Miss Aurora sat over against me at this meal as at most others; she stared at me as though something was wrong. I did not wonder; I had been unable to conceal my astonishment at Greaves’ orders for divine service. Down to this moment he had never read a prayer to the men, never exhibited the least disposition to do so, never imported the faintest shadow of anything religious into the dull and swinish routine of the brig. It was somewhat late in the day to lay up on _that_ tack, methought. But it was for me to obey, and I went on deck, leaving Greaves sitting. Miss Aurora followed, and touched my elbow as I passed through the companion hatch. “What is it?” said she, in English. “Nothing, nothing,” I answered, smiling and shaking my head, for it would have given me a deal too much to act, with Yan Bol and the fellow at the wheel as spectators, to gesticulate Greaves’ intention to collect all hands to prayers. “No danger?” said she, speaking again in English. “No, no,” I responded heartily. She touched her forehead, clasped her hands, and turned up her eyes to heaven with one of her incomparable expressions of tragic melancholy, sighed heavily, and returned to the cabin. “Bol,” said I, stepping up to the great Dutchman where he stood near the wheel, “you will see that the men clean themselves and muster aft by half-past ten for divine service.” “What’s dot?” said he. “Prayers.” He looked at Teach, who was at the helm, and a smile crawled over his face, as wind creeps over a surface of sea. His smile wrinkled his massive visage to the line of his hair. “Brayers, Mr. Fielding! Dot vhas strange after all dese months. For vhat vhas ve to pray now dot der dollars vhas on boardt?” “Reason the matter with the captain, if you choose. You have your instructions.” “Ay, ay, sir. Mr. Fielding, may I hov a verdt mit you?” He spoke respectfully, and moved from the wheel. He was a man I had been careful to give a wide berth to throughout the voyage; but also was he a man whom, for my own peace sake, I had been at some pains not to give offense to. The familiarity of the fellow was Dutch. I never could make sure that it was more than a characteristic of his countrymen with him, and that he meant insolence when he spoke insolently. I bore in mind, moreover, that secretly he, and no doubt the rest of the crew, viewed me as an interloper--as one who would, probably, share far more handsomely than they in the treasure without having entered at Amsterdam or having formed a part of the original scheme of the expedition. This consideration, then, made me wary in my relations with Yan Bol. He moved from the wheel out of earshot of the fellow there, and said, in a rumbling voice of subdued thunder: “I oxbects dot der captain vhas not fery vell, Mr. Fielding?” “He is not very well.” “She vhas a bad shob if he vhas to took und die.” “Yaw; but what is it you wish to say to me?”