And I liked this because I had a rather worrying time on board my own ship.  I had been appointed ex-officio by the British Consul to take charge of her after a man who had died suddenly, leaving for the guidance of his successor some suspiciously unreceipted bills, a few dry-dock estimates hinting at bribery, and a quantity of vouchers for three years’ extravagant expenditure; all these mixed up together in a dusty old violin-case lined with ruby velvet.  I found besides a large account-book, which, when opened, hopefully turned out to my infinite consternation to be filled with verses—­page after page of rhymed doggerel of a jovial and improper character, written in the neatest minute hand I ever did see.  In the same fiddle-case a photograph of my predecessor, taken lately in Saigon, represented in front of a garden view, and in company of a female in strange draperies, an elderly, squat, rugged man of stern aspect in a clumsy suit of black broadcloth, and with the hair brushed forward above the temples in a manner reminding one of a boar’s tusks.  Of a fiddle, however, the only trace on board was the case, its empty husk as it were; but of the two last freights the ship had indubitably earned of late, there were not even the husks left.  It was impossible to say where all that money had gone to.  It wasn’t on board.  It had not been remitted home; for a letter from the owners, preserved in a desk evidently by the merest accident, complained mildly enough that they had not been favoured by a scratch of the pen for the last eighteen months.  There were next to no stores on board, not an inch of spare rope or a yard of canvas.  The ship had been run bare, and I foresaw no end of difficulties before I could get her ready for sea.

As I was young then—­not thirty yet—­I took myself and my troubles very seriously.  The old mate, who had acted as chief mourner at the captain’s funeral, was not particularly pleased at my coming.  But the fact is the fellow was not legally qualified for command, and the Consul was bound, if at all possible, to put a properly certificated man on board.  As to the second mate, all I can say his name was Tottersen, or something like that.  His practice was to wear on his head, in that tropical climate, a mangy fur cap.  He was, without exception, the stupidest man I had ever seen on board ship.  And he looked it too.  He looked so confoundedly stupid that it was a matter of surprise for me when he answered to his name.

I drew no great comfort from their company, to say the least of it; while the prospect of making a long sea passage with those two fellows was depressing.  And my other thoughts in solitude could not be of a gay complexion.  The crew was sickly, the cargo was coming very slow; I foresaw I would have lots of trouble with the charterers, and doubted whether they would advance me enough money for the ship’s expenses.  Their attitude towards me was unfriendly.  Altogether I was not getting on.  I would discover