Now, the tragedy of my first night on the Rio Pongo was my transition from pupilage to responsible independence. I do not allege in a boastful spirit that I was a man of courage; because courage, or the want of it, are things for which a person is no more responsible than he is for the possession or lack of physical strength. I was, moreover, always a man of what I may style _self-possessed passion_. I was endowed with something more than cool energy; or, rather, cool energy was heightened and sublimated by the fire of an ardent nature. Hitherto, I had been tempered down by the habitual obedience to which I was subjected as a sailor under lawful discipline. But the events of the last six months, and especially the gross relaxation on the voyage to Africa, the risks we had run in navigating the vessel, and the outlaws that surrounded me, not only kept my mind for ever on the alert, but aroused my dormant nature to a full sense of duty and self-protection. Is it unnatural, then, for a man whose heart and nerves have been laid bare for months, to quiver with agony and respond with headlong violence, when imperilled character, property and life, hang upon the fiat of his courageous promptitude? The doubters may cavil over the philosophy, but I think I may remain content with the fact. _I did my duty_--dreadful as it was. Let me draw a veil over our gory decks when the gorgeous sun of Africa shot his first rays through the magnificent trees and herbage that hemmed the placid river. Five bodies were cast into the stream, and the traces of the tragedy obliterated as well as possible. The recreant mate, who plunged into the cabin at the report of the first pistol from the forecastle, reappeared with haggard looks and trembling frame, to protest that _he_ had no hand in what he called "the murder." The cook, boatswain, and African pilot, recounted the whole transaction to the master, who inserted it in the log-book, and caused me to sign the narrative with unimplicated witnesses. Then the wound of the cabin-boy was examined and found to be trifling, while mine, though not painful, was thought to imperil my sight. The flint lock of a rebounding pistol had inflicted three gashes, just beneath the eye on my cheek. There was but little appetite for breakfast that day. After the story was told and recorded, we went sadly to work unmooring the vessel, bringing her slowly like a hearse to an anchorage in front of Bangalang, the residence and factory of Mr. Ormond, better known by the country-name of "Mongo John." This personage came on board early in the morning with our returned captain, and promised to send a native doctor to cure both my eye and the boy's leg, making me pledge him a visit as soon as the vessel's duties would permit.