It was a short fight. The first-officer had his six-shooter, the white _lanchero_ his knife, like another. The natives were fierce with blood lust, and the drunkenness of knife gleam and _tequila_. But it was a matter of coolness and of the dominant race. Before the captain on the hurricane-deck could run to his cabin for his carbine, it was over with. Two _lancheros_ had disabling bullet wounds, and the rest had retreated to the bow, all the flush of fight gone out of them, whipped and cringing and scared. The first-officer and the white _lanchero_ stood astern. They had been cut, and the ducks of the first-officer were red. Blood oozed through the _lanchero’s_ rags. He got breath for a moment clutching at the gunwale. Then he turned to the first-officer. “Thank you,” he said. Marsden looked at him, slowly, from his shaggy black hair to his bare feet. “Don’t mention it,” he answered. Then he looked up at the ship. “Unhook that stack for the present, and send down the chair for us,” he ordered, coolly. He considered his left arm. The blood was bubbling out just above the elbow. He knew what it meant. He had seen the thing before. It would be all right once a tourniquet should be put above it. But before that, before the doctor could get down in the chair, he would very likely faint. He was feeling light-headed already--and his eyes were glazing over. He shut his right hand hard above the wound. “You can’t stay with this, Stanwood,” he told the _lanchero_. His voice sounded to himself far away and dead. He was not altogether sure what he was saying. He glanced up. Away and away overhead in a vague distance of hot blue, the chair was beginning to lower. He must make haste. He spoke carefully, with precision, swaying unsteadily as the launch rolled. “We lost a man at Corinto,” he went on; “we--need an--other. You can ship to Frisco with us if----” he staggered, then caught himself, “if you--like.” The chair with the doctor touched the bottom of the scow. The first-officer had fallen, and was lying quite still. The white _lanchero_ was bending over him, clenching his two hands tight about the wounded arm. THE RAJAH’S NEMESIS By W. C. Morrow In my travels abroad I once encountered an extraordinary illustration of the shifts to which Nature will resort in her efforts to overcome the inconvenience arising from a deprivation of the tools with which she is accustomed to work; and the facts of the case are sufficiently peculiar and tragic to warrant their relation.