Our every-day life on board the Sea-mew had not much in it to talk about. Of course the ship was badly handled, and there was a deal of drunkenness aboard, though hardly ever before night. In the daytime they just did what little making or shortening sail there was, and then smoked and ate and drank just as they liked. After the first few days, they had the fat passenger up, and made him cook; and hang me if one day I didn't see him crying into the soup he was making! But I always kept at a distance, never speaking to him, only kept watching my chance. From what the others said, I learned that Mr Bell was only just alive; while some of them used to talk about his poor sister in a way that made me set to work more than ever to get my plans right. I got to think at last, that if I waited much longer, I should never do anything; so one day, when I had a chance, I pitched a bullet down into the cabin, wrapped in a piece of paper, and on that piece of paper was written "To-night!" "Now, if he's the man I take him for, all them pistols will be loaded, and the cutlashes ready for action," I says to myself; and leaving that to Mr Ward for his part, I warned Sam and Bill, and then set to do mine. I'd been saving up on purpose; and as soon as it was dark that night, and just before they set the watch, I put two good big bottles of rum where I thought they would find them, and then waited to see. All things turned out just as I could have wished; for going by an hour after, I could tell from the chatter going on that the three chaps were at the rum, which they supposed to have been left by mistake by those who had the watch the night before. Some of the chaps were carousing in the fore-cuddy, where they could easily be boxed up; and the others were with Van and Brassey, all card-playing in the skipper's cabin. It seemed almost a hopeless case, now it was come to the point; but I felt that making up one's mind was half the battle, and I was up now, and meant to do or die. Bill and Sam were on deck, and knew their parts well enough: Bill to manage the chap at the wheel; Sam to shut up the party in the fore-cuddy; I meaning to secure the cabin-hatch; and then I thought if that was done, we should have time to settle and lash the watch, who ought to be half-drunk, leaving our hands free to keep those quiet who would be trying to get out of the cabin. You see my plan was to get Mr Ward up through the hole I made in my fall, if I could get the fellow away who was stationed there; and now it was that I trusted to the rum; for before now Van had been content to have a chap at the cabin door, leaving the watch to make sure the prisoners did not get on deck.