His manners and conversation betokened refinement; and, take him all in all, he was the last man one would have ever taken for a smuggler or a pirate.

Captain Lane became very much interested in him, and gradually their conversation took a wider range.  In the midst of it and before they had fully completed their business arrangements in relation to the passengers, whom Captain Lane had engaged to convey to the United States, the mate knocked at the cabin door, and informed them that a heavy squall was rising to westward.

They hurried on deck, which no sooner had they reached, than the stranger, looking hastily in the quarter indicated, shook Captain Lane warmly by the hand saying: 

“I must go aboard, captain; that will be a heavy squall.  Keep me in sight if you can; but, if we part company, meet me off Cape Frio—­this side of it—­to-morrow; wait for me till night, if you do not see me before.  Good-by!” and springing into his boat, he pulled away for his vessel.

Captain Lane never saw him again alive.

No sooner was he over the side, than the captain gave orders to shorten sail.  He took in royals and topgallant sails, furled the courses, trysail and jib, and double-reefed the topsails.  They braced the yards a little to starboard, hauled the foretopmast staysail sheet well aft, and the captain, thinking he had everything snug, stood looking over the weather rails, watching the approaching squall.  The wind had almost died away, and the atmosphere seemed strangely oppressive.  Captain Lane was an old sea-dog and had witnessed many strange phenomena on the ocean; but never had he seen a squall approach so singularly.  It seemed to move very slowly—­a great black cloud, which looked intensely luminous withal, and yet so dense and heavy, that an ordinary observer might have mistaken it for one of the ordinary rain squalls encountered in the tropics.  Captain Lane consulted his barometer, and found it falling rapidly.

“Clew the topsails up!” shouted the captain to the mate.  “All hands lay aloft and furl them!”

The order was quickly obeyed; and just as the sailors reached the deck, the squall struck them.  It did not come as it was expected; it had worked up from the westward, but struck the Ocean Star dead from the South.  In an instant they were over, nearly on their beam ends, and a heavy sea rushed over the lee-rail, filling the deck.

“Hard up your helm!” shouted the captain, and, springing aft, he found the helmsman jammed under the tiller, and the second mate vainly endeavoring to heave it up.  Taking hold with him, by their united efforts they at last succeeded; and, after a moment’s suspense, the Ocean Star slowly wore off before the wind and, rising out of the water, shook herself like an affrighted spaniel and darted off with fearful speed before the hurricane.