“Here! you man; what the deuce are you doing aboard here?” I asked as I advanced to the break of the poop and stared down at him.  He gave another snort, and looked at me with undisguised contempt, but disdained to answer and turned away, going to the lee rail and expectorating over the side.  Then he came slowly back across the main deck, while my spleen rose at his superior indifference.  I have always been a man of the people, and have fought my way along to whatever position I have held on the comprehensive rule of give and take.  Nothing is so offensive to me as the assumption of superiority when backed solely by a man’s own conception of his value.  Therefore it was in no pleasant tone that I addressed the stranger on his return to the deck beneath me.

“My fine cock,” said I, “if you haven’t a tongue, you probably have ears, and if you don’t want them to feel like the grate-bars of the galley stove, you’ll do well to sing out when I speak.  Can you rise to that?”

The man looked me squarely in the eyes, and I never saw such a fiendish expression come into a human face as that which gathered in his.  “You infernal, impudent—­” he began; and here for a moment followed a string of foul oaths from the man’s lips, while he passed his hand behind his back and drew forth a long knife.  Then without a moment’s further hesitation he sprang up the steps to the poop.

The fiendishness of the attack took me off my guard, for I was not prepared for such a serious fracas during the first half hour in command of the deck; but I saw there was little time to lose.  There were no belaying-pins handy, so the thing for me was to get in as close as possible and get the fellow’s knife.

As he came up the steps, I rushed for him and kicked out with all my strength, when his face was level with my knees.  The toe of my heavy shoe caught him solidly in the neck, and he went over backward almost in a complete somersault, landing with a crash upon the main deck just outside the window of Mr. Trunnell’s room.  He was stunned by the fall, and I hastened down to seize him before he could recover.  Just as I gained the main deck, however, he gave a snort and started to his feet.  Then he let out a yell like a madman and closed with me, my right hand luckily reaching his wrist below the knife.

It was up and down, and all over the deck for a time, the men crowding aft around us, but fearing to take a hand.  The fellow had enormous strength, and the way he made that knife hand jump and twist gave me all I could do to keep fast to it.  Soon I found I was losing ground, and he noted the fact, exerting himself more and more as he found me failing.  Then it dawned upon me that I was in a bad fix, and I tried to think quickly for some means to save myself.  In another mad struggle he would wrench himself clear, and his ugly look told me plainly how much mercy I could expect.  I gave one last despairing grip on his wrist as he tore wildly about, and then I felt