well awake to what had happened. A ship running down channel had walked clean over the poor old Dolphin, and I had got hold of the bobstay. It took me some time to climb up on to the bowsprit, for every time she pitched I went under water. However, I got up at last and swarmed along the bowsprit and got on board. There was a chap sitting down fast asleep there. I walked aft to the helmsman. Two men were pacing up and down in front of him. 'You're a nice lot, you are,' I said, 'to go running down Channel at ten knots an hour without any watch, a-walking over ships and a-drowning of seamen. I'll have the law of ye, see if I don't.' “'Jeerusalem!' said one, 'who have we here?' “'My name is Jack Perkins,' says I, 'and I'm the sole survivor, as far as I knows, of the smack, the Flying Dolphin, as has been run down by this craft and lost with all hands.' “'Darn the Flying Dolphin, and you too,' says the man, and he begins to walk up and down the deck a-puffn' of a long cigar as if nothing had happened. “'Oh, come,' says I, 'this won't do. Here you've been and run down a smack, drowned father and the other three hands, and your lookout fast asleep, and you does nothing.' “'I suppose,' said the captain, sarcastic, 'you want me to jump over to look for 'em. You want me to heave the ship to in this gale and to invite yer father perlitely to come on board. P'raps you'd like a grapnel put out to see if I couldn't hook the smack and bring her up again. Perhaps you'd like to be chucked overboard yourself. Nobody asked you to come on board, nobody wanted your company. I reckon the wisest thing you can do is to go for'ard and turn in.' There didn't seem much for me to do else, so I went forward to the forecastle. There most of the hands were asleep, but two or three were sitting up yarning. I told 'em my story and what this captain had said. “'He's a queer hand is the skipper,' one of 'em said, 'and hasn't got a soft place about him. Well, my lad, I'm sorry for what's happened, but talking won't do it any good. You've got a long voyage before you, and you'd best turn in and make yourself comfortable for it.' “'I ain't going a long voyage,' says I, beginning to wipe my eye, 'I wants to be put ashore at the first port.' “'Well, my lad, I daresay the skipper will do that, but as we're bound for the coast of Chili from Hamburg, and ain't likely to be there for about five months, you've got, as I said, a long voyage before you. If the weather had been fine the skipper might have spoken some ship in the Channel, and put you on board, but before the gale's blown out we shall be hundreds of miles at sea. Even if it had been fine I don't suppose the skipper would have parted with you, especially if you told him the watch was asleep. He would not care next time he entered an English port to have a claim fixed on his ship for the vally of the smack.'