"Nay, Sir Poet," said the maiden, "if you must be gone, adieu. As for me, Sir Ludar is about to teach me the mystery of the angle, and Humphrey waits on Sir Ludar. Therefore, concern yourself not for me; I am well attended." "Oh," said he, rather chapfallen, "your condescension is a lesson for angels. When the planet deigns to shine into the humble pool, shall the star not do the same? I will even abide at your side, and be gracious too." But his brave intention was thwarted. For a call came just then from the old nurse, which carried the maiden off to her side; while Ludar and I, receiving a summons from the captain, went forward, and so left the poet to his own devices. A sterner summons was not far off, as you shall hear. CHAPTER ELEVEN. HOW THE MISERICORDE CHANGED HER CREW. We were, I reckon, somewhere off the Yorkshire coast; for we had been sailing a week, for the most part against foul winds. To-night, as I said, the light breeze had backed to the south and was sending us forward quietly at some six or seven knots an hour. All seemed to promise a speedy end to our voyage; and yet, as I stood there, drinking in the beauty of the evening, and rejoicing in my recovered strength, I would as soon we had been bound on a voyage ten times as long. I was standing idly near the foremast. On the high poop behind sat the maiden, singing beside her old nurse, who, like me, was enjoying the air for the first time to-night. Ludar lolled near me, on a coil of rope, watching the sun dip as he listened to the singing, and betwixt whiles unravelling the tangles of a fishing line. On the forecastle, the French seamen sat and whispered, scowling sometimes our way, and sometimes laughing at the poet who strutted near them, intent on the sunset and big with some notable verses thereupon, which were hatching in his brain. An English fellow was at the helm, half asleep; while the captain, grumbling at the slackness of the breeze, paced to and fro, with an oath betwixt his lips and an ugly frown on his brow. Suddenly I seemed to detect among the Frenchmen a stir, as if something had just been said or resolved upon in their whisperings. The captain at that instant was near them, turning in his walk; when, without warning, two of their number sprang out upon him. There was a shout, a struggle, the gleam of a knife, and then a dead man lay on the deck. All was so quick and sudden that the murder was done under my very eyes before I knew what was happening. Then, in a twinkling, the whole ship became the scene of a deadly fight. Three of the traitors threw themselves on Ludar; the poet reeled in the grip of another; two others made for me. "Back, back!" shouted Ludar, in a voice of thunder, as he began his struggle. 'Twas well I obeyed him; for the two who had made an end of the captain were already rushing in the direction of the women, and had I reached the ladder a moment later, all might have been lost.