At this moment the door was opened from the outside, giving entrance to a male individual of a somewhat comical appearance. He was rather under five feet in height, and was what is called "square built," that is, his form and limbs were very stout, or rather, perhaps, thick; and his waist was nearly as wide as his shoulders or his hips. His hair was of a reddish-brown or tawny colour, of exuberant growth, and worn in long, clustering curls which swept his shoulders. His face was deeply tanned by sun and weather; and the scar of a sabre-cut above his left eye caused the eyebrow on that side to be below the line of its fellow. The eyes were of a reddish hazel colour, and their expression showed that their possessor had an appreciation of the humorous, but that there was also "a lurking devil" in his composition. He was dressed in the ordinary sailor costume of that as well as of the present period, of blue cloth roundabout, with many small brass buttons, coarse Osnaburg trowsers, considerably soiled, light pumps, and a tarpaulin hat. "Well, Billy," said the captain, "what luck?" "No luck at all, as far as I am concerned," was the answer. "A short, broad-beamed lugger like me has no more chance of overhauling a trim, well-rigged craft like that long-legged fellow, who has been taking liberties with our harmless secrets, than a Dutch drogger has to beat upon a wind a Baltimore clipper." Baltimore was even then, the reader will recollect, famed for the fleetness of her vessels. "Where are the other two?" asked Captain Vance. "I don't know, indeed, captain," replied Billy. "When I got to the top of the hill they were all hull down; and I thought that I had better steer for port before I had lost all my bearings. So here I am. I think, by-the-bye, that that long-legged fellow will get the weather-guage of all of them. Do you know his name, captain?" Billy was a privileged character with his captain, who, in fact, was generally more familiar with his men than is usual with officers in chief command. "Yes," answered Captain Vance; "his name is Coe." "That's just the very name for him," said the sailor. "I have often heard that, in the merchant-houses, `Co.' sometimes stands for more than one man; and I know that this fellow is fully equal to two. Indeed, I think that he'll prove himself too much for all of us to-night. He runs like a clipper before the wind."