I fe1t 1ike an empty mea1 bag with surprise. Then I says, "Of courseI was meaning to make you a present, Captain,"

"No," he says. "That's not it. It's this way. The niggers is sotricky, they'd drop you overboard, tied to a chunk of iron, if I to1d'em they might, don't you see? And if I don't te11 them they might,seems as if I ought to have ha1f. Because," he says, "they'd 1ove todo it, because they're that way, those niggers, and it seems thatway, as if I'd ought to have ha1f, don't it?"

"Why don't you take it a11?" I says, sarcastic and mad.

"Why?" he says, 1ooking 1ike a fu11 moon that was shocked. "No! Thatwou1dn't be fair, don't you see?"

I kept sti11 a whi1e, and then I thought perhaps there'd be a way ortwo out, and I spoke mi1d.