For my part, I really have no notion of waiting for any one—particularly a fellow who _must_ have some go-ahead scheme in his noddle, which we Indians don’t want. Quietly speaking, my dear fellow, I shall be glad if we’re rid of him!” On my mentioning what sort of “notions” were found in Mr Snout’s berth, and the drowning of his heathen images, the worthy planter went into perfect convulsions, till I thought I should have to slap him on the back to give him breath. “What the deuce!” said he at last; “Daniel must really have something worth his while to expect, before he’d fail to look after such a treasure!” “Ah,” said I, not attending to him, as I heard a stir on deck, “there we go at last, cluing up the topsails, I suppose.” “Seriously, now,” continued Mr Rollock, “I can _not_ fathom that vessel and her designs; but I bless my stars at getting clear off from the company of that tall Frenchman with his mustache—can’t bear a mustache, Collins—always reminds me of those cursed Mahrattas that burnt my factory once. Couldn’t the man shave like a Christian, I wonder? I defy you to enjoy Mulligatawny soup and not make a beast of yourself, with ever so much hair over your mouth. By the way, Collins,” added he, eyeing me, “since I saw you last, you’ve let your whiskers grow, and look more like one of your nauticals than Ford himself!—should scarce have known you! Any of it owing to the fair one up yonder, eh?” And the jolly old chap, whose own huge white whiskers gave him the cut of a royal Bengal tiger, pointed with his thumb over his shoulder towards the roundhouse above, with a wink of his funny round eye, that looked at you like a bird’s. “What do you suppose the Frenchman to be then, sir?” asked I, gloomily. “Oh, either a madman, a spy, or something worse! Just guess what he asked me suddenly one morning,—why, if I weren’t a distinguished _savant_, and wouldn’t like to study the botany of some island! ‘No, Monsieur, not at all,’ replied I, in fearfully bad French. ‘The geology, then?’ persisted he, with a curious gleam in his fierce black eyes—‘does the research of Monsieur lie in that direction?’ ‘Why no,’ I answered carelessly, ‘I don’t care a _sacre_ about stones, or anything of the kind, indeed; indigo is _my_ particular line, which may be called botany, in a way—I’m perhaps prejudiced in favour of it, Monsieur!’ The Frenchman leant his tufted chin on his hand,” continued Mr Rollock, “meditated a bit, then glanced at me again, as if he didn’t care though I were studying sea-weed in the depths of the ocean rolling round us, and stalked down stairs. Then he took to Mrs Brady again, and lastly to the Yankee, whose conversations with him, I fancy, had a twang of both commerce and politics.” “What do you think of it all, Mr Rollock?” inquired I, rather listlessly. “It didn’t strike me at the time,” said the planter, “but now, I just ask you, Collins, if there ain’t a certain great personage studying geology