“The nurse and child had just come out of the Captain’s state cabin, when Jacko the ape, being teazed by the negro, plunged wildly towards the nurse, broke his chain, seized the commodore’s infant boy, and with a terrific scream rushed up the rigging with it! “This was a most horrible predicament, for the ape was only half tamed! “A single glance to the main-yard explained the occasion of Jake the negro’s shout and curse. “The nurse had been coming up from the cabin when Jacko perceiving her near him, broke his thin chain, dropped suddenly down from the main-mast and running along the boom cover seized the nurse’s cap from her head, frightened her into a fit, and seizing the child, immediately darted up the main-topsail sheet, and thence to the bunt of the main-yard, where he now sat grinning and screeching most horribly, tossing the child about and each moment threatening to kill it. “But one of our young midshipmen, a great favourite on board, who was a sprightly active fellow, and called Ned, though he could not climb so nimbly as an ape, yet had no mind to let the child suffer or be strangled without an effort to regain it, and kill the monster. “Perhaps he was the more strongly excited to make chase after Jacko and the child, from noticing how much the commodore had praised him for former acts of bravery, and by the loud curses of the nigger Jake, who seemed suddenly horror-stricken at what had happened, because it might have been thought that he had been the main cause of the sad occurrence by teasing Jacko. “‘Ha, you rascal Jacko, hab you no more respect for de commodore den to steal his child? We bring you to de gangway, you black nigger, and get you a dozen on de bare back for a tief, and afterwards skin you alive.’ “The ape looked down from his perch, as if he understood the threat of the negro, and chattered a sort of defiance, showing his teeth, and each instant seemed as if he would bite the crying infant. “‘Ha, ha! Massa Ned, he say you must ketch him ’fore you flog him, and it’s no so easy for a midshipman in boots to ketch a big ape barefoot.’ “A red spot mounted to the cheeks of Ned, as he cast a glance of offended pride and contempt at Jake, and then sprung across the deck to Jacob’s ladder. “In an instant he was half-way up the rigging, running over the ratlines as lightly as if they were an easy flight of stairs. “The shrouds scarcely quivered beneath his elastic motion. “In a second more his hand was on the futtocks. “‘Massa Ned,’ cried Jake, who sometimes, from being a favorite, ventured to take liberties with the younger officers. “‘Massa Ned, you best crawl through the ‘lubber’s hole;’ it take a sailor-man to climb de futtock shroud.’ “But he had scarcely time to utter his pretended caution before Ned was in the top.