another, as though they had never seen each other before. Then I would set to laughing with all my might, and making fun of them. They would laugh, too, with me. You would have laughed to have seen us there like three imbeciles, not knowing what was the matter with us. The fact is, it was really pleasant to see them so fond of one another. They were contented anywhere: they found anything which was given them good. Still they were on allowance, like the rest of us. I only added a little Swedish brandy when they dined with me; only a little glass, just to keep up my rank. They slept in a hammock, where the vessel rolled them about like those two pears I have here, in this wet handkerchief. They were lively and contented. I did like you, I asked them no questions; what use was there for me to know their name and their business—me, a traverser of the waves? I carried them from one side of the ocean to the other, as I might have carried two birds of paradise.
"After a month I came to look upon them as my children. Every day when I called them, they came and sat near me. The young man wrote on my table (that is to say, on my bed), and when I wished it, he helped me to take my observation; he soon knew how to do it as well as myself,—I was quite astonished sometimes. The young woman would sit down upon a barrel and sew.
