The Press., 1889-12-26
"rm ind dozen ways to make him wish he'd

"I'll find dozen ways to make him wish he'd
 rhad committed an osfense, but nothing deserving such rnent as I received for the next three days I,wns .hogged. kicked, cuffed and maltreated in every way captain and mate could think of, and was more than once rendered fnsensible by their cruelty. heard the men Cnrsing the officers for their conduct, and ea1couraging each other to in terfere, but l was passive. Indeed, after beating or two, I was 50 harried that could scarcely remember my own name. On the afternoon of the fourth day. soon after din ner, while was forward with the watch and assisting the sail maker to repair sail, the first mate called me aft The wind was light, and the sea smooth, and few fathoms astern of the brig was an enormous shark. It had occurred to the two brutes to have some fun with me The mate noosed rope and passed it around my waist, and then, while Istruggled and shrieked and begged for mercy, he carried me to the port quarter and dropped me overheard for shark bait. The shark made rush for me, but was hauled up just in advance of his jaws. The captain and mate laughed uproariously, and } the latter had picked me up to drop me from the other quarter when the entire crew came running aft. | saw that much and then tainted away, and what took place while was unconscious was never clearly related to me-
 The crow had determined to interfere, and their action excited the captain and mate to a terrible degree. The former had revolver in his pocket, and when the crew refused to 20 forward he fired at and wounded one of them This brought on fight, in which both officers and one of the sailors were killed. It was rebellion-not mutiny. The sole idea Of the crew was to protect me from further . cruelty In carrying this out murder was :, done and all were liable to the gallows. The dead bodies were lying on deck when re covered consciousness, while the men had congregated in the waist of the brig for con sultation The second mate, whose name was Chapman, had sympathized with the crew, although he had no hand in the fight He was now asked tostake command of the brig until it could be determined what should be |, done, and he did so The three dead men were prepared for burial in the usual way, and launched over the side without service, and an hour after the fight not trace of it was left.
 When the question of what should be done came up for discussion most of the men were appalled, at the seriousness of the case. It was the first duty o< the mate to set signal of distress, but, of course, nothing of the sort was done. Under the law he should head for the nearest port and there surrender brig and crew, but, of course, he had no thought of this While he had not melted the crew to resistance, he had not come tc the aid of the officers. It would have been easy to prove his sympathy for me, and that
 would have made him the accessory of the crew. It was realized that all had outlawed themselves, and the question was, where to go, and what to do with the brig. It was finally decided to haul up for the Solomon 1slands. The brig was bound home through Torres strait, as she had two ports of call to make before reaching the Cape of Good Hope, and we were not more than 45O miles out of Sydney when the murders occurred.
 WeEtherefore had voyage of 1,500 miles, be- foreusEa
 For the first week men could not have be- haved more sensibly. The discipline was good, and all were under proper restraint. We were sighting vessels daily, and on sew ,eral occasions we were passed so closely that we had to signal our number and report all well. On the third day aman-of-war exchang- ed signals with us, and through some bung- ling on our part his suspicious seemed to have been aroused, and he would have per haps boarded us had not change in the D weather occurred. After about a week, how ever, the men began to get independent and td bring forward new plans, and there was no longer any harmony among the crew. While Chapman was the only one who could navigate ship, and while he had been put in charge of the brig, tie men finally refused to do any work beyond that of sailing the craft Some openly advocated that we turn pirate,s and others wanted to run into some port and sell brig and cargo and divide the money. Thiswas booted at by the more in- telligent, and gave rise to further ill feeling. The brig had light or contrary winds and made slow progress, and at the end of two E..weeks the situation on board could not have F been much worse. There were nine of us, including the cook "a black man, and each man of them seemed determined to do as he pleased All messed in the cabin, and all had access to the liquor, and as conse- quence fights frequently occurred, and there | were times when the brig had close slaves | from being made a wreck. On one occasion the men charged the mate with playing
 them false. and with planning to deliver them up to justice, but he somehow satisfied
 them that he was holding to the course orig
 inally agreed upon, and he was honest ID what he said. After run of some twenty five
 days he announced that we were approach.
 ing the Solomon Islands, and the men at
 ouce made ready to carry out their further plans.
 l. One hundred miles southwest of San Chris.
 toval, which is the easternnost island in the group, is a smaller group called the Little Solomons. It was this group we were ap. l preaching, and at that date no white man
 had set foot upon them. They were inhabited by fierce and .bloodthir,ty natives, who com. sbined piracy, wrecking and fishing, and the
 mate was for making for the other group | He was overruled in this, and when the brig l had hauled in until the land, could be seer l from the deck the long boat was got over
 and loaded The men intended to play the
 part of castaways, and had a story all fixed
 up They erased the name of the boat, and
 took nothing aboard which would betray tht
 identity of the brig, which they meant to
 scuttle At noon, after working all the
 morning, they had loaded the boat witf l whatever suited them, divided up the sum o1 I H,250 found on board, and were ready te
 bore holes in the brig's bottom.
 I For two days had been i'll of fever ane
 confined to my bunk. knew from the con | versation around me what was going on anc ! at noon, when one of the men brought me
 cupof gruei, he said we should soon be off
 Half an hour later the brig became so quie
 that grew afraid, and with great effor
 crawled on deck. The long boat was mil,
 away, with every man in it. About foul
 miles to the west, coming up under a ligh
 breeze, was a British man-of-war.5 All sai
 had been taken off the brig, so that she wa
 simply drifting. It was the sight of the man
 of-war which had hurried our crew off s