But as the last link fell off upon the deck two men who were standing ready lifted and banged the empty cask down heavily upon the hatch, a couple of buckets of water were splashed in directly, and then as rapidly as they could be drawn from over the side, others followed and were poured in. Those below were so puzzled that for a time they remained utterly without movement. Then as the water poured in there was a low whispering, and soon after a heaving up of the hatch a little way, but a man held on to the top of the cask on either side, and their weight proved to be too much for those who tried to heave up the hatch. Ten minutes after, the addition of many buckets of water turned the cask into a ponderous object beyond their strength. "Right to the brim," said Mark; and the cask was filled. "There," cried Tom; "it would puzzle them to move that." The men below evidently thought so too, for they made no further effort, and subsided into a sulky kind of silence, while the chain was run back into the cable tier, and the watch resumed without fresh alarm till morning. CHAPTER THIRTY TWO. "HATCHING MISCHIEF." A long, busy day similar to the last, as they slowly crept along by the coast. The weather glorious, the blacks docile to a degree, and the Americans perfectly silent in their prison. Provisions and bottles of water were lowered down to them by means of a line through the ventilator; but the prisoners made no sign. "My!" said Tom, with a laugh, as he fastened a string round the neck of a well-corked bottle to lower it down, "won't the Yankee skipper be mad when he puts that to his lips. Being a bottle, he'll think it's rum. Some folks can't think as a bottle would hold anything else." But no sound came even then, and Mark began to feel anxious. "We haven't suffocated them, have we?" he said in a low voice. "They are so very quiet." "Not we, sir. They aren't the chaps to lie down and die without making a pretty good flurry over it fust. No sir; they're a-settin'." "Sitting, Tom," said Mark, wonderingly. "No, sir; setting. Hatching mischief. They'll give us another of their chickens after dark, and you and I must have a sleep apiece, so as to be ready for 'em to-night." "Yes. We must," said Mark; and after leaving the deck in charge of Stepney and Grote, of the latter especially, as Mark felt sure that he could be trusted now, he and Tom Fillot lay down under an awning they had rigged up, and in less than a moment they were both sleeping heavily. It was nearly sundown when Mark awoke with a start from an uneasy dream, in which he fancied that he had been neglecting his duty. Tom Fillot was standing over him, and the lad's first words were,-- "What's the matter?" Tom Fillot hastened to reply. "Nothing, sir, I've been all round. Prisoners safe, rations been issued, blacks all quiet, shore three miles off, and nice wind from the sou'-west."