“I don’t know, Winchester; there are two sides to that question, too.  Suppose the King of Naples should seize you, here, ashore, and call on you to prove that you are not one of his subjects?  How would you go to work to make it out—­no parish register being at hand?”

“Well, then, Captain Cuffe, if we are so very wrong, we had better give all these men up, at once—­though one of them is the very best hand in the ship; I think it right to tell you that, sir.”

“There is a wide difference, sir, between giving a man up, and hanging him.  We are short-handed as it is, and cannot spare a single man.  I’ve been looking over your station bills, and they never appeared so feeble before.  We want eighteen or nineteen good seamen to make them respectable again; and though this Bolt is no great matter as a seaman, he can turn his hand to so many things, that he was as useful as the boatswain.  In a word, we cannot spare him—­either to let him go or to hang him; even were the latter just.”

“I’m sure, sir, I desire to do nothing that is unjust or inconvenient, and so act your pleasure in the affair.”

“My pleasure is just this then, Winchester.  We must turn Bolt to duty.  If the fellow is really an American, it would be a wretched business even to flog him for desertion; and as to treason, you know, there can be none without allegiance.  Nelson gives me a discretion, and so we’ll act on the safe side, and just turn him over to duty again.  When there comes an opportunity, I’ll inquire into the facts of his case, and if he can make out that he is not an Englishman, why, he must be discharged.  The ship will be going home in a year or two, when everything can be settled fairly and deliberately.  I dare say Bolt will not object to the terms.”

“Perhaps not, sir.  Then there’s the crew, Captain Cuffe.  They may think it strange treason and desertion go unpunished.  These fellows talk and reason more than is always known aft.”

“I’ve thought of all that, Winchester.  I dare say you have heard of such a thing as a King’s evidence?  Well, here has Raoul Yvard been tried and found guilty as a spy; Bolt having been a witness.  A few remarks judiciously made may throw everything off on that tack; and appearances will be preserved, so far as discipline is concerned.”

“Yes, sir, that might be done, it’s true; but an uneasy berth will the poor devil have of it, if the people fancy he has been a King’s evidence.  Men of that class hate a traitor worse than they do crime, Captain Cuffe, and they’ll ride Bolt down like the main tack.”

“Perhaps not; and if they do, ’twill not be as bad as hanging.  The fellow must think himself luckily out of a bad scrape, and thank God for all his mercies.  You can see that he suffers nothing unreasonable, or greatly out of the way.  So send an order to the master-at-arms to knock the irons off the chap, and send him to duty, before you turn in, Winchester.”