patrolling the channel in the general course of a figure 8, and sometimes there were two or three of them on the watch. The Arabs kept close tab on the warships and knew about where they were at all times, except when they doubled on their course, which they sometimes did, with occasional disastrous results. When the chocolate caravans reached the mouths of the Zambesi sales were held, both public and private, at which the slave-dealers bought from the slave-catchers as many negroes as they thought they could handle. The blacks were placed in pens or stockades and kept there until the coast was clear and a dhow ready to sail, when, chained together by the neck in batches of six, they were driven on board and stowed away under the hatches, from two hundred to four hundred constituting a shipload. The average price of these slaves in Madagascar was one hundred dollars, but when, on account of the watchfulness of the warships, they had been kept long in the pens and were fat and strong, they brought considerably more,--sometimes twice as much. In the guise of a peaceful trader, with nothing about us to arouse suspicion, we loafed along the slave coast until we had a good line on the manner in which the Arabs conducted their operations and knew the general routine of the movements of the watching warships. With a satisfactory understanding of the general situation we signed on, at Mozambique, seventy-five additional men, who were ready for any service, equipped ourselves with such paraphernalia as we required, and launched out into the business of snatching slaves. Our ordinary method was to cruise along the Madagascar coast until we sighted a dhow sailing along in a light breeze, or, better still, becalmed. We would just keep her in sight until nightfall. If she was becalmed we would close in on her, with our lights doused, until we were two or three miles away; if she was under slow way we would get the same distance in advance of her. Then we would lower five or six boats, each carrying ten or twelve well-armed men, and attack her from as many different directions. Norton or I always went along in command of the expedition. We tried to surprise the Arabs, and on some very dark nights we succeeded, but most frequently they surprised us by being prepared for our visit. There was always a fight and sometimes, with the larger dhows, a full-fledged battle. We could not use large guns without danger of killing the cargo, so it was altogether revolver and cutlass work on our side. The Arabs used long rifles with beautifully inlaid handles, which really were deadly weapons in spite of their fanciful appearance, and curved swords, in the use of which they were artists. They fought hard enough, viciously, in fact, but we generally had as many men as they carried, or more, and when we did not catch them napping we confused them by attacking them simultaneously at five or six points. We had a man killed now and then and had a number put