“I don’t know much about books myself, Sam,” he said; “so I got a feller that _does_ know to pick ’em out for me, an’ I guess you’ll find ’em the right sort.” I did not tell him that I would have preferred to make my own selection, and afterward I frankly admitted to myself that the collection was an admirable one. By this time I had come to know all the officers and crew, and found them a pretty good lot, taken altogether. The principle “characters” aboard were the dismal Captain Gay, who was really as contented a man as I ever knew, Acker, the ship’s doctor, and two queer black men called by everybody Nux and Bryonia. Acker was a big, burly Englishman, who, besides being doctor, served as mate. He was jolly and good natured as the day was long, and had a few good stories which he told over and over again, invariably laughing at them more heartily than his auditors did. Singularly enough, Captain Gay and “Doc” Acker were close friends and cronies, and lived together in perfect harmony. The black men interested me greatly from the moment I first saw them. Bryonia, or “Bry,” as he was more frequently called, was the cook, and gave perfect satisfaction in that capacity. “Nux” was man-of-all-work, serving the cabin mess, assisting the cook, and acting as “able seaman” whenever required. He proved competent in nearly all ways, and was a prime favorite with officers and men. They were natives of some small island of the Sulu archipelago, and their history was a strange one. In answer to my question as to why the blacks were so queerly named, Uncle Naboth related the following: “It were six years ago, or thereabout, as we were homeward bound from our third Australy trip, that we sighted a native canoe in the neighborhood of the Caroline Islands. It was early in the mornin’, and at first the lookout thought the canoe was empty; but it happened to lay in our course, and as we overtook it we saw two niggers lyin’ bound in the bottom of the boat. So we lay to, an’ picked ’em up, an’ when they was histed aboard they were considerable more dead ner alive. Bill Acker was our mate then, as he is now, an’ in his early days he studied to be a hoss doctor. So he always carries a box of medicines with him, to fix up the men in case they gets the jaundice or the colic. Mostly they’s pills, an’ sugar coated, for Doc hates to tackle drugs as is very dangerous. An’ on account of a good deal of sickness among the crew that trip, an’ consequently a good deal of experimentin’ by Doc on the medicine chest, the pills an’ such like was nearly used up, though no one seemed much the worse for it.