"True," said I; "but I think you'll find that the magistrates will give it in their favour. There's some mistake about the ship's stores. Such bread as the men have had served out to them ought never to have been put on board, and the steward has owned to me that it's all alike." "The captain don't intend to let it come before the magistrates," answered the pilot with a wink, and pulling his pipe from his mouth to inspect the bowl. "He wants to be off, and means to telegraph for another crew and turn those fellows yonder adrift." "Won't he ship some better provisions?" "I don't know, sir. Preehaps he's satisfied that the provisions is good enough for the men, and preehaps he isn't. Leastways he'll not be persuaded contrarily to his belief." "So, then, the police are to have nothing to do with this matter, and the stores will be retained for another crew?" "That's as it may be." "There will be a mutiny before we get to Valparaiso." "Something 'll happen, I dare say." I not only considered the captain's behaviour in this matter bad morally, but extremely impolitic. His motives were plain enough. The stores had been shipped as a cheap lot for the men to eat; and I dare say the understanding between Coxon and the owners was that the stores should not be changed. This view would account for his going on shore to telegraph for a new crew, since sending the old crew about their business would promise a cheaper issue than signalling for the police and bringing the offenders before the magistrates, and causing the vessel to be detained while inquiries were made. But that he would be imperilling the safety of his vessel by shipping a fresh crew without exchanging the bad stores for good was quite certain, and I wondered that so old a sailor as he should be such a fool as not to foresee some disastrous end to his own or his owners' contemptible cheese-paring policy. However, I had not so good an opinion of the pilot's taciturnity as to make him my confidant in these thoughts; we talked on other matters for a few minutes and he then went below, and after a while, on passing the skylight, I saw him stretched on one of the cuddy benches sound asleep. The Downs now presented a very different appearance from what they had exhibited an hour before. There were not above four vessels at anchor, and of those which had filled and stood away scarce half a dozen were in sight. These were some lumbering old brigs with a barque among them, with the water almost level with their decks; picturesque enough, however, in the glorious morning light, as they went washing solemnly away, showing their square sterns to the wind. A prettier sight was a fine schooner yacht coming up fast from the southward, with her bow close to the wind; and over to the eastward the sea was alive with smacks, their sails shining like copper, standing apparently for the North Sea.