Ultimately--due time having been given for Captain Brisket's invention to get under way--he learned that a dyspeptic seaman, mistaking the mate's back for that of the cook, had first knocked his cap over his eyes and then pushed him over.

"And that, of course," concluded the captain, "couldn't be allowed anyway, but, seeing that it was a mistake, we let the chap off." "There's one thing about it," said Tredgold, as Chalk was about to speak; "it's shown us the stuff you're made of, Chalk." "He frightened me," said Brisket, solemnly.

"I own it.

When I saw him come up like that I lost my nerve." Mr.Chalk cast a final glance at the dwindling figure on the cliff, and then went silently below and stood in a pleasant reverie before the smashed door.

He came to the same conclusion regarding the desperate nature of his character as the others; and the nervous curiosity of the men, who took sly peeps at him, and the fact that the cook dropped the soup-tureen that evening when he turned and found Mr.Chalk at his elbow, only added to his satisfaction.
He felt less heroic next morning.