisoners, as if a sufficient atonement had not been rendered for the life of their comrade. To one skilled in the language of the human countenance, it was evident that nothing but the restraint of discipline held them back from a summary act of vengeance and of crime, that would have sunk them to a level with the pirates themselves.

Judging of the feelings of his crew from their looks, or more probably from his own, and anxious to remove the temptation to evil, the captain ordered our eight prisoners to be stowed under the hatches, and they were accordingly tumbled in with very little cere

mony.

How many of this band of genuine desperadoes had been lost, we had no means of ascertaining; for our prisoners either did not, or would not understand English or French. But when they fired upon us, from twelve to sixteen men were distinctly visible, and the yell that followed our discharge was such as is never extorted from mortal man but by the pangs of the last agony. Six or eight, then, of the freebooters had certainly perished. What chance of success they might fancy that an open boat could have against a vessel of the size of ours, it completely bewildered us to imagine. They must either have been intoxicated, or in the situation of a beast of prey, whom the goadings of hunger will compel to rush upon a foe from whose face he would otherwise have fled. Viewing it in either light, it was an act of the most daring hardihood. Our victory, though complete, as has been already seen, was blood-bought. Early in the engagement a ball had also carried away our captain's hat, making a lane through his hair and raking up the skin in a frightful manner; and I have a scar on my chin and another on my temple at the service of any who doubt the truth of this narrative. From the firing of the first gun to the depositing of our prisoners in the hold, not more than ten minutes had elapsed. The struggle had been fierce and boisterous, but it had passed. ship was restored to her usual tranquillity and was moving before a gentle breeze from the shore, yet so slowly as scarcely to scar the face of the ocean.

The

The noise of the conflict had called up the terrified inmates of the cabin; and all the ship's company were now assembled on deck, silent, but too deeply affected with the scene just passed to sleep more that night. Mary was