"The next item on the programme was dinner. The best of everything on board was served up, and they all ate and drank till they could hold no more. They were then so sleepy that they tumbled off their seats, and, lying on the floor, soon snored like hogs. The cool of the evening restoring them, they played pitch and toss, and poker, till tea-time, and then fooled away the remainder of the evening in more cards and more drink. In this manner the best part of a week was beguiled. Then the skipper announced the fact that the last drop of liquor on board had gone, and that, according to the compact, the hour had arrived to commit suicide. Had a bombshell fallen in their midst, it could not have caused a greater consternation than this announcement. The men had, by this time, become so enamoured with their easy and irresponsible mode of living, that the idea of quitting it in so abrupt a manner was by no means to their liking, and they evinced their displeasure in the roughest and most forcible of language. 'The skipper could d----d well put an end to himself if he had a mind to, but they would see themselves somewhere else before they did any such thing--it would be time enough to talk of dying when the victuals were all eaten up.' Then they thoroughly overhauled the ship, and on discovering half a dozen bottles of rum and a small cask of water stowed away in the skipper's cabin, they threw him overboard and pelted him with empty bottles till he sank; after which they cleared the deck and danced till sunset. "Two nights later, when they were all lying on the deck near the companion way, licking their parched lips and commiserating with themselves on the prospect of their gradually approaching end--for they had abandoned all idea of the rat poison--they suddenly saw a hideous, seaweedy object rise up over the bulwarks on the leeward side of the ship. In breathless expectation they all sat up and watched. Inch by inch it rose, until they saw before them a tall form enveloped from head to foot in green slime, and horribly suggestive of the well-known figure of the murdered captain. Gliding noiselessly over the deck, it shook its hands menacingly at each of the sailors, until it came to the cabin-boy--the only one among them who had not participated in the skipper's death--when it touched him gently on the forehead, and, stooping down, appeared to whisper something in his ears. It then recrossed the deck, and, mounting the bulwarks, leaped into the sea.