It was not long before one of those flat, low, dark clipper schooners hove in sight and ran into the bay.  She was small, sat deep in the water, was scarcely three hundred tons burthen, but managed to stow three hundred and forty negroes with ease, and would have taken more had not intelligence from the lookouts been brought in, that a square rig was coming down the coast.  Charles Bramble hesitated whether he should embark in this craft.  It was consigned to his former owners, the very men he wished to meet.  He might have to wait for months in order to obtain another chance, it was hardly a matter of choice with him, but became one of necessity, and he embarked accordingly.

Charles Bramble was no sooner fairly at sea than he was filled with amazement at the condition of matters on board the slaver.  Himself accustomed to enforce the most rigid discipline, he here saw a perfect bedlam; a crew of some thirty people, composed of the vilest of the vile, who must have been shipped only with an eye to numbers, and no regard for character or stability.  Added to this, the captain, though a man of some experience as a seaman, had no control of the crew, and was quite at a loss how to manage them.  Twice was Charles Bramble obliged to interfere between the crew and the captain before they were three days at sea; and by his stern, calm will he succeeded in preventing open mutiny by the crew.  The fact was, the most desperate part of the foremast hands knew very well that the money sent out to purchase slaves, was still on board in good golden doubloons, and they were secretly scheming to take the schooner, kill the officers and appropriate the gold.

Charles Bramble was accustomed to deal with such spirits; he was well-armed at all hours, and prepared for the very trouble which was to come, inasmuch as he had anticipated it.  There were two mates and the captain, beside himself, who might be relied upon to stand by the vessel and the owners’ rights, but they had fearful odds against them.  There was also a lad who had gone out in the “Sea Witch” as cabin boy, whom Charles Bramble was now bringing back with him to his family in Cuba, the boy having escaped the massacre which occurred when the “Sea Witch” was burned, and who had been living at Leonardo’s factory.  On him also he felt he could rely.  The boy soon discovered the mutiny that was hatching, and told the captain secretly that it would occur at the moment land was announced from the mast-head on making the islands of the West Indies.

This was all the information necessary for Charles Bramble, to whom the captain of the schooner gave up all control, to prepare for the emergency.  He completely armed the four parties on whom he could rely, and bade them wait for orders from him, but when he gave those orders to act instantly and without pausing for further consideration.  The crew were somewhat puzzled to see their chief officer give up even the sailing of the vessel to him who had come on board as a passenger, but they could not but also perceive that he who acted as the captain now, was a very different man to deal with, and one who knew his business.  They saw that the schooner was made to sail better than ever before, that the crew were kept in their places and busy, an important thing at sea, and though they were still resolved to make the attempt, they did not like the appearance of matters.