"Why should I?" exclaimed Tom; "it was for your sakes more than for mine; you wouldn't have been half as interested if I'd only told you what I'd heard, whereas I've enabled you, in imagination, to take part in all the scenes in which my brother Jack and I were engaged." "Then you should have said _quorum pars magna_ fuit _frater Jackus meus_," said Archie; "but I suspect that he was the principal actor." "Of course he was," said Tom; "there's not another fellow in the world like my brother Jack; I always said so before I came to sea, and now I have been with him so long, I can say it from my own observation. I might have said a great deal more about him, only my object was to be brief." Others of the _Romp's_ youngsters who had been in the expedition corroborated all that had been said, and made Tom's hearers wish to have the chance of sailing with Jack Rogers, who was sure, they agreed, wherever he might be, to cut out work of some sort or other. More yarns were spun, and many a song sung, before Tom and his shipmates returned to the brig. Next morning, as the corvette was weighing anchor, the frigate was seen coming in from the southward. The _Opal_ accordingly again brought up, and waited for her arrival. As she came to an anchor, the flags run up to her masthead summoned Murray on board. The commodore, on hearing of the number of slaves he had taken, ordered him, instead of going on to Aden, to proceed to Seychelles, where arrangements had been made for the reception of liberated Africans, and, as soon as he had landed them and refreshed his ship's company, to return to the coast, and prosecute his search for slavers. "We must strike a blow at this abominable traffic, and put it down at all cost," exclaimed the commodore; "we have done nothing effectual as yet--for one vessel captured, fifty have escaped."