“Why, from the canoe that lies alongside there.  I heard it several times afore.”

“Well, damn my eyes, if you a’rn’t turned a real coward at last,” politely remarked Mr. Mullins.  “Can’t the poor fat devil of a Canadian snooze a bit in his hammock, without putting you so completely out of your reckoning?”

“The Canadian—­the Canadian!” hurriedly returned Fuller:  “why, don’t you see him there, leaning with his back to the main-mast, and as fast asleep as if the devil himself couldn’t wake him?”

“Then it was the devil, you heard, if you like,” quaintly retorted Mullins:  “but bear a hand, and tell us all about this here ghost.”

“Hark, again! what was that?” once more enquired the excited sailor.

“Only a gust of wind passing through the dried boughs of the canoe,” said the boatswain:  “but since we can get nothing out of that crazed noddle of yours, see if you can’t do something with your hands.  That ’ere canoe running alongside, takes half a knot off the ship’s way.  Bear a hand then, and cast off the painter, and let her drop astarn, that she may follow in our wake.  Hilloa! what the hell’s the matter with the man now?”

And well might he ask.  With his eyeballs staring, his teeth chattering, his body half bent, and his arms thrown forward, yet pendent as if suddenly arrested in that position while in the act of reaching the rope, the terrified sailor stood gazing on the stern of the canoe; in which, by the faint light of the dawning day, was to be seen an object well calculated to fill the least superstitious heart with terror and dismay.  Through an opening in the foliage peered the pale and spectral face of a human being, with its dull eyes bent fixedly and mechanically upon the vessel.  In the centre of the wan forehead was a dark incrustation, as of blood covering the superficies of a newly closed wound.  The pallid mouth was partially unclosed, so as to display a row of white and apparently lipless teeth; and the features were otherwise set and drawn, as those of one who is no longer of earth.  Around the head was bound a covering so close, as to conceal every part save the face; and once or twice a hand was slowly raised, and pressed upon the blood spot that dimmed the passing fairness of the brow.  Every other portion of the form was invisible.

“Lord have mercy upon us!” exclaimed the boatswain, in a voice that, now elevated to more than its natural tone, sounded startlingly on the stillness of the scene; “sure enough it is, indeed, a ghost!”

“Ha! do you believe me now?” returned Fuller, gaining confidence from the admission of his companion, and in the same elevated key.  “It is, as I hope to be saved, the ghost I see’d afore.”

The commotion on deck was now every where universal.  The sailors started to their feet, and, with horror and alarm visibly imprinted on their countenances, rushed tumultuously towards the dreaded gangway.