A Queer Race: The Story of a Strange People — page 12: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A QUEER RACE. , 9 ‘“‘Tam glad you did. Yes, [know Captain Peyton very well. Aman of the right sort, be is.” : ‘* And a first-rate sailor. He knows his business, he does. You were saying just nowas you would like to do something for me. Well, I should like nothing better than to sail with him again; and if you would speak to him, he’d maybe give me a berth as bo’sun or guarter- master. I know a bo’sun’s duty as well as any man, sir.” “T’ll do that with pleasure, Bolsover, as soon as Cap- tain Peyton comes home; and that won’t be long, I think. The Diana is sixty days out from Montevideo, and is pretty sure to be here by the end of the month. You had better leave me your address, and then I can communi- cate with you about that or the other matter.” 1 handed him a pen, and he put down his address in a sprawling but sufficiently legible hand. As he bent his arm, his coat-sleeve (which was none of the longest) ran up a little, and bared his wrist, showing a strange device in blue ink: a ship in full sail, above which was tattooed a name, ‘* Santa Anna;” and below, a date, 661774.” I should have liked to ask what it all meant, but as time was going on,and my letters were still to write, I re- frained, little thinking how much the device portended nor how strangely the mystery which lay behind it was destined to affect my fortunes. Then we shock hands, and Bolsover went away and left me to my thoughts. CHAPTER II. MR. BRANDYMAN. I was right, then; there had been foul play. Captain Deen had committed the crime of barratry, with the con- nivance, and doubtless at the instance, of the ship’s own- ers, Messrs. Barnes & Brandyman. There are a good many respectable people who would do even worse if they could make twenty thousand pounds thereby, this being the amount which Messrs. Barnes & Brandyman’s treach- ery was likely to bring them; for, as I have already ob- served, they had insured the Niobe and her cargo largely elsewhere; and, to give the firm their due, they did not do things by halves. They were not the sort of people JOOKS.- CO (E(0) mm O) m =>