“Well, I don’t think there is any harm in telling you now, that we are bound south, but how far is more than I know.  I expect first we shall go west and try and pick up some prizes among the islands, and after that perhaps go round the cape and lie in wait for Indiamen on their way home.  You see, one of those ships is worth a dozen of these Mediterranean traders, and one is not bothered down there as one is between the strait and the channel with your cruisers and privateers; they swarm so there that one can hardly fire a gun without bringing them down on us.  I don’t suppose the captain would have meddled with that Indiaman if it hadn’t been that he thought the owners would be pleased by a prize being sent in so soon.  As to the bark, we were obliged to take her to get a new mast.  It would never have done to have started on a long cruise with a badly-injured spar.”

“But I should think it would be difficult to send home prizes from the West Indies,” Ralph said.

“Well, you see, although you have taken most of our islands, there are still two or three ports we can take prizes into.  Beside, we can take the best goods out, and if the ship isn’t worth the risk of sending to France burn her.  Then, too, one can spare hands for prizes better there; because one can always ship a few fresh hands—­Spaniards, Mulattos, or blacks—­in their place.”

“But you can’t do that in the case of the Indiamen.”

“No; but a single laden Indiaman is enough to pay us well for all our trouble.  We can put a crew of thirty hands on board her and send her home.  There is little risk of a recapture till we get near France.  We have only to hoist the English flag if we do happen to meet anything.”

Ralph was glad to hear that the ship was bound for the West Indies, as he thought opportunities for escape would be likely to present themselves among the islands.  Madeira was sighted three days later, and after running south for another four or five hundred miles, the brig bore away for the west.  By dint of getting Jacques Clery to translate sentences into French, and of hearing nothing but that language spoken round him, Ralph had by this time begun to make considerable progress in the language.  Not only was he anxious to learn it for the sake of passing away the time and making himself understood, but his efforts were greatly stimulated by the fact that if any of the crew addressed him in French a cuff on the head was generally the penalty of a failure to comprehend him.  The consequence was that when six weeks after sailing the cry of land was shouted by the lookout in the tops, Ralph was able to understand almost everything that was said, and to reply in French with some fluency.  As the brig sailed along the wooded shores of the first island they fell in with, Ralph was leaning against the bulwarks watching with deep interest the objects they were passing.