Then the scene changed once more. We were again on board the ship, and in the power of the enraged mutineers, about to suffer whatever their vengeance might impel them to inflict. Poor Spot was swinging, a livid corpse, at one of the yard-arms. Browne was bound to the main-mast, while Luerson and his fiendish crew were exhausting their ingenuity in torturing him. The peculiar expression of his mild, open countenance, distorted by pain, went to my heart, and the sound of that familiar and friendly voice, now hoarse and broken, and quivering with agony, thrilled me with horror. As he besought his tormentors to kill him at once, I thought that I kneeled to Luerson, and seconded the entreaty-- the greatest favour that could be hoped from him. The rest of us were doomed to walk the plank. Morton was stern and silent; Max pale and sorrowful; his arm was round my neck, and he murmured that life was sweet, and that it was a hard and terrible thing to die--to die so! Arthur, calm and collected, cheered and encouraged us; and his face seemed like the face of an angel, as he spoke sweetly and solemnly, of the goodness and the love of God, and bade us put our whole trust and hope in Christ our Saviour. His earnest words and serene look, soothed and strengthened us; we also became calm and almost resigned. There was no abject fear, no useless cries, or supplications to our foes for mercy; but the solemn sense of the awfulness of death, was mingled with a sweet and sustaining faith in God, and Christ, and Immortality. Hand in hand, like brothers, we were preparing to take the fearful plunge-- when I started and awoke. Even the recollection of our real situation was insufficient to impair the deep sense of relief which I experienced. My first impulse was to thank God that these were but dreams; and if I had obeyed the next, I should have embraced heartily each of my slumbering companions; for in the first confusion of thought and feeling, my emotions were very much what they would naturally have been, had the scenes of visionary terror, in which we seemed to have just participated together, been real. Morton was at his post, and I spoke to him, scarcely knowing or caring what I said. All I wanted, was to hear his voice, to revive the sense of companionship, and so escape the painful impressions which even yet clung to me.