I will not terrify you with useless
details. Enough that all that tradition and romance has given you
of the pirate's life was ours. Happily, through the kindness of my
Portuguese friend, I was kept from being an active participant in
scenes of which I was an unwilling witness. But I must always bear
my testimony to one fact. Our discipline, our esprit de corps, if
I may so term it, was perfect. No benevolent society, no moral
organization, was ever so personally self-sacrificing, so honestly
loyal to one virtuous purpose, as we were to our one vice. The
individual was always merged in the purpose. When our captain blew
out the brains of our quartermaster, one day--"
"That reminds me--DID you read of that Georgia murder?" began
Lightbody; "it was in all the papers I think. Oh, I beg pardon--"
"For simply interrupting him in a conversation with our second
officer," continued our host, quietly. "The act, although harsh
and perhaps unnecessarily final, was, I think, indorsed by the
crew. James, pass the champagne to Mr.
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