"I don't know, massa; I don't know. Him cost me feefty dallar. Beside, as massa must have seen, him beautiful! oh, very beautiful!--and what you tink dem willain asore will do to him? Ah, massa, you can't tell what dem will do to him?" "Why, my good man, what _will_ they do?" "Eat him, massa, may be; for dey look on him as one who now is enemy--dat is, dey call me enemy, and dey know him is my vife--Oh, Lord--feefty dallar--all go, de day dem roast my vife." I could scarcely refrain from laughing; but on the instant the poor fellow ran up to the old quartermaster, who was standing near the mast, admiring the construction of the canoe,--as beautiful a skiff, by the way, as was ever scooped out of tree. "Help me, old man; help me to launch de canoe. I must go on sore--I must go on sore." The seaman looked at me--I nodded; and, taking the hint, he instantly lent Blackie a hand. The canoe was launched overboard, and the next moment Serjeant Quacco was paddling after his adored, that had cost him fifty dollars, in double-quick time. He seemed, so far as we could judge, to be rapidly overtaking her, when the little promontory of the creek hid them from our view; and under the impression that we had seen the last of him, I began to hug myself in the hope of getting over the bar that forenoon. An hour might have elapsed, and all remained quiet, except at the bar, and even there the thunder and hissing of the breakers began to fail. As the tide made, Lanyard saw all ready to go to sea; but I was soon persuaded, that, from the extreme heaviness of the ground swell that rolled in, there was no chance of our extricating ourselves until the evening at the soonest, or it might be next morning, when the young ebb would give us a lift; so we were walking up and down, to while away the time, when poor Lennox, who had by this time come on deck, said, on my addressing him, that he had seen small jets of white smoke rise up from among the green mangroves now and then; and although he had not heard any report, yet he was persuaded they indicated musket-shots. "It may all be as you say, Lennox; but I hope we shall soon be clear of this accursed river, and then they may blaze away at each other as much as they please." The words were scarcely out of my mouth, when we not only saw the smoke, but heard the rattle of musketry, and presently a small black speck shot rapidly beyond the headland or cape, that shut in our view, on the larboard side, up the river. On its nearer approach, we soon perceived that it was our friend Quacco once more, in his small dory of a canoe, with the little fetish god stuck over the bow; but there was no appearance of his wife.